Oct 11, 2014. For at least the last 85 years, since 1929, every time the Democrats took over, jobs were created faster. And every time the Republicans took over, jobs were created slower. Ten times in a row is no accident. And the difference is huge. Why is that? [EMail the Fact Card]
It must have to do with the fact that Democrats worry about jobs and try to stimulate job growth, while Republicans fight job stimulus and worry about government regulations on business — especially things like minimum wage. So the result is really not so surprising.
In a recession, there are two approaches to jobs: (1) stimulus and (2) cutting wages. Democrats favor #1 and Republicans #2. Wage-cutting can take the form of cutting the minimum wage (Michele Bachmann), busting unions (Ronald Reagan), or just letting high unemployment slowly force people to accept lower wages. The idea is that business will hire more workers if they are cheaper. That’s true when business is booming, but not when they can’t sell what they’ve already manufactured.
Emergency stimulus takes the form of temporary government spending on teachers, infrastructure and the like. Normal stimulus keeps interest rates low to encourage new investment housing and business.
In this recession, Obama did as much stimulus as Republicans allowed, and the Fed did its part. This has been too little, so high unemployment has cut wages while the top few percent got richer.
