Sunday, February 12, 2012

So what have the Democrats brought us since they have been in power starting in 2006!


My rant today is on the unintended consequences that always result from the actions of the Leftists. Detroit comes to mind as a great example. The left has had complete control of that region since the twenties and look where it has gotten them. Greece, Spain, Ireland are all showing the unsustainable predictable result.

The Democrats ruled the Senate and House of Representatives from 2006 till 2008 then they controlled all three political branches of government (the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives) from 2008 till 2010 when the (Republicans took control of only the house). The Democrats have control of the White House and Congress from 2010 till the present. So with that all being said they own this mess we are currently in. It is time to live within our means, reduce the size and scope of the government.

A simple measure of Government is as percentage of GDP we are currently at 24% we need to reduce this level to no more then 20% of our GDP as this has been a time proven health sustainable maximum level government size.

So what have the Democrats brought us since they have been in power starting in 2006!
  1. Obamacare (sure to be a drag on the economy for decades)
  2. Spendulus Bills in the trillions (that will be sure to be felt by our grand children)
  3. Dodd-Frank bill (sure to raise banking costs and reduce lending of available money)
  4. 99 weeks of unemployment insurance (sure to prolong unemployment and put further tax burden on businesses)
  5. Quantitative easing 1 and 2 (sure to bring on inflation)
  6. 8% plus Unemployment with
  7. Record food stamp dependency (why Obama's picture should be on the food stamp)
  8. 50% of the population paying no income tax (sure to make it difficult to get voters to make the needed tough decisions that have to be made) 

I have pasted a great article below by John Merline of Investors Daily for your consideration.

Dependency Index Surges 23% Under President Obama


By JOHN MERLINE, INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Posted 02/08/2012 08:02 AM ET
The American public's dependence on the federal government shot up 23% in just two years under President Obama, with 67 million now relying on some federal program, according to a newly released study by the Heritage Foundation.
The conservative think tank's annual Index of Dependence on Government tracks money spent on housing, health, welfare, education subsidies and other federal programs that were "traditionally provided to needy people by local organizations and families."
The two-year increase under Obama is the biggest two-year jump since Jimmy Carter was president, the data show.
The rise was driven mainly by increases in housing subsidies, an expansion in Medicaid and changes to the welfare system, along with a sharp rise in food stamps, the study found.
"You can't get around the fact that policy decisions made over the past two years, on top of those made over the past several decades, are having a large effect on the pace of growth of the index," said William Beach, who authored the Heritage study.
Government dependence has climbed steadily since 1962, when the index stood at 19. By 1980, the index had risen to 100. It stood at 294 in 2010, the last year for which the data are available. D.C.-based Heritage has produced the index for nine years.
The report also found that spending on "dependence programs" accounts for more than 70% of the federal budget. That, too, is up dramatically. In 1990, for example, the figure stood at 48.5%, and in 1962 just over a quarter of federal spending went to dependence programs.
At the same time, fewer Americans pay income taxes, the report notes. Almost half (49.5%) didn't pay income taxes in 2009, the latest year for which the researchers have data. Back in the late 1960s, only 12% of Americans escaped the income tax burden.
Other findings:
The number of people dependent on the federal government shot up 7.5% in the past two years.
In 2010, for the first time ever, average spending on dependence programs per recipient exceeded the country's per-capita disposable income.
The dependency index has dipped only seven times in the past 49 years, three of which were under President Reagan and two under President Clinton.
Some observers say the rise in dependence under Obama is merely a reflection of the deep and long recession.
But Beach says his team's research shows that economic effects account for only one-fifth of the change in the index.
In addition, the index shot up 8% in 2010, a year when the economy grew by 3%.
Also, in the wake of the 1981-82 recession the dependence index climbed only 6%, then fell the very next year. That early-'80s slump was nearly as long as the so-called Great Recession (16 months vs. 18 months) and saw unemployment rise higher (peaking at 10.8% vs. 10%).
The lingering high jobless rate during the slow economic recovery under Obama could also explain dependency's rise. It's also possible that the growth in federal dependency programs is partly to blame for the ongoing jobs recession, not just the result of it.
As the chart above shows, the time it's taken for employment to reach its pre-recession peak has climbed the past four decades, right along with the growth in federal dependency. The current jobs recession hit a post-World War II record of 48 months in January, with payrolls still 5.6 million below their January 2008 high.
Research seems to validate this connection. Various studies have shown that extending unemployment benefits can keep unemployment rates higher than they would otherwise have been.
Obama's own former economic adviser, Larry Summers, noted in the 1999 Concise Encyclopedia of Economics that "government assistance programs contribute to long-term unemployment ... by providing an incentive, and the means, not to work."

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