Evan C. Hackney
Huda S. Al-Sammarraie
Hsin-Ta Tsai
Brenda E. Wamala
Professor Manamperi
Economics 332
3 December 2013
A Policy Analysis on the Macroeconomic Performances in the United States under Three
Presidents: Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is by far the most embraced indicator of a nation’s level
of wealth. The changes in GDP over time often give people an idea of how well developed a
nation is, given it is often implied that with greater wealth comes better living standards. GDP as
an economic indicator offers a picture that is aggregate; therefore, in this paper, we compare and
contrast the differences in the GDP change during the terms of President Bill Clinton, George W.
Bush, and Barack Obama. More specifically, we will investigate and analyze governmental
policies and macroeconomic performance under these presidents using selected economic
indicators that demonstrate major changes in the economy. These indicators include total public
debt (government deficit) measured in billions, real gross private domestic investment measured
in billions, real personal consumption expenditure measured in billions, consumer price index for
all urban consumers (CPI), and the effective Federal funds rate (interest rates). Furthermore, we
will also analyze how strongly these indicators are correlated with GDP and also with each other.
First of all, retrieving data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis under the U.S.
Department of Commerce (fig 1.), we obtain the quarterly GDP percent change based on current
U.S. dollars from the year of 1993, when President Bill Clinton was in office, to present. Bearing
the graph in mind, we begin our analyses chronologically and began with President Bill Clinton.
Bill Clinton
The first President this paper will discuss is Bill Clinton, who assumed office from the
year of 1993 to 2001. Clinton campaigned on
the economic platform of balancing the
budget, lowering inflation, lowering
unemployment, and continuing the
traditionally conservative policies of free trade
(Pear).
Monetary policies-wide, Clinton had
economist Alan Greenspan as the Chair of the
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fig 1. Quarterly GDP percent change based on current dollars
Figure 3: United States Balance of Trade
Figure 2: CPI Trend
Federal Reserve’s board of governors throughout his presidency; he also appointed two widely
considered “moderate advocates of tight money", Alice Rivlin and Laurence Meyer (Burns and
Taylor). The effect of this policy of appointing tight money proponents to the Fed was that the
CPI never went above 5 percent during the Clinton presidency (1993-2001) (Figure 2). This
strategy also lead to a huge growth in the Dow Jones Industrial Average from 3255.99 in January
1993 to 11500 in early 2000 (Burns and Taylor). However it may also have contributed to the
expanding of our trade deficit. From 1996 to 2000, there was a steady growth of the trade deficit
from -$100 billion to an all-time low at the time of nearly -$400 billion (See Figure 3).
For macroeconomic policies during Bill Clinton’s presidency, they can best be looked at
through three main categories: gross domestic product (GDP), inflation rates, and unemployment
rates. The first factor we will examine will be the GDP.
Bill Clinton inherited from his predecessor, George H. W. Bush, a deficit of 4.7% of GDP
(Bartlett). Although the deficit was not a large priority in Clinton’s initial macroeconomic policy,
he made its reduction a higher priority later in his term (Burns and Taylor). Among many parts of
Clinton’s policy to lower the deficit, he allowed for the passing of laws that raised the money in
the US Treasury (Burns and Taylor). Clinton also cut federal spending and also raised taxes on
the wealthy to lower the deficit (Bartlett).
The pursuit of low inflation rates was another large aspect to Bill Clinton’s
macroeconomic policies. He, unlike most other post-war Democrats, worked to keep the inflation
rates low, and succeeded (Burns and Taylor). The mean inflation rates of Bill Clinton were at
2.3% (Burns and Taylor).
Lower unemployment rates were another large part of Clinton’s macroeconomic policies.
Many argue that Clinton cost many Americans jobs because he supported free trade, which some
argue caused the U.S. to lose jobs to countries like China (Burns and Taylor). Even if Clinton did
cost Americans some jobs because of free trade support, he allowed for more jobs than were lost
because the unemployment rate of his presidency, and especially his second term, were the lowest
they had been in thirty years (Burns and Taylor).
Finally, we should discuss the macroeconomic effects. Clinton took the deficit of 4.7% of
GDP in 1992 and turned it into a surplus of 2.4% of GDP in 2000 (Bootle). Federal spending fell
to 18.4 percent of GDP. In 2000 from 22.2 percent in 1992 (Cline). Although Clinton raised taxes
in 1993, he cut them in 1997 (Bartlett). Clinton also lowered inflation rates down to 2.3%
(Bartlett). His lowering of interest rates contributed greatly to the good economic health exhibited
during Clinton’s presidency (Bartlett). Furthermore, Bill Clinton’s policies achieved a thirty year
low in April 2000 with an unemployment rate of 3.9% (Burns and Taylor). However, Clinton did
receive notable criticism.
Clinton has been heavily criticized for overseeing the creation of the North American
Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which made it more affordable for manufacturing companies to
outsource jobs to foreign countries and then import their product back to the United States
(Teslik). This policy caused a significant decrease in the amount of unskilled jobs in the United
States (Teslik). Some liberals and progressives believe that Clinton did not do enough to reverse
the trends toward widening income and wealth inequality that began in the late 1970s and 1980s.
The top marginal income tax rate for high-income individuals (the top 1.2% of earners) was 70
percent in 1980, then lowered to 28 percent in 1986 by Reagan; Clinton raised it back to 39.6
percent, but it remained far below pre-Reagan levels (Piketty and Saez).
George W. Bush
Later from the year of 2001 to 2009, the incumbent president was George W. Bush. In
this portion of the essay we will be examining President George W. Bush based upon the
governmental policies that were enacted during his presidency, and also the effects these policies
had on the economy as a whole. The economic indicators that will be analyzed during the Bush
Administration Era are Gross Domestic Product (GDP), governmental spending, investment
(factories, equipment, inventories and housing), consumption of goods and services, tax rate,
Consumer Price Index (CPI), interest rate and unemployment rate.
To get a better understanding of the health of the economy during the presidency of
George W. Bush, we need to better explain the government policy that was used by his
administration. When George W. Bush took office in January of 2001, the United States was in a
recession caused by the Y2K economic scare. To battle this, President Bush enacted his first set
of tax cuts that were designed to try and create an economic boom by providing U. S. citizens
with lower tax debt. “To address the 2001 recession, President Bush launched tax cuts. The first
tax rebate, EGTRRA, was designed to jumpstart consumer spending. Checks were mailed to
households in August 2001” (Amadeo). This tax cut saved citizens an estimated $1.35 trillion
over the ten year span that the tax cut was in effect. (Amadeo) This governmental policy might
have been more effective if not for the September 11th terrorist attacks on that United States.
After the September 11th attacks the United States economy took an initial hit due to the closing
of the stock market for a short period of time. This created a major overall drop in the stock
market which could have been recovered from if not for the decision of President George W.
Bush to start the War on Terror Campaign. This war cost the U.S., “By the end of Bush's term in
office, the War on Terror cost $864.82 billion” (Amadeo). The final governmental policy that the
Bush administration used to try and boost the economy out of the impending recession fueled by
both the Y2K scare, and the September 11th attacks was the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief
Reconciliation Act of 2003. The idea behind this act was in order to create more jobs to boost the
economy, business’s needed a relief from investment taxes to free up money for increased
employment. Both major government policies that were enacted under George W. Bush were
designed to help bring the United States economy out of recession by the use of tax relief. Neither
policy seemed to boost the economy during his presidency, and can be seen in the further
investigation of the economic indicators throughout the rest of this portion. (Amadeo).
The first economic indicator that will be analyzed based upon economic data from the
Bush Era is Gross Domestic Product, or GDP. GDP is very important when analyzing a country’s
economic performance because it is viewed as the single most important factor that looks at a
country’s economic health. When President Bush took office on January 20, 2001 the United
States GDP was $36,930.76 million. Barring the economic recession that the country was in at the
time, as previously mentioned George W. Bush used personal tax cut government policy to try
and boost the economy. By the end of 2001, the United States GDP was at $37,258.35 million.
This was a very low increase based upon the growth rate of previous years, and did not show an
economic boost. By the end of President Bush’s presidency the United States GDP had increased
from the initial level previously mentioned to $47,612.92 in the final quarter to be analyzed
(bls.gov).
The next economic indicator to be considered in the performance of the United States
economy is governmental spending during this time frame. When George W. Bush took office the
United States budget was in the positive with a balance of $128.2 billion. Considering the 2001
recession, which led to the initial tax cuts approved by President Bush the budget was pushed into
a deficit of negative $157.8 billion by the end of 2002. Also affecting this ever increasing budget
balance was the increased defense spending on the new War on Terror that the United States
entered under President Bush. Directly relating to this deficit was also the previously mentioned
second set of tax cuts enacted by Bush to relief financial pressure from businesses. Both sets of
tax cuts, and the increase in government spending eventually led to the staggering budget deficit
of negative $458.6 billion by the end of President Bush’s presidency (bea.gov).
The next economic indicator to be analyzed during the Bush Era is the level of
investments that were being made in the United States at this time. During the first quarter of
Bush’s Presidency government investment spending was $163,500 million. By the end of his
presidency the government spending related directly to investments was at $285,652 million. This
shows in positive increase in the government’s efforts to produce capital. Directly relating to this
economic factor is the factor of consumption of goods and services by the United States. This
economic factor is looked at to show the amount spent in the economy on the available goods and
services. During the first quarter of the Bush’s presidency the total spent on goods and services
was $8332 billion. Throughout the duration of his presidency this number fluctuated regularly
due to the economic uncertainty of the country. Only during the first quarter of his presidency did
the number drop below the previous total, showing that even during such uncertain times the
United States was still spending. The ending total of President Bush’s presidency was $9834.3
billion. An increase of $1502.3 billion in consumption (bea.gov).
The tax rate, or Federal Funds Rate during Bush’s presidency was an indication of the
economic turmoil of this time period. When Bush took office the Federal Funds rate was at
4.33%. This shows that the Federal government was not purchasing securities to promote lending.
With the event that’s occurred in the early portion of Bush’s presidency, by April of 2004 the rate
had dropped to its lowest level of the presidency of 1.00%. This showed that the banks were not
lending, and the economy was struggling. There was an increase in the rate back up to 5.26% in
January of 2007, but it then dropped off dramatically to 0.51% by the end of his presidency
showing economic weakness (bls.gov).
The next indicator to be analyzed is the Consumer Price Index. The CPI, or the inflation
rate during this presidency shows an ever increasing inflation rate in the economy barring the
recession during 2001-2002. At the beginning of his presidency the CPI was 177.133, this
number fell marginally during the initial portion of the recession, but then continued to climb to
213.849 by the end of the Bush Era.
The last economic indicator to be analyzed in this portion is the unemployment rate
during this era. At the beginning of Bush’s presidency the rate was 4.2%. This is close to the ideal
level of unemployment. By the end of his presidency the unemployment rate had reached 7.3%. A
number that left millions unemployed, and showed financial and economic trouble for the United
States (bls.gov).
Barack Obama
Our last President who assumed office since 2009 was Barack Obama. Under the Obama
administration, the United States economy was slowly recovering from the 2008 financial crisis.
In 2009, the U.S. Congress and Obama passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act
(ARRA), which was a $787 billion package that included a $286 billion tax cut and a $501 billion
spending rise that increased the U.S. real GDP in the following years (Elwell).
In terms of investment spending, on average, investment spending represents the third
largest component of aggregate spending. It is also very sensitive to economic conditions and is
considered more volatile than consumer spending. This is due to its being postponeable, i.e.
people can always delay investment projects to when the economic conditions are better (Elwell).
Investment represented an economic growth when it has risen during the economic recovery in
years 2010, 2011, and 2012 when real GDP increased to 12.7%, 13.5%, and 14% consecutively
(Elwell). Investment has increased under Obama’s administration from approximately $2000,000
billion in January 2009 to almost $2600,000 billion in July 2013.
CPI increased Under Obama’s administration by 10% as a result of an increase in oil
prices, as well as other commodity prices. This rise, however, is not permanent and it does not
generate any inflationary pressure on the economy because it only involves food and energy
prices (Elwell). On the other hand, other indicators that affect inflation immensely remained
fairly stable, such as wages, productions costs, and yields on long-term securities which influence
the longer term inflationary expectations.
Government deficit went down to its smallest annual budget due to the reduction in
government spending and increasing the tax revenue. The national deficit increased by $750
billion in 2013, which is comparatively small compared to the increased in the previous year,
which reached $1.16 trillion. This shows an improvement in the fiscal policy under Obama’s
administration (Hicks).
Since 2009, interest rate has remained fairly stable yet had slight fluctuations. From 2009
to early 2010, interest rate fell to 11% while it increased drastically to 20% in April 2010. It then
fell down gradually until it reached 7% in October 2011 and was followed by slight fluctuations
between 8% and 16%. These fluctuations are caused by three main economic indicators: Gross
Domestic Product, Inflation (CPI), and the Unemployment Rate.
As for consumer spending, the rise in oil prices from October 2011 through April 2012
by 30% had a major impact on household budgets and led to a reduction in consumer spending in
that period. This is due to the fact that the demand for energy is inelastic, and hence, when
consumers spend more on energy, they are likely to spend less on other commodity, which
consequently slows down the economy (Elwell). As soon as the oil prices went down in April
2012, the economic growth started recovering as the consumer spending increased from around
$9,863 billion in July 2009 to $10,732 billion in July 2013.
Correlation Analysis
This part of the paper includes a simple correlation analysis between real GDP and the
five economic indicators and among the indicators themselves. Made possible by the data tool
provided in Excel, the correlation results show how strongly correlated each indicators are with
one another, with 1 being perfectly correlated and 0 being perfectly uncorrelated. The level of
correlation also reveals growth trends, negatively or positively, of all variables compared.
First, we look at the correlation result during Clinton Administration:
GDP Consumption CPI Investment Deficit Interest
Rate
GDP 1 Consumption 0.997342 1
CPI 0.988595 0.985297915 1 Investment 0.995135 0.987355891 0.977126 1
Deficit 0.94301 0.925169348 0.960943 0.9439488 1 Interest Rate 0.642066 0.630206745 0.708911 0.6328619 0.732569 1
Table 1: Correlation Result during Clinton Administration
As the table shows, total public debt (government deficit), real gross private domestic investment,
real personal consumption expenditure, and consumer price index for all urban consumers (CPI)
are all highly (almost perfectly) and positively correlated with GDP. Only the effective Federal
funds rate (interest rates) shows moderate level of correlation with GDP. These relationships are
shown in figure 4, 5, and 6, where the growth trend lines of total public debt (government deficit),
real gross private domestic investment, real personal consumption expenditure, and consumer
price index for all urban consumers (CPI) (placed in a separate graph because of different units of
measurement) move consistently with the GDP growth trend line. In a separate graph, figure 6
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Figure 4: Growth Trend of GDP, Consumption, Investment, and Deficit
GDP
Real Personal ConsumptionExpenditures in billions
Investment in billions
Total Public Debt in billions
Linear (GDP)
shows how the Effective Fed Funds Rate (Interest Rates) exhibits a correlation with GDP that is
only moderate.
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fig.5 Growth Trend of CPI
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fig. 6 Growth Trend of Effective Federal Funds Rate
Secondly, we have the correlation result during Bush administration:
GDP Consumption CPI Investment Deficit Interest
Rate
GDP 1 Consumption 0.994311 1
CPI 0.949861 0.964255649 1 Investment 0.66051 0.59684497 0.413468 1
Deficit 0.904111 0.931875605 0.972482 0.304946 1 Interest Rate 0.35199 0.309229251 0.213048 0.634348 0.093318 1
Table 2: Correlation Result during Bush Administration
According to the
table, total public
debt (government
deficit), real
personal
consumption
expenditure, and
consumer price
index for all urban
consumers (CPI) are
all highly and almost
perfectly correlated with GDP. However, real gross private domestic investment went from
highly-correlated during Clinton time to moderately-correlated during Bush time. The effective
Federal funds rate (interest rates) demonstrates a weak correlation with GDP this time. These
correlations are shown in figure 7, 8, and 9, where the growth trend lines of total public debt
(government deficit), real personal consumption expenditure, and consumer price index for all
urban consumers (CPI) (placed in a separate graph because of different units of measurement)
move consistently with the GDP growth trend line. However, the graph also shows that real gross
private domestic investment exhibits less consistency. In a separate graph, figure 9 shows how the
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fig. 7 Growth Trend of GDP, Consumption, investment, and deficit
GDP
Real PersonalConsumptionExpenditures in billions
Investment in billions
Total Public Debt inbillions
Linear (GDP)
Effective Fed Funds Rate (Interest Rates) demonstrates a correlation with GDP that is only
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fig.8 growth trend of CPI
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fig. 9 growth trend of Effective Federal Funds Rate
The last correlation result we have is during the on-going Obama administration:
GDP Consumption CPI Investment Deficit Interest
Rate
GDP 1 Consumption 0.991938 1
CPI 0.980581 0.985458044 1 Investment 0.984197 0.965635613 0.945743 1
Deficit 0.991806 0.98864962 0.984669 0.96900854 1
Interest Rate -0.37636 -
0.389908137 -0.50036 -
0.36502204 -
0.39538 1
According to the
table, total public
debt (government
deficit), real
personal
consumption
expenditure, real
gross private
domestic
investment, and
consumer price
index for all urban consumers (CPI) are all highly and, again, almost perfectly correlated with
GDP. The result also shows that the effective Federal funds rate (interest rates) has a weak and
negative correlation with GDP during Obama’s time. These correlations are shown in figure 10,
11, and 12, where the growth trend lines of total public debt (government deficit), real personal
consumption expenditure, real gross private domestic investment, and consumer price index for
all urban consumers (CPI) (placed in a separate graph because of different units of measurement)
move consistently with the GDP growth trend line. In a separate graph, figure 12 shows how the
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fig.10 Growth Trend of GDP, Consumption, Investment, and
Deficit
GDP
Real Personal ConsumptionExpenditures in billions
Investment in billions
Total Public Debt in billions
Effective Fed Funds Rate (Interest Rates) demonstrates a correlation with GDP that is weak and
negative.
Conclusion
With all the policy analyses and data analyses, we see clear differences of
macroeconomic performance across these three presidents. However, this paper is not presented
in an attempt to judge a particular president or to show favoritism towards one over the other two.
It is imperative to notice that “[normal] economic cycles mean that growth is likely to be less
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TIME (QUARTERLY)
fig.11 growth trend of CPI
0.000.020.040.060.080.100.120.140.160.180.20
20
09
-01
-01
20
09
-04
-01
20
09
-07
-01
20
09
-10
-01
20
10
-01
-01
20
10
-04
-01
20
10
-07
-01
20
10
-10
-01
20
11
-01
-01
20
11
-04
-01
20
11
-07
-01
20
11
-10
-01
20
12
-01
-01
20
12
-04
-01
20
12
-07
-01
20
12
-10
-01
20
13
-01
-01
20
13
-04
-01
EEFE
CTI
VE
FED
ERA
L FU
ND
S R
ATE
TIME (QUARTERLY)
fg. 12Effective Federal Funds Rate
impressive for a president who enters office at the end of a boom, as George W. Bush did, and
better for one who enters when growth is weak, as Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan did” (Norris).
Overall, we are able to see effects from the implementation of policies to show on GDP changes
and that the selected indicators in this paper almost all exhibit strong correlation with GDP and
mostly with one another.
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