“President Obamas stimulus failed because it didn’t hold unemployment under the promised 8 percent.”
In fact, President Obamas transition team based that projection on the GDP numbers from the 3rd Quarter of 2008, which showed an economic decline of 3 percent. However, in the 4th Quarter of 2008, the US economy fell off a cliff resulting in a decline of 8.9 percent; far worse than anyone expected. So the original recommended stimulus could not possibly have reached the goal of 8 percent unemployment. And Teapublicans threatened to filibuster the stimulus if it was made any larger.
As he took office, President Obama faced the worst economic decline in US history…even worse than the Great Depression! Not only had the GDP declined at the rate of 8.9 percent, the economy was shedding 800,000 private sector jobs each month.
Despite unprecedented opposition by Teapublicans, the Obama administrations policies have dramatically turned those numbers around. Since taking office, the GDP has turned from the 8.9 percent decline to a sustained growth rate of 2-3 percent. And the economy has added an average of roughly 200,000 jobs each month.
Thats a sustained turnaround of 11-12 percent in GDP and a positive swing of approximately a million jobs per month!
Almost any fair-minded observer would label the turnaround as utterly miraculous. Indeed, a British economist stated that to have done more, President Obama would have to have been Winston Churchill on steroids.”