January 20, 2009 – Thank Goodness!!

Next Tuesday at 11:30am, President-elect Barack Obama will assume the Presidency of the United States of America. What a wonderful moment that will be! We cannot know for certain what the future will bring, but once again we can be hopeful that the future will be better than the past.

Our country faces the most severe economic crisis in three generations. Rather than working to solve these problems, President Bush has chosen to spend his last days in office in an attempt to polish his legacy.

For many, it is difficult to remember where we were eight years ago and what these years have meant to the average citizen of this country. Let’s take a look at some of these aspects of our national economy.

The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the measure of the total value of all goods and services produced in the country. During the eight years of the President Clinton, when adjusted for inflation, it grew at an annual rate of 3.6%. During the past eight years, it has grown 2.2% per year. When you factor in the fact that our population grows at about 1% per year, these figures become 2.6% vs. 1.2% in terms of the amount of goods and services produced, and therefore available to, each citizen.

Recessions, as defined by the National Bureau of Economic Research, are periods of reduced economic activity: GDP declines and unemployment rises. During the past eight years, two recessions have begun. During the eight years under President Clinton, there were no recessions. This has been a repeating pattern in recent years: of the past 11 recessions, 10 began with Republicans in the White House.

Despite what President Bush has said again and again, he did NOT inherit a country in recession. The recession of 2001 began five months after his election. It was also not caused by the attacks of 9/11: it began five months prior to that terrible day.

The years of President Bush have been particularly hard on working Americans. Although he will boast that three million jobs were created during his two terms, over 14 million jobs were needed just to keep up with our increasing population. This means that there was a “jobs deficit” of over 11 million during his Presidency. There has been a deficit in five of his eight years. In contrast, there were 23 million jobs created during President Clinton’s term in office, far more than the 13 million needed to keep up with growth in the work force. In every year of the Clinton Presidency, there were more jobs created than were needed to employ our growing population. In my lifetime, two Presidents have overseen periods of “jobs deficits”, and their names were Bush.

The Stock Market is also an indicator of economic growth, although it is not solely due to activities within our country: most large corporations do business around the world. During the past eight years, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has declined by 17%. In contrast, this value rose 229% during President Clinton’s years. The Market declined in each of President Bush’s terms. All of us are acutely aware of recent Market losses: it has dropped 40% in a little over a year. The last eight years represent the worst Stock market performance of a Presidential administration since that of President Herbert Hoover.

Perhaps of greatest consequence to the long term health of our country is the massive debt that has been accumulated during the past eight years. Today, the National Debt stands at $10.6 trillion. $4.9 trillion of that has been accumulated during the last eight years. 46% of the National Debt has been accumulated during the Presidency of George W. Bush. In fiscal year 2008, we spent $412 billion just on interest payments on our debt. Since half of that was accumulated during the past eight years, we can thank President Bush for saddling us with these interest payments. And they will be with us for years to come.

At this point, every American’s share of President Bush’s debt is over $16,000. Every year, each of us will have to pay an additional $630 in taxes just to pay interest on the debt he has accumulated. On average, we will each have to pay taxes totaling $16,000 to eliminate this debt accumulated under this President. Where will President Bush be when we have to make this sacrifice?

We can’t know what will happen during the Presidency of Barack Obama. But as we move into this next phase of our country’s history, let’s be crystal clear on what has happened over these past eight years. Economically, it has been a true disaster. Let us all hope that better days lie ahead economically, and in all of the other aspects in which this country has been tarnished of late.