Guest post: The Obama Record after 3 years – Jobs and GDP
by Jon Hammond at Econographia
Guest post: The Obama Record after 3 years – Jobs and GDP
The performance of the economy over President Obama’s tenure to date has been much discussed in light of the severe contraction that began in December 2007 .. and the policies implemented to correct course and restore growth. As of early 2012, the economic recovery shows signs of gathering momentum. Since the enactment of the Recovery Act .. and especially now with the presidential campaign season heating up .. misrepresentations have been piling up. Despite the fact that the economy has been creating jobs for 22 consecutive months, his opponents continue to attack his record … a recent example: “This president has been on the attack and has been a job killer,” GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney told a town hall meeting in Salem, N.H. Another example: “Either the president’s economic policies are killing this economy, or his lack of leadership,” Rick Santorum said in September. “Either way, President Obama is to blame.”
Here’s the factual record on economic growth and private sector job growth. In both cases, the graph displays the data points from the beginning of January 2007, showing the run-up to the Recession, followed by the enactment of the Recovery Act and the subsequent recovery through December 2011.
The two graphs below display:
Quarterly Real GDP, Q1 2007 though Q3 2011, sourced from BEA NIPA table 1.1.6 here:
Private Sector Jobs, monthly net change January 2007 through December 2011, sourced from the BLS data series CES0500000001 here:
Quarterly Real GDP Q1 2007 – Q3 2011, billions 2005 dollars:
Net Private Sector Jobs January 2007 – December 2011, month-over-month change (000s):
As the historical record clearly shows, the economy has rebounded to pre-recession levels in both economic output and private sector job growth. Since NBER declared an end to the Recession (June 2009), the economy restored almost 700 billion in real GDP and has added a net 1,992,000 private sector jobs. Moreover, from January 2010 through December 2011, the business sector has generated net job growth of over 3,000,000 jobs. The partisan rhetoric simply doesn’t match the record.
(I will comment in comments.)
the economy has rebounded to pre-recession levels in both economic output and private sector job growth.
pardon my French, but this is utter bullshit
yes, the economy was “topping out” in the pre-recession period:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=4H1
but comparing the current economy, allegedly years out of recession, with the 2007 phase of the spin cycle is highly deceptive.
Employment is back to 1999 levels while there’s 15 million more people in the workforce:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=4H2
now is an expecially curious time, as we have the boomers beginning to leave the workforce and the boomer echo entering it en masse:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNU00000012
The economy “restoring” $700B in annual GDP since 6/09 while the Feds have wracked up $3.5T in added debt is nothing to particularly crow about.
the economy has rebounded to pre-recession levels in both economic output and private sector job growth.
This is a rather selective reading of the data.
In 2007 the economy was “topping out” in the immediately pre-recessionary period:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=4H1
200,000 jobs in a month is what the economy needs to just remain from going contractionary.
Comparing the current economy, allegedly years out of recession with 2007 is highly deceptive.
Total employment is only back to year 2000 levels while there’s ~15 million more people in the workforce:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=4H2
Now is an particularly curious time, as we have the boomers beginning to leave the workforce and the boomer echo entering it en masse:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNU00000012
The economy “restoring” $700B in annual GDP since 6/09 while the Feds have wracked up $3.5T in added debt is nothing to particularly crow about, either.
Clearly the economy has not recovered to pre-recession levels in terms of job growth. Adding 150-200k jobs per month is not enough to lower the unemployment rate holding labor force participation constant.
Your chart on employment trends is misleading. Show us the same chart from 2005 to more clearly illustrate pre recession levels and let the data speak for themselves.
The federal govt has been running debt financed deficits over $1trn annually since 2009. Should we net this against the “recovery” in overall GDP over this period? How about the expansion of the Fed balance sheet?
The true story is that they’ve been throwing what they could at the fiscal situation to mitigate the pullback from losing the 2002-2006 mortgage debt mother of all bubbles.
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=4H6
shows how the influx was $800B+/yr plus, 2003 through 2006. That was a nice tailwind of monetary stimulus.
Losing that in 2007 cut off the Bush Economy at the knees.
My thesis does not tell me that there will be any recovery this decade, but I would love to be proved wrong on that of course.
If you’re going to bold factual record I would expect facts. Graphing the derivative of private sector employment, starting Jan 2007, seems purposefully misleading, at least without explaining why this is a useful measure.
Dean Baker:
“Does the Obama Administration Really Want People to Celebrate Job Growth That Will Get Us Back to Full Employment in 2028?“
Some graphs that compare past recessions to our current situation, instead of just a couple months of 2007:
http://www.crgraphs.com/
President Obama is to blame, but he’s still the better option for the average, middle class, corporate employee. Whether or not he can or will make actual improvements, time will tell. But he beats Reaganomics 2.2 (or at least Obama has the potential to finally end that policy, may never happen, but it could). The 1% really are crybabies when it comes to marginal tax rates and entitlements.
Besides, I think the republican party is just going through the motions until they can get Christie to run in 2016. Red or blue, *those people* have enough wealth to survive the next 5 years no matter what happens to you or me.
I am with the rest. The charts do nothing to change the fact that Obama has been an abject failure on the economy and we would not even be considering the possibility of his re-election if the GOP had any non crazy person other than Romney running.The sad thing is that he could have done so much more–been transformative, but instead almost purposely was Jimmy Carter redux. I have said it before and I will say it again. When it comes to the economy I have every expectation that Romney would govern to the left of Obama and I believe not one word of Obama’s recent populist message. He fooled me once, he will not do it again.
terry
i mostly agree
but i wouldn’t give Romney the benefit of “non crazy.” After all Ted Bundy was proud of the fact that he “wasn’t crazy.”
While I understand that the data presentation could be seen as biased. The suggestion that the current state of affairs is Obama’s fault is laughable. He was handed a tanking economy, thanks for the tax cuts, unfunded wars, unfunded Medicare Part D, and an exploding housing bubble; and he caused the problem! And just to be sure that it is all his fault, Congress in its infinite wisdom has resisted his proposed remedies except when the stockmarket took a dive to emphasize the need for action (Stimulus package, national debt extension).
The suggestion that the current state of affairs is Obama’s fault is laughable.
I don’t really see that going on here. For one, my thesis incorporates the somewhat uncommon understanding that the 2002-2007 economy was powered by the $6T housing bubble machine.
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/HHMSDODNS
95%+ of the population doesn’t really understand that. YOU don’t apparently understand that, and from what I’ve read it is certain the Obama economic team did not either in 2009.
I only blame Obama and his team for being really utterly clueless in the 2009-2010 period. They were really behind events.
But foremost I blame the American people for being childish retards. In any sane country the SOTU would have begun “I have the distinct displeasure to inform the Congress that the state of the union is FUCKED” or somesuch.
The deregulation crowd blaming Obama for the current slow recovery is like the gunman trying to blame the E.R. doctor of malpractice for not saving the victim.
“abject failure”
At the hieght of the crises, when Money Market funds had seized up, what would you have done, and moreover what would a republican president have done. Would you have bailed the banks out, would you have bailed the auto industry out, would you have injected a large stimulus package into the economy. Larger perhaps, smaller maybe, or none at all. There were endeless casades of commentary in all the media, by the intelligencia of this country to the effect that nobody quite had experienced anything like this before, and nobody had a clear answer for what to do. I myslef have many frustrations with Obama, but this rearward view by many today that they are dissapointed, by his response to something the very same dissapointed people were clueless about is cause and effect of the problem itself.
Today America is on the verge of rewarding the same politcal party who attacked core constituional rights for eight years, took us to illegal wars, sponsered a frenzy of deregulation, that set up for an economic implosion and then fought tooth and nail to protect the very culprits who did it, against any attempt at even mild re-regulation. That is the true abject failure of responsible citezenry.
Get an insight into the performance of the economy over President Obama’s tenure to date has been much discussed in light of the severe contraction that began in December 2007
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