Economy Made Few Gains in Bush Years - Eight-Year Period Is Weakest in Decades

[lostnotforgotten]

By Neil Irwin and Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, January 12, 2009; Page A01

President Bush has presided over the weakest eight-year span for the U.S. economy in decades, according to an analysis of key data, and economists across the ideological spectrum increasingly view his two terms as a time of little progress on the nation's thorniest fiscal challenges.

The number of jobs in the nation increased by about 2 percent during Bush's tenure, the most tepid growth over any eight-year span since data collection began seven decades ago. Gross domestic product, a broad measure of economic output, grew at the slowest pace for a period of that length since the Truman administration. And Americans' incomes grew more slowly than in any presidency since the 1960s, other than that of Bush's father.

Bush and his aides are quick to point out that they oversaw 52 straight months of job growth in the middle of this decade, and that the economy expanded at a steady clip from 2003 to 2007. But economists, including some former advisers to Bush, say it increasingly looks as if the nation's economic expansion was driven to a large degree by the interrelated booms in the housing market, consumer spending and financial markets. Those booms, which the Bush administration encouraged with the idea of an "ownership society," have proved unsustainable.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/11/AR2009011102301.html?hpid=topnews

[babylonsister]

1. Say it ain't so. nt

[Rosa Luxemburg]

2. for some strange reason GOP voters don't believe this

[Enthusiast]

5. They only believe the official reality

They get this from Hannity and Limbaugh. Not a problem.

[Juche]

3. Define 'Gain'. Corporate profits and income of the top 1% skyrocketed

Corporate profits went from about $500 billion to $1.4 trillion.




Income for the top 10% went up.

http://scienceblogs.com/mikethemadbiologist/2007/12/rising_income_inequality_and_t.php



Here's what the numbers say about percentage gains in after-tax income from 2003 to 2005:
Bottom quintile: 2%
Next quintile: 2.4%
Middle quintile: 3.9%
Fourth quintile: 3.7%
Top quintile: 16%

Top 10%: 20.9%
Top 5%: 27.7%
Top 1%: 43.5%


The Bush admin has not been a failure. The rich got much much richer (corporate profits and income of the top 5% went up about 15-20% a year, even as incomes of the bottom 90% stagnated or went down), unions were busted, taxes became more regressive, we ended up in foreign wars and human/civil rights were violated. The Bush admin has been a total success by right wing standards. The country is much more authoritarian and plutocratic than it was in 2000.

People never step back and look at it from the perspective of the plutocratic and authoritarian christian right wing. Bush has been a total success by their standards. If the middle and working class didn't see any gains, tough shit. Bush was never president for them in the first place.

[OHdem10]

4. What GOP and Bush "misunderestimated in their pursuit of Reganomics

They never recognized the fact that the US was a different place
with different circumstances.

I am not a fan of Ronald Regan(he seemed to be a nice and likable
person but I disagreed vehemently with his policies. Let us get that
out of the way.

While Regan set in motion this "FREE Trade" disaster, he had the wisdom
to go slow. There were times he stopped the exporting of jobs.
The GOP seems to forget this at their peril. (when it appeared to
hurt one state too much, for example.)

While Regan gave some of largest taxcuts in History. May I remind
everyone that he went back and increased taxes when he saw the taxcuts
were too much and would create problems. The GOP always talks about
his taxcuts.

Because of his cold war spending he left us with a terrible deficit.

The GOP and Bush have run into the ditch because they blindly follow
a Conservative Ideolgy no matter the facts on the ground.

When Regan was president most of the companies were still in this
country. Yes, the chase for cheap labor in foreign markets had starte
but the outsourcing and transplanting had not reached the fever pitch
we have faced over the past decade. The country was still rather stable
so job creation was not such a challenge as it has been during the
last eight years.

You cannot discuss the economy without examining the impact Trade
Policy has played in US.

Since the GOP and Bush goofed in this regard along with giving BUSINES
the store, I hope those advising our President elect will not be myopic
and instead, look at all factors contributing to instability in our economy.

Further, please not rules (even Ideological ones) must be applied
to new and changing circumstances. Trying to force a changing society
into an old set of rules does not always work.

[Enthusiast]

6. But they won't acknowledge facts.

"The GOP and Bush have run into the ditch because they blindly follow
a Conservative Ideolgy no matter the facts on the ground."

I've tried to inject a bit of reality into discussions with these people, they will have none of it.