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From Lighthouse Blog
Dow Jones Change: Bush Versus Obama
Bush: DJIA 12/12/2000 - 10,768.............1/16/2009 - 8281
Over 8 years, including 2 major wars and 911, the market dropped only 2487 points from final election results to the end of the Bush presidency.
Obama: DJIA 11/05/08 - 9069............3/6/2009 - 6488
In only 120 days since Obama was elected, the DJIA has dropped 2581 points!
Is there any question what type of economic policies are better liked by the markets, and thus grow taxpayer wealth?
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My response to such an accusation:
Markets don’t like Obama’s economic policies because they in the market, Wall Street, operate within the world of the upper-middle and upper classes of our society. Wall Street believes that common people of a lower class then themselves should be taxed - -and apparently exploited and cheated, as well) - - but not them. They believe in the trickle-down economic theory. They believe in free markets. I believe, they, more often than not, are representative of Conservative or Republican capitalism and free market ideology. They loved it when Bush and Paulson came to the governmental financial aide of Wall Street, but the same is not true when it applies to government financial aide for the common people, Main Street. They fail to see that their unregulated free market shenanigans were the cause of this recession. Greed is what the market is about, and if there are systems in place that restrict the creation of wealth, as the market perceives regulation, they will always react negatively towards it. As Greenspan admitted the market cannot regulate itself.
We should not be measuring performance of the financial system by wealth creation; it should be measured by the ability of people to live substantive lives, a life as measured by our constitution, i.e. life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. For some wealth is happiness, for most of us to be free from financial burdens is all we require. America, so far, has not fulfilled that constitutional commitment.
I find it hard to accept this critique of a falling stock market by placing blame on President Obama, considering he has been office for only 45 days (1/20/2009 thru 3/06/2009). I don’t know how this analysis could even be considered. Bush’s presidential performance over two terms in office was poor by any measurement one could make. The economic mess that President Obama was given came from eight years of the Bush Administration, and six of those years dominated by a Republican Congress.
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