Bush is dead wrong

[tuvor]

Joseph Stiglitz
Wednesday October 6, 2004
The Guardian

Many around the world are surprised at how little attention the economy is receiving in President Bush's re-election campaign. But I am not surprised: if I were Bush, the last thing I would want to talk about is the economy. Yet many people look at America's economy, even over these past three-and-a-half years, with some envy. Annual economic growth - at an average rate of 2.5% - may have been markedly slower than during the Clinton years, but it still looks strong compared with Europe's anaemic 1%.
But these statistics mask a glaring fact: the average American family is worse off than it was three-and-a-half years ago. Median income has fallen by over $1,500 in real terms, with families being squeezed as wages lag behind inflation. In short, all that growth benefited only those at the top of the income distribution, the same group that had done so well over the previous 30 years and benefited most from Bush's tax cut.

For example, some 45 million Americans have no health insurance, up by 5.2 million from 2000. Families lucky enough to have health insurance face annual premiums that have nearly doubled, to $7,500. Families also face increasing job insecurity. This is the first time since the early 1930s that there has been a net loss of jobs over the span of a presidential administration.

Bush supporters ask: is Bush really to blame for this? Wasn't the recession already beginning when he took office?

The resounding answer is that Bush is to blame.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1320596,00.html

[ogradda]

1. it's not his fault - he never makes mistakes <sarcasm>

just watching his lying lips move make me sick.