Obamanomics: We know economics has been called the dismal science, but the latest Economic Report of the President makes for especially bleak reading. Looking through it, it's easy to see why the economy under President Obama is so bad.
Heritage Foundation economist Brian Riley had a very interesting insight: Just for grins, he went through the 435-page presidential economic tome and counted up the mentions of "freedom" and "inequality."
The score: Freedom got 1 mention, inequality 235.
That tells you the Obamanauts are so obsessed with "inequality" that they delude themselves about what's really important to an economy: growth. Sure, they talk about something called "inclusive growth," as if any such thing even exists. It doesn't. It's a feel-good social-branding term that has no basis in actual reality and excuses Obama's failure to make the real economy grow.
Make no mistake, growth is the salve that heals all wounds. A growing economy creates greater income, opportunity and resources for all -- even for those at the bottom. What's the best way to get growth? In a word, freedom. The same word that Obama's top economist, Jason Furman, and the phalanx of economists working for him, have studiously ignored in the president's report.
Because of limits imposed on the economy -- the highest marginal tax rates on corporations in the developed world, costly rules on factories from the EPA to curb CO2 output, ObamaCare taxes, and Dodd-Frank's poisonous new regimen of financial regulation -- this has been the most anti-growth administration in modern history.
If growth had merely been average emerging from the last recession -- that is, 4% rather than Obama's 2.2% -- our economy would be $1.8 trillion larger. Cumulatively, we've lost more than $5.5 trillion in total output. Congress' Joint Economic Committee estimates that if growth had been only average since the recession ended in the second quarter of 2009, "after-tax per person income would be $3,339 (2009 dollars) per year higher." That's the Obamanomics growth tax paid by every working American.
It's even worse than that, however. Despite the crowing by the Obama administration, the current 5% unemployment rate is no true success. That number has been distorted by the massive wave of departures from the workforce. Today, a record 94 million Americans over 16 are out of the workforce -- meaning, they're supported by the 135 million people who work. The employment-population ratio remains stuck below 60% -- the lowest since the stagflationary 1970s.
While Obama touts the "14 million new jobs" created under his stewardship of the economy, he isn't telling the whole truth: With merely average growth, we would have had 5 million more jobs created since 2009. In short, his administration has been a jobs disaster.
Truth is, our traditional economic freedom has been severely damaged under Obama. In the 2016 Index of Economic Freedom, the U.S. tied its all-time worst score, and is now ranked 11th in the world -- down from a ranking of sixth when Obama took office.
And, yes, this matters. There is a very close link between economic freedom and economic growth, as repeated studies demonstrate. Yet, at every juncture during the past seven years, Obama has opted for class warfare, divisive identity politics, inequality battles and confrontations over race, rather than finding ways to make the economy grow.
As the Joint Economic Committee said last year: "The economy continues to suffer from gaps in economic growth, private-sector jobs, and real income growth, lagging far behind the average post-1960 recovery."
Nor is any of this an accident. The current president has intentionally allowed the economy to deteriorate, knowing that it would set off furious battles over "fairness," "equality," "greed," and the like. Obama's 2016 economic report only underscores his economic folly.
