WIEGIE - whatcha think

[cliaz]

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/feature...?printable=true

 

Reckoning

The Economic Consequences of Mr. Bush

The next president will have to deal with yet another crippling legacy of George W. Bush: the economy. A Nobel laureate, Joseph E. Stiglitz, sees a generation-long struggle to recoup.

 

When we look back someday at the catastrophe that was the Bush administration, we will think of many things: the tragedy of the Iraq war, the shame of Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib, the erosion of civil liberties. The damage done to the American economy does not make front-page headlines every day, but the repercussions will be felt beyond the lifetime of anyone reading this page.

 

I can hear an irritated counterthrust already. The president has not driven the United States into a recession during his almost seven years in office. Unemployment stands at a respectable 4.6 percent. Well, fine. But the other side of the ledger groans with distress: a tax code that has become hideously biased in favor of the rich; a national debt that will probably have grown 70 percent by the time this president leaves Washington; a swelling cascade of mortgage defaults; a record near-$850 billion trade deficit; oil prices that are higher than they have ever been; and a dollar so weak that for an American to buy a cup of coffee in London or Paris—or even the Yukon—becomes a venture in high finance.

 

And it gets worse. After almost seven years of this president, the United States is less prepared than ever to face the future. We have not been educating enough engineers and scientists, people with the skills we will need to compete with China and India. We have not been investing in the kinds of basic research that made us the technological powerhouse of the late 20th century. And although the president now understands—or so he says—that we must begin to wean ourselves from oil and coal, we have on his watch become more deeply dependent on both.

 

Up to now, the conventional wisdom has been that Herbert Hoover, whose policies aggravated the Great Depression, is the odds-on claimant for the mantle “worst president” when it comes to stewardship of the American economy. Once Franklin Roosevelt assumed office and reversed Hoover’s policies, the country began to recover. The economic effects of Bush’s presidency are more insidious than those of Hoover, harder to reverse, and likely to be longer-lasting. There is no threat of America’s being displaced from its position as the world’s richest economy. But our grandchildren will still be living with, and struggling with, the economic consequences of Mr. Bush.

Remember the Surplus?

 

The world was a very different place, economically speaking, when George W. Bush took office, in January 2001. During the Roaring 90s, many had believed that the Internet would transform everything. Productivity gains, which had averaged about 1.5 percent a year from the early 1970s through the early 90s, now approached 3 percent. During Bill Clinton’s second term, gains in manufacturing productivity sometimes even surpassed 6 percent. The Federal Reserve chairman, Alan Greenspan, spoke of a New Economy marked by continued productivity gains as the Internet buried the old ways of doing business. Others went so far as to predict an end to the business cycle. Greenspan worried aloud about how he’d ever be able to manage monetary policy once the nation’s debt was fully paid off.

 

This tremendous confidence took the Dow Jones index higher and higher. The rich did well, but so did the not-so-rich and even the downright poor. The Clinton years were not an economic Nirvana; as chairman of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers during part of this time, I’m all too aware of mistakes and lost opportunities. The global-trade agreements we pushed through were often unfair to developing countries. We should have invested more in infrastructure, tightened regulation of the securities markets, and taken additional steps to promote energy conservation. We fell short because of politics and lack of money—and also, frankly, because special interests sometimes shaped the agenda more than they should have. But these boom years were the first time since Jimmy Carter that the deficit was under control. And they were the first time since the 1970s that incomes at the bottom grew faster than those at the top—a benchmark worth celebrating.

 

By the time George W. Bush was sworn in, parts of this bright picture had begun to dim. The tech boom was over. The nasdaq fell 15 percent in the single month of April 2000, and no one knew for sure what effect the collapse of the Internet bubble would have on the real economy. It was a moment ripe for Keynesian economics, a time to prime the pump by spending more money on education, technology, and infrastructure—all of which America desperately needed, and still does, but which the Clinton administration had postponed in its relentless drive to eliminate the deficit. Bill Clinton had left President Bush in an ideal position to pursue such policies. Remember the presidential debates in 2000 between Al Gore and George Bush, and how the two men argued over how to spend America’s anticipated $2.2 trillion budget surplus? The country could well have afforded to ramp up domestic investment in key areas. In fact, doing so would have staved off recession in the short run while spurring growth in the long run.

 

But the Bush administration had its own ideas. The first major economic initiative pursued by the president was a massive tax cut for the rich, enacted in June of 2001. Those with incomes over a million got a tax cut of $18,000—more than 30 times larger than the cut received by the average American. The inequities were compounded by a second tax cut, in 2003, this one skewed even more heavily toward the rich. Together these tax cuts, when fully implemented and if made permanent, mean that in 2012 the average reduction for an American in the bottom 20 percent will be a scant $45, while those with incomes of more than $1 million will see their tax bills reduced by an average of $162,000.

[H8tank]

After almost seven years of this president, the United States is less prepared than ever to face the future. We have not been educating enough engineers and scientists,

 

Dammit bush, can't you do anything right?

[TimC]

Vanity Fair?

 

Yes, I think wiegie uses Vanity Fair as a teaching tool.

[Egret]

Vanity Fair?

 

Yes, I think wiegie uses Vanity Fair as a teaching tool.

You'd be surprised what passes for text books in Germany.

[TheShiznit]

Dammit bush, can't you do anything right?

 

He and his advisors can't do math...that is for sure.

[Perchoutofwater]

The sky is falling.

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

The value of the US dollar is colapsing.

 

fixed

[TheShiznit]

QUOTE(Perchoutofwater @ 11/12/07 1:20pm) *

The value of the US dollar is colapsing.

 

Capn Grunge

fixed

 

Not so much....collapsing?

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

Not so much....collapsing?

 

That too...

[TheShiznit]

That too...

 

LOL....

[Randall]

The next president will have to deal with yet another crippling legacy of George W. Bush: the economy. A Nobel laureate, Joseph E. Stiglitz, sees a generation-long struggle to recoup.

 

 

 

The next 3 Nobel Prize Laureates will be the ones who fix Bush's messes. In business he was a failure, but this is a failure beyond measure.

 

How did this idiot get a job like president?

[polksalet]

The next president will have to deal with yet another crippling legacy of George W. Bush: the economy. A Nobel laureate, Joseph E. Stiglitz, sees a generation-long struggle to recoup.

The next 3 Nobel Prize Laureates will be the ones who fix Bush's messes. In business he was a failure, but this is a failure beyond measure.

 

How did this idiot get a job like president?

 

Ask yourself that. What happened before his election to make people vote for such an idiot.

[AtomicCEO]

Ask yourself that. What happened before his election to make people vote for such an idiot.

 

Don't try to shift the blame for your mistake. Take responsibility for your own actions.

 

"I was so frightened that I voted for Bush" is not an excuse.

[polksalet]

Don't try to shift the blame for your mistake. Take responsibility for your own actions.

 

"I was so frightened that I voted for Bush" is not an excuse.

 

If I had it to do over again I would vote the same way. I cannot even imagine the clownfest that would have resulted from a walking corpse fighting the taliban.

[SheikYerbuti]

If I had it to do over again I would vote the same way. I cannot even imagine the clownfest that would have resulted from a walking corpse fighting the taliban.

 

Yes, the results would have been so much worse. . .

 

[polksalet]

Yes, the results would have been so much worse. . .

 

 

Surrender would have been worse.

[DemonKnight]

Surrender would have been worse.

 

What exactly would constitute surrender to islamic extremists? Turning the United States into an Islamic country governed by Koran law? How ignorant do you have to be to believe ANY presidantial candidate would do that?

[polksalet]

What exactly would constitute surrender to islamic extremists? Turning the United States into an Islamic country governed by Koran law? How ignorant do you have to be to believe ANY presidantial candidate would do that?

 

I meant that as a joke. There is no way any democrat would surrender to islamo facists. Muslim is anti-abortion.

 

On a serious note, while gw has done a less than stellar job in certain things I really believe Gore would have done far worse.

[DemonKnight]

On a serious note, while gw has done a less than stellar job in certain things I really believe Gore would have done far worse.

 

I guess you have to justify the last 7 years to your consious somehow.

[SheikYerbuti]

I guess you have to justify the last 7 years to your consious somehow.

 

Well played!

 

[polksalet]

Well played!

 

 

I was going to say that I do not have to justify anything to myself nor do I have to learn how to spell. But that would have been rood.

[DemonKnight]

I was going to say that I do not have to justify anything to myself nor do I have to learn how to spell. But that would have been rood.

 

Ooh, the oh so convenient spelling burn. I missed a "c" in haste. At least I didnt vote for Bush.... twice.

[AtomicCEO]

Ooh, the oh so convenient spelling burn. I missed a "c" in haste. At least I didnt vote for Bush.... twice.

 

It's a childish and unsophisticated retort... yet somehow... it works!

[Yukon Cornelius]

Ask yourself that. What happened before his election to make people vote for such an idiot.

it was voge to vote for the god president.... well now we know that he only heard eddy munster in his head ....

[cliaz]

Bush was never elected. Remember that unlike other democratic political systems in the world where a president is elected we are the only one elects the president indirectly. We use the Electoral College. A president can lose out to the popular vote but still be elected president. He was placed in power the first time by voter fraud in FL and the second time the election was rigged.

 

Elvis and Sammy Davis Jr. rigged the election from their under ground bunker on the Moon.