Since Barack Obama became president-elect, many in the mainstream media have claimed he will inherit the greatest economic crisis since FDR.
Interestingly, many in the media made similar claims before Ronald Reagan was sworn in as president. For example, according to the January 19, 1981 issue of Newsweek, “When Ronald Reagan steps into the White House next week, he will inherit the most dangerous economic crisis since Franklin Roosevelt took office 48 years ago.”
Is Obama really facing an economic crisis greater than Reagan faced 28 years ago?
The misery index (the sum of the inflation rate and the unemployment rate) was 21.98 in June 1980. It was down to 10.07 when Reagan left office in January 1988. The misery index was 7.77 in November 2008.
Given that the misery index was nearly three times as high when Reagan became president than it is today, it appears the claim that Obama will inherit the greatest economic crisis since FDR is quite an exaggeration.
The misery index is a lagging economic indicator
The_Gadfly Thursday, January 8th at 1:00PM EST (link)The hits the market has taken are in point of fact the worst since The Great Depression. Even in my relatively well-insulated job with a beltway bandit working in healthcare related issues, the rumblings of the economic contraction are being felt. For me personally, on paper I’m having the best year of my life. I’m making more than $1K per year I’ve been alive, my obscene amount of credit card debt is holding steady and if I behave myself and don’t use them to buy stuff that isn’t essential will actually go down. I even felt I had sufficient margin so I can plan to have a lasik procedure done now that I’m old enough to need bifocals (one pair of glasses I can manage, but I’d ruin my eyes using the wrong part of the lens if I had bifocals). But I’m not expecting good things next year at raise time.
On top of that, especially given his cabinet picks of late, I expect Obama will be pushing the exact worst options for fixing the economy, and that if he misses any opportunity to stifle recovery either Czarina Pelosi or Herr Reid will ensure they don’t. I expect a misery index of only 21.98 to be a wistful memory of the good old days by the time he faces re-election. These people aren’t clueless. Clueless people guess randomly and get at least SOME of the answers right.
No my friend, like it or not, this is the one true thing the media is saying. Things are bad, and they are going to get worse.
We’ve been called racists enough now that it shouldn’t bother us any more.
-AChance, http://www.redstate.com/moe_lane/2009/11/03/what-men-may-do-we-have-done/#comment-24463
If NY23 was a beat down for Conservatives, what do you call what happened to Progressives in NJ and VA?
inspired by ColdWarrior, http://www.redstate.com/hooah_mac/2009/11/04/ny-23-the-agony-of-defeat-not-so-much/#comment-156