The overall State of the Union was another political spin from a failing President, but there were a few points that really stood out as just false statements!From the State of the Union address...
'Our economy is healthy and vigorous, and growing faster than other major industrialized nations. In the last two-and-a-half years, America has created 4.6 million new jobs -- more than Japan and the European Union combined. Even in the face of higher energy prices and natural disasters, the American people have turned in an economic performance that is the envy of the world.' - George Bush, State of the Union Address, February 1st, 2006
The real story...
The President noted that the US has gained 4.6 million jobs in the past two-and-a-half years. That's true. However, most of that gain merely made up for the 3.1 million jobs that were lost during Bush's first two-and-a-half years. The graph below shows the cumulative change in jobs starting in January 2001, when Bush first took office, and ending in December 2005, the most recent month for which the Bureau of Labor Statistics has released figures for total nonfarm employment.
So if I take over as CEO and in the first four years my revenue drops by $50MM, but then get my revenue up by $5MM in the last year, can I really say I was responsible for growing the revenue of the company by $5MM? I don't think Wall Street would go for that, and neither should the American public!
