With the economy now recovering, I think its important to look at what/who caused it, what/who fixed it, and what/who hindered the recovery.

Where is 9/11? It was a major factor (but certainly not the only one).

I don't think you can objectively pinpoint Clinton - from what I understand, the CIA was against many of his major military actions against Al Qaida, although he did get a few bombing runs in the late '90's in Afghanistan. And his administration did catch the WTC bomber, as well as those who attacked our embassies in Africa....

I see the economy crumbling as a direct result of the 9/11 attacks....I do believe it was slowing down prior to the attacks, and we would have suffered a downturn as a result of corporate scandals.....the key is consumer confidence....

As far as fixing it.....i think the jury is out on that one....I'm doubtful Bush's "tax cuts" will help....the economy is driven by consumers, not by big business....its going to be slow process....Bush has presided over the largest job loss in the history of the U.S...he's got a lot of catching up to do.....

I really don't think you could just pinpoint one major factor in the economic downturn. It has been a combination of the 9/11 attacks, corporate scandals, and general "bushonomics" (which resulted in the largest loss of jobs since the Great Depression) that have caused this slump.

What fixed it? I really don't think that the tax cuts will have any effect at all, since the people who are more apt to spend their money (the middle- and lower-class people) aren't receiving most of the money (source: Bush's Tax Cuts: A Form of National Insanity). I'd say it is the consumers who are fixing it. They are finally deciding to get out there and spend some of their cash (which is probably not tax cut cash).

What hindered it's recovery? I'd say that the President's little war and his general apathy towards the economy hindered it. When he finally did decide to take action, it manifested itself in the form of tax cuts, half of which went to the top 1% of citizens (source: same as above).

Edited for clarity.

since bush assumed office the unemployment rate has skyrocketed. though it isn't completely his fault, he hasn't done much to help.

I don't think it has much to do with him really, but instead with treaties like NAFTA, FTAA, which suck jobs out of the country. in the 80's most of our jobs started to go overseas where labor is dirt cheap. the unemployment end with with the advent of the "service economy" which is based upon selling services rather then tangible goods. within the past few years however these jobs started to move overseas as well(mostly to india) again, this is so much bush fault, but he certainly isn't doing much to help out the situation.

My vote went for the Iraq war.

For or against it, you have to admit that war is always an uncertain undertaking. Uncertainty keeps investment and consumer bucks out of the loop.

If you mean in a positive way, I might agree.

The beginning of the war ended the "speculation" of what was going to happen. The pre-war jitters did not help confidence much. The market is way up since the start of the war, although that has not "trickled down" to affecting the employment numbers (a lagging indicator) yet.

Amlord,

No, I dont' mean it in a positive way. The war in Iraq *talk* kept the markets down much longer than if the war talk had never been brought up. Now that the aftermath is looking more uncertain, the markets react in kind. I'm afraid you are looking at a short-term gain that can quickly reverse should the aftermath look like an expensive stalemate.

By official analysis, the recession ended about two years ago. We should have seen job growth by now, but it hasn't materialized. This is directly a result of the war in Iraq, and the potential of this undertaking to kill optimism is still strong.

I voted "corporate scandal" and am pleased to see that so many agree. But it was probably just the icing on the cake. Aside from the other selections, Wall Street and the economy has cycles, and it may have been that, of multiple cycles, there was a coincidence of downturns that combined with the current results.
Surely the high tech industry has put so much technology at our fingertips that we have little need of new technology until we catch up with the current stuff. That takes time, and we humans are still slow to adapt, collectively speaking.
One of my computer engineer friends says the chip industry has pretty much all the hardware they need available to them for just about anything. The trick is to come up with new applications that will appeal to other businesses and to the ultimate consumer.

Bill55AZ,

Except we don't have broadband to residents and small businesses to speak of. Sure, some places can get DSL and cable, and we have microwave up here in the mountains, but what we need is fiber optics everywhere.

Verizon is attempting to do this, but it will take 10-15 years. Meanwhile, other major players like AT&T, MCI, and Sprint aren't touching this with a 10-foot pole.

Yah gotta wonder why. Is it because of MCI's woes? Eh, not really. Actually, AT&T is out to kill MCI by lobbying to bar it from government contracts.

So what is making AT&T so cautious while Verizon is so bold? For one thing, AT&T is entrenched while Verizon is hungry. The entrenchment comes from being unsure about the future, and that unsureness comes from what?

Wars and rumors of wars? Just a suggestion since historically, war has always impacted the economy. And not for the better.

I voted Corporate Scandals. After I saw the Enron case, I saw the economy drop with it. People pulled their money out of the stocks and here we are.

War is an unusual scapegoat for this one, because historically, war has always given the economy a much needed boost. The second World War took us out of the depression.

BecomingHuman,

Note that the US was not in that war locally. Our industrial infrastructure was not bombed. In addition, industrialism was about to hit its stride, and with world markets lacking the ability to produce their own industrial goods, this was a turkey shoot. WW II was an anomaly regarding war.

But that was back in the industrial age balloon. Now it doesn't matter--the expense of war in terms of actual dollars, perceptions of investors, loss of materials, and loss of citizens has a great economic impact.

I'll agree that the scandals caused a stock market drop. This is only one economic indicator, and the drop led quickly into a short revival. The scandals were a blip compared to war.

Besides, it's been long enough since those scandals that the economy should have revived to the point of vigorous hiring. That's not the case. Job loss is still a major issue with this economy. We have recovery and growth, but no jobs.

Part of the reason is coming out now--farming out good paying white collar jobs overseas. Uh-oh, while everyone was looking toward Iraq, business decided to abandon America for world markets *and* foreign workers.

So we'll be left holding the deficit bag and no way of paying it off. Sounds like a prescription for bankruptcy: ring up the national credit card and get laid off.

This is excerpted from a speech Al Gore delivered the other day:
http://www.moveon.org/gore-speech.html


The economy was heading south when George W. Bush took office. Since then, it hasn't changed direction.

We can blame anything in your poll for our economic problems, but the Bush administration, at this point, is largely responsible for the mess.

(Edited to add link)

Well, when Emperor Bush was anointed, one of the first remarks that he made was that we had to fight the recession. Everyone started asking "What recession?" I think that Bush is far more responsible for his self-fulfilling prophecy than any corporate scandal, individual business failure, or crime wave.

People in a position to embezzle a few dollars will do it. Why should we be surprised then, when someone embezzles a few million dollars?

Every class I ever took on business administration started out with statistics on how few businesses survive.

I double check the locks if I think that there is a violent criminal loose in the area. Shootings in the Washington D.C. area didn't keep me from walking to the Seven-Eleven for my morning paper in Michigan. I just took a long hard look at the playground around my daughter's school. When the shooters were arrested, we all started to breathe easier. End of story.

Or perhaps we all are responsible for not crying out that the emperor had no clothes. Of course only a few people knew that he had bet on a trifecta.

The corporation scandals effecting the economy (specifically the consumer confidence level) because when ENRON hit the fan & then Worldcom, consumer confidence went down along with the DOW because consumers lost their faith in the trust of the CEO's of the big corporations. It is slowly returning with the recovery of the economy itself

Biggest Economic Hurt................................9/11
Biggest Stiffle to Recovery..........................Dems fighting everything Republican

If they fought EVERYTHING Republican how did we get our tax cuts and pass HUGE defense spending bills this last session of Congress?

I'm no economic expert and I rarely jump in on these debates, but I think there were a number of variables that were left out of the poll options that seem rather important.

I would have added:

• an over exuberant tech sector that crashed hard in the late 90's
• Sending tech jobs overseas
• HUGE deficit spending
• Terrorism limbo
• Skyrocketing insurance costs in all areas
• Government mishandling of money on all levels

There are two options listed in the poll that are additional factors I feel contributed to our current economic woes: Corporate scandals and Our color-coded reminder of terrorism.

Just my two cents

Very good Jaime,
But you didn't mention how the size of the Tax Cut shrank because the dems fought it so hard, nor the fact that the Dems lost their majority thsi last election.

I have a problem with the "Sniper Attacks" option because that never effected the national economy. It only effected the economy of the Beltway

The central problem with the economy is over capitalization. Little of Bush’s tax cut(s) have been targeted at consumer spending therefore increasing the size of the tax cut would have had no effect on the economy. And democrats did not cause Wellstone's plane to ice up an crash nor did they do a smear campaign on Max Clealand, so I really do not see what the Democrats losing the majority in the Senate has to do with anything other than bad luck and the general character of the Carl Rove.