10 Obama's Numbers FROM PAGE 1


took office. Analysis Gathering


statistics is a


painstaking and time-consuming job. Figures on crime, household incomes and poverty in 2016 weren’t released until September 2017, for example.


complete


But now we have a reasonably statistical


picture of the


Obama years, which began in the middle of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, and ended with the highest level of household income ever recorded.


These facts often turn out to be at odds with the impressions created by candidates who, for example, claimed wages and incomes were stagnant when in fact they were rising. The facts also can conflict with impressions created by news media reporting dramatic but untypical events. Despite nonstop coverage


of several mass


shootings, for example, the murder rate was going down for most of the Obama years, hitting the lowest ever recorded in 2014.


Some of these figures remain subject to tweaks and revisions. Figures on handgun production in 2016 are still “preliminary,” for example, and others will remain subject to slight revisions for years to come, as statisticians routinely refine their methods and assumptions. We will keep this update current as necessary in the months and years to come. For now, it’s as “final” as possible.


Jobs and Unemployment Jobs — Over Obama’s eight years


in office, the economy added a net total of nearly 11.5 million jobs — a gain in total nonfarm employment of 8.6 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.


That percentage gain is not as


large as for most other administrations since the end of World War II.


In fact, the only other post-war


administrations to see smaller gains in employment were those of Obama’s predecessor, George W. Bush, who eked out a bare 1 percent gain, Dwight D. Eisenhower (7.1 percent in his eight years), and Bush’s father, George H.W. Bush (2.5 percent during his four years).


Jimmy Carter saw a much stronger employment gain — 12.8 percent — despite the fact that his administration lasted only four years, half as long as Obama’s.


Note: For these historical comparisons, we’ve begun with the inauguration of Harry Truman in 1949, when he became the first president elected after the end of World War II. For simplicity, we’ve combined the administrations of Democrats John F. Kennedy and his successor, Lyndon B. Johnson (who took office after Kennedy was assassinated), and of Republicans Richard Nixon and his successor, Gerald Ford (who served out the remainder of Nixon’s second term after Nixon resigned), as though each were single eight-year adminis- trations.


In our graphics, Republican had the administrations


we show in red,


Democratic administrations in blue. Obama


unique


disadvantage of taking office in the midst of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. More than 4 million jobs were lost in his first year


Volume 12 Number 1


in office, on top of the 4 million lost in George W. Bush’s final year.


To be sure, Bush’s eight years


were marked by two recessions, including one that began two months after he took office in 2001. That helps explain why job creation on his watch was by far the worst of any post-war administration.


Both Bush and Obama also were bucking strong demographic trends. The surging percentages of women entering the job market, which started in the 1960s, peaked at the end of the Clinton administration.


Also,


“baby boomers” — those born in the years after WWII veterans returned from the war to take up family life — reached retirement age in great numbers during Obama’s time.


Because of these and other factors, relatively


Labor Force Participation — fewer people


said they


wanted to work. Under Obama, the labor force — those either working or actively looking for a job — slipped from 65.7 percent of those age 16 and older to 62.9 percent.


Job Openings — With relatively fewer people seeking employment, a job shortage changed to a worker shortage under Obama.


The


Department of Labor reported that the number of unfilled job openings more than doubled during Obama’s time, hitting just under 6 million in July 2016. That was at the time the highest in the more than 16 years that Labor Department statisticians had tracked this number.


Before Obama’s tenure, the only


time job openings topped 5 million was January 2001. During Obama’s second term, there were 26 months with over 5 million openings. It has since continued to rise, topping 6 million for the first time in June 2017, under President Donald Trump.


Unemployment — The


unemployment rate was high when Obama took office — 7.8 percent — and it continued to get worse in his first year. It peaked at 10 percent in October 2009 and didn’t drop below 9 percent until two years after that.


But slowly, and more or less


steadily, the rate improved. By the time Obama left office, the jobless rate had dropped 3 full percentage points, an improvement exceeded only by the slightly bigger declines during the Clinton and Kennedy- Johnson administrations.


By the time Obama left office, the jobless rate was down to 4.8 percent — well below the historical norm of 5.6 percent (the median rate for all the months since Truman’s inauguration in January 1949).


But getting down to that point was a long, slow grind. So slow that over all of Obama’s 96 months in office, the median jobless rate was 7.7 percent — the highest for any administration since the end of World War II.


Obama’s experience is similar


to that of Ronald Reagan — who presided over the second highest median jobless rate, 7.2 percent.


In Reagan’s first term,


unemployment peaked at 10.8 percent — higher than Obama’s 10 percent peak. And under Reagan, it stayed at or above 10 percent for 10 straight months starting in September 1982 — compared with Obama’s one-month high of 10 percent.


Like Obama, Reagan also saw


the rate decline steadily after the worst was over.


By the time Reagan left office in


January 1989, the rate was down to 5.4 percent, not far above Obama’s final month at 4.8 percent.


Both Obama and Reagan left


office with job approval ratings above 50 percent.


Income and Poverty The inflation-adjusted incomes


of American households reached the highest level


ever recorded under


Obama. The Census Bureau’s measure of median household income reached $59,039 in 2016. That was $2,963 more in “real” (inflation-adjusted) dollars than in 2008, for an overall gain of 5.3 percent.The median figure represents the midpoint — half of all households earned more, half less. And while real median income hit a record level in Obama’s final year, it was a long, rough road to the top.


Obama barely made up for the 4.2 percent loss under his


In fact, the 5.3 percent gain under predecessor.


And for his first six years in office, median income was below the level in 2008.


Obama’s 5.3 percent gain was less than the 13.9 percent gain under Bill Clinton, and the 8.1 percent gain under Reagan. It is also pushed up to a degree by a change in the Census Bureau’s survey questions in 2014, designed to correct for under-reporting of certain types of income in previous years.


The trend to higher incomes also shows up in the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ monthly report on average weekly


earnings for all workers,


adjusted for inflation. That figure, which includes salaried managers and supervisors, was 4.1 percent higher in the month Obama left office than it was in the month he first entered the White House. It was 3.7 percent higher for just production and nonsupervisory employees.


As incomes rose, the rate of


poverty declined. The percentage of Americans living with income below the official poverty line went down to 12.7 percent of the population in 2016, a half-point drop compared with 2008.


That decline also wasn’t nearly enough to reverse the 1.9 percentage point rise in poverty under George W. Bush, and it was far less than the 3.5 percentage point Clinton.


decline under And even though the rate of


poverty went down under Obama, the number of people in poverty rose — just not as fast as the population in general. In 2016, just over 40.6 million Americans were still living below the poverty line, an increase of 787,000 people compared with 2008. Under George W. Bush, the number went up by more than 8 million, after going down by more than 6 million under Clinton.


Home Prices Home values rebounded under


Obama, reaching a new high in his final year.


Association


Sales figures from the National of Realtors show the


national median price of an existing, single-family home was $235,500 in 2016. That was $38,900 higher than in 2008, an increase of 19.8 percent under Obama.


The 2016 figure was a record, but only in raw dollars, without accounting for inflation. Prices


October 2017


reached their pre-recession high in 2006. In the decade between then and Obama’s final year, home prices rose 6.1 percent, while the Consumer Price Index rose 19 percent.


Home Ownership The home ownership rate drifted


down under Obama, lowest


point touching in more than half


the a


century during his final year. In the second quarter of 2016,


62.9 percent of households owned their own home, according to Census Bureau figures. That ties the lowest point since the Census Bureau began collecting the figures. The last time the rate was that low was in the third quarter of 1965.


The home ownership rate began


its slide after peaking at 69.2 percent in


the second quarter of 2004. It already had come down 1.7 percentage points before Obama took office, but it went down by a greater amount in his two terms as president.


In Obama’s last quarter, the rate rebounded to 63.7 percent, as the economy improved and sales of new and existing homes hit their best pace since before Obama entered office. But the ownership rate was still 3.8 percentage


points lower than the


quarter before he took office. Food Stamps


The number of people receiving food aid under the Supplemental Nutrition


Assistance Program


(formerly known as “food stamps”) rose by a third under Obama.


In Obama’s last month in office,


there were just under 42.7 million Americans receiving SNAP assistance, a gain of 10.7 million or just under 33.5 percent from January 2009.


The number grew as the 2007-2009 recession threw millions out of work, as benefit levels were boosted for several years by the stimulus legislation Obama signed in 2009. The average benefit per person went up from around $113 per person in January 2009 to around $134 in July.


At the peak of food stamp


enrollment in December 2012, a total of 47.8 million were receiving aid, an increase of nearly 16 million or 49 percent.


But then millions melted from the rolls as employment and incomes improved, and as Congress cut benefit levels, which dropped to a monthly average of around $124 per person in Obama’s final month.


Measured from his first month to


his last, benefit levels and enrollment both grew less under Obama than under his predecessor.


Under George W. Bush, the


number of people getting food stamps grew by 14.7 million, or 85 percent (compared


with the 10.7 million,


33 percent gain under Obama). The average monthly benefit per person grew from $73.89 in the month Bush took office to $113.60 the month he left.


Corporate Profits


Corporations did much better than workers during Obama’s time. Their profits hit several new yearly highs during his tenure.


Profits had surged under George


W. Bush as well, but when Obama took office they had plunged from their previous peak in 2006, due to the


That’s a 54 percent increase, compared with the 9 percent gain at the end of Obama’s time in office.


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