The Truth About The Obama Economy

Why Democrats Are Responsible For The Mess We’re In

Editors Note: This is an update to the article we originally published in October of 2009, which contains much of the data that Rush Limbaugh mentioned on his radio show on Friday, January 29th during the second hour of his show.  The data used below comes from Government websites, notably the Department of Labor, Bureau of Statistics and contains the original reference links to the data we used for our analysis below. 

Obama and the Democrats have the audacity to brag that the economy is getting better and that the job cut numbers have gone down? Looks to me like they have NOTHING to brag about.

Bureau of Labor Statistics Chart, 1999 - 2009

Anyone with a right-thinking brain that looks at the above chart and clicks on the link I provided is going to see a very scary picture for the Democrats.

First, CLICK HERE and look at 2001. As Bush took office our economy was already contracting, showing signs of economic weakness. Most (not all) economists will tell you that job losses under 300,000 a month means our economy is growing.  Job losses exceeding  300,000 a month means we're experiencing a contraction. Beginning in Sept. of 2001 we saw the contraction begin post the 9-11 attacks.

By October we were in contraction mode. Then what happened? THE BUSH TAX CUTS WERE PASSED AND GOVERNMENT ISSUED TAX REBATE CHECKS. This action stopped our economy from turning fully negative and by early 2002 we were back in growth mode, meaning less than 300,000 jobs per month were being lost.

Second point, look at 2002 where we actually experienced months of PRO JOB GROWTH. June, October, November of 2002 saw positive, net new jobs being added to the economy. Why is 2002 important? Because it's the first year of the Republican (White House & Congress) Federal Budget. The last Clinton budget expired in 2001, leaving George W. Bush free to create the first all Republican Federal Budget, which included tax cuts for all and tax rebates for all, including our small businesses which are the economic engine of our country.

Now look at 2003, more pro job growth as the Bush Tax Cuts fully kick in and we see NET JOB GROWTH in six months: January, July, September, October, November and December. This is now the second year of the Republican controlled White House & Congress. Even while we're at war in Iraq, jobs continue to grow and become plentiful and federal income tax revenues reach near all time highs.

After a second round of Bush Tax Cuts fully kicks in, 2004 sees a full year of NET JOB GROWTH, there are no net job losses (no minus signs in front of the numbers) for the entire year.

Now look at 2005, 2006 and 2007.  For 34 of the 36 months in this time period, the economy EXPANDS adding net new jobs. Exactly how was this the "worst economy since WW2?" According to the Democrats and the "mainstream media," "most economists agree the recession began in December of 2007." If you look though, you'll see that December of 2007 actually ADDED 120,000 jobs to our economy!

Now let's look at 2008, which is the first Democrat Controlled Congress' fiscal budget since they took over Congress in 2006.  Here it’s important to remember that Congress writes the Federal Budget a year in advance, and the last Republican Congress in 2006 wrote the Federal Budget for 2007.  The Democrats first Federal Budget was written in 2007 for the 2008 Federal Budget year.  

Immediately in January 2008 (again, the first year of the Democrat Controlled Congress' Federal Budget) our economy starts LOSING jobs.

By September of 2008, job losses cross the 300,000 mark, which is where most economists agree that the job market starts contracting as one of the first signs that a recession is happening. As we get closer to the election, job losses accelerate to 380,000 jobs lost in October, 2008 and balloon up to nearly 600,000 jobs lost in November of 2008.

Now stop and ask yourself why this happened? The answer is painfully obvious and clear: Obama had a full year of "hope and change" mantra under his belt. Small businesses as exemplified by "Joe the Plumber" knew what Obama's anti-small business, pro Big Government Tax and Spend rhetoric was all about. As we approached the election and it became more and more clear that Obama would win, companies began shedding jobs. Why? It's simple, and anyone who's ever started up a business knows what I'm about to say is true.

As a former small business owner myself who's started up two companies and sold them off, I can tell you that as the primary risk taker, I deserve the rewards of starting up the company and taking all the risks. If the Government (in this case, Obama) is telling me that they're going to RAISE TAXES I have an obligation to myself and my family first to maintain my standard of living.

In short, that means someone who works for me is going to lose their job. That's just the way it is and anyone who owns a small business will tell you the same.  (If they don’t they’re LYING.)

In November of 2008 when small and large businesses across this country saw that Obama actually won, they knew that taxes were going up, Obama was going to force all kinds of "mandates" on them (Cap & Trade anyone?) and that they'd have to do something to protect their profits to stay in business.

That means people lose their jobs.

Now look at November - December of 2008 through today. From the time Obama won the election in November, 2008 through today, a total of 4,864,000 jobs have been lost. That's an average of 540,000 jobs a month.

And this Obama occupied White House and the Democrats have the audacity to brag that the economy is finally starting to "recover?"

I hope you're still looking at This Chart from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 1999 - 2009 because here's the most important question of all:

Where are the jobs Obama was going to "create or save" with the so-called Economic Stimulus?

The answer is: ZERO. Not a single job has been created since this ZERO took office.  If any jobs were created it’d be reflected as positive job growth in the Bureau of Labor Statistics data.  We simply don’t see that.

This brings me to my second question: Exactly how did the unemployment number DROP from 9.5% to 9.4% when not a single net new job has been created, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics? The reality is, it CAN'T drop unless net jobs are being added to the economy!

The reason that the Unemployment number under Bush was down to 4.5% during his Presidency was because NET NEW JOBS were being created in this economy.  The numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics don’t lie – they’re non-partisan.

Conclusion: Obama and the Democrats have NOTHING to "brag" about stating this economy is getting better. IT IS NOT! We are still in decline, as evidenced by the charts and numbers provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Now they can claim "well, the pace of the decline has slowed" and that may be true - for now. If Obama gets his "health care reform" and "Cap & Tax" plans implemented you'll see the numbers climb again as small to medium sized businesses take on more major financial hits in paying more new taxes to the Government to fund Socialized Health Care and stop "global warming."

My (revised) prediction: the worst may be yet to come.  Even though the Democrats have now lost three key races (Virginia, New Jersey, Scott Brown in Massachusetts) Nancy Pelosi and key Democrats continue to be hell bent on passing the monstrosity known as “ObamaCare” on the rest of us.   Additionally, in his SOTU address, Obama continued to push for Cap & Trade legislation which would implement a carbon energy tax that would affect the price of everything made or grown in this country should it pass.  The worst may be yet to come as it appears the tone-deaf Democrat leadership and the current occupant of the White House simply refuse to see the writing on the wall that they’re headed in the wrong direction.