Last week, Bush made it sound like his economic policies were poised to create tremendous growth in the coming years.
“[O]ur economy has come through a lot and it’s growing. And people realize that, and that’s positive. And there’s a reason why people say it’s growing, besides me, and that’s because the facts say it’s growing. I mean, we’re growing at a pretty healthy rate of 4 percent over the last year. New jobs are being added. The manufacturing sector appears to be stronger.”
Three days later, the White House isn’t nearly as optimistic.
The Bush administration has significantly scaled back expectations of U.S. job growth, reflecting continued hesitancy on the part of employers and robust growth in output per worker.
The White House said it expects nonfarm employment to rise 2.1 million next year to an annual average of 133.4 million. In February, it had projected 3.6 million more jobs in 2005. To achieve its new projection, employment growth should average 175,000 a month in 2005, according to the forecast, which was jointly developed by the Council of Economic Advisers, the Treasury Department and the Office of Management and Budget.
The administration also lowered its long-term employment projections, forecasting an average annual increase of 1.8 million for the next six years, down from two million in the February projections.
So much for “strong and getting stronger.”
Based on Bush’s estimates last year, his third tax-cut scheme was supposed to create 300,000 jobs a month, every month, starting in July 2003 and ending this month. So far, he’s fallen short of his guarantee 14 out of 17 months. And now that his economic policies have had four years to start working, Bush wants Americans to know one simple truth: expect even less.
Please note the implications of Bush’s new estimates: if the U.S. averages 175,000 new jobs a month in 2005, the growth will barely break even with population growth. These are the economic “good times” that Bush has produced after four years of an economic policy that starts and ends with tax cuts for rich people.
I’m sure it’s just a coincidence that these new, pessimistic estimates were held until after the election and released a few days before Christmas.