History is repeating itself. Today, the Commerce Department reported that, contrary to what they previously thought, the economy did not grow at 0.2 percent in the first quarter. In fact, the economy shrank at a 0.7 percent seasonally adjusted annually rate over that same period.
Exactly one year ago, the Commerce Department came back with almost identical bad news. As Majority Leader McCarthy said on May 29, 2014:
“Late last month, economic reports showed that first quarter GDP growth slowed to a barely discernible 0.1 percent annual rate, the weakest quarter since 2012. We now realize that the GDP growth was even worse than initially presumed. New reports indicate that first quarter GDP actually shrank at a one percent annual rate, the worst report since the first quarter of 2011. It appears that the imperceptible recovery has now dipped into another economic downturn.”
When will the news be different? When will America’s economy reach its full potential?
Americans are tired of waiting for the recovery that the President has repeatedly promised. After six years, it’s easy to see that almost everything this President has done harms the ability of our economy to recover.
This Administration’s excessive regulatory agenda, including actions to increase the cost of carbon, expand the regulatory power of the EPA over every possible waterway in the U.S., and enact harmful policies through the NLRB, discourages businesses from expanding or even starting altogether. The President’ punitive tax policies penalize success, and his spending agenda works in large part to support non-competitive crony capitalism and feed programs that encourage people to drop out of the work force. And Obamacare hangs like a dark cloud of businesses and individuals, driving up costs and increasing uncertainty.
If the President wanted to deliberately create policies to destroy our economy, it would be difficult for him to put together something more effective than what he has already been doing. What’s worse, despite six years of mistakes and bad policies, the President hasn’t been willing to change one bit and has instead doubled-down on every wrong idea that undermines economic growth.
For the sake of every American still struggling in President Obama’s economy, the House is offering alternative, pro-growth plan. We have not and will not stop passing bills to that actually aid our economy, not hold it back. Already this year, the House has passed:
- A pro-growth balanced budget so that America will be on strong fiscal footing
- A permanent extension of the research and development tax credit so that our innovators have the ability to succeed
- A job creating energy infrastructure and permitting reform bill so that our energy sector can continue to boost our economy
- A series of bills to help small business grow, create jobs, and pay higher wages so that America’s biggest job creators have more room to grow
- A bill to reprioritize how we fund research so that every dollar is spent on something relevant to national needs and human health
- A bill to stop the EPA’s overreach so that businesses and individuals aren’t held back by fanatical EPA regulating
- An approval of the Keystone pipeline so that 42,100 Americans can have jobs
- A reform of the natural gas pipeline permitting process so that no more job-creating pipeline projects are held back by red tape like Keystone is
- A regulatory reform bill that requires agencies to consider the least costly rulemaking option so that the people don’t face needless and costly regulations
With yet another year of the same bad news, it’s long past time for the President to give up on failure and change course.