Economy

President Bush wanted to address two main things, “The first is employment and output growth. The second is inflation.” However, given the unemployment rate he didn’t accomplish exactly what he wanted. After Katrina, he recognized, “more than a million people have been displaced, thousands of businesses and jobs have been disrupted or destroyed, and the infrastructure—notably for energy—took a severe beating.” He said “the preceding two years, monetary accommodation and robust productivity growth supported economic activity,” which provided jobs. The unemployment rate was close to 5% then. So Katrina, he said, was the beginning cause of the recession. Oil then doubled in price, causing many Americans to discontinue road trips and vacations because of the economy. When people aren’t buying products and services the economy worsens. Around the time elections came around, McCain was for supporting the oil companies by giving them tax breaks and not looking for other alternate energy sources. Meanwhile Obama was for giving the American’s tax breaks, and finding alternate sources of energy. Obama also promised to end tax breaks for businesses that send Americans to other countries to work to keep the jobs here in America, while McCain would continue this. As far as health care goes, Obama would decrease family health care by up to $2500, whereas McCain would tax it and give it to the government.

The outcome of this and a lot more campaigning lead Obama to become president. He became president when two wars were going on, there was a $1.3 trillion deficit, and unemployment. His response was to give companies and businesses money to thrive and create more competition so that the products and services would drop in money, thus people would invest in the economy again. The American Recovery and Reinvestment act, which Obama pushed for within a month of his inauguration, was to create 3.5 million jobs for people and give 95% of working Americans tax cuts. These are for the middle class instead of the wealthy upper class. Obama’s plan is also to build a stable economy by regulating all the projects that the government spends money on. In another way, Obama has helped the people by creating the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which protects consumers when they buy products. This persuaded Americans to buy more, because they won’t have to worry about any troubles. Businesses are required to give clear terms for their service or products. Obama has also been trying to find alternate energy sources, and bring an end to oil dependency. He made investments in solar, wind, biofuels, and geothermal power, as well as energy efficiency and conservation programs. Obama will invest $150 over the next ten years to create 5 million jobs to help the environment and manufacture new technology to help.