who says the economy is doing well?

Question

bush took office the Dow was @ 10,500,....six years and almost no growth......real estate is dropping nationwide, the right has declared war on all unions, oil and energy costs are crushing small businesses, US auto industry is a joke, ........we are so busy spending money on a worthless war, that our only industry relies on war itself.

btw---what does america produce?

Answer 1

The good news is perhaps well-known, but bears retelling. Real GDP growth for the fiscal's first quarter is 8.1 per cent, including 10.1 per cent for industry and 9.6 per cent for services. Within industry, manufacturing is on a tear, growing at 11.3 per cent. Merchandise export growth has been strong: up 25 per cent from April to August in US dollar terms, and broad-based both in commodity composition and in destination market.

Perhaps even more important for the health of the economy has been the continued buoyant growth of non-oil imports (29 per cent in the fiscal till September), within which capital goods imports have grown even faster. As the Review notes, the return to a trade deficit has assisted the job of liquidity management, allowing the RBI to dispense with the market stabilisation scheme and to use its more conventional tools of open market operations.

Answer 2

The Dow was still high from the dot-com boom in 2001. It went down to as low as 7528 in mid-2002, and is now up over 4000 points since then. So, yes, that benchmark of the economy has improved.

Also, consider that:
Unemployment is still below 5%.
New housing starts have continued to rise through most of the year.
There are more self employed Americans today than ever before.
More Americans own their homes today than ever before.

The economy is fantastic, denying it just shows you have no understanding of basic economics.

Answer 3

Just because we have jobs to fill does not mean that the economy is great, I think it's lousy. Ever hear of the working poor? That's me, two jobs and I can't pay the basic bills. I don't smoke, drink or do drugs so I don't waste money on that. The cost of fuel had driven gas, heating oil and food prices up. The minimum wage is a joke, who can support themselves on that? The economy is awful unless you own oil fields

Answer 4

the economy where I live is booming. Maybe you should move.

My family is trucking along quite nicely-we ain't rollin in money, but we are paying our bills, eating out once or twice a week, and still setting money aside in savings. I feel very confident with the economy. I am sorry you are insecure. Perhaps you should go back to school or consider a career change if you feel you haven't got enough money to live on.

Answer 5

I don't think I can ad anything to this except to say.. yer right !

(wait)

I dislike this site because you can not debate the answers with any appreciable result.. but in fact I will ad this.
Shiraz, Interested, Birdsnakecat.. are all right wing Ideologists.. I have gone round and round with all of these characters and no matter what ...these core hard liners along with a few others always pop up, no matter what time of day it is with this same line of Bush!t.. if you have a real statement or question they're there for damage control. Either they are paid or are stuck like me in front of a computer day and night but either way..

what the gentleman posed is completely accurate. The recession of Bill Clinton? that is a joke.. we had leveled of the deficit and were in the black.. there is no denying that ..period! within the last 5 years it has ballooned to it's all time high with no end in sight. Going up at a rate of 1.6 billion dollars a day ! This current administration has borrowed more money from foreign interests than all the administrations prior put together, again fact ! check it out... http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

As for GDP/GNP this paper(http://www.bu.edu/historic/06conf_papers/Carew.pdf#search=%22%20GDP%20AND%20GNP%20IN%20THE%20UNITED%20STATES%20FALSE%20%3F%22) sums it up very well.. for example, the GDP goes up if five families loose their farm to agro-corporates ..but we know on the ground that the displacement of the farm owners, the workers from those farms as well as the community where those farms existed are all adversely effected by that transition. Because corporations are recognized as "individuals" through the misuse of the 14th amendment the GDP goes up as the corporate-individual's production goes up.. however again.. the reality is that companies like General Foods and Monsanto are international conglomerates (not people) ..the money does not stay in the community, the specialized and repeated growing of the same crop year after year requires more and more life support ( bio and petrol chemicals, pesticides/defoliants ) as the soil is stripped of it's natural growth properties and in the end.. the displaced workers end up working in a wall mart or super Kmart because those are the only jobs left.. but again the GDP goes up as the Wallmart and Kmart "individual" show growth and ad jobs albeit low paying and often times below the poverty levels.. The QLI or "quality of life index" is a much more complete statistic that shows a steady trend of burgeoning poverty for middle class America (http://www.uic.edu/orgs/qli/) also from the census bureau, this report from 2006 ironically shows that "red states" have the highest levels of poverty both adult and child(http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/acs_cpspovcompreport.pdf) and also that the median family income has been steadily dropping off (http://www.treasury.gov/press/releases/reports/032806%20tei%20final.pdf#search=%22average%20household%20income%201965%202004%22) in this last graph you can see that the median family income was 34000.00 in 1965 by 2004 it had only risen to 44000.00 that is a ten thousand dollar increase (census beareau ) in 1965 the average automobile was 2100.00 in 2004 it was 17000.00 in 1965 the average home cost was 19000.00 in 2004 it was 189000.00 but that last one by 2006 had risen to 237,000.00 but in some places like NY or CA the averages were nearing 498,000.00 .. I could only find a graph that went from 1965 to 2004 but we all know that everything has sky rocketed in the last 2 years...

as for unemployment .. again the numbers look one way but really reveal something else all together.. first the only sectors to have seen any growth in the last 3-5 years have been the military ( contractors/arms manufacturing/personnel) and service industries.. however once you stop receiving Unemployment from the factory job that you were working (that one of the "free trade agreements" sapped from you community ) you then drop off the counted list and become one of the Economic ghosts that Gore Vidal talks about in " perpetual war for perpetual peace".. the sad reality is once again masked by huff and puff from the corporate media. Small cities in the United States run around a 17-44% unemployment rate(http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/economy/july-dec03/unemployment_07-29.html)

The bottom line is that more Americans are disenfranchised than ever before and as the Gap between very wealthy and very poor spreads we grow closer to the grand police state that the current administration so desperately desires. we have a war on poverty a war on drugs a war on illiteracy a war on terror a war on aids.. but none of these wars are being won.. in fact they all boil down to a war on people..

I am willing to intelligently debate this via email with anyone that's willing .. but I won't hold my breath.

Answer 6

Everyone else except the delusioned degenerates such as yourself.

The economy is not judged upon the Dow, you nitwit, it's judged upon GDP. Quit talking about stuff that is way over your feeble head.

Answer 7

Propaganda gets you nowhere.If you work hard and spend your money right and save properly you SHOULD have nothing to worry about.Cost of living goes up and down that's just the facts."What goes up must come down". Facter in a WORTHY war and that leaves it sitting in your lap to depend of youself.Go whine in the mirror.

Answer 8

doom and gloom......your sad news is nothing more than misrepresentation of the truth.

hows this....

the consumption of grains has increased since bush took office 6 yrs ago. the cost of gas has gone up in that time so Bush must be forcing people to eat more grains in order to raise the price of gas......that about as logical as your question.

stop drinking the cool aid

Answer 9

The conservatives/Republicans are saying that the economy is well. Halliburton and other companies are making killer money right now since the Iraq invasion. Other than that the others are suffering big time.

Answer 10

Haliburton and Exxon believe the economy is doing well