On January 9, 2009, Christina Romer, released a report showing how badly our economy needed Obama’s “stimulus.” This report claimed that with the “stimulus” plan, the unemployment rate would not reach 8 percent.
Forty months into the “recovery” and a trillion dollars later, the unemployment rate has just barely edged below 8 percent. The “stimulus” and Obama’s economic policies have failed to come close to what was promised.

Even then, the unemployment rate is only telling a small part of the economy’s story.  The rate is measured against the actual labor force, which had changed dramatically since the start of the Obama presidency. According to BLS data, more than 4 million people have given up looking for work and have dropped out of the labor force, effectively shrinking the denominator used in the unemployment rate calculation. They are the forgotten Americans of Obama’s recession.

If you were to count these forgotten Americans, the employment rate would be 10.56 percent today. This is more than double the unemployment rate that Obama promised we would have at this point in his administration.

How does this compare to the recovery during Reagan’s presidency?

Since June this year, the economy has been adding, on average, 147,000 jobs per month. At the same time in Reagan’s presidency, the economy was adding an average of 305,000 jobs per month.

However, this is just a small sample. If we look at Obama’s entire presidency, the picture is much worse. According the BLS non-farm payroll data, we have barely recovered the jobs lost since the beginning of Obama’s presidency.

The verdict is in. Obama’s policies have failed. Higher taxes and massive spending have stalled the economy. The robust recovery under Reagan show what really works to jumpstart and economy: smaller government, lower taxes and less regulation can spur the growth we were promised government would provide four years ago.