Reader FW writes:
I was curious about the stock market’s performance during the Clinton era vs the Bush era so I looked up historical Dow Jones Industrial Average data. I thought you might be interested in the results.
11/02/92 – Last market close before 1992 election 3262.21
11/06/00 – Last market close before 2000 election 10977.21
09/17/08 – market closed @ 10609.66From just before the 1992 election to just before the 2000 election, the stock market rose by 336%. From just before the 2000 election to the present (9/17/08), the market has FALLEN 3.3%. But gotta look on the bright side – oil company and Halliburton profits are way up!
This is a message that Democrats really need to do a better job of getting out. Much like Obama needs to do a better job of getting out the message that he’ll cut taxes more than McCain will for everybody but the superrich. We do better for the country economically, though I think that we’re at our best in that regard with Republicans running a chamber of the legislature, preferably the Senate.
I have been directed to this site many times by Google to hear the sound of a fisher cat but site can’t find this. Help?
The problem with this particular message is that Americans aren’t stupid. When is the last time Democrats lowered ANYONE’S taxes?
By the way, are you seriously suggesting that there is a direct correlation between the White House and the stock market?
I cannot help. I’ve never heard a fisher cat in my life. There was a recording of a barking fox on my site, but I removed that after dozens of websites linked to it, claiming that it was the cry of a fisher cat.
Are you seriously suggesting that there is no legislative body in the nation that is headed by Democrats that has lowered taxes recently? I’ll do you the courtesy of assuming that you’re not speaking literally as I imagine you’ll do the same for me.
I. Publius wrote,
Do you have data showing that Republicans are more likely to lower a given person’s taxes?
Yeah, I’ve seen this around, and while I do think it speaks somewhat to the incompetence of the Bush administration, I don’t really credit Clinton with driving up the stock market, and I can’t say that the thrust in the stock market helped a middle class that was shrinking at the time.
Besides, I’m not sure that we want to highlight the economic boom during Clinton’s years because much of that was growth in the finance sector that’s currently looking pretty damn shaky, specifically the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act which tore down the walls between investment banks, commercial banks, and insurance companies (which was passed with a veto-proof majority from a Republican legislature, but sadly, I’m not sure that’s relevant in a discussion about messaging).
I’d LOVE to see proof of any Democrat-led legislative body that lowered taxes recently. If one exists, I’d be willing to wager that it was in the deep south, where most Democrats are of the Health Shuler, Zell Miller variety (IOW, anywhere else, they’d be Republicans.)
Waldo, if you weren’t speaking literally, what’s the point of the blog entry? The only logical reasons that you’d want to “get this message out” is that you either 1) believe there’s a correlation, or 2) think enough Americans are stupid enough to believe there might be.
I am disappointed by the lack of fisher cat sounds.
That is all.
Listen, I’m just not going to googling around for every recent news article about Democratic legislative bodies that have lowered taxes. Life’s too short. Likewise, you and I both know that there is a relationship between the presidency and the health of the economy. The strength of that correlation has been the subject of debate among political scientists and economists for many years. (Michael Kinsley had an article on the topic in Slate just a few days ago.) I neither stated nor implied that there is a “direct correlation,” so I’ll just conclude with the same words that Kinsley used:
Those who understand the DJ recognize the drawbacks of the comparison and it is pretty easy to poke holes through that as an argument for or against a politician. I think that most Americans are stupid enough to believe, as I. Publius was saying; but most Americans are stupid enough to believe anything, and most party faithful are willing to do anything to see their party in control. That both sides use half truths in their commercials to smear the other side is a testament to this.
Oh but of course Democrats are the tax and spenders, just like they’re the ones who want to socialize all aspects of our lives! When’s the last time a Republican tried to use socialist tactics to subvert the freemarket econo…oh right. Wednesday.
Hey so, maybe we can be generous and say that all of this whitewashing, conclusion-drawing-by-stereotype is 99% bullshit? Or would I Publius like for us to spend the rest of our lives calling him and his political bretheren Communists?
Bill Clinton took a busted economy,reeling from John McCain’s last deregulatory brainstorm (S&L bailout) and left office with a budget surplus, on course to pay off the national debt by 2013…
And today as Baby Bush winds down his “administration” we find our financial markets socialized, our national debt doubled (and possibly tripled), 600,000 people unemployed since January and on record with a budget deficit that just went from $500 billion/yr. to “unknowable”.
Yeah, good thing we had the Republicans in charge.
Bubby, you’re smart enough to know that 1) After the 90-91 recession, the economy was already on the rebound before Clinton took office, and 2) he didn’t have a balanced budget until Newt & Co. forced one on him.
Nice try.
It’s no secret, the budget does better when the president and the congress are from opposing parties. It’s a lot easier not to spend money when no one can agree on what to spend it.
Point to “Newt & Co” all you want, we’ve seen what happens when Republicans control both the oval office and the capitol. I’m actually a little worried about having the Democrats control both houses of congress and the office of the president, but the Republican party is sick and needs a chance to reform itself, and Barack Obama will make an excellent president.
I don’t know that I’ll be voting Webb next time around, though.
No Webb vote on a budgetary basis, specific to him? Or just as a general vote for split gov’t? If the former, why?
Giving the President credit and not talking about which party is in control of Congress makes this a very silly point. Sorry you lack a cause to your effect
I encourage you to read the discussion before commenting.
I did read your “correlation is fine” quote and others. Go ahead and keep saying “the economy does better with a democratic no i don’t know why” as an ad.
MB,
My complaints about Webb are perhaps the subject of another discussion, but they’re not budgetary in nature. My general belief is that when the Democrats are in the majority, then I’m interested in trying to move the party leftward. That may very well mean losing a few seats, but when we’re in the majority is when we have seats to spare.