Reuters
Perhaps the most famous one-liner in a presidential debate, Ronald Reagan's "Are you better off than you were four years ago?" question to voters in his match with Democratic incumbent Jimmy Carter in October 1980, came as high inflation pummeled consumers' spending power and captured a general malaise about the economy. As President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump head to the first of two debates ahead of their rematch this November, some version of that question may well come up or at least be on the minds of people taking stock of the past, very turbulent, four years. Look at almost any economic data series and the pandemic is not just an obvious break in the trends, but poses the challenge of when to mark the end of the "normal" years for Trump and the resumption of a "normal" period for Biden.