Actually Trump similarly boasted of record low unemployment, but much like Obama who also managed (finally) to reduce unemployment, Trump had to raise the national debt dramatically, about the same as Obama. So too with Biden, the good "economic" news is overshadowed by the enormous increase in national debt making it possible. An argument heard lately for raising the debt limit is that the United States "must" pay its bills. Why does that not mean the United States "must" spend less? If government spending was making it possible for a strong economy to pay off national debt, why has that not worked in 60 years? Why is the debt shooting up faster and faster? What happens when the interest on the debt is twice the revenue? That is, if it can even go that far.
So yes, there is a great need for help, and no, materialism is probably not the answer.
For a long time now it has been obvious that the "Creationism versus Evolution Debate" is run by people with no understanding of either religion or science. On one side are people who take the Bible literally when even the Bible does not require it be taken literally. On the other side are people who hope to explain the origin of life using the theory of evolution, when even Darwin did not claim that.
That resulted in people with rudimentary reading ability gaining positions of power and influence in society. Rudimentary reading ability usually means materialism, even for those "Trump" Christians. You might already know the "Trump" Christians are more atheist than declared atheists. They have the unstable marriages, income and education levels to prove it. At this time there is a very strong materialism resisting an overdue change in education. It is no longer possible to claim that the mathematics and biology of the origin of life could happen without assistance from an agency outside "nature" as currently catalogued.
Some of those materialists are afraid that "religion" would waste the resources of the Earth because of a lack of discipline. That is no doubt because their concept of "religion" is based on Trump Christians, who are more atheist than declared atheists. They are not "spiritual" in the least. Unlike Trump Christians, "spirituality" can be a very good "steward" of the planet and very well disciplined.
Meanwhile atheist Democrats are burning enormous amounts of fossil fuels without justification in their panic to introduce new "science" to save the world and their current level of material comfort. Curly fluorescent light bulbs, electric vehicles that charge on the fossil fuel grid, overspending on health care and faulty public policy on and on.
People with a rudimentary reading ability often need one-size-fits-all policies for simplicity. They can have difficulty distinguishing opinions from facts and distinguishing public and private matters. For example when it was noted that Republicans will likely not reduce abortion without reducing rape, they began to argue that the "internet" and its new superior surveillance capabilities would reduce crime to almost zero. Wouldn't that be great? No one would need guns for protection anymore! Now they do not seem alarmed that is failing, and agree with shooting down balloons, and whatever. What changed? Now they want to avoid discussing the origin of life and any agencies it suggests by shutting down the cameras. Since they found out they won't be getting much credit, if any, for intelligent design, it has become sour grapes to them. That however is not a matter of anyone's personal papers, it is a matter of facts that are true everywhere whoever might have papers on it. It is a public matter that cannot be kept secret indefinitely.