The title of this diary is what Bill Clinton said at the 2000 Democratic Convention. ("We've tried their way, we've tried our way, our way just works better."
At least in regards to economic growth, the data is now in to confirm that:
Calculated from information from www.measuringworth.com:
Growth of real GDP per capita under Clinton: 1993-2000: 2.65%
Growth of real GDP per capita under Bush: 2001-2008: 1.42%
Some may say that this comparison isn't entirely fair because Clinton took power when a recession was just ending, whereas Bush took power when a recession was just starting. So, we can modify the results to exclude the first year:
Growth of real GDP per capita under Clinton 1994-2000: 2.63%
Growth of real GDP per capita under Bush 2002-2008: 1.55%
Still a huge difference.
Some may argue that other factors cause a greater influence than the president, but I tend to think that over an 8 year period, those other factors will 'wash out' leaving the policies of the president as a main factor, if not the mean factor. A small difference could be explained by any number of factors, but you're looking at nearly twice the rate of growth under Clinton as under Bush. The odds that that would occur due to 'luck' I think are pretty minimal.
One could argue that under the first year of a new administration the economy is mostly swayed by the policies of the previous administration and that the performance of real GDP per capita in 2001 should count under Clinton's record. That would decrease his showing.
However, to complete that comparison, you'd also need to include the 2009 data under Bush's record and, first, that obviously isn't possible, and second, that would really decrease his showing.
The primary difference between the two admins was the Clinton raised taxes whereas Bush cut them. I'm not saying that the tax cuts led to the lower economic growth, but I am saying the fact that GDP grew faster under Clinton than it did under Bush is very strong evidence that tax cuts do not cause the economy to grow. This is likely due to the fact that the tax rates under Clinton were already low enough that the diminishing returns of benefits caused by lowering taxes had already been reached.
One could, in fact though also make a reasonable case that the tax cuts did slow economic growth: they fueled the housing bubble and other non beneficial spending that was essentially, at best, wasted money and did not lead to increases in the productive capacity of the economy.
The other major difference is that Clinton balanced budgets while Bush caused massive deficits. A simple case could be made that balancing Federal budgets whether through tax increases or spending cuts is an essential ingredient in sustaining solid economic growth. However, I'd need to see a lot more information to begin to determine whether that was true or not.