DUTCH TREAT:

The Gipper as pie chef (Don Erler, 6/08/04, DFW Star-Telegram)

As this newspaper reported on Sunday, the first two years of Reagan's term included the "worst recession since World War II." But after that, our country enjoyed 72 consecutive months of economic growth -- not a single down month, much less an entire down quarter.

Unemployment would soon follow the revived economy that the Reagan tax cuts stimulated. Just as real per capita income increased almost 17 percent, the unemployment rate during the Reagan boom dropped nearly 23 percent. In fact, the economy netted an additional 20 million jobs during the 1980s.

Reagan-bashers, of course, pointed to the fact that more than 47 million Americans lost their jobs between 1981 and 1990. It makes no difference to such economic naysayers that 67 million jobs were created.

Much the same can be said -- is being said -- about the current economy, now growing at an astonishing rate (around 7 percent). Yet Bush-bashers see only economic gloom.

One pundit even wrote on this page last week that "the Bush administration is really about … steadily making this country less fair and making life harder for most citizens."

You might think that the differing perspectives on the current economy are simply a matter of seeing the glass as half full vs. half empty. Wrong. The Bush-bashers are looking at a 10-ounce glass containing 8 ounces of economic juice and complaining about our citizens' unsatisfied thirst.

Consider the facts.

Economic numbers are notoriously difficult to process especially at the time--it seems likely that fifty years from now the interpretation will be that there were no negative quarters even up until today.

Posted by Orrin Judd at June 8, 2004 12:52 PM