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President Bush presided over the weakest eight-year span for the U.S. economy in decades, according to an analysis of key data, and economists across the ideological spectrum increasingly view his two terms as a time of little progress on the nation's thorniest fiscal challenges.
Gross domestic product, a broad measure of economic output, grew at the slowest pace for a period of that length since the Truman administration.
Americans' incomes grew more slowly than in any presidency since the 1960s, other than that of Bush's father.
"It's sad to say, but we really went nowhere for almost ten years, after you extract the boost provided by the housing and mortgage boom," said Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Economy.com.
For the first seven years of the Bush administration, gross domestic product grew at a paltry 2.1 percent annual rate.
The administration also failed to gain traction on some of the fundamental economic and fiscal issues facing the nation -- including solidifying the finances of Medicare and Social Security, simplifying the tax code, or making health care more affordable. Resolution of those issues might have left the government more flexibility to respond to the current crisis by lowering the nation's future budget deficits.
The federal government had a modest budget surplus when Bush took office in 2001, but ran a deficit -- funding itself to a significant degree with borrowed money -- of 4.9 percent of gross domestic product in 2004 and 4 percent in 2005, even as the economy was growing at a healthy pace.
Bush did not steer the country toward a more sound long-term fiscal position. After winning reelection, he made a failed push both to tweak Social Security to stabilize its long-term finances and create private accounts for Americans to invest in the stock market.
Changes to Medicare were also elusive for the administration. When Bush entered the White House, the program faced a long-term funding deficit. It still does, and its cost is expected to balloon in the years ahead. In fact, the administration's addition of a prescription drug benefit enlarges Medicare's long-term funding imbalance.
"On tax reform, I think they themselves were not very interested in it," said Kevin A. Hassett, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and an adviser on Bush's reelection campaign.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/11/AR2009011102301.html
Gross domestic product, a broad measure of economic output, grew at the slowest pace for a period of that length since the Truman administration.
Americans' incomes grew more slowly than in any presidency since the 1960s, other than that of Bush's father.
"It's sad to say, but we really went nowhere for almost ten years, after you extract the boost provided by the housing and mortgage boom," said Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Economy.com.
For the first seven years of the Bush administration, gross domestic product grew at a paltry 2.1 percent annual rate.
The administration also failed to gain traction on some of the fundamental economic and fiscal issues facing the nation -- including solidifying the finances of Medicare and Social Security, simplifying the tax code, or making health care more affordable. Resolution of those issues might have left the government more flexibility to respond to the current crisis by lowering the nation's future budget deficits.
The federal government had a modest budget surplus when Bush took office in 2001, but ran a deficit -- funding itself to a significant degree with borrowed money -- of 4.9 percent of gross domestic product in 2004 and 4 percent in 2005, even as the economy was growing at a healthy pace.
Bush did not steer the country toward a more sound long-term fiscal position. After winning reelection, he made a failed push both to tweak Social Security to stabilize its long-term finances and create private accounts for Americans to invest in the stock market.
Changes to Medicare were also elusive for the administration. When Bush entered the White House, the program faced a long-term funding deficit. It still does, and its cost is expected to balloon in the years ahead. In fact, the administration's addition of a prescription drug benefit enlarges Medicare's long-term funding imbalance.
"On tax reform, I think they themselves were not very interested in it," said Kevin A. Hassett, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and an adviser on Bush's reelection campaign.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/11/AR2009011102301.html