Obama endlessly cites the loss of 750,000 “per month” just before he took office, as if that bottom was destined to be continued forever but for Obama.
It’s the extrapolation fallacy.
This video pretty much sums up the theme:
Yet why shouldn’t Obama own at least some of those job losses between his election and inauguration?
Businesses plan ahead. And what businesses saw in Nov. 2008 – Jan. 2009 was exactly what we ended up experiencing, a massive imposition of the regulatory state on vast sectors of the economy, runaway deficits, hostility to the energy sector, and general gross incompetence.
How many of those job losses were the result of businesses preparing for Obama? And how do we prove it?
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“what businesses saw in Nov. 2008 – Jan. 2009 …”
I’d say business people saw a Democrat president coming at least as early as May 2008 … and saw a Tyrannosaurus Barack a couple months later. Only the Palin blip interrupted that, but McCain sold out to TARP, and seemed not that interested in winning.
Obama actually owns those last three red bars.
And if you hear Obama claim unemployment is going down, keep in mind it’s happening in Repub states, not Dem.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/07/07/Unemployment-Rate-Dropped-In-Every-State-That-Elected-A-Republican-Gov-In-2010
Summary “In 2010, influenced by the Tea Party and its focus on fiscal issues, 17 states elected Republican governors. And, according to an Examiner.com analysis, every one of those states saw a drop in their unemployment rates since January of 2011. “
I see Rags noted that link long ago. 🙂
But seriously, even eschewing statistical tricks, the influence of big Dem spenders at Federal, state and local levels over a period of decades (and some notable Repub spenders as well) along with truly awful bureau spending by Fannie Mae, …there are so many factors that contribute to the mess.
The problem of too much debt will not be solved by taking on more debt.
Such an obstructionist/racist…!!! 😉
Democrats took over the House and Senate in Jan. 2007. They passed the budget, spending and tax bills following that. So they need to take 2/3rds responsibility for FY2008 and FY2009. Color those 2 years “purple” as joint responsibility of the D’s and Bush.
They also own primary responsibility for the subprime mortgage meltdown, since D’s in Congress refused to rein in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. So they get a big chunk of the responsibility for the cause of the Great Recession in most knowledgeable, objective observers of it. Romney should know enough about macroeconomics to nail this.
Uncertainty pushes business risk into the infinite range. Business people have to weigh risks as they consider future conduct.
Like now.
Until investors from all over the world see that the U.S. is turning SHARPLY away from the last several years, capital will find places like Canada for home.
The BLS stated that the workforce when Obama took office and now is essentially the same, though America has grown by 6.2 million souls.
The “jobs created” is the gross number and not the net (i.e. created-lost=gross) jobs created. Also, he does not differentiate between F/T and P/T. Check out the summary from Zero Hedge: http://i1072.photobucket.com/albums/w362/TrooperJohnSmith/ObamaSummary.jpg
And, seeing how nearly half were created in Texas, the Democrats want to have it both ways. When Rick Perry was running against Bill White in 2010 and seeking the Republican nomination, all those jobs were, “low-paying… part-time… dead-end”. However, when Obama lists those same jobs on his dubious resume, they’re all apparently wonderful, fantastic, great jobs. Also, the BLS numbers don’t take into account people working 2-3 part time jobs, because there is no cross-indexing. In the BLS numbers, a guy working 3 jobs is invisible as such, and is instead, shown as “three workers”.
Finally, the work force is growing faster than jobs. The only thing keeping the unemployment rate steady around 8 points is the fact that several million people have run out of unemployment bennies and have quit looking for work. Many are working for cash. The real unemployment rate is around 10.4%.
Nice going, you incompetent moron. At this rate, we’ll be a viable nation again in… never.
U6 is actually closer to 15%
Let’s not forget the illegals he wants to keep in the US. 800,000 to 1.2 million more jobs will be required.
In answer to the question, an even stronger personal trait is at work here. Unfortunatly, our President has not had the ability, likely not the desire, as well, to admit that anything is his fault.
His unwillingness to accept responsibility for any of our problems, social, economic, forign affairs, etc. and to continue to blame Bush, a Tsunami, Europe, Republicans in Congress, for everything gone wrong in our Nation, has become what appears to be an illness.
He could have gotten away with it for a year, or so, but he appears to have become so deluded that he seems to believe what he says. January 20th can not come too soon.
Not only that, but Obama was part of the Democratic congress in 2006-2008 and supported the spending increases and helped to block reforms of the financial systems by Bush.
This supports your assertion Prof. and you arent alone in questioning.
Ill invite anyone to look at this and select years 2008 and 2009 and look for yourselves. Its an easy to use stat generator based on weekly BLS statistics.
http://www.ows.doleta.gov/unemploy/claims.asp
After getting the results scroll down to about W/E 10/25/08 and keep going. Begins with about 449,000 weekly actual claims and gets really bad in the weeks following the election thru into 2009.
I’ve been sitting here, after reading this post three times, trying to decide if I would post a comment or just not bother. Every instinct tells me to not bother. But I probably will. Hell. Why not? It’s not like I haven’t been banned before so why not just go for it?
Are you fucking insane? Is this a serious post? Do you really wonder why Obama doesn’t have to answer for anything he has done or not done, or anything he has said or anything any other Democrat has said or done?
Do you really need it explained to you?
“How many of those job losses were the result of businesses preparing for Obama? And how do we prove it?”
That’s a totally rational question. And SOME job loss could easily be attributed rightly to the immense economic uncertainty of the financial collapse.
Offering sneering questions in lieu of rebuttal is cheap rhetorical posturing. It has no value to me even if I agree with what the questioner is driving at.
Which in your case, troll, I don’t.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/07/07/Unemployment-Rate-Dropped-In-Every-State-That-Elected-A-Republican-Gov-In-2010
Suggestive, no?
Rags: l have suspected this for some time & it is good to see a link that confirms it. We were due for a downturn in 08 on cyclic forces alone. The 06 offyear dem election installing a congress hellbent on protecting & growing its constituant “public sector” base ; combined with a tired ,lame duck G. W. Bush just off failure off S.S. reform. Add all the pent up financial sector abuses it was inevitable. Then on top of that throw in a clueless hyper radical new president with a supermajority radicical ,clueless hyperpartisan congress? What can you expect? For those that will see ,the red state model offers a telling contrast. Problem is with our left politicized press ,it is hidden in plain sight.
DrJim77 below raises an interesting point or two.
Still, from an analytical POV, there are just too many variables to say with certainly we could answer the Prof’s question, IMNHO. We could opine, but never “prove”.
It would be interesting to see a chart using the same perimeters for the Reagan first term, wouldn’t it? Again, too many differences in specific, factual inputs, but perhaps instructive nonetheless.
I think Roberts ruled on this, didn’t he? All job losses belong to Bush. All jobs are Obama’s.
For me, the most telling moment in Obama’s presidency—and apropos the professor’s challenge—came in the fall of 2010, when Obama appeared on Jon Stewart’s show. Stewart asked him about economic adviser Larry Summers.
“In fairness,” Obama said testily, [Summers] “did a heck of a job.”
That brought a laugh and admonishment from Stewart; he was thinking of President Bush’s much ridiculed defense of former FEMA head Michael Brown, who Bush had insisted was doing a “heck of a job” after Hurricane Katrina. “You don’t want to use that phrase, dude,” Stewart told Obama.
Instead of laughing along at his unintentional echo of a famously stupid moment, Obama bristled defensively—then lied: “Pun intended,” he insisted.
No, it wasn’t intended. That’s inarguable. Because if it had been intended, he would’ve been criticizing Summers, not defending him.
Obama can’t stand to think that anyone considers him less than perfect, and he believes that the give and take of a democracy is somehow a slight directed personally at him. Not even Jimmy Carter had skin as thin as Barack Obama. His prickliness and cock certainty won’t allow for a sense of irony—a quality without which any chief executive is doomed to fail. He’s emotionally and intellectually incapable of owning anything less than perfect.
I believe the only data that would *prove* the decline started due to preparation for an Obama administration would have to come from companies and their internal data. They would need to distinguish the impact of the September crash vs. the election impact.
However, when you hear various businessmen discuss Obama and his policies (when they do, candidly), they state pretty clearly that Obama and his policies are the reason for the overall economic malaise (aka depression), the continued job crisis, the stagnant to nil growth of anything since his election.
When you can get that, you will be certain.
For now, we can only connect the dots, extrapolate data, and use our knowledge of history to tell us that what is happening is due to the Democrat leftist spending tsunami and this administration’s overall policies; they knew what was coming and were prepping for Obama and the super-majorities in Congress.
^^Jaynie. For me its not about Obama answering for anything. But its a question many economists look at in attempting to understand the job losses. Looking at weekly unemployment claims for 2008 and 2009 indeed makes economic statisticians wonder about things when we see an obvious uptick in weekly claims. Was it the election? Hard to say. Maybe it was warmer weather as weve been told more recently.
As far as jobs go? The only thing Obama needs to explain (but wont) is this statement of fact:
F•Unemployment Rate Hits 8.1%; 651,000 Jobs Lost in February (March 6): Unemployment in the U.S., which has been steadily growing for several months, reaches 8.1% in February 2009. This is the highest rate since 1983, and an additional .5% over January. There were 651,000 reported jobs lost last month, slightly down from 655,000 in January.
Nobody can spin that as progress. Currently 8.2%
Wonder what that chart would look like with 2006 & 2007 bars included? Bet that time period was excluded for a reason. The red bars for the excluded months probably overshadow the positive bars on the Obama side.
There’s a CSPAN episode from right around Dec, 2008 and I believe its titled Center for American Progress and the Liberal Agenda.
The panel was very dismissive of the extent of the financial crisis and quickly moved right onto how the progressive agenda is panacea for all that ails.
Ya know, the spending that forwards their agenda is the Keynesian spending that cures the financial crisis.
But wait, there’s more!
If the ARRA stimuless wasn’t signed into law until February 17, 2009 … Barack Obama and his backward policies had no effect over reducing job losses until sometime after that.
Job losses just didn’t mysteriously subside at the exact moment of the election of Barack Obama.
Therefore one can only conclude that the recession is a standard “V” recession and job losses naturally were subsiding.
Professor, related to this is something that sticks in my craw: Obama’s claim “he created 4 million jobs”. That number is about 5 million shy of the job openings required during a normal-level recovery — and doesn’t account for 5.4 million people who have given up looking for work entirely.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/05/the_lost_5_million.html
Someone asked for a longer view of unemployment rate:
Here we are
https://fortress.wa.gov/esd/tools/NumbersAndTrends/URateDetails.aspx?area=53_01_000000
Businesses preparing for Obama? And how did they know.
A sham wow moment.
How did businesses know?
No need for Mental Jujitsu here.
Allen West On The Left’s Ideology:
“You Can Call It Communism, Progressivism, Socialism, Marxism, Or Statism”…
http://video.foxnews.com/v/1722145049001/
For me..the saddest of all statistics. Here we are 3.5 years into the Pbama term…recession over in 2009 and we have this
The economy created just 80,000 jobs in June, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday. But that same month, 85,000 workers left the workforce entirely to enroll in the Social Security Disability Insurance program, according to the Social Security Administration.
Jerry Della Femina is a successful businessman and backer of Hillary Clinton. When Obama beat Hillary in 2008, he decided to sell everything he owned. After a successful career owning his own ad agency famous for its creative work, he opened a restaurant in a seaside enclave not far from NYC popular with the rich and famous. He loved his restaurant, it was quite popular. “So why am I selling one of the most successful restaurants in East Hampton?
In 2008 I watched Barack Obama run over Hillary Clinton to become our President.
From the very first “Yes We Can” and “Change You Can Believe In,” I decided that this country was falling in love with an attractive, great-speechmaking hustler/socialist who, if he got into office, was going to pursue his agenda to destroy the best health care in the world and re-distribute wealth. Yours and mine.
I told my friends that from that moment on everything I owned—my houses, my advertising business, my newspaper and my restaurant—was for sale.
A lot of people have come around to my way of thinking, but there is no way in the world that Barack Obama won’t be reelected in 2012.
If you think that Obama’s plan for over-taxing everyone but the 46 percent who don’t pay any income tax (including his friend Jeffery Imholt and General Electric) will stop after he’s re-elected in 2012, you are naïve.”…
4/20/11, “Jerry’s Ink: Della Femina Restaurant Is Sold“
AS smfoushee says above, the effect of the Democrats gaining control of Congress in 2007 (which obama was part)should be regarded as the point in which obama and the democrats should be culpible for. At least that is how the republicans should frame this argument….
That is how the democrats would be framing it if the shoe was now reversed. Hmmm…. Actually they are…
Once jobs go Barack, they never go back.
“Why doesn’t Obama own some of the job losses between election and inauguration?”
Don’t be silly, Prof. Bambi refuses to own the job losses after the inauguration, too. Nothing is ever his fault, unless it’s something good, and he and his minions have to LIE even to come up with that.
Don’t you know everything is Bush’s fault?
(Pretty powerful guy, that Bush – out of office 3-1/2 years and still responsible for the way the economy is going. And apparently pretty much everything else, too.)
I doubt Bush would do it … so I think the GOP should get that guy who looks just like Bush and impersonated him at a White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
In 60 seconds have him spell it out how both sides were to blame for what happened in the fall of 2008 …
Mention how Reagan didn’t go on and on for the mess he “inherited” from Carter ….
And at the end have him tell Obama he’s taking out a Blame Restraining Order …
And have LI’s own Bill Dyszel start on the next video.
Oh. Well. Guilty here of creating Obama job creation. Replaced two full-timers with three part-timers. Do the math.
My turn-
Obama endlessly cites the loss of 750,000 “per month” just before he took office, as if that bottom was destined to be continued forever but for Obama.
Indeed.
The housing bubble burst-a few million jobs lost in an instant; took a few months for the job losses to plateau and stabilize.
Libs would like you to believe every single job in America would have been lost if not for the government (that caused the bubble)
Obama endlessly cites…
You don’t say-
Kinda like:
-4.5 million jobs created since taking office (for 2 years running)
-12-20 million illegal aliens in America for the last 15 years (80-150 K caught crossing the border every single year)
However, nothing demostrates the theory of “repeat a lie often enough….than this:
(Gotta go with a split post–don’t want to link for affect)
June 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report and it is informative to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/07/06/employment-situation-june)
May 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report and it is helpful to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/06/01/employment-situation-may)
April 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report and it is helpful to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/05/04/employment-situation-april)
March 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, and it is helpful to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/04/06/employment-situation-march)
February 2012: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report; nevertheless, the trend in job market indicators over recent months is an encouraging sign.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/03/09/employment-situation-february)
Part II
January 2012: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report; nevertheless, the trend in job market indicators over recent months is an encouraging sign.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/02/03/employment-situation-january)
December 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/01/06/employment-situation-december)
November 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/12/02/employment-situation-november)
October 2011: “The monthly employment and unemployment numbers are volatile and employment estimates are subject to substantial revision. There is no better example than August’s jobs figure, which was initially reported at zero and in the latest revision increased to 104,000. This illustrates why the Administration always stresses it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/11/04/employment-situation-october)
September 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/10/07/employment-situation-september)
August 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/09/02/employment-situation-august)
Part III
July 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/08/05/employment-situation-july)
June 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/07/08/employment-situation-june)
May 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/06/03/employment-situation-may)
April 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/05/06/employment-situation-april)
March 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/04/01/employment-situation-march)
February 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/03/04/employment-situation-february)
January 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/02/04/employment-situation-january)
December 2010: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov
(Yes, there’s more….but we get the picture–Like nobody is a closer ally than the head of State in a photo-op with Obama)
Ask gun dealers when the boom in gun sales began and they’ll tell you November 2008. I think it likely the fear of Obama re: 2nd Amendment rights motivating behaviors was mirrored in the business world. I know it worked that way for me. I sat on a business expansion until Obama won, then shelved the idea as too risky, and left that investment money on the shelf where it remains.
Would anyone place a bet on a roulette wheel where none of the spaces are marked or colored? That’s what business is like under this regime – blind roulette – and until 2010 my state government was just as bad, worse even (NC, now all GOP congress).
Not so blind … we know Obama is gunning for the successful … class warfare. 50% pay no income tax, yet Obama keeps saying the rich should pay their fair share … should be ready to give more … should step aside and let someone else have a chance. Our food stamp president continues to punish the job creator, instead of trying to bring others into the job market.
Obama takes Boeing to court for going to a right to work state, but handles the GM “bankruptcy” himself, with a taxpayer bailout and huge handouts to his union bosses. A bankruptcy judge would have knocked down some of those pensions (making GM more competitive), but Obama keeps the union thiefdom in place, with government backing.
Obama continues to punish those that don’t submit to his union label. And the beatings will continue till morale improves … or he is voted out.
No business owner lays off workers, or goes belly up because of political winds.
It’s called math
Too much personal sacrifice goes into starting, building, and sustaining a business-
Business owners will turn themselves into pretzels before they are forced to stand in front of a mirror and say “I failed”.
The day failure is acceptable is the day we are no longer the America of our Fathers.
This is why there are companies like Bain.
To make independent decisions and force business owners to face reality that their fundamentals are all wrong and/or their business model is broke.
Either leverage finances and reorganize to produce positive results and/or liquidate to save them from themselves and reallocate resources and capitol to more fruitful endeavors instead of waiting till its a complete disaster.
Democrats would just leverage public money to keep propping up failed endeavors in the name of saving jobs.
One business owner I worked for refused to change his business model to my recommendations … can you fix the AC unit? -uhm err yep. .. can you put up an OTA tv antenna on the roof while you’re up there so I can cancel cable, I only watch PBS anyway -ah Yep.
Can you fix this riding lawnmower? -YEP!
Can you start cutting the grass so I can cancel the Hispanic lawn crew??? -NOPE!
How about I install a drink holder and you can cut the grass your damn self … and quit continually putting the entire burden of this pretzel twisting dream on me.
and then there is this which is often overlooked
Lest We Forget
The Mess and how Obama inherited it
This tells the story, why Bush was so bad at the end of his term.
Don’t just skim over this, read it slowly and let it sink in. If in doubt, check it out.
The day the democrats took over was not January 22nd 2009, it was actually January 3rd 2007 the day the Democrats took over the House of Representatives and the Senate, at the very start of the 110th Congress.
The Democrat Party controlled a majority in both chambers for the first time since the end of the 103rd Congress in 1995.
For those who are listening to the liberals propagating the fallacy that everything is “Bush’s Fault”, think about this:
January 3rd, 2007 was the day the Democrats took over the Senate and the Congress. At the time:
The DOW Jones closed at 12,621..77
The GDP for the previous quarter was 3.5%
The Unemployment rate was 4.6%
George Bush’s Economic policies SET A RECORD of 52 STRAIGHT MONTHS of JOB GROWTH
http://rightwingfringe.blogspot.com/2012/07/lest-we-forget.html
Here’s a similar chart that shows Job Creation by President – each bar represents a year – a longer time period “evens” out the differences between Bush & Obama on job creation. Like I said above, Obama just picked the time span that gives maximum effect to the jobs recently created: his 3 years versus Bush’s 1 year.
Chart: Job Creation By President/Political Party
Excellent! Thanks, Alan!
Professor – I remember a time in Dec 2008 or Jan 2009 when Pelosi and Obama both acted and talked about possibly moving up the expiration of the Bush tax cuts from Jan 2011 to early 2009. They had control and they were flexing their muscle.
Combined with that, remember raising the minimum wage in 2007. Remember they dug in their heals on reforming Fanny and Freddie. Bush went along with the minimum wage, but he tried (not hard enough) to address the mortgage standards.
Chart the downturn in employment with the increase in minimum wages. Keep in mind that Pelosi and Obama’s implicit threats to move up the expiration of the Bush tax cuts on high income and small business. I wish I had the youtube but it must be out there somewhere. It would be devastating.
I fully support your view here. Obama and the democrats own much more of this downturn and they should be tarred with it. Romney and his team has got to do a better job of correcting the lie promulgated by the Ds. In the course of doing it, they have to somewhat defend Bush, which I suppose they think is a problem. They need to fight back!
I’m stunned. Considering who they are, why in the world would you expect them to?
McCain co-owns some of the bars before election with Obama- either of them were going to be our commander in crisis…and either way we would have been screwed with a democrat controlled congress. Business owners new that.
True Story: When the banking melt down started to take shape I assessed on the Saturday before labor day 2008 that McCain was an idiot and Obama was going to take us to hell economically. On Tuesday when the market opened I sold 80% of my portfolio and paid off my mortgage. The banks started falling like dominos w/in 3-7 days of that, if memory serves they started falling that Thursday with momentum really picking up the following week until the bottom in March.
Since march 2009, I’ve been betting against Obama and congress by selling covered calls deep into the money.
Talk about dodging a bullet. This week marks the 1 year anniversary since my business has had any billable projects, but I’m making decent coin predicting Obama’s failure. Seeing a disaster coming and preparing for it are two different animals. It pays to hunt both of them.
FU Obama and the democrats who controlled the house and senate since 2006!
Obama has not created jobs, he has redistributed them. From full time to part time. From high paying to low paying.
Obama spends taxpayer money to save inefficient union jobs (GM, government workers) but attacks non-union job creation (Boeing, Gibson Guitar, oils rigs, oil pipeline, etc.).