Congress & Research—Our Economy Does Better With Democrats Than Republicans
Who manages the economy the best? Democrats or Republicans? History shows us Democrats do the best, by far!
In 2016, Congress announced ever since World War II, Democratic presidents have had better economies than Republican ones. You can see the report here:
Republicans constantly weaken our economy, and Democrats fix it and grow it.
- Together, Clinton, Obama, and Biden created 50.2 million new jobs.
- Together, G. H. W. Bush, G.W. Bush, and Trump only created 900,000 jobs.
- Tax cuts by Reagan, G. W. Bush, and Trump all exploded our national debt.
- Reagan cut the highest tax rate on the superrich from 70% to 28%. This alone cost us at least $20 trillion in revenue.
- Carter, Clinton, Obama, and Biden all significantly shrank our budget deficits.
- Clinton left G. W. Bush a $236 billion surplus.
- Biden reduced the deficit by $1.7 trillion—the largest drop ever.
- Reagan destroyed the unions that used to protect 2/3 of workers with good pay, benefits, and retirement. (1/3 of Americans were in unions but another 1/3 had good benefits because other companies had to compete with union jobs.)
Biden’s economic growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was 3 times the average growth under Trump’sfirst term.
- Biden created 15 million new jobs, more jobs than created under any other president in a 4-year term in all our history.
- Biden brought unemployment down to the lowest it had been since 1969.
- Biden created 800,000 new manufacturing jobs; Trump lost 75,000 manufacturing jobs.
Republicans constantly give massive tax breaks to rich people and corporations, claiming this will create jobs and grow our economy.
- The Congressional Research Service found tax cuts don’t create jobs or grow our economy—they just make the rich richer and most of us poorer.
- After Republicans explode the deficit with huge tax cuts and Democrats take power, they pretend to care about deficits, ranting and raving to stop Democrats from spending money to help regular Americans.
10 out of the last 11 recessions happened under Republican presidents, according to the Joint Committee of the US Congress, the National Bureau of Economic Research, and many other studies.
Between 1933 and 2020, we had 7 Democratic and 7 Republican presidents.
- Under the Democratic presidents, our economy grew at an average rate of 4.6%.
- Under the Republican presidents, our economy only grew at an average rate of 4%
A 2013 study by 2 Princeton professors found the US economy performed far better on many measures when the US president is a Democrat rather than a Republican.
A study published in 2014 by forensic psychiatrists James Gilligan and Bandy Lee found for over a century,ever since 1900, every time we had a Republican president:
- economic growth slowed
- unemployment, economic inequality, and stress increased
- rates of suicide and murder increased
On August 24, 2020, Business Insider magazine used data going back to 1946 and found: “Democratic presidents are better for the stock market and economy than Republicans.” It noted:
- “Since 1947, the S&P 500 has posted a total annual return of 10.8% under Democratic presidents, versus 5.6% under Republican presidents.”
On April 14, 2022, Forbes published an article about “The Economy Does Better Under The Democrats.” It found:
- “By crucial metrics like GDP, job creation, business investment and avoiding recessions, the economy does a lot better with Democrats in the White House than with Republicans.”
- “It is simply a fact that since World War II, Democratic presidents have seen 24.4 million more jobs created on their watch—an average of 6% more jobs created per year of Democratic administrations—than have Republican presidents.”
- “Ditto real GDP growth, 44% higher under Democratic presidents.”
- “On the flip side, unemployment has been 18% higher under GOP presidents.”
- “Real business investment has been 193% higher under Democratic presidents.”
On April 2, 2024, The Economic Policy Institute published “Economic Performance Is Stronger When Democrats Hold The White House.” They found ever since 1949, Democratic presidents have had better:
- Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth
- Job growth
- Unemployment rate
- Growth in inflation-adjusted wages
- Growth of market-based incomes per capita
- Inflation
- Interest rates
They also found “Household income growth (adjusted for inflation) was faster on average and far more equal during Democratic administrations, and the Democratic advantage shows up for every group.”
On 3-28-2024, the Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center for Science & International Affairs published a blog“Historical Puzzle of US Economic Performance under Democrats vs. Republicans.” It reported all the following:
- “The US economy has since World War II consistently done better under Democratic presidents than under Republican presidents.”
- “Since World War II, Democrats have seen job creation average 1.7 % per year when in office, versus 1.0 % under the GOP.
- US GDP has averaged a rate of growth of 4.23 percent per annum during Democratic administrations, versus 2.36 per cent under Republicans.
- If one goes back further, to the Great Depression, to include Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt, the difference in growth rates is even larger.”
- “The average Democratic presidential term has been in recession for 1 of its 16 quarters, whereas the average for the Republican terms has been 5 quarters, a startlingly big difference.”
- “A remarkable 9 of the last 10 recessions have started when a Republican was president.” (They gave the odds of this happening by chance even worse, just 1 out of 100.
- “Ever since World War II, every time a Democratic president replaced a Republican one, the US growth rate went up. Every time a Republican president replaced a Democratic one, the growth rate went down.” (They gave the odds of this happening 1 out of 1,024, like getting 10 heads out of 10 consecutive coin flips.)
All the following statistics come from two New Republic magazine articles, dated May 3, 2022, and October 31, 2022:
Recessions:
- We’ve had 17 recessions over the last 100 years, with 13 happening under Republican presidents and only 4 under Democratic presidents.
- The 4 very worst recessions occurred under Republican presidents, including the Great Depression and Trump’s covid recession in 2020.
Economic Growth:
- No president has ever had larger growth in gross domestic product (GDP) since the Democratic president Franklin Roosevelt.
- The next 3 best presidents for GDP growth were the Democratic presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Clinton, in descending order.
- Donald Trump had the very worst growth in GDP of all the presidents since Roosevelt.
Job Creation:
- The 6 presidents with the fastest rate of job growth since Roosevelt were all Democrats: Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter and Clinton.
- The 4 worst in job growth since Roosevelt were all Republican: Eisenhower, both Bush presidents (father and son), and Trump.
- Trump had the very worst job growth. In the last 90 years, he was the only president to lose more jobs than he created!
Deficits:
- In general, Democrats have done far better with our deficit than Republicans.
- Clinton cleaned up the deficit exploded by Republican George H. W. Bush to $255 billion. Clinton took that huge deficit and turned it into a surplus of $236 billion.
- Republican George W. Bush exploded the deficit again up to $1.4 trillion with his tax cuts and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
- Democrat Obama brought that down by half to $584.6 billion.
- Republican Trump exploded it back up to $3.1 trillion.
- Biden has it down to $1.7 trillion now.
Stock Markets:
Princeton economists Alan Blinder and Mark Watson found that, since Truman, stock markets rose more than twice as high under Democratic presidents than under Republican ones.
Comparing Recent Democratic & Republican Presidents
In the 32 years between 1988 and 2020, we had 16 years with Democratic presidents and 16 years with Republican presidents.
During this time:
- Democrats created 33.8 million jobs, Republicans only 1.9 million.
- Democrats grew the gross domestic product (GDP) 3.1%, Republicans only 1.62%.
- Democrats increased median household income 9.5%, Republicans only 0.6%.
- Democrats increased the Dow Jones an average of 185.5%, Republicans only 26%.
- Democrats reduced our deficit by $400 billion; Republicans increased it by $3.5 trillion!