If there was any lingering doubt, yesterday's news that the economy lost 17,000 jobs in December -- the first month of job losses since 2003 -- should verify that we are entering, if we aren't already in, a recession, the second of the Bush/GOP decade. The GOP is worried about a popular repudiation of its neoliberal Chicago-school style economic program, and rightly so: the Bush/GOP economic expansion of 2002-2007 has been the weakest since the Great Depression.
There is no more hiding from the facts. In recent diaries I've told you about the how the 1920s credit bubblemirrored this decade, and how the ensuing housing slump looks to be the worst since the Great Depression. In this diary I will lay out for you simply and clearly just how awful the GOP record of job creation has been, and where the growth has gone.
Yesterday the Bureau of Labor Statistic reported that the US economy lost 17,000 jobs in December 2007. In the past, actual job losses in this survey have meant that the economy is about to enter, or is already in, a recession. Almost as bad, the BLS revised sharply downward its entire 2007 jobs survey, from ~1.3 million to ~1 million, meaning more than one quarter of all the jobs thought to have been created last year, evaporated into thin air: they never happened. The gradual but inexorable decline in the creation of new jobs per month ever since 2005 is easily seen on this graph showing same:
Since Bush took office in 2001 and the Republicans held a majority in both Houses of Congress, the US population has grown about 18 million people, from ~285,000,000 to ~303,000,000. How many jobs has the GOP economy added? As the graph below shows, a whopping 5.5 million:
It is usually accepted that the US has to add about 150,000 jobs a month, or about 1.8 million jobs a year, just to keep even with population growth. That adds up to 12.6 million in 7 years. As the two graphs above show, the Bush/ GOP economy is about 7 million jobs short.
Moreover, when we compare the Bush/GOP expansion with every other expansion since the Great Depression, its record of job creating is easily the worst. This can be easily seen in the graph below, which shows the percentage of additional jobs created in the economy each year. The Bush expansion is last last little camel hump on the right. But more importantly, it is obviously the smallest hump. Notice that every other expansion since the 1930s -- even in the dismal 1970s -- created a higher percentage of new jobs than did Bush and the GOP this decade.
If we zoom in a little closer on the same graph, we can see that even Ronald Reagan's expansion created more new jobs (+5 %), as did Pappy Bush's (+3 %) as did Bill Clinton's (+3 %), than did the economic policies pursued by Bush and his GOP Congress-drones. The very best their expansion could manage was a measily (+2 %):
So what did expand during the Bush/GOP economy? Not household income. Their economy was the very first expansion since the Great Depression during which median household income failed to surpass or even equal household income at the time of the last peak in 1999. That's right, since Bush and the GOP took charge of the economy in 2001, the average American household has never made it back to the income it enjoyed at the peak of the Clinton economy, as we can see on this graph that shows median American household income: [note: diary updated to fix graph]
So, where did all the income go? That riddle is solved by the second piece of news that came out yesterday, namely, ExxonMobil's record profits:
Exxon Mobil Corp. and Chevron Corp., the two biggest U.S. oil companies, reported gains in fourth- quarter earnings after record crude prices more than made up for declining output.
....
Both companies set all-time highs for full-year profit, and Exxon Mobil broke its own record for net income by any U.S. corporation, at $40.6 billion. The companies also topped analyst earnings estimates, which were tempered by contracts that give oil-rich nations bigger shares of output as crude prices rise.
That's right. ExxonMobil alone made ~$125 in raw profit for every man, woman, and child in the US, during 2007. It's share price during the Bush Administration looks nothing like the stagnating jobs and income graphs above:
And while ExxonMobil's stock price has been surging, ExxonMobil corporate insiders cashed in ~$150,000,000 worth of shares in the last 12 months, mainly acquired via stock options.
No wonder that polls of whether the country is on right track or the wrong track poll are at abysmal lows, with only 27% of Americans saying the country is on the right track, and 68% saying it's on the wrong track. Americans have learned an essential truth:
The only thing the GOP is good at is the politics of Fear and Smear. When it comes to job creation, like most every other important measure of the economy, the GOP's record is the worst since the Great Depression.