Biden Will Leave Office With Job Creation Bragging Rights

When President Joe Biden leaves office Jan. 20 to make way for the second Donald Trump administration, he’ll be able to point to an unprecedented accomplishment.

December’s report on job growth made it official: the economy added jobs every single full month he was in office, something that’s true of no other president since the government started collecting data in 1939. The last time the economy lost jobs was in December 2020, the last full month Trump was in office.

Biden took office when the country was being wracked by waves of COVID-19 outbreaks, but employers were hiring back workers they initially had laid off in March when the pandemic first hit. As the pandemic faded over the following years, employers accelerated hiring to a frenzied pace.

Economists have credited Biden’s $1.9 trillion relief bill, the American Rescue Plan of 2021, with stoking job creation and economic growth by funneling money to households via stimulus checks and child tax credits, among other things. Some have also blamed this extra money for contributing to the high inflation that took hold at that time.

Job growth has continued with no end in sight, and the Biden administration has often cited this aspect of the economy when defending the president’s economic legacy.

However, Biden’s job creation streak won’t be secure until next year, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics completes its annual revision on job creation figures, which have recently resulted in downward changes. It’s also possible that January’s job figures show job losses or that they could be downwardly revised in 2026 to show losses for the month split between Biden’s and Trump’s presidencies.