Election unlikely to cause major shift in fiscal policy

At face value, there are substantial differences between the fiscal plans of the two presidential candidates. While Hillary Clinton’s policies would essentially maintain the status quo, Donald Trump’s plan could entail a massive fiscal expansion. Attempts to analyse how these policies might affect the economic outlook are pointless, however, because whichever candidate wins in November will have to have their fiscal plans approved by Congress. In practice, this means that there is far less scope for major changes to the Federal budget than many seem to assume.