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Republicans are trying to push the meme that Obama has failed. And it is true that the 'recovery' is still pretty shaky, but it is undeniably true that the disaster happened when the disaster that was George W. Bush was in the White House. Here's a report on job gains (or losses) by quarter.
2008 1st (93,000) 2nd (573,000) 3rd (1,002,000) 4th (1,895,000) total (with Bush as President) (3,563,000)
2009 1st (2,258,000) note - Obama was sworn in as President and the stimulus passed in the middle of this quarter 2nd (1,433,000) total (in Obama's first five months in office (3,691,000)
3rd (780,000) 4th (310,000) total of the last half year (1,090,000)
That the economy was no longer losing 1,000,000+ jobs every quarter is a very positive thing. The economy was in free fall and the stimulus was like a parachute. When you open a parachute, you keep falling, but at a much slower rate so that the landing does not kill you.
2010 1st +118,000 2nd +543,000 3rd (137,000) 4th +385,000 total 2010 + 909,000
2011 1st + 497,000 2nd (provisional and so far)
April +232,000 May +54,000
total of 1.6 million jobs created. Yes, that is a long way from recovering the 8 million jobs lost, but it seems to be a step in the right direction, but all the media wants to talk about is negativity.
Another point, about Republicans claim that we need to "cut spending" to save the economy. This is from an article on the most recent jobs report "Cities and counties have cut jobs for 22 straight months and have shed 446,000 positions since September 2008."
Over 400,000 jobs lost because of "spending cuts" and every one of those lost jobs means a loss of consumer spending and an increase in government spending as those now jobless people stop shopping and start collecting government benefits.
And I have written this before about the Reagan years, which are now remembered as "the best of times" in much of the public memory.
"Going back to GDP
1981.1 - (.8%) 1981.2 - 1.22%
At this point Congress passed the Reagan tax cuts, titled as the Economic RECOVERY and Tax Act. Given that it was the middle of the 3rd quarter and that the economy grew at an annual rate of almost 5% in the 2nd quarter one might ask "Recovery from what?"
ERTA passed on 4 August 1981. A date that should live in infamy. The unemployment rate was 7.4%. By September of 1982 the unemployment rate was 10.1%.
Talk about a failed stimulus. I am sure that the media was hammering Reagan for his failed stimulus.
Of course, ERTA cannot really be blamed for the slump in late 1981 as the economy shrank by 1.25% in the 3rd quarter and by 1.64% in the 4th quarter, making the slump for 1981 a total of (2.47%). Still blaming ERTA for the slump is just as fair as Republicans blaming the stimulus for the lost jobs of early 2009. Still Republicans picked up two senate seats in the elections of 1982 and while they lost 27 seats in the House that still did not erase their gains of 1980. Meanwhile unemployment rose to a peak of 10.8% in December and stayed above 10% until July 1983.
So, to repeat, unemployment was 7.4% when ERTA passed and it rose to over 10% and stayed there for almost two years. Talk about a failed stimulus, and it took almost ANOTHER year before unemployment fell back to 7.4% by May 1984, and it was still 7.4% in October of 1984 and stayed over 7% for all of 1985 and for 8 months of 1986. Again, talk about a failed recovery. Remember that unemployment was below 6% for half of Carter's term. And five years after Reagan's stimulus - his RECOVERY act, unemployment is still over 7%.
The average unemployment rate for Reagan's first term was 8.61%, compared to 6.54% for Carter's term. 10 million jobs were created in Carter's four years, compared to only 6.3 million for Reagan's first four years."
Yet Republicans, aided by the M$M still want to push Reaganomics as an answer to economic troubles. It was Reaganomics version 2.0 that drove the economy into the ditch it is still struggling to get out of. And the Republican's only "idea" seems to be Reaganomics 3.0 - the steroid version, bigger and meaner than the two previous version combined. Well if I was gonna revive something from a Reagan, it would be from Nancy - "Just say 'No' - to failed economic theories"
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