The Republicans have tried to convince Americans that the economy would never improve under President Obama because the president is "anti-business". During the last campaign, Mitt Romney said, "The president and his people just don't understand how the private sector works." Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said, "This is certainly the most anti-business administration since the Carter years." And Mike Huckabee chimed in with, "I think he borders on being hostile to the private sector."And Wall Street agrees with that assessment. They donated many millions of dollars to the Republicans in the last election to try and defeat the president, and continue to try and paint the president as being hostile to business interests. They all must be living in some dream world though, because the Obama administration has certainly not been bad for business. He saved the auto industry, and has cut taxes for small businesses several times -- and as the above chart shows, corporations are doing very well under President Obama's administration.
Even the noted business publication Bloomberg News recognizes this fact. They report that corporations have done very well during the Obama administration. Bloomberg says:
U.S. corporations’ after-tax profits have grown by 171 percent under Obama, more than under any president since World War II, and are now at their highest level relative to the size of the economy since the government began keeping records in 1947, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Profits are more than twice as high as their peak during President Ronald Reagan’s administration and more than 50 percent greater than during the late-1990s Internet boom, measured by the size of the economy.
In addition, American corporations are currently sitting on $1.7 trillion in cash (and still whining that they need new tax cuts). Frankly, it doesn't sound to me like the Obama administration has been bad for American business. In fact, I would say he's been very good for them. And it's not just the corporations, but also Wall Street. The Stock Market has seen larger gains under President Obama than any Republican president since Dwight Eisenhower (which includes Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush I, and Bush II).
The president has done some things that business doesn't like (re-regulated Wall Street, passed Obamacare, etc.) but these things don't seem to have affected the business community negatively at all. In fact, they have probably helped honest businesses trying to do right (and not rip-off consumers). He also thinks the rich and the corporations should pay their fair share in taxes. That won't hurt their profits at all, but I'm sure they don't like it -- since their greed seems to be limitless.
Is Obama anti-business? Not even a little bit.
