Facts absent in GOP rhetoric
Allow me to introduce a few economic facts into the Republican economic campaign rhetoric – reduce the federal debt, cut taxes, increase defense spending, cut entitlements, etc.
Comparing seven years of Obama (2009-2015) with eight years of Bush II, we find 1) federal debt: Obama up an average of 7.3 percent a year, Bush up an average of 9.4 percent a year; 2) Change in unemployment rate from start to end of term: Obama down 37.2 percent, Bush II up 85. 7 percent.
Comparing these same statistics for 35 years of Democratic administrations and 36 years of Republican administrations from 1945 through 2015, we find: 1) Federal debt: Democrats up an average of 3.9 percent per year, Republicans up an average of 8.6 percent per year; 2) Average change in unemployment rate (1948-2015) from start to end of term: down 28.6 percent for Democrats’ five terms, up 68.2 percent for Republicans’ five terms.
Certainly, many factors in addition to economic policies of an administration influence these statistics, but the consistency of the trends do point to a strong influence of such policies on the results.