Of the more negative responses to today\u2019s column, the one that\u2019s been most common was the one I was least prepared for: The Bush economy, my correspondents say, was actually pretty good! As one reader e-mailed, \u201cA stock market bordering 14,000, gas prices around $2-2.5\/gal, a deficit in the low billions, an unemployment rate of 5-6% .\u2009.\u2009. oh, how horrible.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s something to this. Depending on how you look at it, the Bush economy was either okay, a bit weak or absolutely awful.<\/p>\n
To make it look okay, you eliminate all context. You look at levels rather than trends. Unemployment was in the 5 to 6 percent range. The economy was growing. Deficits, though rising, were at manageable levels. The stock market was booming. Most Americans were living pretty well. That all sounds pretty good.<\/p>\n
To make it look weaker, you add back in some context. Monthly job growth from March 2001 to December 2007 \u2014 so, from the end of the 2001 recession to the beginning of the 2007 recession \u2014 was 68,000. That\u2019s one of the weakest expansions on record. Meanwhile, poverty and inequality were increasing even as median incomes were falling. Oh, and while Bush\u2019s deficits weren\u2019t huge, they came during a period of growth \u2014 normally, periods of growth are when you cut the deficit, as we saw in the 1990s. So these were deficits of an unusually irresponsible sort.<\/p>\n