Day: October 17, 2014
Obama Can’t Even Get Credit for … a Meal in a Restaurant
I went to a restaurant up in New York when I was … during the U.N. General Assembly, and my credit card was rejected. It turned out I guess I don’t use it enough. They were … they thought there was some fraud going on. Fortunately, Michelle had hers.
— President Obama, quoted by the Washington Post.
Christie Might Run for Prez to Get Secret Service to Babysit His Daughter
By the way, one of the biggest motivating factors for me actually considering this is to have 24-hour surveillance on my daughter. It would be great.
— Gov. Chris Christie, quoted by Business Insider, on why he might want to run for president.
Deficit Drops to Lowest Level Since Before the 2008 Financial Crash
The budget deficit in the U.S. shrank in the last fiscal year to the lowest level as a share of the economy since 2007 as faster growth and falling unemployment boosted tax receipts, the Treasury Department said.
The shortfall was $483.4 billion in the 12 months to Sept. 30, compared with $680.2 billion a year earlier, the Treasury said today in Washington. That’s about a third of the record $1.4 trillion deficit reached in 2009. Revenue jumped 8.9 percent and spending gained 1.4 percent, the figures showed.
Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew said the fiscal improvement is partly tied to stronger growth, as the nation’s unemployment rate dropped to 5.9 percent in September from 7.2 percent a year earlier. Still, the deficit is forecast by the Congressional Budget Office to start widening again as an aging population prompts more spending on Social Security and health care.
Initial Jobless Claims Fall to Lowest Level Since Clinton Left Office
“The number of people who applied for U.S. jobless benefits fell 23,000 to 264,000 in the week that ended Oct. 11, hitting the lowest level since April 2000, showing that employers are laying off few workers, according to government data released Thursday,” Marketwatch reports. April 2000 was three months after Pres. Clinton left office. The chart above from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that employment never recovered during the six years Republicans controlled the White House and both houses of Congress. The chart also shows that unemployment surged in advance of the financial collapse on Bush’s watch and only began to recover very slowly after the Stimulus kicked in. It’s impossible to say how much more quickly employment might have rebounded if Republicans in Congress and GOP governors hadn’t deliberately stalled the recovery by cutting funding to government services and employment.
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