´óÏó´«Ã½

So the electorate 'wants it cake and to eat it'. Same as over here - except we do not have the advantage of the US entrepreneurial spirit. Too many in the UK economy do not want to work for a living, too many have poor skills to do so if the jobs were there. In the US they have Obama who is a leader people will follow. In the UK we have nobody worthy of the name leader. Nobody who is big enough and honest enough to spell out the tough choices. 2010 difficult for Obama and the US. 2010 make or break for the UK economy.

President Obama must be so happy that in economic matters he listened to and took guidance from that great genius saviour of planet Earth, Gordon Brown. I don't think.

#1 tonyparksrun

"Too many in the UK economy do not want to work for a living, too many have poor skills to do so if the jobs were there."

Now go and take a look at the US skills analysis and you will find that they are in far worse shape than us. BTW, what do you base your "Too many in the UK economy do not want to work for a living" statement on?

What a "matter-of-fact" assumption ridden article. Blanket statements presented as "truths" are meant for those that cannot analyze events on their own and need "bloggers" to spell things out. It is amazing how after all this time articles like this still casually blame current problems on things from prior administration. It is a wonderful cop-out that potus himself uses frequently.
It is hard to understand how can health care bill be considered a success if it was essentially pushed through despite the opposition from the voters. And it also exposed all sorts of problems with political system - case in point the 1 republican that voted for it. I'm sure all are aware why. One does not have to be a genius to understand implications of removing "preexisting condition" rules and caps for premiums. All these costs are always passed on to consumers. This is notwithstanding the unconstitutional nature of making people buy insurance.
Economic growth is scant if at all existent. Companies are still cutting overhead and many sectors are still plunging. The fact that Dow went up a bit is by far not an indication of recovery.
In other words mister president has done nothing but talk. Leadership is measured by results - so far there is nothing to measure.

#1 tonyparksrun

"we do not have the advantage of the US entrepreneurial spirit" - that's quite a broad statement that really isn't borne out by the fact that a large slice of UK employment comes from small businesses - approximately 1 in 8 people are self employed for example. You should get your facts straight before running down the UK, along with all the other whining snipers.

I think the Obama promise on his stimulus which involved tax cut/credits was to save/create 3.5 million jobs, 90% being in the private sector. This would be over 2 years. He'll be judged a year from today. He did make it clear that this would depend on banks lending to businesses and the success of his Adminisration's bank bail-out. Not only has employment fallen but lending has not recovered according to Geitner in December 09. There is too much pussy-footing around on this continuing credit freeze both in the US and here. The BoE say that UK banks will need to raise £33bn of further capital and refinance £1trn wholesale finance over the next 5 years as well as meet new liquidity and capital regulation. Now, everyone's talking of breaking the banks up. We need G20 Mk 11 to get to grips with this CRISIS which hasnt been resolved by any stretch.

America will fall in our lifetimes, the dollar is already on the brink. It at least had a small chance of escaping the British tyranny, but eventually fell to the same statist elites and socialist thinking - that you can leave saving and production to "poor" countries whilst we live lives of luxury in debt. .

Why would anyone try and follow the fiscal and social disaster that is the NHS voluntarilty?

The orchestra has started tuning for the final symphony.

Obama is a just another puppet president. When will people wake up?
I guess when he orders the attacks on Iran.

As in the UK the problem is exacerbated if the country becomes obsessed with the thirties style balance sheet view of the deficit. Nothing will deal with the deficit quicker than more employment and spending. So far it has only been half a new deal.

#9 great idea, only one issue - where is the money coming from? - we don't have any. Where are the jobs coming from? The governemnt?

An objective comment on Obamas first year would at best be:"must try harder" or perhaps a C-. Lets look at a few issues

His only real achievement to date is the "economic stimulus". That was taken after listening to and taking guidance from Gordon Brown.

Obamas health care package might or might not be a success.

His decision to close GBay is now under scrutiny as the prisoners released are turning up in various parts of the World demonstrating thier terrorist ambitions.

His approach to the threat of Iran has been weak and indeed Iran has ignored him completely.

Obama, will I suspect prove to be a one term President that promised much and delivered little

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

Stephanie the ´óÏó´«Ã½'s economics editor writes 'Few incoming US presidents have faced a first year in office as challenging as President Obama's'.
Not sure that a US political historian could agree with that although he or she may wonder if the economic reality of the latest attempt to replace the UK's First Lord of the Treasury is being smoked and mirrored.

In the end, so much comes down to luck. It's easy to look good in fair weather. It's a rare and a good leader who wisely saves and invests in the good times to prepare for the bad ones.

Rare? Like hen's teeth.

Steph....what's it like to be involved in a pseudo science???

Far more eminent economists have summarised his presidency as follows...

Stiglitz:
'Wall Street creating short respite before next crash'
Nobel economist Joseph Stiglitz recently warned: Unless Wall Street's incentive system is drastically reformed, "the financial sector will only try to circumvent whatever new regulations we put in place. We will simply have a short respite before the next crisis." Warning, nothing's changed, it's worse: Lobbyists run Obama, Congress and the Fed.

Taleb:
'Fed haunted by ghost of Greenspan's failed Reaganomics'
When Obama reappointed Bernanke, Nassim Taleb, risk-management professor and author of "The Black Swan," warned of a new disaster: "The world has never, never been as fragile," yet Obama reappoints an economist who "doesn't even know he doesn't understand how things work." New proof? At last week's American Economic Association, Bernanke was still shifting the blame: "The best response to the housing bubble would have been regulatory, not monetary."
Bernanke conveniently forgets he was advising Bush earlier, did nothing. Now Obama's stuck with a Greenspan clone and an insane ideology focused solely on saving a failed banking system by flooding the world with inflated dollars guaranteed to trigger another meltdown

BO is a smooth operator - what I like to call a pragmatic visionary. He set out a few pillars of policy - economics / healthcare / environment and Afghanistan. He has 4 years to be seen to deliver this and isn't willing to spend 3 years failing to get everything that he wants. And so, in 1 year he has initiated what he can get through in all 4 of these pillars - stimulus package - healthcare (almost through) - environment (through the House) - Afghanistan policy (decided). He now has 3 years for these initiatives to kick in and for the US to see the results of his policies. Amazingly for a politician he is doing what he said (as far as he has the authority to do so) and only asks to be judged on his success. Love him or loathe him you have to respect him.

#16 Martin Vasey...are you in any way related to Mr Barack Obama?

Otherwise, I honestly believe you are seriously deluded.

#16, that is the best comment on this thread!

How can anyone argue? Elected on a platform for four years - why not give him four years to implement it?!

His choice is to do what he is told by his sponsors, or break away and be a truly great President. So far it looks as if he is going for the former, just like most of his predecessors did.

The Republicans that oppose the President are the same ones that voted to deny oversight of the financial institutions when it was brought to the attention of congress in 2001 that the structure was a house of cards. Republicans are hypocrits and tend to be liars as well. Republicans voted immediately to bail out the banks and auto industries with tax dollars, thus contributing to the high deficit. They have nothing to offer but a return to the influnece peddling of the monied and how it benefits them and their families. As all have seen, this President has tried to limit the influence of lobbyist but that has been denied by congress. Nothing meaningful can happen when corruption is on this grand scale. Everyone watched the Republican be pimped by the healthcare inductry to make sure their was no competition in their collusion and price fixing. This is about ethic in government, or more acurately, establishing some ethic in government. The US and the West were locked in a cold war with Russia and the game was fought with techology and education and now the battle is with China and the game is designed around corruption. The West has no moral authority because it has become corrupt. If the people in the West do not demand for things to change, nothing will. The problems can be solved but it is unsure if the politcal culture can.

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

It is NOT just Obama who is responsible for the PEOPLES discontent with their ELECTED Officials. But, all of the Congressmen and Senators who have decided or been bribed or coerced by the Administration in passing a hopelessly unfocused disjointed Health Care Bill have played their roles in angering the American voters. If the American voters' collective memory is not distracted, then many of those officials will be turned out of office come election day.
While the World may 'love' Obama (eg. Nobel Peace Prize for what?!), most patriotic Americans of all political stripes are fed up with a President who goes around the world apologizing for America's past.
Personally, no America blood or treasure should have been expended on foreign wars or police actions since 1898. As far as I can recall, only one nation ever repaid their War Debt from World War II. I don't recall the United States ever receiving "foreign aid" to develop itself. Many Americans believe that the U.S. should cutoff all foreign aid around the globe.
Next time, some country yells for a 'Policeman' to help save their country from civil war or invasion; let some other nation (perhaps China) step into the breach.

Obama is a black swan event - what we see now is not what we will get later.

Good stuff her folks. Obama has indeed had a tough year, but I'd say he's a good deal wiser and smarter than many of his predecessors (Clinton included) and he knows that you have to cash in your chips fast before the odds shift. That's what he's done with healthcare, the stimulus and social ownership of the banks. Any US president who is able to override the cosmic American ideology (excluding sport) which sets against social ownership of enterprise, has got big cahones, and that's a good sign. We know he'll have to fight a constant running battle with the Republicans, but I feel, powerful as they are, their intellectual and moral capital is blown, they are, for now, a busted flush. What all so called free market economies need is a fundamental reattachment of people to their social and moral responsibilities. The fact that large numbers of people are able to accumulate vast wealth alongside a large underclass is unacceptable. All the more so because the mixture of phoney economics and tax evasion/avoidance that sits ever more closely with the monied classes is a fissile influence in society. As Ruth Benedict (Anthropologist) identified in the 1930's, societies characterised by high competition, social aggression with gains santioned at the expense of others, are low synergy societies. They tend to have very bad numbers on the happy index, as opposed to those with relatively low competition, low aggression and higher levels of cooperation (that's Scandanavia I believe). Food for thought.

"But foolishly, the Obama administration predicted a year ago that passing the stimulus package would keep the jobless rate below 8%"

"Foolishly"?

The ´óÏó´«Ã½ and the libtard supporters have been saying Obama is nothing less than the Messiah sent down from heaven to rescue mankind!!!1!!!!!!!!!!!

He can surely do no wrong.
The anointed one`s approval ratings clearly demonstrate this,ha,ha.

it's snowing so..

Hi Stephanie,
yes, tough choices for Obama, as they were for Bush when he was first elected. It would appear to an outsider to USA that the vested interests that operate on Capitol Hill are still winning despite the change of President/ Congress.
Judged on his election promises to the American people, I would say that Obama has not been the President that they hoped for.
The net result will be a change in majority of Congress yet again which will further hamper the Presidents stated policies. I also do not think that he will be re-elected as there will be a groundswell of opinion among ordinary voters that they were better off under the Republicans.
Don't forget that voters have exceptionally short memories!

I love this bikering! O bama has shown that he can nnot deliver on his promises without violating the Constitution. the "healthcare reform" is proof of that. You must also remember that his "friends" Pelosi, Reid, Boxer, Feinstein,Kerry, Durbin and many others will turn on him as quick as possible to further their own ambitions. You can also thank people like Pelosi who go on national television and admit they are working to destroy the constitution (" Some people may call taking power from the people as violating the constitution"). Funny thing is she was correct, it is a violation of the Constitution to take the peoples rights away from them. It also gives the States the main power, not the Federal Government. Let the states do what they are supposed to do and get out of the way for better growth than in the last 150 years.
As for the economy, if you want to see how bad the depression could have been then let OBama continue to follow FDR and hope that a war will save the economy.
If you do not study history you are doomed to repeat it. This is being shown to be the case. You should also add to the study list economics and politics.
Stalain is being successful from his grave as he promised he would destroy the US from within. Look at Obamas' friends, Bill Ayers (unreformed anarchist) and the ACLU.

As an American living abroad at the time I must laugh at the attempts to whitewash the things Mr. OBama has tried to do. If you look at his voting record as a Senator you would have seen that he was just another New Era Democrate who lines his own pockets at the expense of the populace. I am registered as a Democrate and would not and did not vote for this person as he proved that he was another used care salesman or "Snake oil salesman". You can promise everything to everyone if you lay the blame on all the other people when you get caught. The New Democrates do this and get re-elected while the Republicans expell those who fall. We should have all these laws that are built to "Explain" other laws thrown out and get back to the Constitution so that America can actually do what it used to do. It used to be a shining light as evidenced by the people who tried to honestly get to the US to work and prosper. Most of the millionaires and billionaires in the US started with little or nothing and worked hard for what they got as a reward. Maybe people should try to better themselves instead of relying on Government to provide them a living?

A giant-sized photograph of Barack Obama is being used without permission as a presidential pull to shoppers on a Times Square billboard.


The latest celebrity was born!

Obama had two electoral selling points.
He is Black
He is not Dubya
No one knew or seemed to care about anything else.
Well surprise, surprise, he is not the Messiah, Superman or the tooth fairy.
He is not out of the same mould as the Kennedy's, FDR, Lincoln or Washington.
He is just another self-seeking politician, who mouthed enough sound bite platitudes to get elected.
This must come as a great shock to the PC, multi-culturalist fascists, but no great surprise to anyone with a brain.

To be honest there is quite a bit or rubbish being quoted in the comments here.

You cannot deny that Obama has been putting considerable effort into delivering on this promises already. For example. if you were realistic about US politics (and the power of the lobbyists) you should realise that it is perhaps amazing how far he has already managed to advance the health care bill. Comment 16 above is probably the best.

!Shock news!

St. Obama declared human

Is this a distraction from UK economics?

fdd #3

"Now go and take a look at the US skills analysis and you will find that they are in far worse shape than us" This may be true in certain analyses, however my generalised point was that we in the UK are poorly equipped to generate wealth to pay off the debts as our skills base has developed in response to employment markets skewed by easy credit and a financial services based economy. The US has far less dependence on financial services and has skill base in the mineral and energy extraction industries and agriculture that can create wealth to pay off the deficit.
and
"BTW, what do you base your "Too many in the UK economy do not want to work for a living" statement on? In my opinion, we need to revisit the social safety net that has been skewed during 10 years of economic growth largely generated by easy credit and financial services engineering. The political economy thought that as the tide rose all could benefit - we now see the tide has risen in an unsustainable way - ergo social safety net we thought we could afford is no longer affordable. Accepted my comments were generalised to keep the initial post short and sweet.

#5 sacallaghan
"we do not have the advantage of the US entrepreneurial spirit" - that's quite a broad statement that really isn't borne out by the fact that a large slice of UK employment comes from small businesses - approximately 1 in 8 people are self employed for example. You should get your facts straight before running down the UK, along with all the other whining snipers.
Accepted a broad statement, but it is generally accepted that the US is the home of the entrepreneur. We do have a vibrant small business sector (I work in that sector) but it is dashed difficult to make a small business successful and sustainable and would point to statistics that the vast majority of small businesses fail after a fairly short life. My argument is that many in the UK are content to be employed, a signifcant number by government and banks, and who don't take responsibility for their own performance or that of their employer. To me, entrepreneurial spirit doesn't just stop at self-employment. It's an attitude of mind in business and we don't, in my opinion, have enough of that to work hard and pay off the deficit.

Stephanie, you say, "But foolishly, the Obama administration predicted a year ago that passing the stimulus package would keep the jobless rate below 8%. Now it's 10%, he's paying the price.

The whole idea of a 'stimulus' somehow being able to keep people in jobs is at best controversial. Some businesses may need short-term loans to keep them going through hard times, but propping up unviable businesses which have actually already failed only postpones the inevitable.

The problem with the 'fiscal stimulus' theory is that there is no proper control over how the money is spent and the entire country ends up footing the bill for decades to come - which in the end damages the prospects of future growth.

The 'fiscal stimulus' idea has been sold to us as a way of keeping the economy going and avoiding recession. But the recession is here anyway. Perhaps it is more to do with preserving the illusion that things are OK with Gordon.

"Too many in the UK economy do not want to work for a living, too many have poor skills to do so if the jobs were there."

Someone pointed me to the following figures:

Number of people in the UK who have never worked in their adult lives - 2 million
Number of people in the UK who have never worked since Labour came into power in 1997 - 5 million

If these are anywhere near accurate it is a sad state of affairs.

Wow, comment on the US, all the Americans come out of the woodwork, and the comment quality goes waaayyy down. I'm ashamed for my country.

Ghostofsichuan has it right - Obama's first year has shown that the US government is hopelessly corrupt and incapable of dealing constructively with any problem. Healthcare reform was desperately needed, but it turned into a bribe-fest for the politicians and a bonanza for the insurance companies. Insurance companies will jack their premiums through the roof (mine already got started, with a 20% increase this year), because they know that Americans will HAVE to buy insurance from them, and have no choice but to pay.

Ditto financial reform: desperately needed -> bribefest -> bonanza for the financial companies at the expense of the taxpayers.

Obama et al. have done NOTHING for the economy except "extend and pretend". They've
- propped up the housing market with tax credits
- propped up the auto market with cash for clunkers
- allowed banks to delay foreclosures, keeping zombie home loans on the books (or selling them) as though they were productive
- allowed banks to abandon mark-to-market for mark-to-makebelieve, to make them all appear solvent
- allowed the banks to fill their empty balance sheets by borrowing money at 0%, stiffing savers, and raking in fees
- allowed the derivatives trade to continue unregulated and unmonitored
- allowed criminal fraud to go unpunished
- allowed the Fed to give out over 1.5 trillion dollars, with no accountability
- devalued the dollar

Meanwhile in the REAL world many states are bankrupt, tax takes are way down, commercial real estate is collapsing, foreclosures set another record last year, and unemployment is still 10% (17% by U6). That unemployment is *structural* - the result of over 20 years of aggressive offshoring of good manufacturing and IT jobs. Those jobs are NEVER coming back, and any new "jobs" we create will be low paying service jobs.

I don't think Obama can keep all these balls up in the air - 30 years worth of chickens are coming home to roost, and the government is paralyzed by its own corruption. The economy will continue to collapse, and the middle class will continue to be squeezed from both sides (shafted by the rich, taxed to help to poor). The voters will rebel (as per Splendidhashbrowns), and vote in a Republican majority next election under the erroneous impression that it will make a difference. It will not. The plutocrats are now firmly in power, and it matters not which party is their public face.

I suppose the basic problem is one of historical context and assessing the effectiveness of a President in the here and now. I seem to remember a comment about FDR which was 'he saved capital for the capitalists and they never forgave him for it". But he did win 4 elections! Obama can only get two terms but I suspect the stimulus package has prevented mass redundancies and will stimulate a recovery later in 2010!

Without the economic stimulus package the whole US economic system would have gone into meltdown. Here in the UK we were hours away from cash points not operating because banks tottered on the edge of bankrupcy! Gordon Brown for all his failings saved the banking system and stimulated the economy because the private sector had blown a fuse. Scant praise will come but it remains true without significant state interventon by the USA, UK and nations across the globe we would now be in a depression to equal the 1930's.

"There were many who said that the healthcare bill should have been deferred - to let Obama and his advisors focus all their energies on the economy and the financial system."

Obama's reasoning was that health care costs were dragging down the economy and therefore needed fixing right away. This was rationalizing doing what he wanted to do instead of doing what needed doing. First of all, the health care act even if passed into law won't take effect until 2014, much to late to affect the current situation so it was not an urgent matter except for him politically. Secondly, this bill is mostly about redistribution of wealth, that's where the crux of the issue lies. Nobody in America dies on the street for lack of emergency health care. But many don't get the routine medical care they need or get it in emergency rooms where it is expensive. There will be a redistribution of administrative costs, profits to insurance companies, and who winds up paying which portion of the bill but on the whole the net change will be marginal for the overall economy. Poor people will have better health care available to them...at the expense of the middle class and the rich. That is about all that will change. Some people call that social justice, others call it class warfare, take your pick.

President Obama was a United States Senator for three years before he was elected. He had access to every scrap of information the government had about the economy. If he wasn't fully informed it was his own fault. If he didn't understand or appreciate the size and complexity of the problem that was also his own fault. He said in the campaign he would fix the economy. He is in no position now to divert attention from his shortcomings by blaming his predecessors, what I call the Tony Blair gambit. Every shortcoming for ten years was blamed by Mr. Blair on "the party opposite" and how they'd wrecked the UK. The fact is that President Obama's party was equally complicit in engineering the depression as the Republicans were. President Clinton admitted his complicity, Senator Dodd's decision not to run for re-election is a demonstration of his. Barney Franks babbles on like he had nothing to do with it.

Sooner or later the stimulus money will run out. It can't last forever. When it does we will see if the economy continues to run, accelerate on its own, or sputters out. The US economy is two thirds driven by consumer spending. When people have lost their jobs or are worried about losing their jobs, they are not in a mood to buy new televison sets or cars unless they have no choice. The diversion of the government's energies and the public focus to health care now was a very dangerous mistake, a costly waste of precious time. President Obama may well pay the penalty for it in the mid term elections by seeing his party lose control over one or both houses of Congress. It's the economy stupid. And national security.

foredeckdave

totally agree with your coments. I am a skilled IT network engineer, i have been out of work for 4 months now.
There simply are no jobs and what there are, there are about 200 people going for.

To many people whom dont want to work? what like the 2.5 million whom have lost there jobs due to the depression - because to call it anything other than a depression is lying. wake up tonyparksrun - there are very few jobs that allow one to earn enough to raise there families!