Obama 'Jobs Recovery’ More Than 100 Million Not Working

January's labor report confirmed yet another month with over 100 million Americans not working. In fact, more than 100 million Americans have not been working in Obama's workers' paradise for all of 2012 and 2013, a unique achievement in American history.

White House spokesman James Carney hailed this as a milestone on the path toward the ultimate complete liberation of the American worker from the drudgery of work.

Obama is not the only president to be challenged by a recession while in office. Since the Great Depression, there have been 10 other recessions before this last one. On average, all the jobs lost in those recessions were recovered within two years after the recession started.

Moreover, Obama apologists cannot claim that the recovery from the recession was so bad because the recession was so bad. The historical record for the American economy has always been that the worse the recession, the stronger the recovery. Under every other president in U.S. history, going back for well over a century at least, the economy was in a booming recovery within years, even under Franklin Roosevelt during the Great Depression!

How has Obama managed to "liberate" so many workers from work? Through Social Security disability, which has increased by more than 21%, extending "unemployment" benefits to two years and by eliminating work requirements as a condition of receiving federal benefits.

The number of Americans on food stamps has soared by 50% under Obama to close to 50 million, largely because work requirements, asset checks and other restraints on abuse have been relaxed. Indeed, more than twice as many more Americans have gotten food stamps under Obama than have gotten jobs. Under ObamaCare, the same transformation is now under way for Medicaid.

"You do that by lowering the government imposed cost of doing business here, i.e., taxes and regulations."

The jobs weren't exported because of taxes and regulations and changing them won't bring them back. Jobs were exported because of coolie labor costs, toleration of pollution and working in firetrap conditions. Bring those conditions here and jobs will return.

"Raising tariffs on imported Chinese goods won't hurt them. They'll just raise the tariffs on exported American goods to their country, which puts you back at square one."

2013 U.S. Imports from China $440 Billion.
2013 U.S. Exports to China $122 Billion.

So if we raised the import tariff 10% on China, you're telling me China will raise the tariffs on American Goods by 30% to offset our 10% tariff?

I say let them. We'll just raise our tariff even more, and Americans will go back to work.

I agree with ex-snook. The wage differential dwarfs the cost of regulation. You can eliminate all taxes and all regulations and you still can’t compete with Chinese labor rates.

If what you say were true, there wouldn't be a single manufacturer left in the United States. But there are, which proves your argument to be fallacious.

The United States has the highest capital gains tax rates in the developed world. That's a fact. That alone has been the cause of much of our manufacturing leaving these shores. Coupled with thousands of onerous federal regulations, it's done inestimable damage to the jobs situation in this country.

Attacking those things first is the conservative solution. Trade wars via tariffs might make you feel good, but they only reward government, and do nothing to entice businesses to locate their operations here.

"If what you say were true, there wouldn't be a single manufacturer left in the United States. But there are, which proves your argument to be fallacious."

That proves no such thing.

The products with the highest labor components will be off-shored first.
China has come a long way in building their manufacturing capacity by stealing our industries, but they can't build it instantly and steal them all instantly.
Chinese purchases of American firms still have to go before a congressional board. But that board pretty much rubber stamps everything. Still it makes China cautious about moving too fast for fear of triggering retaliation.
Some products are durable goods, but still counted as manufacturing. They won't survive the transit so they are made here.
Some manufacturers have leadership that is loyal to the U.S. even though they could be realizing more profits, and even though they are opening themselves to being run out of business by anyone who offshores their products.
In some cases U.S. manufacturers have automated so that the wage differential is no longer much of a factor.
There are many other special cases where there are reasons why some manufacturers are still here. But too many have left.

We lowered the import tariffs in the 60's. You can see that it stopped the growth and we are now in decline.

Some of the job loss is due to automation. But clearly much is do to off-shoring. And one only has to look at the growth of imports as a percent of GNP, the trade goods deficit, or your local Walmart to see the many products that the U.S. could be making for ourselves, but instead we buy from others.

We lowered the import tariffs in the 60's. You can see that it stopped the growth and we are now in decline. ...one only has to look at the growth of imports as a percent of GNP, the trade goods deficit, or your local Walmart to see the many products that the U.S. could be making for ourselves, but instead we buy from others.

We all see the ill effects to our jobs and economy in the U.S. What many fail to see are the root causes. Lowering tariffs isn't what caused many U.S. manufacturers to relocate their operations overseas. It was the cost of doing business here, versus China and elsewhere.

While our government made it easier for foreign made goods to enter this country, they greatly expanded the costs of domestic manufacturers, which then drove them to greener pastures.

Bottom line (and old business euphemism), business is profit driven. Decrease the cost of doing business in an area, and that will increase the amount of business being done there. It's no more complicated than that.

As I said before, America has the highest capital gains taxes in the developed world. That is a punitive tax on production, and the result is less of the kind of activity that creates jobs, wealth, and even revenue to the government.

It's a symptom of runaway Socialist solutions being instituted in government. I advocate for more conservative solutions, like lowering the capital gains rate and rolling back the thousands of onerous regulations that are strangling business and industry.

Imposing tariffs on foreign made goods may have a part in the overall solution, but they should be considered last, not first.

As long as we have a huge trade goods deficit and high unemployment, tariffs should be considered first.

To do otherwise is to say that any country with enough population can effectively control the wage level in our country through their policies. Which is what China is doing.

Those tariffs worked well for us for the first 190 years of our country. Tariffs are conservative. They are what our founding fathers recommended. They viewed tariffs as taxing foreigners for access to our market and as maximizing freedom by avoiding direct taxation of citizens.

You're solution of lowering taxes without first fixing the trade policy will result in even more government debt and few additional jobs. And eventually they'll either be raising the taxes even higher than they were, or debasing the currency to offset your tax cut.

My plan is tax neutral in that we lower taxes by the amount that the tariff raises. A 10% increase in the tariff would result in a $1500 per worker tax decrease.

My plan cuts government spending automatically as people go back to work. No arbitrary cuts to social networks need take place.

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