Explainer · numbers from this site’s backtest, updated with each run
Do people feel worse than the economy is?
Right now, a little. Economic data imply 50.3% of the vote for the party in power; approval implies 49.5%. The mood ran behind the economic data in 13 of the 20 past elections too.
The gap, then and now
Two-party popular vote, not the Electoral College. 2028: if the election were today (latest quarters and today’s approval stand in). Source: FRED/ALFRED (BEA, BLS, Census), FOMC projections; model fits by this site; approval averages compiled by Wikipedia contributors (CC BY-SA 4.0); Gallup (1948–2024). As of October 16, 2026.
Show the numbers
| Election | Economy | Mood | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1948 | 51.3% | 48.7% | +2.6 |
| 1952 | 49.3% | 46.2% | +3.0 |
| 1956 | 52.9% | 61.4% | −8.5 |
| 1960 | 51.6% | 56.2% | −4.6 |
| 1964 | 58.7% | 60.6% | −1.9 |
| 1968 | 49.6% | 49.2% | +0.4 |
| 1972 | 57.1% | 55.0% | +2.1 |
| 1976 | 49.0% | 50.5% | −1.5 |
| 1980 | 46.5% | 49.9% | −3.3 |
| 1984 | 57.7% | 54.6% | +3.1 |
| 1988 | 50.7% | 50.4% | +0.4 |
| 1992 | 48.9% | 47.4% | +1.5 |
| 1996 | 53.4% | 53.9% | −0.5 |
| 2000 | 52.2% | 51.9% | +0.2 |
| 2004 | 55.3% | 52.6% | +2.7 |
| 2008 | 45.4% | 43.4% | +2.0 |
| 2012 | 52.4% | 52.3% | +0.1 |
| 2016 | 47.6% | 50.1% | −2.5 |
| 2020 | 53.2% | 50.4% | +2.9 |
| 2024 | 50.4% | 49.9% | +0.5 |
| 2028 (today) | 50.3% | 49.5% | +0.8 |
Small in votes, large in odds
A gap of 0.8 points of vote share sounds small. But both forecasts sit close to 50%, where a small shift changes who is favored, so the win chances differ by 12 points (55% against 43%). That is the headline gap on the home page.
How to read it
- Approval partly reflects the economy, so the two lines aren’t independent opinions. The gap measures the mood beyond what the economic data explain.
- Past elections with a gap at least as large as today’s: 1948, 1952, 1972, 1984, 1992, 2004, 2008, 2020.
- The economic forecast for 2028 uses the latest quarters as stand-ins until election-year data exist; the gap will move as those arrive.
Other ways to measure the mood
The Mood page also shows the New York Fed’s monthly survey of how households expect their finances to change. It starts in 2013, too late to test against elections, so it is context rather than a model input.