Obama By the Numbers - Unemployment

Originally I wanted to put together a rather lengthy and detailed economic analysis of Obama's performance thus far against other presidencies.  The only problem was that this would take a lot of hard work and effort and if there's anything I learned in my 20's it is that hard work and effort rarely pays off.  Ergo, I decided to do more of a series where we take one individual economic statistic at a time and compare the Affirmative Action President against the performance of other, obviously lesser, presidents.

Before we do this, however, I should point out that such comparisons are actually somewhat flawed in that chalking up the performance of the entire economy to one man and his affiliate political party is foolish.  It is really the policies that are implemented by congress, the president, not to mention the actions of the American people that ultimately determine the economic success and growth of a nation.

For example both Reagan and Obama inherited outlandishly bad recessions.

Bill Clinton, though a democrat, implemented more conservative policies than Bush Jr because of a Republican congress.

And the "Great Recession" can squarely be blamed on incompetent bankers and a galactically stupid and ignorant American population rather than Bogeyman Bush.

Therefore, remember to take these statistics with a pinch of salt.  Be intellectually honest and realize it is the overall policies and financial intelligence of the American public that determines our economic success.  However, if at anytime you get into a presidential performance debate with a leftist about "Oh yeah!  Well Bush caused AIDS and eats baby kittens!" then by all means feel free to use these statistics.

Today's statistic is unemployment.

Though I could have gone back longer, I didn't feel the need because unemployment pre-Carter was actually not that bad (well, actually it was under Ford, but I don't want too convoluted of a graph).  Regardless, since the data series has been kept since 1948, Obama, thus far, has the worst unemployment average out of all of our presidents.  In all fairness, like Reagan, he inherited a crippling recession that largely wasn't his fault, however, unlike Reagan, his recovery...well...isn't a recovery.  Reagan was able to get unemployment reduced faster than Obama and it was through job creation, not people leaving the labor force, that did it (as GDP figures when we visit it will show).

So far, based on the NUMBERS (I know, those damn factual mathy statisticy things!) the left's great hope is dead last place.

I'm sure when we look at GDP, though, things will turn around for America's first golf-like handicapped presidency.