Short-Term Minds, Long-Term Matters

On February 10, 2012, the New York Times published an article entitled, "How Much Does the Economy Matter in 2012?" In this article, writer Daniel Stone describes the national issue that he declares will prove the focal point of the upcoming presidential election. He writes that the election "won't hinge on foreign policy or domestic programs or even personality", but "on the economy, and how much Barack Obama has done to improve it."

He goes on to explain that while various studies can calculate different aspects of how the economy is doing, such as unemployment rates and commodity values, the key figure to consider is how the voters themselves feel about the economy - how they feel about it right now. This is measured by web favorability, which is found by tracking 40,000 news sources and social media sites on the Web and analyzing the public response to a given topic. Stone acknowledges that popular perception of the U.S. economy can be "as unstable as the Richter scale", but nevertheless, according to the studies, it currently (as of Thursday) rests at a comfortable score of 12 on a scale of -100 to 100, which indicates slight favorability.

However, Stone adds, strong perceptions seldom last long, and with each passing economic report the perceptions change, often dramatically. "The fact that web users are so fickle about the nation's fiscal health suggests the economy may not matter as much as pundits will tell you," he writes. By averaging out the highs and lows of these perceptions, "the aggregate reaction becomes akin to a collective shrug." Additionally, even for the most interested and informed of voters, the information that matters is the current stuff - what's happening at the moment, not what happened over the long-term in retrospect. Based on this logic, nothing in the presidential campaigns really matters to voters until the weeks leading up to Election Day. In the end, short-term memory wins out over long-term commitment. Whatever pompous promises the candidates deliver to us now will not hold a candle to the reality of the national economy come November 2. That's what voters will be looking at, and that's what will sway their opinions on who to vote for as our next president.

This article is a worthwhile read because it describes in simple and informative terms the effects that public perception will have on the upcoming election. I would encourage any curious individual to take the time to read it so that they can better understand how our short-term mindset as voters will have a long-term effect on U.S. government.