Bold New Plan to Imitate George W. Bush

By Randall Hoven

The AP reports that Barack Obama's economic plan "aims for 2.5 million new jobs by 2011." In other words, he hopes to do almost as well as President George W. Bush did.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics http://www.bls.gov/ces/#tables, employees on non-farm payrolls numbered 131,785,000 in 2000 and 137,623,000 in 2007 (the last year of available data). That is an average of 834,000 new jobs per year, even through the 2001 recession, 9/11 and Katrina. If we use a base year of 2003 instead, at 129,999,000 jobs, the average number of new jobs per year was 1,906,000.

By my count, 2011 is three years from now. Given Bush's rate of job creation, there would be 2,502,000 to 5,708,000 new jobs created by 2011.

According to the AP, Obama said,

"We have acted boldly, bravely, and above all, together. That is the chance our new beginning now offers us, and that is the challenge we must rise to in the days to come. It is time to act. As the next president of the United States, I will."

Apparently, it is time to act boldly, bravely and together to match George W. Bush's performance through recession, the worst terrorist attacks in our history, and the worst natural disaster in our history.

For the record, George W. Bush did twice as well as that from 2003 to 2007, when both houses of Congress had Republican majorities. You didn't read that in the Times?