Economics

US Presidential election: live results

Published

3 weeks ago

November 4, 2024

On November 5th America will pick its next president, as well as the House of Representatives and a third of the Senate. The Economist will publish live results and analysis covering every race. Check back here soon after first polls close at 6pm EST / 11pm GMT to see in real-time how many votes Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are picking up, and which of them will win the White House, as well as which party will control the two chambers of Congress.

Before then, this page provides a guide for what to look out for ahead of the election. Elsewhere, our daily updated election forecasts calculate each presidential candidate’s chances of winning, and who might take the House and the Senate. Our poll tracker rounds up the latest presidential polls. And The US in brief, our daily update delivered by newsletter, gives you all the election stories that matter.

What to watch

This year, given large numbers of people have voted early, many expect the counting will be slow. Officials, however, insist that ballot tallying will be faster than in previous years. The results could be known just a few hours after polls close across the country—as they were for seven of the past ten elections (see chart). Or they could take days to become clear.

The first states to conclude voting will be on the east coast. Six states, including the key battleground of Georgia, will finish voting statewide at 7pm EST. By 8pm, 19 more states will have joined them and a flurry of data will be published. Readers should exercise caution: little of substance will be revealed at this stage of the night, unless the election is a landslide.

In some states, where one candidate is heavily favoured, the election result will be called almost immediately. Unless there is a major upset or a striking trend, these calls may not say much about the election overall. The absence of a call may be more informative: it may indicate that an expected landslide has not happened, for instance.

The final result will probably come down to seven key states. Of those, Georgia and Michigan may be the fastest to count. North Carolina is also traditionally quick to count but may experience disruption due to Hurricane Helene.

Others could well be slower. Pennsylvania will not start processing millions of postal ballots until the morning of election day. Arizona and Nevada, in the west, finish voting later that day and take longer to count their mail-in ballots, which are popular in both states. Nevada accepts and counts ballots which arrive after election day, too (although these are unlikely to flip the state).

Read more about what to watch on the night, and in the days that follow.

What are the candidates’ paths to victory?

Pennsylvania is the most important state for both candidates. (Mr Trump won Pennsylvania in 2016, but it flipped to Joe Biden in 2020.) According to our forecast model, as of November 4th, Ms Harris wins in 92% of our simulations when she takes the Keystone State’s 19 electoral votes; Mr Trump wins in 88%.

Mr Trump has even better odds when he wins Michigan (95%), but he has more alternative routes to the presidency without Michigan than without Pennsylvania. Other swing states are less influential: Ms Harris and Mr Trump win the election in only 71% and 67% of simulations, respectively, when they win Nevada, a state with only six electoral votes.

The most likely outcome—occurring in 19% of our simulated elections on November 4th—is that Mr Trump will win all seven swing states and go on to win the presidency. The second-most likely is the exact opposite: our model gave Ms Harris a 9% chance of sweeping the seven. The third would give all of the swing states except Nevada to Mr Trump—that would be a repeat of the 2016 result. But based on all of our model’s scenarios, the race is a toss-up: neither candidate has a lead big enough to offset the kind of polling errors seen in previous presidential elections.

Economics

As Jack Smith exits, Donald Trump’s allies hint at retribution

Published

6 hours ago

November 26, 2024

Business Finance News

In the end Jack Smith jumped before he could be pushed. On November 25th the special counsel who spent two years pursuing Donald Trump dropped the two federal indictments against him. The Department of Justice (DoJ) forbids prosecuting sitting presidents, so this was a question of when, not if. Mr Smith will file a report about his futile endeavour before packing his things. The alternative was a stand-off with Mr Trump, who had promised to fire him “within two seconds” of his inauguration. The two criminal cases against Mr Trump in state court, in Georgia and New York, are in effect over, too.

Economics

Trump’s proposed tariff increases would boost inflation by nearly 1%, Goldman Sachs estimates

Published

11 hours ago

November 26, 2024

Business Finance News

President-elect Donald Trump speaks at the U.S.-Mexico border on August 22, 2024 south of Sierra Vista, Arizona.

Rebecca Noble | Getty Images News | Getty Images

The latest tariff proposal from President-elect Donald Trump would likely put upward pressure on inflation in the United States, according to Goldman Sachs.

On Monday, Trump said on social media site Truth Social that he would impose an additional 10% tariff on goods from China and a 25% duty for Canada and Mexico. Goldman chief economist Jan Hatzius said in a note that the proposed levies would result in a notable increase for consumer prices in the U.S..

“Using our rule of thumb that every 1 [percentage point] increase in the effective tariff rate would raise core PCE prices by 0.1%, we estimate that the proposed tariff increases would boost core PCE prices by 0.9% if implemented,” Hatzius said.

“PCE” refers to the personal consumption expenditures price index. The core PCE, which strips out food and energy prices, is the preferred inflation reading of the Federal Reserve.

A tariff-linked increase in core PCE could scramble the calculations around Fed rate cuts. The October PCE reading is due out on Wednesday, and it’s expected to show a year-over-year increase of 2.8% for core, according to economists surveyed by Dow Jones. In other words, inflation is still above the Fed’s target of 2%, and the tariffs could widen that gap.

Traders have been dialing back their expectations for Fed rate cuts in 2025, though it is unclear how much of that is due to election results versus a resilient U.S. economy. Fed Chair Jerome Powell has said the central bank will consider the impact of tariffs and other fiscal policy changes on the direction of inflation once the details become clear.

To be sure, it remains to be seen whether the tariffs will actually be implemented at the levels Trump proposed — or what exceptions might be made. The President-elect suggested in his social media post that the tariffs were conditional on changes to immigration policy and drug enforcement, specifically fentanyl. Some of Trump’s advisors and supporters have characterized the tariffs he proposed during the campaign as a bargaining position rather than a set policy.

Hatzius, for his part, said it seems more likely that Canada and Mexico would avoid across-the-board tariffs than China.

The three countries in question account for 43% of U.S. goods imports, and the tariffs would result in slightly less than $300 billion in revenue annually, according to Goldman Sachs calculations.

Economics

Trump wastes no time in reigniting trade wars

Published

14 hours ago

November 26, 2024

Business Finance News

Donald Trump has fired the first shot. Goods arriving in America from Canada and Mexico will meet tariffs of 25% as soon as he returns to the White House, the president-elect announced on November 25th. Mr Trump also said that he would also impose additional 10% tariffs on Chinese goods. With two months to go before his inauguration, the promise is rippling through financial markets. Mr Trump is not wasting any time in seeking to exert America’s influence.