As former President Joe Biden left office, we reflected on his legacy, and it’s not good.
Many blunders and policy failures have marked his four years in office. Some had national implications, such as the botched withdrawal of U.S. presence from Afghanistan that resulted in the deaths of 13 servicemen and women. Or the intentional opening of our southern border that spiked illegal immigration and the resettlement of over 10 million people across the country with no concern for public safety, national security, and public resources.
Most Americans, especially in the poor, working, and middle classes, felt inflation most acutely. Inflation is the rate at which prices rise. Prices are always rising, but it’s the difference between the average price of bread rising 50 cents in one year versus rising $5.
The inflation rate eventually came down but is still over double (2.9%) from when he took office when it was just 1.4%. Worse, prices have not returned to their pre-Biden levels, which is what Americans feel. And recently, the inflation rate is accelerating again.
IW has tracked inflation during Biden’s presidency. We took a look back at price levels on common household items, and we could not believe just how much high prices have risen over the past four years.

This is Biden’s legacy: high prices, high inflation, high interest rates, and high frustration.
Biden’s inflationary federal spending bills, beginning with the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), ignited inflation soon after taking office. Continued federal spending turbocharged price increases to a 40-year high in 2022.
President Biden denied rapid inflation, calling it temporary. Then, instead of halting his reckless fiscal policies, he doubled down by introducing a multi-trillion-dollar Build Back Better Plan to advance climate change spending. Expensive climate subsidies for the wealthy and corporate interests did not reduce inflation as the slimmed-down bill’s name—the Inflation Reduction Act—falsely misled Americans to believe.
The Federal Reserve Bank used the tool of throttling interest rates to battle inflation. Hiking interest rates at least a dozen times from March 2022 to July 2023 cooled household spending and froze the housing market. Increased interest rates on consumer debt from credit cards to car loans have taken a costly toll by compounding the hardship of high prices on the backs of hardworking American households.
Americans refuted Bidenomics, the Biden-Harris inflationary economic agenda. They elected President Donald Trump to fix the economy and bring prices down, along with securing the southern border.
President Trump has a great task ahead of him, but if there is a president who has shown a willingness to alleviate the economic hardship on households and businesses by boosting the economy, it is Trump. Deregulation, tax cuts, and energy production worked in his first administration, and we believe they can work again.
While Biden’s legacy is hardship for Americans, President Trump can cement a legacy of American prosperity.