Presidential Numerical Claim Density (NCD), 1923–2025

Presidential press conferences offer a rare window into how leaders communicate under pressure. This paper examines a century of these exchanges (1923–2025) to determine how often presidents use numbers and whether that practice changed over time. Using 2,452 transcripts containing 8.35 million words, I introduce Numerical Claim Density (NCD): substantive numerical references as a percentage of total words. I hypothesized that numeracy would increase consistently, but the data don’t support that. Numerical rhetoric peaked in the 1930s under Herbert Hoover, declined through the late 20th century, and rebounded in the 2020s under Donald Trump. The President's identity accounts for roughly 25% of the variance. Any "recession effect" (more numbers during economic crises) is almost entirely driven by number-lover, Herbert Hoover’s Depression-era conferences. The data suggest that presidential numeracy is episodic and personality-driven rather than a product of modernization or crisis.