I have written many times about how the Republican-imposed "trickle-down" economics and austerity are holding back the economy and stunting the growth of U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The GDP is the best indicator of how healthy the economy is, and a normal healthy economy will have around a 3% yearly growth in GDP. The definition of a recession (for economists) is three straight quarters of negative growth.Last year, the United States economy fell far short of that normal 3% growth, and the first quarter of 2014 shows the economy is barely hanging on. That first quarter growth was a pathetic 0.1% GDP growth (which would translate into a yearly growth of only 0.4%). That means the economy is very close to slipping back into a recession (even though most Americans have yet to recover from the last recession).
And perhaps most embarrassing for the congressional Republicans is what kept that first quarter GDP from being negative -- Obamacare (the program they have voted to repeal more than 50 times). The increase in government spending due to Obamacare added about 1.1% to the GDP growth in the first quarter -- which means that the GDP growth would have been -1.0% with Obamacare (if the Republicans had been successful in repealing it).
The Republicans seem to be doing everything they can to throw this nation back into a recession (which they would then try to blame on the Democrats). They must be voted out of office in the coming election -- so we can return to a sane economic policy that will spur economic growth and create jobs.
