Closing the book on the Obama economy, by Robert Romano, 1/18/17
There are less than 51
hours left in the Obama administration, which will end Jan. 20 at noon Eastern
Standard Time.
So, what will President
Barack Obama’s legacy of office be? Obama will have headed
the only administration in modern history that presided over an economy that
never grew above an inflation-adjusted 3 percent. Such growth has not been
achieved since 2005.
In fact, the Obama’s
administration at 1.46 average annual growth so far — we’re still waiting on
2016 data — has marked the slowest economy since the postwar recession that
followed World War II.
Obama left the civilian
labor force participation 9.7 million workers short of what it would have been
had the U.S. maintained 1997 participation levels of 16-64 year olds. That
represents working age adults who either left the labor force or never entered
on a net basis.
If they were included in
the Bureau of Labor Statistics monthly unemployment numbers, the jobless rate
for 2016 would be 10 percent instead of the reported 4.9 percent for the year.
To put the number in
perspective, the population of 16-64 year olds grew by almost 8.9 million
since, but the civilian labor force that age only grew by 1.9 million, according
to data compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, meaning there are
comparatively fewer opportunities to pursue the American dream. As a result,
labor participation for that age group declined from 75.3 percent to 72.9
percent while Obama was in office.
All the while the Obama
administration sat haplessly by, watching U.S. economic power declining for
eight years. There was no robust recovery like had followed previous
recessions.
All the while, the
national debt doubled to $20 trillion. The only other thing that increased was
regulations, making it even more expensive to do business in the U.S.
One silver lining of
this relatively poor economic record is that it is now coming to an end. The
slate gets wiped clean and now President-elect Donald Trump will have an
opportunity to right the ship of state.
But the challenges
facing Trump will not be easy. In truth, economic growth has been slowing and
labor participation has been declining for two consecutive administrations,
indicating many of the challenges facing the U.S. could be systemic.
Trump has attributed the
slowdown in part to globalization. And now he will get his chance to prove his
economic model, that through insourcing production back into the U.S. via
America first trade deals and creating more jobs domestically, the economy will
grow faster.
Trump promised to get
the economy back to a real 3 percent growth rate and to increase labor
participation, helping Americans to get back to work. In the end, that is how
his record will be judged historically. It will be hard to do worse than Obama.
It is clear is that if Trump succeeds, America succeeds.
Robert
Romano is the senior editor of Americans for Limited Government.
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