Is It Really All Obama's Fault?

I just heard a woman on the radio (frankly I don't know who she was but she must have been a political candidate or someone in a party committee or something such). She claimed that (1) we have never had such a protracted period with the unemployment rate over 8%; and (2) that the price of gasoline is 110% higher now than when Obama took office.

All this led to a pitch for Mitt Romney as better qualified to be President.

Let's look at these claims and examine whether they are to be blamed on Obama. First, the price of gas. It's been stated many times that one reason that gas prices have risen is that world demand for oil, led by increasing living standards in China and India, has been rising. Everybody has heard of the law of supply and demand: with greater demand, the price is going to rise.

Second, Obama has been guiding the US back to economic health after a worldwide near-meltdown of the economy and the banking system in 2008—before he took office. The economy is still not robust and thus employment has been improving only gradually. It probably would take New Deal–style programs to make a big difference in that—programs which the Republicans definitely would fight tooth-and-nail and almost certainly would successfully block.

I heard someone talking about the power of the President. The bottom line was that the president does not have as much power as people tend to think. Our government is divided into three branches—the so-called Separation of Powers, which has shown itself to be a wise provision of those who established our form of government. So the Executive Branch (the President and his cabinet departments) can't do everything on their own.

Where government departments and agencies can influence the economy, we have (again) Conservatives and Republicans crying out that the government has too much power and advocating for little or no regulation—the "free market" philosophy which, as they'd like us to forget, is what caused the economic mess in the first place.

So it looks like they (the Conservatives and Republicans) want to blame Obama for any and all problems the country is experiencing, but at the same time they want to negate or thwart any power he or his cabinet departments might actually have to affect those same problems.

Looks to me like they just want to blame.

Updated May 13, 2012

Copyright © 2012 by Richard Stein

It's a Good Wind That Blows No Ill: The "Made in America" Campaign

Again I refer to the US television network called ABC and their "ABC World News" evening news program.

They have been carrying on a campaign that urges Americans to buy more American-made items as part of their Christmas gift shopping. The slogan is "Made in America." They have shown video clips of factories that have added workers because of increased sales of their manufactures--in turn, presumably, because of the demand for those products that has been stimulated by ABC.

The numbers of additional workers hired seem to be generally small: 3 here, maybe 10 or so there. I'd be curious to know what the total increased employment is, but that is not given and probably is not even known; but I don't think the impact is a really large one.

Still, I think this is a good thing. I am happy to see American workers rehired or new jobs being created. It's hard to argue with that, since it's good for all of America. Unemployment causes anxiety and suffering, even hunger--which no one in a prosperous land like the US should suffer.

And not only are there restored or newly created American jobs, but this has to be good for the economic statistic called balance of payments: When a country imports more than it exports, that is called a trade deficit and is supposed to be a bad thing--although the great amount of oil that the US imports, to fuel its enormous SUVs, is a big contributor to the US trade deficit.

Now, this is what is called a zero-sum game, meaning that if someone gains, someone else loses. If less imported merchandise is being bought, someone suffers. And it's easy to guess that the main loser in all this would be China.

I don't feel sorry for China if its factories are making fewer goods to be sent to America. In fact, it's not even totally a bad thing for China. Chinese peasants in very large numbers have been leaving the farm to move to the cities and work in factories. This causes at least some social disruption. It can't be totally a bad thing if more peasants remain in the rural areas and grow food.

On the other hand, the "Made in America" trend is not quite totally a good thing for America. If you pay attention to the transportation industry in America, you can't help but be aware that there is a very, very large amount of activity involving goods that come from China: shipping containers, very many of them carrying goods from China, are being moved by American trains and trucks. So that business might be hurt. Still, domestically-made goods have to be transported, too. Maybe some fuel with be saved by manufactures being moved shorter distances.

Copyright (c) 2011 by Richard Stein