President Bush: The Economy

A president’s economic performance is probably the most difficult aspect to measure when assessing an administrations entire body of work.

While presidents make economic policy, they do not have the same control over the economy as they do with say…foreign policy. That may come as a shock to the millions of people that blindly email online petitions to “Get President ________ to lower prices on ________”.

That’s right; presidents don’t set prices, manipulate inventories, discontinue old, or develop new products.

In general, too much praise is heaped on a president for a good economy and too much criticism is assigned to them during poor ones.

I say “in general” for a reason, as President Bush deserves both ample praise and sharp criticism due to his economic decisions being so bold, so substantial.

I’ll start with the good.

From 2001 to 2007, President Bush had a very impressive economic record.

When he took office, he inherited a recession that started in the later stages of the Clinton administration. This recession became far worse after the September 11, 2001 terrorists attacks.

To get the country out of the tough economic position it was in, President Bush aggressively cut taxes and took an extremely pro-business approach to his economic policies.

As a result, this country experienced its longest run of uninterrupted job growth - 52 consecutive months and 8.3 million jobs created. Unemployment averaged 4.7% from 2001-2007, compared to the 5.2% experienced under the “Good Old Days” of the Clinton Administration.

Additionally, from 2001-2007, real GDP grew by 17%, gaining an extraordinary $2.1 trillion.

Also in that time, real after-tax income per capita increased by 11% and there was a 4.7% increase in the number of new businesses formed.

116 million taxpayers benefited from the President's tax relief. The across-the-board tax cuts provided tax relief to every American who pays income taxes, created a new bottom 10 percent bracket rate, doubled the child tax credit to $1,000, and (contrary to what the Left will lead you to believe) actually increased the share of the Federal income tax burden paid by the top 10 percent of individual earners from 67 percent in 2000 to 70 percent in 2005. Furthermore, this Administration removed 13 million low-income earners from the income tax rolls completely.

This economic growth spurred by tax relief also spurred growth in Federal tax receipts, as the Federal Treasury realized the largest three-year increase of revenue in 26 years and tax receipts grew more than $542 billion between 2000 and 2007.

Then came 2008.

While unfettered economic growth cannot continue forever, I don’t think anyone could have foreseen the economic hangover this country was in for in 2008.

With the collapse of the housing market and the financial system coinciding with an election cycle, we had the perfect storm for an economic meltdown.

Now I’m not going to sit here and claim that President Bush was the cause of all of the economic turmoil that this country experienced in the last 12 months.

That would be foolish.

I am, however, going to criticize the president’s lack of vision and, frankly, backbone when dealing with the economic crisis.

I’ve heard supporters of the president say “he warned Congress about the dicey lending practices of Fannie and Freddie for years”.

Yeah? So?

If he was so concerned about this situation, why didn’t he do something to stop these practices from happening? I don’t want to hear that he couldn’t get the Democrats to play ball, as that’s a foolish argument. He had majorities in both the House and the Senate until 2006 and nothing was done.

Even if he didn’t have majorities, he still could have applied some pressure on Congressional Democrats to changes these lending rules.

After all, President Reagan never had the Congressional majorities that President Bush had and he sure as hell got things done.

Then there’s the bailouts.

It’s a good thing that we passed those massive bailout packages, as now everything is perfectly fin…oh yeah, that’s right, they’ve done nothing! And if that’s not enough, there were reports last week stating that government officials have no idea how the funds are being spent and where a lot of the money is.

Your U.S. Government folks! The epitome of efficiency (insert eye roll here)!

My God, I still don’t know what President Bush was thinking when he agreed to go along with these bailouts.

You know, instead of blindly going along with these ridiculous spending sprees, I wish he would have just said, “you know, things are pretty tough right now and they may get tougher down the road, but capitalism didn’t just break. All we need is a little patience and the markets will correct themselves…as they always have”.

As I suspected, now that the government bailed out the financial system, everyone and mother is asking for a handout from Uncle Sam.

This is so, so, so dangerous as at this rate, the government is going own a piece of most major companies in this country. We all saw how well that worked for the Soviets.

Unfortunately for President Bush, these bailouts will be his economic legacy. All of his tax cuts and pro-business policies were great, but in the end, they will be completely overshadowed by his capitulation to the Left and public opinion while agreeing to use public funds to bailout private industries.

Once again, this is something we will be paying for for a long, long time.

That’s all for now folks. Until next time, take care and be well.

-John