And Obama And The A-Team Can’t Figure Out the Problem!

Right now the writing is on the wall for higher taxes, more regulation and uncertainty, and the Dems wonder why businesses aren’t lending, investing, and hiring.

Some Recent Headlines

“Big Firms Would Face Deeper Tax Bite”. – The Wall Street Journal

“A Red-Ink Decade/Obama Budget Sees Years of Deficits”. – The New York Times

“Obama to target overseas tax breaks.” – The Financial Times

“Higher Taxes for All in Obama Budget, $1.6 Tril 2010 Deficit”. – Investor’s Business Daily

“Obama budget would spend billions more”. – The Washington Post

I mean, don’t or perhaps can’t at least some people in the WH read the newspapers?

The following chart compares the growth of gross domestic product (GDP) since the beginning of the current recession in 2008 to previous recessions.

Click Image To Enlarge

* GDP is the broadest measure of economic performance, tracking the market value of all goods and services produced in the United States.

The present recession is noteworthy not just for its severity of economic contraction but also for the length of the decline.

A quick look at the table shows that in the nine previous recessions on record, that the economy had actually grown by an average of 4% compared to its pre-recession peak, seven quarters after the official start of the recession.

However, seven quarters after the current recession began, the economy remains 3.2% smaller than its pre-recession peak and this holds true even though the third quarter of 2009 saw the first positive growth in GDP in a year.

So despite the GDP uptick in the most recent quarter, the current recession remains the worst performer on record this long after a business cycle peak.