“it’s misleading to suggest that the president—and by extension, the major political party to which the president belongs—is singularly or even primarily responsible for the success or failure of the job market. Rather, individuals in dynamic economies operate independently of the political party that happens to occupy the White House.
Clinton’s numbers are technically right: According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the economy added 2.63 million nonfarm private sector jobs while George H.W. Bush was president. During Clinton’s two terms, the economy added 22.9 million jobs. Only 1.37 million jobs were added during George W. Bush’s terms, with another 11.57 million during Barack Obama’s tenure. During Donald Trump’s single term, the economy lost 2.72 million jobs, and in Joe Biden’s term through July 2024, the economy has added 15.81 million.
In total, that equals 51.56 million net jobs added since January 1989—50.28 million under Democratic presidents and 1.28 million under Republican presidents. That’s not the whole story, though.
Many of the presidents’ terms coincided with substantial external forces. Trump left office during a recession caused by the COVID-19 pandemic: In his first three years in office, the economy actually added 6.4 million jobs. Similarly, George W. Bush left office amid the Great Recession, during which the economy shed nearly 7.4 million jobs. Calculating Bush’s term up to December 2007, the economy added 5.7 million jobs.
On the other hand, Clinton served during the dot-com boom. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite more than doubled between January 1999 and March 2000. But then the bubble burst: The economy entered a recession in March 2001, just weeks after Clinton left office, and the Nasdaq would lose 78 percent of its value between its March 2000 high and October 2002.”
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“National economies—particularly those as large and complex as ours—are dynamic, with an infinite number of inputs and externalities. “Month-to-month job creation is just a function of the dynamic U.S. economy that’s bigger than one person,” Chris Douglas, associate economics professor at the University of Michigan–Flint, told Marketplace in 2022. Central planning fails for this reason: Dynamic economies are driven by individuals, each operating only with his or her own knowledge and interests in mind.”