EDITORIAL: Plucking fruit of Obama’s rule
Former US president Barack Obama inherited an economy in deep recession and gradually stabilised the ship
The inauguration of Donald Trump as the president of the US is a moment of some potential — and of great danger. There is the potential for economic upliftment, and for a more functional government. By virtue of its position as the world’s largest, the vitality of the US economy is transparently in the interests of the globe as a whole. Perhaps the greatest and least acknowledged achievement of former president Barack Obama is that he inherited an economy in deep recession and gradually stabilised the ship. Trump’s supporters tend to downplay this but the facts stand against them. The seven-and-a-half-year US recovery is one of the longest on record. Obama’s critics claim it has been one of the weakest postwar recoveries, but the 2008-09 economic crisis was no normal recession. It was a recession caused by a financial crisis, and those take longer to fix — if they ever are fixed. Europe still has not recovered to nearly the extent the US has, and Japan has not recovered at all almos...
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