More Proof That "Trickle Down" Doesn't Work

The era of the Bush administration was a great time for the rich and the corporations.   Taxes were at their lowest point since World War II, Wall Street and the financial giants were freed of most regulations, corporate profits and management bonuses were at record-breaking levels, and the rich were able to amass a huge portion of the nation's total wealth and income.   It was truly the golden age of Republican "trickle down" economics.

Ever since the presidency of Ronald Reagan the Republicans had been touting the benefits of their trickle down theory of economics -- that said if the rich were allowed to make unfettered profits much of that money would trickle down the economy to be shared by the rest of us in the form of new jobs and high wages.   If their economic theory was correct, then the effects of that trickle down should have evidenced itself during the Bush administration.  

The previous administration of Bill Clinton had produced about 21 million jobs in eight years.   If Republican trickle down economics worked like they promised it would, then the Bush administration should have produced significantly more jobs than the Clinton administration did.   Unfortunately, that didn't happen.  

In the eight years of the Bush administration only about 1 million jobs were produced in America.   And this doesn't take into account the record number of jobs that were outsourced to other countries during that eight years, nullifying the paltry amount of jobs created during those years.   In addition, while the rich were getting much richer, the wages were stagnant for the rest of America (with buying power falling behind 1970s levels).

It is obvious that nothing was "trickling down" during those supposed golden years.   Further proof that the Republican economic theory was a fraud is the fact that all it really produced was the current recession, which actually cost the country 12-15 million jobs.   That's not too good a record -- to create a million jobs and then lose 12-15 million jobs.

Now we have further proof of just how ineffectual the Bush/Republican economic policy really was.   During the single year of 2010, the Obama administration and the Democratic Congress created 1.1 million jobs.   Let me repeat that.   Obama and the Democrats created more jobs in one year than the Bush administration did in eight years.   And they did it in the midst of a recession with the Republicans trying to obstruct everything they tried to accomplish.

The sad part is that the 1.1 million jobs created don't even begin to make up for all the millions of jobs lost by the Republican economic policies.   It has done little more than keep up with the number of new workers entering the workforce, and the unemployment number remains well over 9% (over 18% if those who've given up finding a job and those working part-time but looking for full-time work are counted).   Even though Obama's job creation numbers are more than 8 times higher than Bush's, at this rate it will take many years to replace the jobs lost by the Republican policies.

It should be obvious to anyone by now that the Republican "trickle down" economic policy simply doesn't work (unless you're trying to destroy an economy instead of growing it).   But the Republicans were recently put back in power by the voters -- taking control of the House of Representatives and increasing their strength in the Senate.   And they want to go straight back to their failed trickle down economic policies.   Some people never learn.