Saturday, August 13, 2011

Make No Mistake, This is NOW Obama's Economy (Aug. 12, 2011)



It is an understatement to say that President Obama now owns the bad economy. He and his minions are actually creating and perpetuating it, policy by policy, decision by decision.

At an Aug. 4 press briefing, White House spokesman Jay Carney said: “The White House does not create jobs.” That may be strictly true, but the guy who lives there can cause jobs to be lost and make the recovery more difficult — at which President Obama has excelled.

There is a fundamental principle that seems to have eluded the president and his men: A recovering economy that creates jobs needs to encourage innovation and the creation of wealth.

The president and his minions are going to learn some lessons the hard way.

First, that policies have consequences. In his study of the 1,000 years of the world’s economic growth, the late British economist Angus Maddison observed that the “golden age” for worldwide growth was from 1950 to 1973, with per-capita GDP increasing 3% per year.

In 1973 growth slowed in Western Europe and Japan: “Some slowdown in these countries was warranted, but policy failings made it bigger than it need have been.”

Second, that as my mother used to say, actions speak louder than words. Merely saying that you’re not hostile to business doesn’t make it so.

And although redistribution of income might satisfy liberals’ desire for “social justice,” it doesn’t stimulate the economy or create private-sector jobs.

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