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The received wisdom after a turbulent few days in American politics is that Donald Trump has suffered a stinging defeat, his Republican party is in disarray, and the Democrats are on the road to recovery at the mid-term polls next year.

Well, wrong, wrong and (probably) wrong again.

It’s true that Trump backed Roy Moore, a firebrand evangelical, as the Republican candidate for a Senate seat in Alabama. It is true that Moore lost last week to a Democrat.

Trump's tax reforms are edging closer to being signed off and will provide a major boost to blue-collar workers across America

But the President’s response should give us pause. When the votes were counted in Alabama, he phoned the winner, Doug Jones, and congratulated him warmly. He even invited him to the White House. 

He has moved on — as well he might. Not having Roy Moore in Washington is a plus for Trump and for the Republicans. Yes, their Senate majority is cut to 51 against 49.

But how much trouble would it have been for the party to have Moore — a man accused of sex offences by at least seven women — in the seat of power? A man who thinks 9/11 was divine punishment. A man who wants Muslims to be second-class citizens.

He would have been poison for the Republicans and a gift for the Democrats.

The other good news for the President is that he and the Republicans are about to have a very big day, which will surely change the subject.

For all Trump’s bluster and madcap energy, most people take a view of politics based on what’s happening in their own lives. And away from his ill-advised retweets of far-Right British racists, away from the rows about him recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Donald Trump’s America is on the march.

Imagine for a moment that you work as a carpenter on an American building site. You live in upstate New York. In summer it’s sweaty, in winter it’s freezing. 

You work hard, as does your wife or girlfriend, who’s a waitress or a hairstylist. Neither of you went to college, but both of you want dignified jobs and a decent life.

What has happened to that couple’s lives since Donald Trump was elected? Hillary Clinton claimed during the election last year that a multi-millionaire property developer like Trump would ditch the little people once he got into office. But she was wrong.

All the bleating about Trump — often from those who share his privileged background — has hidden a simple fact about his presidency: a large and important constituency believe he has delivered what he promised, in economic terms at least, and is about to deliver even more.

There is rising optimism that the tax reforms will be signed off, and that will have a huge impact on America, and possibly the wider world, which should benefit from a resurgent American economy.

Al three US stock exchanges hit record highs this week amid growing consumer confidence and record investment in small businesses

This week, all three major stock exchanges in the U.S. soared to record highs. Though it is not certain what the new tax levels will be, Trump has already talked of his ‘giant’ tax cuts being a ‘big, beautiful Christmas present’ for voters.

The suggestion is that as well as cuts at the lower pay levels, income tax for top earners might drop from 39.6 per cent to 37 per cent. 

Crucially, corporation tax — paid on firms’ profits — is likely to fall from 35 per cent to 21 per cent, which should spark growth and job creation.

When the final bill is passed by Congress and signed by the President, it will be a genuine political achievement.

But even before the tax cut, blue-collar America has been having a better time of it than at any stage in recent memory.

Consider if you were a cleaner or factory worker in the States. Both groups have seen their pay rise by 11 per cent in one year. 

Bus drivers are up more than 4 per cent. Maintenance men and women are getting more than 3 per cent extra a year. The list goes on. It includes hairdressers and waitresses and truck drivers. It certainly includes those carpenters on building sites.

No wonder consumer confidence has gone through the roof. No wonder small businesses, the engine of the U.S. economy, are reporting record investment and activity levels.

Another Trump promise was the cutting of regulations for businesses. Again he has delivered. There is less paperwork for fish farms. Easier approvals for apprenticeships. New freedom for private railways to select the trains they use.

He also promised a new age for the energy industry, and that is coming to pass, too. Fracking — a cheap, efficient means to extract shale gas and oil from the ground — has taken off after a big dip in activity when energy prices fell and it became less economic. There are more than 900 active rigs in America now, up from fewer than 600 a year ago.

With inflation still low and wages picking up, there is a sense among many ordinary Americans doing humdrum jobs that — finally — they are reaching better times. The stock market is booming at record highs, too, after climbing almost relentlessly from the day he was elected. 

And that was before the announcement that tax cuts were on the way.

Now let us be blunt about those cuts. Trump claims they won’t benefit him, but experts say the rich will do very nicely out of them. 

This is not a redistribution of money from rich to poor. People with private jets, for example, get new exemptions for their maintenance costs. Not very helpful if you work on a building site.

But the bill also cuts taxes for those in work but not on high pay. It will put more money in people’s pockets, and if they spend that money, the economy will benefit.

Trump's tax plan does provide many incentives for the wealthy such as a tax break for private jet owners, but also aims to bring back wealth from overseas to be taxed at home

There is another aspect of Trump’s plan, however, which could provoke a sea change in the American financial landscape — and it concerns eye-watering sums of money. To be precise: $1.3 trillion.

At present, that mountain of money sits in accounts held outside America. It belongs to American companies who keep it ‘offshore’ because of the fact that they don’t pay tax on their profits unless they bring the money back into the U.S.; Apple alone has more than $200 billion stashed in this way. 

Trump’s tax bill offers these giant firms a deal: bring your money back in, and we will tax it very lightly. His view is that it’s better to get some tax than none at all, especially if the companies spend those profits on investments in the U.S.

The President’s other hope is that American manufacturers which currently use cheap foreign labour will start giving jobs to U.S. workers instead.

So is all this too good to be true? Well, yes and no. Blue-collar workers do feel better off than they have for some time.

But if you are very poor in America — if you are unemployed and your child has a chronic illness, for example — the Trump economy is not for you, because the tax cuts don’t help those on benefits, or alter the ruinous cost of healthcare.

There are concerns, too, about the long-term cost to the nation. The plan will add a whacking trillion-and-a-half dollars over ten years to America’s debt — which already stands at $20 trillion.

The President says economic growth driven by the cuts will cover those costs. But his government may well have to recoup some of the money lost to the Treasury by removing personal tax breaks, which is most likely to disadvantage middle-class workers.

For now at least, though, the Trump economy seems to be working.

To many people watching from overseas, or from swanky parts of America, the President looks crass and foolish at best. He frightens and repels them.

But put yourself in the shoes of that carpenter in New York state: Trump seems to be delivering for you. Come 2020 and the next presidential election, you might even vote for him again, and so might your friends.