There’s been a lot of talk coming out of DC about the economy and how good it is. Since some of the terms that are being used are comparative, (i.e.: “higher than the average of the 70s, 80s and 90s”) I thought it might be interesting to compare today’s numbers to those in the past.

The first set of numbers looked at was the GDP. The percent of change in the GDP, adjusted for inflation, was calculated for each of the presidential terms since Truman took office in 1949. This covers 14 presidential terms.

Here is how they ranked in descending order:

21.81% _ Johnson
21.00% _ Truman
19.86% _ Kennedy/Johnson
17.87% _ Clinton (2nd)
15.98% _ Reagan (2nd)
13.67% _ Carter
13.53% _ Clinton (1st)
13.45% _ Eisenhower (1st)
12.63% _ Reagan (1st)
12.38% _ Nixon
10.91% _ Eisenhower (2nd)
10.62% _ Nixon/Ford
09.56% _ Bush 43
08.81% _ Bush 41

Here’s where the numbers can be found:
http://www.bea.gov/bea/dn/gdplev.xls

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/us.html

GDP - real growth rate:
Definition Field Listing Rank Order
4.4% (2004 est.)

i have no clue where the hell you got your inflated numbers from..but this is from the CIA WORLD FACT BOOK..4.4%

Well, I notice both posts site ".gov" sites for their numbers.
You have to remember that the GDP is a number based upon government caculated numbers, found by or created by the government to estimate the amount of growth. And considering that we all know how disconnected the government is from reality, its not a big jump to guess that they are disconnected from each other.

To true, Left. I thinks it just shows how inemped this government is that it cant even gets its OWN facts straight.

But even if the numbers are wrong somewhat, the order is the same. Notice how at the bottom is the Republicans and their pride of being fiscally sound? What a laugh. These guys should have went into comedy.

AH listed the link with the data. The 4.4% you refer to is one years growth, the numbers in the OP are for a 4-year term in office, that's why they are so much larger.

ApathyEcstasy:
Thanks for the link. I haven’t explored it yet but it appears to have a wealth of good information.

Leftinrightsouth:
“You have to remember that the GDP is a number based upon government caculated numbers, found by or created by the government to estimate the amount of growth”

That may be true but these are the numbers Bush is bragging about and they are the only ones I have to work with.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/20...1/20060106.html
GDP Growth Is Strong. The economy grew at 4.1 percent in the third quarter, the 10th consecutive quarter in which GDP grew at a rate above 3 percent.



That gives me an idea for another comparison.

Arm,
I wasn't discouraging you at all, I was trying to get Apathy to understand where you were coming from and why it's dificult to believe any of the numbers produced by this whitehouse. You might also look at the numbers of the "falling unemployment' he's (Bushco's) so proud of...and then consider who gets counted as unemployed.

Leftinrightsouth:
You might also look at the numbers of the "falling unemployment' he's (Bushco's) so proud of...and then consider who gets counted as unemployed.

You may have more than a little ESP. I’ve been working on that off and on since the 5th of this month. I’ll try to post it this evening.

it's dificult to believe any of the numbers produced by this whitehouse.

I realize that all administrations come out with “preliminary” figures and revise them as more accurate figures come in. I, also, have no idea how much revision was done by previous administrations.

I do know what revision were made when the Bureau of Labor Statistics posted their last updates on January 5th. I had downloaded the employment levels early that morning. Later that day they published the updates, including the new data for December, and I downloaded the new data set.

I always check the most recent figures against those I previously downloaded for any changes and here is what if found:

The only revisions were to the months Bush was in office. Those between January of 2001 and November of 2005.

That covers a time frame of fifty-nine months. Fifty-seven of those months were revised, either up or down.

Total revisions to the number of employed for the calendar year:
2001 down 12,000 jobs
2002 down 30,000 jobs
2003 down 43,000 jobs
2004 down 49,000 jobs
2005 up 549,000 jobs

It took them up to four years to discover that they had been over-counting the number of people with a job, paying taxes and Social Security and only one month to find over a half a million that they overlooked last month.