Economic Fundamentals and the Election
One thing you keep hearing from political pundits is that the state of the economy should lead to a crushing defeat for Obama — no president has ever been reelected with unemployment this high, etc.. But as quite a few better-informed people have pointed out, the political science literature is unambiguous on this point: what matters isn’t the state of the economy, it’s the perception of trend. If the economy appears to be improving, the incumbent tends to do well even if in absolute terms it’s still pretty bad.By that standard, Obama is in a much better position than the conventional wisdom would suggest; the economy isn’t booming, but it’s growing, and the labor market is moving sideways rather than down. It’s not Reagan’s morning in America (which reflects the different and much more intractable nature of the 2008 crisis and aftermath), but it’s not the political disaster you might imagine.
But wait, there’s more: elections aren’t decided by national popular vote, they’re decided state by state. And it seems likely that this election will be decided in the industrial midwest, Ohio in particular — a region that has bounced back strongly.
Here’s a comparison I haven’t seen made: the unemployment rate in Ohio under two administrations:
And you could say exactly the same thing this time around, with the added twist that much of the good news can be attributed to the auto bailout that Obama carried out in the face of frantic GOP opposition.
Now, national sentiment matters too, and Obama obviously can’t run a campaign on boosterism. But the key point is that the economic background isn’t that bad for him politically; it’s good enough, in particular, for him to try to turn this into a “choice” election that his opponent clearly wasn’t ready for.
From the NYT by Paul Krugman.
10 comments:
Unemployment nowadays is what everyone is worried about. People want to know when and where they are going to get a job because they want to supply for their families. Of course a lot of people are going to be hypocritical about what Obama is really doing for this country, whether he is helping us out or not. People really need to look at the big picture and see whether or not what he is doing is good for the economy as a whole and the rest (I.e unemployment, interest rates, etc) will all come together eventually.
i have long thought the unemployment rate is the key number to watch heading into this election. Although the numbers and calculations for unemployment can be skewed depending on the angle in which one views it, this number hugely reflects on the economy as a whole.
That being said, with the worldwide recession scaring investors and general uneasiness among business owners to hire and expand, 8.3 does not bode well for the President's chances at being reelected. I do think he can overcome it, but it will be awfully difficult.If it drops below 8%, I think Obama has a very good shot at being reelected.
I feel like everyone expects the President to know exactly what to do and exactly how to fix everything. If he is not mking our situation worse then what's the point in electing someone else. He seems to know what he's doing. Unemployment has been an issue during other President's terms also. Im not big on politics and such but he got elected for a reason and needs a chance to do his thing. And if he fails, there's always the next election.
Unemployment might be the most vital factor heading into this election. No one feels good about the percent of people who are unemployed. I'm not too keen on politics, but the graph makes it appear as if unemployment was a huge factor under Reagan too. It does appear as if unemployment is going down though and that should play into Obamas hand.
Based on this article things are looking great for Obama. It is believed that the foreshadowing of who will win this election is past traditional circumstances. It isn't about where the economy is now, it's about where it's heading. The economy seems to be improving in baby steps. Also the elections are being held in the state of Ohio where unemployment rate is going down. Even when unemployment rate was fairly high during reagan's time as president, he was re elected.
I honestly think that the unemployment rate is a huge factor that every one is considering today and therefore it will affect the voting for the upcoming election. Everyone is sketchy about the unemployment rate and many people are worried about losing jobs or cannot get any jobs. My father without a doubt dislikes the ways of President Obama and thinks that he should not be re- elected. After reading this article i understand things more clearly now and it seems to me that Obama is not as bad a everyone makes him seem to be. He is doing his job as President and is trying to decrease the unemployment rate; it might not go down my much but at least he is trying and is successful to some extent.
It looks like Obama does have a good chance of being re elected as our President. Even though the US economy isn't in its best shape it's still getting better which is comforting to hear. Yes unemployment rate is still a problem in this country but once the economy improves to it's fullest hopefully it won't be an issue anymore.
Thsi country has been heading into a crisist of being unemployed for a while and obama has tried to get new amd more but not better ones. Our country has too many people having jobs that cant really support a family and i think it starts with our education system. many kids are going to college graduating and not being able to find a job for there major, its almost being epidemic in our country. The worst part about it is the debt it is bringing to the future peoplew of this country. So many people are in thousands of dollars of debt from college loans and it takes years to try to pay it back almost making in debt for most of your adult life. Obama is helping with this crisist and trying to have more money in goverment pell grants to help the students of today to help make a better tomorrow.
In my opinion Ohio's unemployment rate shouldn't benefit Obama's campaign in anyway. Ohio's Governor Kasich is the person who should be credited to the decrease in unemployment. The Republican governor worked hard to help his state prosper whereas Obama helped by increasing our countries debt and increasing taxes on the middle class and upper class. If the trend in Ohio is going to benefit anyone it's going to be Mitt Romney's campaign because it was the conservative capitalistic views that Governor Kasich used to help Ohio prosper.
Another aspect to look at is where are all the jobs coming from? The national debt is skyrocketing but the unemployment is decreasing: that seems fishy to me. The question to ask is where are all the jobs coming from? Are they government funded jobs because if so our debt ceiling is going to have to be raised infinitely because our debt will never stop growing. But on the bright side the trend in unemployment will look great for Obama's re-election campaign.
Unemployment will probably be one of the deciding factors in the upcoming election because voters are afraid of losing even more jobs. This is an unfair basis to judge the election on because it is not a situation that can be changed in the term that the President. Just like everything it is a cycle.
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