Obama Outperforms Reagan on Jobs, Growth and Investing
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) today issued America’s latest jobs report covering August. And it’s a disappointment. The economy created an additional 142,000 jobs last month. After 6 consecutive months over 200,000, most pundits expected the string to continue, including ADP which just yesterday said 204,000 jobs were created in August.
One month variation does not change a trend
Even though the plus-200k monthly string was broken (unless revised upward at a future date,) unemployment did continue to decline and is now reported at only 6.1%. Jobless claims were just over 300k; lowest since 2007. Despite the lower than expected August jobs number, America will create about 2.5 million new jobs in 2014. And that is great news.
This is the best private sector jobs creation performance in American history
Deitrick – “President Reagan has long been considered the best modern economic President. So we compared his performance dealing with the oil-induced recession of the 1980s with that of President Obama and his performance during this ‘Great Recession.’
As this unemployment chart shows, President Obama’s job creation kept unemployment from peaking at as high a level as President Reagan, and promoted people into the workforce faster than President Reagan. President Obama has achieved a 6.1% unemployment rate in his 6th year, fully one year faster than President Reagan did.
At this point in his presidency, President Reagan was still struggling with 7.1% unemployment, and he did not reach into the mid-low 6% range for another full year. So, despite today’s number, the Obama administration has still done considerably better at job creating and reducing unemployment than did the Reagan administration.
We forecast unemployment will fall to around 5.4% by summer, 2015. A rate President Reagan was unable to achieve during his two terms.”
Where myth meets reality
There is another election in just 8 weeks. Statistics will be bandied about. Monthly data points will be hotly contested. There will be a lot of rhetoric by candidates on all sides. But, understanding the prevailing trends is critical. Recognizing that first the economy, then the stock market and now jobs are all trending upward is important – even as all 3 measures will have short-term disappointments.
There are a lot of reasons voters elect a candidate. Jobs and the economy are just one category of factors. But, for those who place a high priority on jobs, economic performance and the markets the data clearly demonstrates which presidential administration has performed best. And shows a very clear trend one can expect to continue into 2015.
34 comments:
I noted with some amusement - although I refrained from commenting - the exchange between our friends Jerry and RN (see prior discussion thread).
Trading stats tit-for-tat is a relatively useless exercise - and inconclusive at best. Both presidents came into office on the heels of recession; and both presidents employed deficit spending as a means of economic stimulus. All things being equal, what makes the two accounts different?
The economy was much smaller during the Reagan years; which means the appearance of gross deficits during the Obama years (compared with gross deficits in the Reagan years) is relative and misleading. As a percent of deficit to GDP, you will find more rough equivalence.
How about the difference of 38 years? The recession of 2007-2008 was far more severe - structurally much worse than the Great Depression according to some economists - than the recession of the early Reagan years.
One BIG difference between THEN and NOW: Slash-and-burn partisanship is off the Richter Scale compared with the Reagan years. There is no more bi-partisanship left, no more compromise and consensus; only a radical "nullification" fringe that has damaged the country in untold ways - economically, politically, institutionally, and structurally.
Can the damage be undone? There are far too many pent up resentments - and I see few signs of hope within my lifetime. This kind of partisan division is a sign of decadence and decline.
Whattaya expect from the lieberal media like Forbe's magazine?
You may also enjoy this blog...
http://genuinequotient.com/obama-outperforms-reagan/
When Reagan was in office both sides saw some compromise. Now both sides see opportunity to gain by not compromising.
Bohner and Reid need to be replaced by thinking adults who will represent the interests of the American people.
One thing this or any other study does not consider is the number of workers forced to work part time or being under employed. We no longer produce non-skilled jobs yet we have a huge number of unskilled workers. The answer is not paying a burger flipper $10 an hour.
Yes, Octo, you can often make statistics say what you want. You just have to compare the right numbers...or the left numbers. ;)
"The answer is not paying a burger flipper $10 an hour."
How do you know that's not the answer? When people are paid a living wage, they have money to spend in their community and that's good for the local economy. How does anyone make a living on $7.25 an hour?
"Among OECD nations, every single country that pays a higher minimum wage than the U.S. pays upwards of $9.00 U.S. dollars per hour.
Australia, the nation with the best minimum compensation on the list, has a minimum wage equivalent to $15.75 in U.S. dollars.
Japan, which is the lowest paying country to beat the U.S. pays U.S. $9.16 per hour.
All told, the U.S. falls toward the bottom of the pack near Greece, Spain and Israel." --Business Insider
Remember that Israel has has universal health care subsidized by the government. So even if Israelis have lowers wages, they don't have to worry about health care for their families. Something not true about this country:
"Israel’s health care system is fully subsidized by the government; it is socialized medicine. There are three HMOs, each of which offers a ‘basket of benefits,’ which are fairly comparable. The differences between the three are often administrative – such as location of doctors or ease of getting appointments. Each HMO assesses a monthly fee for coverage of every Israeli citizen; the fee increases as the member ages. One can purchase additional benefits within each plan – such as alternative care, occupational therapy benefits and so on.
In addition to the monthly fee, every Israeli employee is assessed a health tax which is determined by income level. A person earning a higher salary is assessed a higher health tax which is separate and apart from the income tax assessed. On the whole it is fairly costly. But – and here is the biggest but – every Israeli citizen has at least basic health insurance. Every Israeli citizen has access to a physician and a hospital when needed. Society bears the cost of insuring its members.
Clinics throughout the country care for children until the age of three. These ‘tippat chalav’ (literally, drop of milk) clinics inoculate children, educate their parents and serve as a resource for informal parent support groups.
The health basket also includes prescription medication. Admittedly, the cost for pharmaceuticals has increased over the years. Arguably, there is medication which should be included but is not; citizens lobby the Ministry of Health vigorously to have access to cutting edge medication. Sometimes they succeed and at other times, they do not." --The Philadelphia Jewish Voice
"Economically, President Obama’s administration has outperformed President Reagan’s in all commonly watched categories. Simultaneously the current administration has reduced the deficit, which skyrocketed under Reagan.
Additionally, Obama has reduced federal employment, which grew under Reagan (especially when including military personnel,) and truly delivered a “smaller government.” Additionally, the current administration has kept inflation low, even during extreme international upheaval, failure of foreign economies (Greece) and a dramatic slowdown in the European economy."
Let's see skutrunner tell us this is all a lie and that Obama didn't build that!
The wingnuts haven't said a word about this because it sticks in their throats that Obama has done a better job with the economy than their idol, Ronnie Raygun.
FCGB... you're FOS. But we won't tell anyone.
You'll never see a right winger talk about this becuz they can't handle the trooooooth!
A.C.R., it appears our friend from the right, Mr. Skudrunner will not take the challenge.
FCFB, in wingnuttia, no one is better than R.R. even when they're better than R.R. It's a sacred law.
RN, Are you saying FCFB is "Full Of Sense?"
Texas Chump, truth is a fungible commodity in certain right wing circles. See Jo Joe Politico, for example.
I'm not surprised you see so much economic misery where you live, Mr. F.T., because my new post shows that Florida is among the 10 worst economies in the country.
There will always be negatives, even as the country recovers from a catastrophic financial collapse that happened during a conservative president's administration. The new president had ZERO cooperation from the GOP in trying to move the country forward. The GOP's behavior has been like an arsonist setting fire to a house then complaining that the firefighter made everyone's life miserable by not putting it out fast enough.
To carp, complain, cavil grouse, denounce, criticize, bewail, lament, grumble, deprecate gets us nowhere and further divides us.
Facts are stubborn things, and the facts are that OVERALL, the country IS doing much better under Mr. Obama than it did under the recovery headed by Mr. Reagan, individual anecdotal reports notwithstanding.
You have proved my point, which is that no matter what this president accomplishes, the right wing's default response is to defame, deride, and detest.
The fault, dear Mr F.T., is not ALWAYS in Mr. Obama, but in oneself, that one is often disgruntled.
I was unaware there was a challenge so therefore I did not respond.
It is difficult to to discuss with anyone who views flipping burgers at $10 an hour as a successful strategy for bringing up the bottom.
Statistics can be played any way one wants. If a company increases their sales from $10 to $20 they have had a statistical huge gain but is it really meaningful? If 70% of jobs created are part time when people want full time, is that an accurate picture of a healthy economy and job market.
In the Reagan years there was a middle class, there was US manufacturing and there was prosperity. People who worked part time did it by choice instead of necessity. The overriding factor was you could be successful if you worked hard.
With the current response of reward failure and condemn success, the middle class is eroding. The leftists rage over income inequality is brought to you by the leftists but as always, they blame others.
Now, if the country is doing better why are so many moving to government assistance instead of employment?
skud: "In the Reagan years there was a middle class, there was US manufacturing and there was prosperity."
Not everyone swallows that meme:
Google "How Reagan Ruined the Middle Class," and this is what comes up:
"Reaganomics killed America's middle class - Salon.com
www.salon.com/.../reaganomics_killed_americas_middle_class_par...
Salon"
Apr 19, 2014 - AlterNet There's nothing “normal” about having a middle class. Having a middle class is a choice that a society has to make, and it's a choice ...
How Ronald Reagan destroyed the American Dream
www.rawstory.com/.../reagan_destroyed_american_dream...
The Raw Story
But Reagan, who was known as “Dutch,” eventually got his casting call on the .... a willful uprising of wealthy white zealots against the American middle class, ...
How Reaganomics Destroyed The Middle Class...And ...
Video for how Reagan ruined the middle class► 8:27► 8:27
www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5CCRI1vdwE
Dec 5, 2010 -
The National Debt went up under: Carter 41%, Reagan 186%, Bush Sr. 53%, Clinton 40%, Bush W. 77%. Do ...
How Ronald Reagan's Policies Destroyed the United States
/.../-How-Ronald-Reagan-s-Policies-Destroy...
Feb 9, 2011 - "It's difficult to overstate how much Reagan-era propaganda hurt the country. ... The sad things is that many middle class Republicans who voted for ...... once one of the world's great cultures until his governorship ruined it.
Debunking the Reagan Myth - New York Times
www.nytimes.com/2008/01/21/.../21krugman.html
Jan 21, 2008 - How we talk about the Reagan era still matters immensely for ... By the late 1980s, middle-class incomes were barely higher than they had ...
So you see, skud, there are many other points of views that refute your claims. Do you ever read them?
Every day I read what your friends write about Mr Obama.
He's been the president, effectively, for 5 years, since the beginning of his administration, as in all administrations, he was functioning on the previous administration's budget.
R.R. made a lot of people feel good but it was like giving sugar pills to a sick person and telling him that everything would be find in the next morning in America.
People who worked part time did it by choice instead of necessity. The overriding factor was you could be successful if you worked hard.
With the current response of reward failure and condemn success, the middle class is eroding. The leftists rage over income inequality is brought to you by the leftists but as always, they blame others.
Now, if the country is doing better why are so many moving to government assistance instead of employment?
skud: "People who worked part time did it by choice instead of necessity. The overriding factor was you could be successful if you worked hard."
That's b.s., and you know it. Tell that to American migrant workers who work back-breaking jobs in horrendous conditions on barely subsistence pay. I know of no hard-working tomato pickers who "made it."
skud: "With the current response of reward failure and condemn success,"
That's another false meme. Who exactly is rewarding failure?
sku: "The leftists rage over income inequality is brought to you by the leftists but as always, they blame others."
Hogwash and nothing more than repeated talking points that make no sense.
skud: "Now, if the country is doing better why are so many moving to government assistance instead of employment?"
Actually one's economic success depends on the state one lives in. Just look at the latest post on my blog and see which states are doing the best and worst economically.
Is there even ONE fact-checker in this forum? Has anyone questioned the seemingly bogus 92+ million figure in an above comment at 8:53 AM?
Here are some facts: There are several unemployment figures, the monthly Jobs Report (known as U-3), the marginally attached figure (known as U-5), and the real unemployment rate - marginally attached workers, discouraged workers, and part-time workers who want full-time work - known as U-6. Here are current stats (as of Sept 5, 2014):
Official (U-3) unemployment = 9.591 million
Current labor force = 155.959 million
Official unemployment rate (U-3) = 6.1%
Marginally attached (U-5) unemployment = 2.141 million
Part-time workers = 7.277 million
Real (U-6) unemployment rate = 19.009 million
Current labor force = 155.959 million
Real rate = 12.18%
Has anyone noticed something strange? How about this claim:
FeetStinke (at 8:53 AM, Sept 9 2014 - above): “… NINETY-TWO-MILLION-PLUS currently UNEMPLOYED ...”
Not the U-3 nor the U-5 nor the U-6 (the most all-encompassing stat of all) even comes close to this level of bogus bullshit: 19 million versus 92+ million. Speaking of RANK DISHONESTY, please note the intended Wortspiel.
Thank you (O)CT(O)PUS for checking. I had some unexpected news around 1 PM and was not able to do any fact-checking.
He's probably counting K through 12 school children.
Legs,
Of course you realize that unemployment is based on the number who actually are looking for work and therefore on the unemployment rolls.
I will also assume you know that the participation rate is the lowest since 2008, another milestone caused by a Democratic congress. More Americans than ever before are not working with 92 MILLION people out of the workforce. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2537585/More-Americans-not-working-92-million-people-workforce.html
Ms shaw,
Really, you use Rawstory, salon, paul krugman as references. That is as unbiased as using glen beck and rush to illustrate that obama is incompetent.
I was part of the middle class during Reagan years and the country was more unified and prosperous that currently. We had a president who talked to the people and worked with congress.
Did he make mistakes, sure but what president hasn't. This leading from behind is not working well and he needs to try a different tactic.
WASHINGTON — The number of U.S. job openings remained near the highest level in 13 years in July, and companies also stepped up hiring that month to the fastest pace in nearly seven years, two signs the job market is slowly healing.
The tally of available jobs ticked down 2,000 to 4.67 million in July, the Labor Department said Tuesday. The drop was led by a decline in government job postings. Businesses actually advertised slightly more jobs.
Total hiring, meanwhile, jumped 81,000 to 4.87 million, the highest level since December 2007, when the Great Recession began. That indicates companies are more likely to fill their open jobs. Still, that is below the pre-recession average of just over 5 million hires a month.
Knoxville News Sentinel
@skud -- I was part of the middle class during Reagan years and the country was more unified and prosperous than currently. We had a president who talked to the people and worked with congress.
----------
We have a president right now that will do that.
I'm from Tip O'Neill country. Are you honestly going to compare Tip's ability to compromise with Boner's.
Maybe Obama can compromise with Ted Cruz?
Obamanomics: 92 Million Americans Not Working
May 02, 2014
Have you heard about the great economic news? ... The US labor force shrunk by more than 800,000 people in April. ... that means 800,000 people stopped looking for work or quit working. The labor force participation rate declined or decreased to 62% ... the lowest it has been since 1978. ... that means is only 62% of Americans of working age have job.
The number of Americans not working, but eating and watching television, probably driving and making cell phone calls, 92,594,000. ... You used to have to work to eat. There's nothing good here, folks.
[D]espite all of this, the unemployment rate has plunged from 6.7 to 6.3%. That just doesn't make any sense. Well, it does, if you know how they calculate the number. They simply don't count the number of people who have given up trying to find a job ...
No Shaw, actually I had something else in mind with respect to FCFB.
Have you heard how the Rethuglicans have done NOTHING to work with this president to help the people who are not working? How can you come here and post these lies without acknowledging how useless the GOP congress has been. The president has proposed legislation to alleviate the situation and the GOP congress has stopped everything he has proposed. So why don't you just STFU about this or at the least be honest about how the GOP has done aboslutely NOTHING NOTHING NOTHING for the working people.
It's NOT all Obama's fault.
NINETY-TWO-MILLION-PLUS currently UNEMPLOYED
TWENTY-MILLION now on FOOD STAMPS
CREATING FALSE IMPRESSIONS with INDISPUTABLE FACTS
boy....was that some bullshit.
Octo provided statistics, Free Dunk just threw up numbers, and then summed it up with an Oxymoron......the only thing he got right in that rant was..................................."The recession of 2007-2008 was far more severe - structurally much worse than the Great Depression according to some economists"
hmmmmmmm...now, gosh, whose policies caused that? hmmmmmm who was in charge....then?
The conservative policies of GOP presidencies caused the breakdown of the middle class beginning with Ronnie raygun.
The country thrives economically under Democratic presidencies. Loo it up. People like FT will always be with us and always use subterfuge and mis direction to divert you from the truth. Republicans are always bad for the economy. See the stock market under GOP vs. dem administrations.
Freethinke, you are aware that there is a huge surplus of labor worldwide, I assume.
Kapital has more than enough cheap labor to satisfy demand.
All hail supply side. If the productive capacity is there, demand will follow. What a load of crap you conservatives have foisted on the world.
ok
"hmmmmmmm...now, gosh, whose policies caused that? hmmmmmm who was in charge....then?"
You do remember it was the democrat controlled congress who insisted on supporting fanie and said there were no problems with sub prime mortgages. The elite maxine waters backed dodd and frank it is policy.
skurunner you and all the rest of the T-GOP blame Obama for EVERYTHING that's happened since Nov. 2008, and now you're blaming th Democrats for the finanial collapse that happened on GWB's admin.? I have an idea, let's havr Dem. presidents and congress forever, since you guys blame them for everything anyway.
Skud: “Of course you realize … I will also assume you know …”
Thus begins another erroneous screed from a POMPOUS ASSHAT with a learning-disorder, a reading impediment, and selective recall. The forever partisan Skud these quotes in his own reference (note: the illiterate Skud doesn’t even know how to create a live link in HTML code):
“… aging population …
“The rate's decline has accelerated since the 2008 financial crisis, partly because baby boomers are reaching retirement age and the unemployed have struggled to find work.”
“So what happened in December? Economists struggled for explanations: Unusually cold weather. A statistical quirk.”
Here is a NUMERO UNO example of quotes TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT to purposely misrepresent the contents of a news article and hijack a discussion board. Retirement aged persons included in an unemployment statistic. No cigar! A statistical outlier of cold weather causing a statistical quirk: No cigar!
Of course you realize, Mr. Skud, the full scope of your INTELLECTUAL DISHONESTY!
This comment also applies to the infamous FeetStinke who goes further:
FeetStinke (September 9, 2014 at 7:15 PM): “Payrolls rose a humdrum 148,000 in September, the unemployment rate fell a tick to 7.2% …”
Correction: The current unemployment rate is 6.1%, not the 7.2% as represented by FeetStinke. A deliberate misrepresentation is one thing. Inconsistency is another:
FeetStinke (September 9, 2014 at 7:12 PM): “… the unemployment rate has plunged from 6.7 to 6.3% …”
So which is it, Mr. FeetStinke: 7.2% or 6.3% or the official rate of 6.1% published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics?
Here is a postscript from the cephalopod on the nature of partisanship today:
Structural anthropologists claim that the human brain tends to analyze experiences of the world in terms of binary opposites: Hot versus cold, raw versus cooked, us versus them, Blue states versus Red states, and win versus lose. Perhaps this view explains why partisan debates always devolve into contests of rigidity and shallowness.
Sometimes there are three, four or more sides to a debate but we think of “two” because the dialectic of partisanship demands that someone wins or loses.
Partisanship is not about the honest analyses of available data. It’s about winning at all costs as if every debate were a political campaign - with ritualistic talking points, deliberate errors of omission, tone deafness, misrepresentation, outright lies, defamation, and demonizing.
My problem with this way of thinking is what we lose along the way: Our fundamental humanity, the ties that bind, and the bit about "united we stand."
These concepts are utterly alien to Skud and FeetStinke who regard any opposing viewpoint as a conspiracy to take over the world and impose some imaged and fictive dictatorship of liberalism. This is the same kind of framing device employed by some of the most savage bigots of history.
We deserve better trolls!
Wow Legs that was quite a diatribe with no basis for truth.
Mr. FreeThinke did have a error in the percent of unemployed in one segment of his post. I guess that makes him not perfect and capable of minor mistakes which are unforgivable under any circumstances. Unlike you, I have made errors in the past as well.
As to the remainder of my post being incorrect?
1. Was congress a democratic majority during the beginning of the housing collapse
2. Did Maxine Waters say there was nothing wrong with the administration of freddie?
3. Did Frank and Dodd support the continuation of sub-prime loans?
I think you must admit that all three statements are true therefore my post was accurate.
As to not being able to create a live link in and HTML code, I will enroll in a live link class soon to so you do not become offended.
Skud: “Unlike you, I have made errors in the past as well.”
Unlike you, I research and consider my comments carefully. In contrast, you argue in BAD FAITH with only one purpose in mind: To TAUNT and DISTRUPT this discussion board.
Point of fact: Causes of the housing collapse started long before Democrats won a House majority in 2006. Non Sequitur! What Maxine Waters said? Non Sequitur! What Frank/Dodd supported? Non sequitur! What matters here: WHO CRAFTED ECONOMIC POLICY that led to collapse, not who said what and when. Here are the questions that matter:
What president signed into law the Tax Reconciliation Act of 2001 and the Tax Reconciliation Act of 2003?
Name the Head of the Fed who admitted before a Congressional committee in 2008: ““Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself included, are in a state of shocked disbelief.”
Name the Treasury Secretary who wrote the “no strings” memo that became TARP – subsequently used and abused by the same bankers and fraudsters who brought on the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
Name the president who signed into law the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, also known as TARP.
How about an HONEST accounting of CAUSE AND EFFECT, not the kind of PARTISAN BULLSHIT you bring to the table!
Finally, here is the most DEPRAVED and OFFENSIVE comment of all:
Skud: “The answer is not paying a burger flipper $10 an hour.”
From the beginning of our republic, there has been a long-standing American tradition that places high value on the DIGNITY OF WORK. Your comment turns the dignity of work upside-down as you DEHUMANIZE minimum wage earners and regard them as little more than an UNWORTHY UNDERCLASS.
Unbeknownst to you, the social safety net - programs that stave off privation – also constitute a form of CORPORATE SUBSIDY. Large retailers such as Wal-Mart reap billions in food stamp profits. Retailers and fast food chains reap one more benefit: Low wages enable them to privatize profit while shifting the cost burdens of food stamps, Medicaid, and other forms of public assistance onto the American taxpayer. This is not free enterprise; this is INSTITUTIONALIZED SERFDOM.
Only a MISERABLE EXCUSE FOR A HUMAN BEING SUCH AS YOU would DEMEAN and DEBASE the working poor.
In the interest of bipartisanship, I will quote, not a liberal or Democratic, but a REPUBLICAN critic of GOP economic policy who said:
“The GOP cares solely and exclusively about its rich contributors. The party has built a whole catechism on the protection and further enrichment of America's plutocracy. Their caterwauling about deficit and debt is so much eyewash to con the public. Whatever else President Obama has accomplished (and many of his purported accomplishments are highly suspect), his $4-trillion deficit reduction package did perform the useful service of smoking out Republican hypocrisy. The GOP refused, because it could not abide so much as a one-tenth of one percent increase on the tax rates of the Walton family or the Koch brothers, much less a repeal of the carried interest rule that permits billionaire hedge fund managers to pay income tax at a lower effective rate than cops or nurses” (Mike Lofgren, Reflections of a GOP Operative Who Left the Cult).
Yup! The words of a Republican, not a Democrat. With respect to the minimum wage, I prefer $12.00 per hour. If for no other purpose, it makes it easier for people like you to count the number on both hands.
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