Modeling the economic policy of Mexico’s fourth transformation: A populist agenda or a precautionary stance?

This paper analyzes the economic policy of the Mexican government during the “Fourth Transformation” (4 T) to assess its alignment with the characteristics of economic populism. First, we establish a well-defined framework for economic populism, focusing on policies that prioritize short-term growth and redistribution to the detriment of macroeconomic stability. Subsequently, we construct a quantitative Populism Index (PIo) for the period 2006–2025Q2 using key variables associated with populist economics: wages, social transfers, unemployment, public debt, inflation, and public spending. We then employ a Random Forest (RF) machine learning model to assess the relative importance of these variables within the index. A comparative analysis of recent presidential terms is performed to contextualize the economic policy of the 4 T. We conclude that, while the 4 T government pursued important redistributive objectives, its macroeconomic management during most of its term was largely precautionary, displaying significant deviations from the patterns of historical economic populism. That is, the 4T's economic policy is not at all populist, but rather a precautionary economic policy with wealth redistribution.