Poll: More say Trump responsible for economy than Obama

More voters credit President Trump for the current state of the U.S. economy than former President Obama, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll out Wednesday.

The survey results mark the first time since Trump took office that more voters say he bears more responsibility for the current economy than his predecessor, according to Quinnipiac. 

In the poll, 48 percent of respondents credit Trump for the country’s economic state, while 41 percent attribute it to the lingering impact of Obama’s time in the White House. 

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Regardless, a slight majority of voters – 51 percent – are happy with Trump’s handling of the economy, according to the Quinnipiac poll. Conversely, 43 percent disapprove.

From his earliest days in the White House, Trump has credited himself with driving down the unemployment rate, spurring job creation and influencing record gains in the stock market. 

But over the course of Trump’s first year in office, voters have consistently attributed the state of the economy to Obama, who presided over a massive economic recovery following the 2008 financial crisis. 

The last Quinnipiac survey on the matter, released Jan. 10, found that 49 percent of voters credited Obama with the country’s current economy, compared to 40 percent who said Trump was responsible.

But while voters may be more willing to ascribe the country’s economic state to Trump now, the GOP tax overhaul signed into law last month remains relatively unpopular.

In the Quinnipiac survey, 39 percent of respondents approved of the tax plan, which slashed business tax rates from 35 percent to 21 percent and offered a series of more modest individual tax cuts. Forty-seven percent of respondents still disapprove of the plan.

Still, those numbers signal a slight increase in the tax law’s favorability. On Jan. 11, Quinnipiac pegged its approval at 32 percent and its disapproval at 52 percent.

The Quinnipiac poll is based on interviews with 1,333 registered voters nationwide, and was conducted from Feb. 2-5. Its margin of error is 3.3 percentage points.