What If Hillary Had Won?

(first published in North State Journal 9/19/18)

Where would we be today?

We would still be languishing in the throes of the economic malaise we endured for 8 long years under President Barack Obama. The same policies that never produced more than 1.9% annual GDP growth for 8 years from 2009-2017.

The question for everyone as we head into the election season this fall is this:

‘Are you economically better off than you were 2 short years ago?’

Had Hillary Clinton been elected President, here’s where we would be today:

• 1 million more people would be on Medicaid nationwide and 2 million more people would be collecting food stamps because they couldn’t find a job.
• Enrollment in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) would be 12% higher than 2.3 million today.
• Enrollment in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) would be far higher than 40.7 million reported in January 2018, the lowest since May 2010.
• The number of people on Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) would far higher than 8.6 million in March which was the lowest level reported since February 2012.
• The Dow Jones Average would be 20,000 today, perhaps 21,000. Not 26,062 as it closed Monday.
• We would not be experiencing the benefits of 3.5% to possibly 4% real GDP growth rates we are now seeing.
• Businesses would continue to suffocate under the staggering flood of never-ending new rules and regulations promulgated under President Obama.  Hillary Clinton would have kept all of them in force and expanded them in number; under President Trump, thousands have been rescinded and new regs have been reduced to a dribble.

The election of Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton triggered a massive sense of relief in the business sector and unleashed ‘the animal spirits’ of entrepreneurs nationwide as Adam Smith would have said. The Council of Economic Advisers point towards the demarcation point as being November 8, Election Night 2016. (see chart)

Not one day before.

IF such an explosion of confidence had happened during any of the 8 long years that President Obama was setting policy for our nation, everyone would have known it, recognized it and applauded him for getting the job done.

The explosion of confidence never happened under President Obama. It would not have happened under Hillary Clinton either because she vowed to continue and expand every one of President Obama’s misguided policies.

This new-found confidence in the private sector is working. Friends, neighbors, family members and people everywhere are getting new higher-paying jobs instead of job rejection letters. Millions more of our fellow citizens of all ages and races are working today and providing for their families.

The national Democratic Party wants the public to believe that a sign of government policy success is how many people are on government assistance. They want more socialism which means more government control of your lives, not less.

We believe the reverse is true. The more people are independent and off of government assistance because they have a good job, the better it is for them personally and for the nation as a whole.

Think very carefully about yourself first and your personal economic interests, dreams and desires and those of your children and your friends when you vote this fall.

Do you really want to give the keys back to Congress to the same Democratic leaders who supported every failed economic policy put forth by President Barack Obama?

In 1999, Gallup found a vast majority of Americans thought President Bill Clinton was personally immoral but they liked the fact they personally benefited from the results of the economy that happened under his watch.

You may personally dislike President Trump and the way he does things. But be wary of electing people to Congress and legislatures who want to reverse everything that has worked so far under his term.

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