From the most recent history seems to like the democrat Presidents in their handling of the economy, this is not always the case (C). President Reagan had an advantage in who ranks the best President for the United States economy, has before he took office the economy was very poor to begin with. The EPI was at a high seventy six percent in the year 1981. President Reagan oversaw a large collection of his fiscally enlarging policies, from cutting social welfare to large defense spending, which lead to a much higher national debt, but it should be noted the every President of the twenty first century has raised the national to one way or another. President Reagan in my view, is one of the best if not the best President of the modern era. Reagan led the country a greater economic future that has ripples and aftershocks that can still be felled today. Many would think President Bill Clinton would be pretty high in the rankings, but many believe he was catch coattails of Presidents Reagan and Bush H.W. Even though President Bill Clinton had a good economic report card, in the overall view he was impeached and a quite a few scandals throughout both his Presidential terms. Like President Reagan, President Obama had a big boost mostly because of the bad state of the U.S economy was in when he took office in 09. The financial crisis had started and the state of the economy was worst then when President Reagan took office in 1981 (G).
During President Obama’s second term most of America disapproved of his handling of the economy that number increasingly rose and passed the number that approved of his actions in his first six months (I).President Obama’s approach to the economy was an embrace of intervention in the economy, tax cuts for small business and regulation oversight. The President passed a bill that kept two promises he made while campaigning, giving aid to state and local government workers such firefighters and policemen. Even though President Obama was aiming to reach across the aisle and get republican support, it is worth saying that the bill got no GOP support at all (I). While Obama was dealt a bad hand with the economy and I’m from a different party, he did a somewhat good job getting the economy from the dump where it was before he took office in 2009. Even though President Obama had a somewhat good recovery in the U.S economy, Obama oversaw one of his parties biggest losses in the several elections that were held during his two Presidential terms. The question, what party is better for the economy is most of time, the strongest driving force when people go to the voting box.
President Carter had a very much stronger job gain with nearly thirteen percent. Despite that President Carter serviced over only one presidential term, half as much as President Obama. President Reagan’s first term, the jobless rate was 10.8 percent, which was even higher than President Obama. Under President Reagan it stayed at the rate for around 10 months. Like with President Obama, President Reagan saw the unemployment rate fall after the worst was over. According to Heather Boushey “Unemployment benefits, for example, had kept millions of people out of poverty, the Congressional Research service found that unemployment benefits kept 3.3 million people out of poverty in 2009, and the U.S Census Bureau found that they kept 3.2 million people out of poverty in 2010 and 2.3 million in 2011.’ President Obama had a disadvantage of taking the White House in one of the worst financial disasters since the Great Depression. There were four million jobs lost in Obama’s first year in office. On top of the nearly four million that President Bush lost in his final year of being in the White House. The horrible disaster that was 9/11 and to me, President Bush did a wonderful job of handling the crisis, during and the weeks following. Thought his economic record is not the best when compared to his father and the republican golden boy Ronald Reagan. The unemployment rate when President Obama took office was quite high, around 7.8 and that continued to worsen in the first year of his first Presidential term. At its highest point it reached pass 10 percent in mid-October 2009, and did not drop lower than 9 percent until 2011 (F).
In early 2009 the economy loss was nearly eight hundred and twenty thousand jobs, which was the single biggest loss in month since the World War 2. Within the first couple of months of being in office President Obama signed (ARRA) which added around 787 billion dollar booster shot into the arm of the economy. He then made a plan to save the American auto industry (D). The reason the jobless rate was at such a high point was because of an overall pattern of stale job creation. A ton of jobs were lost thought 2009 and 2008 (E). Very slowly the unemployment rate improved over time. When President Obama stepped down in early 2017 the jobless rate had fallen a total of three percentage points, which is only eclipsed by the Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Clinton (F). This move from massive losses to firm growth in jobs per month, happened due to his decisive action of the administration who made quite a few well thought out policies. The growth was the result of (ARRA) and as well as several other policy changes, as well as helping the auto industry and aimed a greater number of aid to the financial market’s problem of its own making (D 181).
Over the course of President Obama’s eight years as President the economy added a net total of more than 11 million jobs. A gain of in total non-farm jobs of 8.7 percent (F). The economy has greatly improved since the Great Repression, from the loss of 800,000 jobs a month in late 2009, to an increase of a150, 000 for a period of twenty four months (D). When President Obama left office the unemployment rate was at the low number of 4.8, lower than the historic norm of 5.6 percent (F). It is well known the unemployment rate has hovered at that small rate since the official end of the recession in the middle of 2009 (E). However, the long-term rate rose to historic highs, the job creation that would be expected form as showed slight decline in the rate (E). The only over post-war President who had lower gains in jobs was that of Obama’s predecessor, President Bush, who had barely made a one percent gain. The others would be George H.W Bush (2.5%) and President Eisenhower with (3.1%) during their terms (F).
In early 2014 President Obama hatched a plan to raise the minimum wage. Pres Obama thought that a person that works a full time job should not have to raise a family in poverty. The minimum wage was around fourteen thousand a year, which makes it difficult for a low-income worker to make both ends meet. With a household of five the minimum wage worker is still under the poverty line. That’s why President Obama made a proposal to lawmakers to up the minimum wage for Americans in parts to nine dollars an hour in the year 2015. One way President Obama wanted to help is by giving reward work by rising the federal wage limit from around seven to nine dollars an hour. Another way would be rising it for over fifteen million Americans low-income worker. The minimum wage has a huge impact on the money that those low-income workers take in a yearly. According to Congressional Digest “Around 60 percent of workers benefiting from a higher minimum wage are women.
Less than 20 percent are teenagers. Also, those workers who would benefit from an increase in the minimum wage brought home 46 percent of their household’s total wage salary income in 2011.” Rising the wage to near or pass the nine dollar goal would most likely rise the incomes of around 15 million workers. And would make a ripple for those choosing to pay their workers more (K). Unless a greater portion of the country gets access to a better and higher education and gets the skills needed to compete for the more skilled jobs, wages will continue to drop. And the money and income gap will just continue to get wider. As the need for little to no skilled worker will still lag very far behind the need for skilled labor (E 30).
Before President Ronald Reagan was elected and then passed tax cuts, the top one percent of tax paying Americans paid eighteen percent of the federal income taxes. The top rates went from a very high seventy percent to a much lower twenty eight percent, which with a final result. Their part of the tax bill had been doubled- they then paid thirty six percent of federal taxes. Only on can think of what President Reagan would have thought of the spend-happy elites in Washington D.C today. Reagan was elected in 1980, many Americans could foresee a future in which their children could live better lives, and that the national debt was lower then a trillion dollars (H).
President Bush’s two presidential terms in office were marked by recessions, one that started two months into first term. This explains why jobs were very high on his list of watch items, as he was worst so far of the post-war Presidents (F). The White House agreed to twenty four month extension of President Bush junior’s tax cuts, and a slight decrease in social security payroll rate taxes. They were given a six percent of their income, and up to four hundred for singles and double that amount for couples. This was done to avoid underhanded spending money that would have helped with the recovery of the economy and tax decreases. Work pay tax is an added in (ARRA) that gave workers a tax credits in 09 and 2016, which was the end date (E 31).
There are many factors in deterring to state of the economy, let alone what political party is the best for the economy. There are some major things to look at if you want to know the state of the economy. Unemployment is one of the best things to look at the overall direction of the economy. Whither the rate is low, which means that there a higher portion of the country has jobs; and a high rate would mean that a lot of people are without jobs and income. Another point would be wage, whether or not wages are high or low can have huge impact on people’s income and the economy overall . The minimum wage is often a focus point in partisan debates. Lastly, another big indictor of the state of the economy is taxes. Whether the taxes high or not often effects spending money that a person has. More likely than not the Political party that passes tax cuts will win the next election. Despites these points there many things that can and will affect the economy.
