[Investors.com] President Obama has staked a great part of his legacy on the idea that he skillfully engineered a great recovery from the financial crisis. The Obama-friendly media routinely parrot the idea. But in fact, as a shocking new study from the nonpartisan U.S. Council on Competitiveness and the Gallup organization suggests, the so-called recovery doesn't exist. Those of us that live in reality could attest to that.
As recently as Oct. 11, less than a month before the election, the online publication The Hill ran this headline: "Obama's economic legacy ensures Democrats decades of success." No kidding. But it's a bit unfair to single them out: Others have run with similar themes. The point is, it's not true. Never stopped the MSM from printing it
The reason Obama's chosen successor, Hillary Clinton, didn't win a third straight presidential term for the Democrats was that they actually seemed to believe their own propaganda, while Middle America didn't. For most Americans, the much-hoped-for recovery has been nonexistent. That's why they voted in droves for Donald Trump in normally Democratic strongholds.
The new study, "No Recovery ‐ An Analysis of Long-Term Productivity Decline," provides strong clues as to why that is.
"Conventional wisdom ‐ as reported in many major newspapers and media ‐ tells us the U.S. economy is 'recovering,' " wrote Gallup Chairman Jim Clifton in a surprisingly blunt foreword to the study. "Well-meaning economists, academics and government officials use the term 'recovery' when discussing the economy, implying that growth is getting stronger. The study finds there is no recovery. Since 2007, U.S. GDP per capita has been 1%."
It's even worse when looking at a trend line. From a range of about 2.6% to as high as nearly 3.5% a year during the late 1960s, per capita GDP has steadily declined over time. This year, the report shows, per capita GDP will be a pathetic 0.5%. Per capita GDP is important, since it's a common measure of living standards around the world. When it's not growing, neither is your standard of living. Costs are still going up like crazy. You ever wonder why only one earner could afford a house and a family in the 50s and 60s and two earners can't afford the same lifestyle today? There is your answer.
Put another way, at the late 1960s growth rate it took about 24 years for the average American to double his or her standard of living; at the 2016 growth rate, it would take 144 years.
Or, put yet another way, "If 1% growth continued for the next 35 years, per capita GDP would increase from $56,000 in 2015 to just $79,000 in 2050. With 1.7% growth, GDP per capita goes up to $101,000 by 2050, and with 2.4% growth it enlarges to $129,000," the report notes. The difference between 1% growth and 2.4% growth is enormous.
In an executive summary, the report's authors note the economy's problems didn't start with President Obama, but they didn't end with him, either, as the media and White House frequently suggest. The study makes a devastating case that something has gone very wrong with the U.S. economy in the past 20 years or so. See unfair trade agreements and NAFTA.
"For decades, the nation's income, measured as GDP, has barely grown overall; on a per capita basis median household income peaked in 1999; the subjective general health status of Americans has declined, even adjusting for the aging population; disability rates are higher; learning has stagnated; fewer new businesses are being launched; more workers are involuntarily stuck in part-time jobs or out of the labor force entirely; and the income ranks of grown children are no less tied to the income ranks of their parents," the report said, listing a litany of woes that now bedevil the economy.
The main reason for the slowdown is a decline in productivity growth, which is in danger of "stalling completely," says the report. That, in turn, is in large part a result of just three sectors in which inflation has been high but quality increases have been low: health care, housing and education. As recently as 1980, the report notes, just 25% of all GDP was spent in those three sectors; today, it's 36% of GDP, and rising. Without the inflation since 1980, per capita GDP growth would have been a robust 3.9% ‐ not 1.7%.
Poor K-12 education, soaring costs for college without an increase in educational quality, "slight gains" in Americans' overall health, declining labor-force participation by adults, and high housing costs have been afflicting the U.S. economy for years, damaging the dreams of many who seek to climb the economic ladder of success.
That's the bad news.
The good news is, it can be fixed. But it will take radically different policies and the political will to buck the special interests, lobbyists and crony capitalists that stand in the way.
As such, whether you like him or not, President-elect Donald Trump is beholden to no one but the voters for his unlikely victory in November. He may be ideally suited for the difficult, but necessary, job of reforming the economy to restore its once-extraordinary growth. Let's hope so. If not, the next presidential campaign is just 36 months away. Cutting a lot of the regulatory costs (by getting rid of a lot of regulations) would help quite a bit.
#2
If you get a government paycheck or are on welfare, or if you are in a "private" business the demand for which has been greatly increased by the crush of regulations added in the past ten years, or work for the financial services, IT, entertainment, or education industries and your industry has bribed the Democrats for indulgences from those same regulations, the "recovery" was great.
For the rest of us, not so much.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
12/14/2016 6:16 Comments ||
Top||
#3
People in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin knew it was a myth.
#1
Not to worry, the POTUS will find some way to get into the news again.
Posted by: Bobby ||
12/14/2016 7:28 Comments ||
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#2
Media will continue to fawn over him and his family. Every decision Trump or his administration makes media will seek audience with O for his opinion on what should have been done. Not to worry. Media has lost its audience a long time ago.
#3
Barry doesn't stand a chance. Whenever the Donald wants to own the news cycle, all he need do is meet with a pop star or hint that a white business executive is being considered for a role in his admin.
#4
One good thing about Dubya was that, with the exception of his brother's unfortunate run in this year's Republican primary, after 2008 he went back to Crawford, laid low and kept his mouth shut. Here's hoping Obumble can do the same.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
12/14/2016 11:38 Comments ||
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#5
.....he went back to Crawford, laid low and kept his mouth shut. Here's hoping Obumble can do the same.
Why would you wish anything such as that on Crawford Abu ?
The devil you say! Being beaten over the head day in, day out for eight solid years about something the general population did not do, didn't help matters any?
Spent the last eight years balkanizing the country by race, and forgot that the single largest racial group is ... white Scots-Irish. Few of whom were happy about what has been done...
[Breitbart] Monday on Comedy Central’s "The Daily Show," President Barack Obama was asked by host Trevor Noah how he navigated the line between speaking his mind and sharing "true opinions" on race while in the meantime not alienating people.
Obama acknowledged the difficulty but added the caveat the country still hasn’t overcome its legacies of slavery, Jim Crow, colonialism and salvery.
Partial transcript as follows:
You know, my general theory is that, if I was clear in my own mind about who I was, comfortable in my own skin and had clarity about the way in which race continues to be this powerful factor in so many elements of our lives. But, that it is not the only factor in so many aspects of our lives, that we have, by no means overcome the legacies of slavery and Jim Crow and colonialism and racism, but that the progress we’ve made has been real and extraordinary -- if I’m communicating my genuine belief that those who are not subject to racism can sometimes have blind spots or lack of appreciation of what it feels to be on the receiving end of that, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not open to learning and caring about equality and justice and that I can win them over because there is goodness in the majority of people.
Another way of saying this is there has not been a time in my public life or my presidency where I feel as if I have had to bite my tongue. There have been times in my public life where I’ve said, "How do I say this diplomatically? How do I say this, as you indicated, in a way that it’s received?"
So there have been very few instances where I’ve said, "Well, that was racist, you are racist." There have been times where I’ve said, "You know, you might not have taken into account the ongoing legacy of racism in why we have so many black men incarcerated. And since I know that you believe in the Constitution and believe in justice and believe in liberty, how about if we try this?"
The legacy will only be overcome when the U.S. follows the model of the democratic utopia of Zimbabwe and all whites surrender their privilege and migrate elsewhere.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Investors.com] President Obama has staked a great part of his legacy on the idea that he skillfully engineered a great recovery from the financial crisis. The Obama-friendly media routinely parrot the idea. But in fact, as a shocking new study from the nonpartisan U.S. Council on Competitiveness and the Gallup organization suggests, the so-called recovery doesn't exist.
