Every president since 1945: who they were, where they were educated, and what each official economic series did while they held office.
Harry S. Truman (1945–1953) — A Missouri farmer, artillery officer and county administrator who reached the White House on Franklin Roosevelt’s death, and the last president to hold the office without a college degree.
Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953–1961) — The Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, and the last career soldier elected president; educated at West Point and at the Army’s own staff schools.
John F. Kennedy (1961–1963) — A Harvard-educated naval officer and Massachusetts senator, the first Catholic president, killed in Dallas in the third year of his only term.
Lyndon B. Johnson (1963–1969) — A schoolteacher turned congressional operator who became the most effective Senate leader of his era, and passed the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts while escalating the war in Vietnam.
Richard Nixon (1969–1974) — A Duke-trained lawyer and two-term vice president who opened relations with China, created the EPA, and resigned the presidency in 1974.
Gerald Ford (1974–1977) — A Michigan football star and Yale-trained lawyer, and the only president never elected to either the presidency or the vice presidency.
Jimmy Carter (1977–1981) — A Naval Academy graduate and nuclear-submarine officer who ran the family peanut business, governed Georgia, and served one term.
Ronald Reagan (1981–1989) — A radio announcer, film actor and union president who governed California for eight years and won two presidential terms by large electoral margins.
George H. W. Bush (1989–1993) — A decorated naval aviator, Texas oilman, envoy to China and CIA director who came to the presidency with as broad a résumé in appointed office as anyone who has held it.
Bill Clinton (1993–2001) — A Rhodes Scholar and Yale-trained lawyer who was governor of Arkansas for twelve years, and the first president born after the Second World War.
George W. Bush (2001–2009) — A Yale graduate with a Harvard M.B.A. — the only president to hold one — who governed Texas for six years before two terms shaped by the attacks of 11 September 2001.
Barack Obama (2009–2017) — A community organiser and constitutional-law lecturer, president of the Harvard Law Review, and the first Black president of the United States.
Donald Trump (2017–present) — A New York property developer and television host with a Wharton economics degree, elected in 2016 and again in 2024 to non-consecutive terms.
Joe Biden (2021–2025) — A Delaware lawyer elected to the Senate at twenty-nine, who served there for thirty-six years and as vice president for eight before winning the presidency in 2020.