^ +1
Obama came in with a pretty low benchmark. Under Bush, the Feds borrowed hundreds of billions of dollars booked as “spending” in 2008, which were actually accounts receivable to be repaid under Obama. So you have this $800 billion outflow in 2008 under Bush, and hundreds of billions of that AR coming due under Obama. And still the deficit is more nearly 3 times that of 2007 in inflation adjusted terms.
Regarding the economy in general, it would be pretty ridiculous if it didn’t get better since the crisis levels that Obama inherited. But I don’t think that the level of economic growth we’ve seen is even acceptable by historical standards. Whether it can be empirically tied to the Democrats’ interventionist economic policies is less certain. But the fact is that economic and employment growth significantly lagged the administrations expectations. And I think that we can assume that they would have set their own benchmark conservatively.
Right, except we should compare against the rest of the world and not historical downturns. The fact is that Europe and Asia which followed austerity are struggling and the US thanks in large part to Obama engaged in stimulous which has proven to be the right course of action.
Regardless, the success or failure of Obama’s regime doesn’t have to be extrapolated to the next four years. Let’s assume Obama implemented left leaning policies that have been good for the economy during an abnormal period. While this gives Obama some credibility as an administrator, it is not prood that MORE of the same policy will be good in the next few years. One chocolate cake is good to eat, but more than that can be bad for you. The same would apply to a Republican administration.
But then again, Obamacare doesn’t really take full effect until 2016, does it? And the individual’s tax returns won’t reflect it until 2017, well after the next election (in which he will not be running). That’s when you’ll probably start seeing a lot of mayhem. (At least the tax preparers will.)
I am very confused by the assumption that the economy is better off. If we look at the last 50 years, where do we stand in terms of
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national debt
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national deficit
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food stamps
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labor participation rate
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inflation-adjusted household earnings
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unemployment rates for people under age 30
I just get the impression (whether it’s Obama’s fault or not), that this is the first generation where kids graduate college only to move back in with their parents because they can’t find a decent job. Don’t believe that was the case under Bush, or even under Bill Clinton.
Here’s some quick fact checking. (The fact checking comes from the AP. I would have linked the original article, but the AP’s website hurts my brain.)
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-01-21/fact-checking-obamas-state-union-speech
Your partisanship is showing.
Things are definitely better for me economically that they were under Bush II, but then again I got older and got better jobs. Kids have always graduated college and gonehome to live with their parents. Now, there are just more college graduates.
A better idea than scrapping 529 plans would be completely eliminating Federal subsidies for student loans. College costs would come down to a more fair level and students would actually think about their income potential post-college rather than just take the money they’re pushing at you.
If they screw with 529 plans, I’m going to be pissed.
You and me both. What’s next, make Roth withdrawls taxable?
I’m in the camp that the President has minimal impact in the immediate-term on the economy. The US economy is like a giant tanker: it’s huge, moves pretty slowly, is hard to stop, and can’t turn on a dime. Even the President can’t alter the physics that much, particularly because he usually spends half his first term just getting warmed up.
What the President CAN do is make major long-term strucrtural changes to the US and its economy. The problem with Obama is that he is making structual changes that are undermining the US, not stregthening it. The math hasn’t worked for a long time and he has gone out of his way to make it a whole lot worse. We’re going to be feeling the fall out from Obamacare, increased deficit, and the illegal immigrant push for decades to come.
The good thing about the US though is that we have the trump card in the reserve currency, so we can just dilute everyone else and force them to pay for our overspending. This seems unsustainable but no one is going to challenge the US on this front because we would go to war before we would lose the reserve currency. In the mean time we’re going to pick off the weak countries and try to exploit them for resources (e.g., Iraq). which is one of the things we do best in terms of global politics.
You can hardly blame Obama for trends over the past 50 years! Look at the trend of those indicators over the last five years and you will find broad improvement.
+1
USA! USA! USA!
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2014/07/06/14-million-more-on-food-stamps-under-obama/
This article is 6 months old, but it clearly states that people are “giving up” on job searches and that food stamp enrollment went up 50% in a 5-year period. Our national debt is at 18 trillion, and it was only 16 trillion when Obama won the 2012 election, and only 8 trillion when George Bush was in office.
I do not consider going into an additional $10 trillion of a debt the sign of a strong economy.
This!
Look at when the debt is approved, not when it is funded.
How is that relevant?
Is this right? 47 million people are on foodstamps? That’s 5-10x higher than I would have guessed.
Facts are largely irrelevant in presidential elections.