Obama’s Economic Indicators #1
This is the first of two infographics I’ll fact check, it is comparing what the state of the Economy was in January 2009, when Bush left Office, and Obama took office, and is trying to compare what Obama was left with, and what he has today. It chooses specific Economic indicators which attempt to make Obama look worse. The second of the two I will check is using other economic indicators attempts to make Obama look better since 2009. I realize some of the “Today” data may be out of date, but since I found the image posted on fFacebookin August 2014, I’m using those numbers, since it was posted then with the intent to reflect that time period.
Unemployment Americans
January 2009 11.6 million, close enough to the listed 12 million
http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2009/feb/wk2/art02.htm
August 2014 : 9.1 Million is quite a bit lower then the 13.9 million shown
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm
Unemployment Rate
January 2009: 7.6%
http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2009/feb/wk2/art02.htm
August 2014: 6.1%
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm
Gas Prices
National Average Gas Prices:
Jan, 2009: $1.84
August 2014: $3.56
Gas prices go up with supply/demand and inflation, they spent a good majority of Bush’s last two years over $3 (including the still standing record daily average of $4.11 in July 2008) and the prices dropped due to the decreased global demand from the 2008/2009 global recession.
http://www.investopedia.com/articles/07/oil_gas.asp
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=EMM_EPM0_PTE_NUS_DPG&f=M
Federal Debt
January 2009: 10.6 Trillion
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/debt/search?startMonth=01&startDay=20&startYear=2009&endMonth=01&endDay=20&endYear=2009
September 2014: 17.7 trillion
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/debt/search?startMonth=09&startDay=12&startYear=2014&endMonth=09&endDay=12&endYear=2014
Debt per person
Jan 2009: 10.6 trillion debt divided by 305 million population
$34,754 per person
Sept 2014: 17.7 trillion debt divided by 316 million population (population estimate from July 2013)
$56,012
http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/trendy/trends/1218
http://www.census.gov/popclock/
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2008/12/31/us-population-2009-305-million-and-counting
Food Stamps
January 2009: 32 Million
http://frac.org/newsite/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/snapdata2009_january.pdf
August 2014: 47 Million
http://www.fns.usda.gov/sites/default/files/pd/SNAPsummary.pdf
Health Insurance Premiums
2009: $3515
2013: $4823
http://kff.org/interactive/premiums-and-worker-contributions/
Average Home Sales
2009: $245,200
2014: $339,100
https://www.census.gov/construction/nrs/pdf/uspricemon.pdf
And according to Zillow the median sale price was Jan 2009 $187k, and Julay 2014 was $217k (higher than every Month since Aug 2007) and United States home values have gone up 6.5% over the past year and Zillow predicts they will rise 2.7% within the next year.
http://www.zillow.com/home-values/
Obama Economic Indicators #2
This is the second infographic, using numbers attempting to make Obama look better.
The Dow Jones Industrial
On January 20, 2009, the Dow closed at 7,949.
https://www.google.com/finance/historical?cid=983582&startdate=Jan+20%2C+2009&enddate=Jan+20%2C+2009&num=30&ei=zecUVNCaJsjP8waSvIHABA
The Dow had a record high close on July 16, 2014 of 17,138.
https://www.google.com/finance/historical?cid=983582&startdate=Jul+16%2C+2014&enddate=Jul+16%2C+2014&num=30&ei=0OgUVIigLJHh8wbF04DwCQ
Unemployment Rate
January 2009 Unemployment Rate: 7.8%
August 2014 Unemployment Rate: 6.1%
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000
GDP Growth
2009: -5.5%
http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/national/gdp/2009/gdp109f.htm
August 2104 : 4.2%
http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/national/gdp/2014/gdp2q14_2nd.htm
Deficit GDP
Jan 2009: -9.8%
Dec. 2013: -4.1%
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/FYFSGDA188S
Consumer Confidence
January 2009: 40.0
August 2014 92.4
http://future.aae.wisc.edu/data/monthly_values/by_area/998?grid=true
References:
Sponsored Reading:
![]() See larger image |