(CNSNews) - President Obama frequently points to the nation's 5 percent unemployment rate as a sign of economic strength, but he doesn't mention the labor force participation rate, which is hovering at lows not seen since the late 1970s.
"And the extent to which people are not working is a very significant drag on growth in the American economy," Robert Doar of the American Enterprise Institute told CSPAN's "National Journal" on Tuesday.
As CNSNews has reported, the labor force participation rate has steadily dropped since its record high of 67.3 percent in early 2000. In December 2015, only 62.6 percent of the civilian, non-institutional population over the age of 16 participated in the labor force by either having a job or actively seeking one. Not since 1978 has the labor force participation rate been that low.
According to Doar, "If we had the same labor force participation that we had prior to (Obama's) presidency, we'd have 8 million more people working" right now.
"My view is, is that over the last eight years, and going back into the Bush administration a little bit as well, there was more of a focus on getting people signed up (for public assistance) and not enough on employment. And I think that's a problem. Not because I want to hurt or harm people, but because I think people are better off when they're working."
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3 comments:
One cannot compare now to Bush's unemployment issues because an entire industry fell during the first days of his presidency. Silicon valley and internet IPOs crashed and many hi-tech personnel were thrown out of work. When an industry implodes, unemployment goes up because of the obvious.
As for these assistance programs promoting work, negative. Many times, due to the constraints of those programs, it simply doesn't pay to work. When a worker works even part-time, it dangerously infringes their take on the welfare dole and with the economy inflation, their part-time wages don't meet their everyday demand.
The government needs to get out of the helping hands business and go back to fixing issues that impede a healthy economy so people can prosper not become slaves to the system.
I believe the best way to run any "welfare" program is to take the federal government completely out of it and turn it over to the states to run. In so doing we would have several DIFFERENT programs and the states would better and more quickly deal with their specific regional difficulties.
The NAACP would push back on this and say it is Racist.
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