Debt Skyrockets, Growth Plummets Under Obama

Obama’s performance review; skyrocketing debt and near-negative growth. Yet he wants us to rehire him.

 

Here are FACTS, and they are indisputable: The economy slowed down in 2011 according to new data released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA).

 

In 2010, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) had grown at 3 percent in 2011, but only at 1.7 percent in 2011. The Bureau said the slowdown was on account of “a downturn in federal government spending, an acceleration in imports, and a larger decrease in state and local government spending.”

 

But spending at the federal level actually increased last year. The slowdown proved that the Obama stimulus of 2009 and 2010 merely created some artificial demand for goods and services, which, once it ran out, did not create a sustainable cycle of growth as promised.

 

The only thing that was apparently accomplished is that now the debt is nearly larger than the economy. While Obama flounders, the national debt is growing at about 10 percent annually.

 

Currently, the national debt stands at $15.236 trillion, while the GDP stood at $15.294 trillion as of Jan. 1. But the real-dollar GDP number may be revised downward, just as the 3^rd  Quarter 2011 GDP numbers were, first from 2.5 percent to 2 percent, and then down to 1.8 percent, resulting in the total number decreasing.

 

The economy in the third quarter has once again fallen way short of the government’s rosy projections. The BEA initially exaggerated the actual growth number by 38 percent!!!

 

If the 4^th quarter 2011 GDP number of 2.8 percent growth is revised downward, it will affect the 1.7 percent annual number significantly and will likely confirm that the national debt is already larger than the entire economy.

 

More will be revealed with the BEA’s revision of the 4^th quarter data, scheduled on Feb. 29, according to the release, which warned, “the fourth-quarter advance estimate released today is based on source data that are incomplete or subject to further revision by the source agency”.

 

To sum it up, four years after the recession began, the economy is still very weak, unemployment remains unacceptably high, consumer inflation is still rising, and the cost of doing business in America remains among the highest in the developed world.

 

Because government-created problems in housing, the financial and monetary system, the burdensome regulatory environment, the restrictions on capital creation, and the highest corporate tax rate in the developed world remain unaddressed, all the spending, borrowing and money printing produced was more pain and continued deterioration of the economy.

 

The situation is now truly bordering on the 1930’s when, no matter how much borrowing, spending, and printing the government did, the economic woes persisted through the decade, and meanwhile, government became considerably larger.

***Ed Randazzo, is a nationally syndicated author. He has been a conservative activist and consultant for over 30 years and is currently the Chief News Editor of Life and Liberty Media***