Throughout the 20^th Century the US experienced larger than normal GDP growth following the end of a recession and the magnitude of the recovery was roughly proportional to the magnitude of the recession but something has happened under Obama to break that trend.

Here is what the US economy did following the August 1957 – April 1958 and April 1960 – February 1961 recessions.

Notice how GDP growth was in the 7% to 10% range for the 4 quarters following these two recessions.

The recoveries from the recessions during the early 1970’s had GDP growth rates in the 5% to 9% range.

Let’s see what happened to the US economy under Reagan following the July 1981 – November 1982 recession.

You can see that the economic recovery surged for 5 quarters with GDP growth over 6% (and 4 quarters over 8% GDP growth) and then settled into a normal growth period.

Now let’s see how the US economy responded following the December 2007 – June 2009 recession under Obama.

Notice that the ‘recovery’ following this latest recession was no different than a normal economic growth period prior to the recession. The GDP growth rate occasionally sniffed 4% but that was it!

Something happened in the US during the past 5 years that caused its economy to buck the trend of higher than normal GDP growth following a recession. Of course those on the Left say it has nothing to do with Obama or his policies, it must be the weather or the fact that the last recession was so severe. Wrong!

This is the inconvenient truth that Leftists must now come to grips with – The pitiful economic ‘recovery’ following the last recession is exactly what we can expect from Keynesian and Anti-Business policies. If we as a nation fail to recognize this brutal fact then we can expect more sub 2% and many sub 0% GDP growth quarters to follow in our near and long term future.

Welcome to Obamanomics!

Note – All the GDP data in the graphs above was obtained from the BEA website.