Through January 2012: Republican Admins are Directly Responsible for 80% of Our Nation’s Debt.

Republicans would have us believe that they are the guardians of the purse — but the true numbers never lie.

It always irks me when uneducated comment posters continue to say things like President Obama has “racked up more debt than any previous three presidents combined”.

This is a ridiculous statement and something that can be directly disproved by simply looking at the numbers. As of today, March 11th, 2014, Bush has increased the debt more than President Obama by .4 trillion dollars.

So how is it possible that someone could believe that the current president has increased the debt more than the last 3 presidents combined? One word — ignorance.

And it’s this same ignorance that drives the same people to think that somehow Democrats are the one responsible, in large part, for our nation’s debt. In fact, the numbers tell a very different story.

It is my contention that from the beginning of our great nation, through January, 2012 — that in fact 80% of our nation’s debt is directly attributable to Republican administration policies.

Here are my facts with the sources to back them up.

The bulk of Federal spending related to the current president’s policies happened before 2010 and were due to economic circumstance. Since 2010, federal spending has dropped off a cliff. Federal spending under this president has risen at a much lower rate than under George W. Bush. This president is not a run-away spender, contrary to what you may have heard.

In January of 2012 the debt stood at 15 trillion. At that point, Republican administrations and their policies were responsible for 80% of our entire national debt. I know it sounds incredible, but it’s true and I can prove it.

Policies directly attributable to this President and his initiatives grew the debt only 2 trillion dollars over the first 4 years of his presidency. If you adjust for actual savings as a result of his policies, it’s closer to 1 trillion. This is better than all previous presidents in recent history, save Clinton who did not contribute to the debt at all.

The Argument

I’d like to invite you to reality:

- http://zfacts.com/p/1170.html

- http://zfacts.com/p/1195.html

- http://zfacts.com/p/57.html

The large majority of this president’s debt came from his republican predecessors and economic circumstance. Trillion dollar deficits were already cooked into the books before Obama stepped foot in the office. The actual debt attributable to this presidents policies is around 1.9 trillion in his first 4 years:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/adding-to-the-deficit-bush-vs-obama/2012/01/31/gIQAQ0kFgQ_graphic.html

If you adjust that debt for projected savings for policies directly attributable to this president, it’s less than 1 trillion dollars.

This figure is bested only by William Jefferson Clinton who increased the debt between 2.2 trillion over 8 years and even this is the result of interest on debt inherited from Reagan/Bush. Clinton would have otherwise paid off our debt had Reagan and Bush balanced their budgets.

By contrast, in 12 years, Bush/Reagan increased the debt by 3.3 trillion. It increased every year as a percentage of the GDP. Every single year.

http://zfacts.com/p/318.html

George W. Bush increased the debt by 6.1 trillion dollars over 8 years. Which is bad but again he was paying compounding interest on the Reagan/Bush debt as is Obama.

If you add up Republican debt (including Clinton debt as 100% direct result of Bush/Reagan interest), by September 2010, total debt attributable to Republican administrations was 12 trillion dollars. The total debt on September 30, 2010:

$13,561,623,030,891.79

So the percentage of debt that Republicans were responsible for on this date: 88% — eighty eight percent.

In January 2012 the debt stood at approximately 15 trillion. Without accounting for the increase in debt due to compound interest on Reagan/Bush debt between 2010 and 2012 (we’ll just pretend the debt share is a static number which it’s not), Republicans were still responsible for 80% of our nation’s debt at that point. If we account for interest on Republican debt between those 2 years, it’s slightly higher in fact.

Republican Congress vs Democratic Congress

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/GPO-CDOC-107sdoc18/pdf/GPO-CDOC-107sdoc18-1-12-4.pdf

This chart shows a comparison of administrations’ requested budgets and the amount they actually received. On average when Democrats were in control, Republican and Democratic administrations got less than what they requested. However under Republican controlled budgets passed, they gave the administration as much as they requested or more.

A lot of Republicans like to claim that the only reason spending didn’t balloon under Clinton is because of the Republican controlled congress which helped to reign in all this spending he wanted to do.

That’s a lie. Yes, Republicans did grant less than president Clinton requested for every year of Clinton’s presidency where they held the majority… but so did Democrats.

As you’ll see here: http://uspolitics.about.com/od/usgovernment/l/bl_party_division_2.htm

Democrats controlled both the senate and house in 1993 where they granted a total of 30 million dollars less than president Clinton requested.

In 2001, R’s and D’s shared control of house and senate. The first year of the Bush II’s presidency, total appropriations enacted were 26 million less than requested. By contrast in 2002, where Republicans held solid majorities in both senate and house, total appropriations enacted were 6.3 million MORE than requested.

I invite you to do your homework and see how this trend plays out over history.

And finally, the last point I would like to make is debt as a percentage of the GDP per president. This chart shows from the year 1900 and makes a projection through 2015:

http://articles.businessinsider.com/2010-05-22/markets/30060713_1_national-debt-tax-cuts-government-revenues

and here…

http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2010/05/national-debt-by-president/

I realize that this is a bit difficult to look at for Republicans, mainly because it shows the result of Republican stewardship of the economy in stark, stark terms.

Obama too has increased the debt as a percent of the gdp every year IF and ONLY if you attribute all debt which is actually a result of his republican predecessors to Obama. We all know that of course only a small portion of the 5 trillion in debt over this period can be attributed to this president’s policies.

This tool will allow you to the rise and fall of the GDP in % over any time period that you specify.

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-states/gdp-growth

As you’ll see, Bush II enjoyed positive 4% growth in GDP his first year in office. Whereas Obama enjoyed a wonderful -9% growth GDP his first year in office. GDP was down and deficit spending was way up due to the crisis, increased unemployment benefits, lower revenues, the bailouts, stimulus, and so on. None of which would had been necessary had the economy not been in a nose dive. Most competent economist agree that this spending WAS necessary and was effective including the non partisan congressional budget office.

If you look at the projections through 2015, Obama’s numbers regarding debt as % of gdp start to level off. I haven’t done this yet, but I bet it would be quite interesting. If you erase Bush entirely and you take the average gdp growth from President Clinton’s years and you apply that to the first 4 years of Obamas presidency — and then you look at the cost of his policies that have no relation to the crisis. Compare the costs as a percentage of GDP and I’m quite certain it would be a downward trend.

And in terms of spending, Federal spending has dropped off a cliff since 2010 and upcoming cuts including defense spending will further that trend. It’s no wonder why the recovery has been sluggish. After the initial stimulus the government virtually quit spending.

Again Republicans can attack the stimulus all you want but most credible economists agree that it was necessary and it did improve the economy. The CBO estimates that it created 3.3 million jobs, cut unemployment by as much as 1.8 percent and boosted GDP by up to 4.1 percent:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/political-economy/2010/08/cbo_says_stimulus_may_have_add.html

And if most Republican comment posters are actually as big of policy wonks’ as they claim to be, they’ll really enjoy this: http://www.cbo.gov/directors-blog?p=3026

And ending the stimulus has only served to further put a drag on the economy:

http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2011/05/30/End-of-Stimulus-Could-Pull-Economy-Down-Further.aspx#page1

And due to this massive explosion of debt from 2001 — January 2012, much of which Republicans are responsible for, they’ve suddenly become born again deficit hawks. They’re now looking to European austerity for inspiration. All of the sudden, it’s critical that we slash spending. Convenient now that they ran up the bill and are no longer in power. Of course they get to rail against the President.

The problem is that their plans for European austerity will only serve to further destroy any economic recovery we might expect to see in the next 4-8 years. And the CBO confirms that the federal government gets a much better bang for its buck by giving money to individual states and allowing them to spend it than by cutting taxes for the wealthy and expecting that they’ll put that money back into the economy or hire a single person because of it. This is laughable Republican ideology that’s already been proven wrong.

But the real issue here is, like I said, most people don’t take the time to educate themselves. They do their simplistic calculations that they pulled from some fact checking article they read or worse some right wing blog.

People like me on the other hand seek to understand the situation in its entirety. This requires a bit more effort than searching Google and finding a Washington Post fact checking article.

So now that they know the truth, will they begin to think independently? My guess is no. The bubble continues.