CU analysis: Romney wins presidency because of economy -accurate since 1980.

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A University of Colorado analysis that relies on economic data predicts Republican candidate Mitt Romney will win the presidency, picking up Colorado and all but three of 13 swing states.

The research paper raised eyebrows with one Colorado pollster, as well as a nationally known political statistician, who questioned the data.

The analysis, done by CU political scientists Ken Bickers and Michael Berry, uses unemployment data and changes in personal income in states to conclude that Romney has a 77 percent chance of victory, with the presumptive GOP nominee winning Colorado with 51.8 percent of the vote.

"Putting these pieces together, clearly President (Barack) Obama is in electoral trouble," the analysis argues, saying that while the Democrat has the incumbency advantage, the "fragile economy" hurts him.

"For a Democrat running for re-election, when unemployment starts going above 5.6 percent, they're in trouble," Bickers said, "but that's contingent on a given state's voting history."

The national unemployment rate is at 8.3 percent, which mirrors the rate in Colorado. Meanwhile, Colorado's per capita personal income has dropped by half a percentage point since the fourth quarter of 2008, when Obama was elected, Bickers said.

"We're a state where there is a fair amount of economic distress which has shown up in a lot of other ways: the mortgage foreclosure issue, the lack of homebuilding," Bickers said. "The big drivers of that is how much money do people have in their pockets to buy things and how secure do they feel in terms of their employment situation."

The analysis asserts Romney will win every one of 13 swing states except Nevada, New Mexico and Michigan. The researchers also assert that their economic-based model, which they developed after the 2008 election, would have correctly predicted the outcome of every presidential race since 1980.

According to the analysis, which Bickers said the pair would update in September when new economic data arrives, Obama will only garner 218 electoral votes, well less than the 270 needed to win.

That prediction is well below the 286.3 electoral votes Obama is forecast to win by Five ThirtyEight.com, a political statistics blog for The New York Times run by Nate Silver. The statistician, first known for his analyses of baseball statistics, gained national notice during the 2008 election when he began writing about politics.

Silver's analysis, which relies on multiple sets of polling data in states, gives Obama a 66 percent chance of winning the election, a number that has fallen over the summer but which still shows the election is Obama's to lose. Silver's blog also says Obama has a 51.8 percent chance of winning Colorado.

Asked about the CU analysis, Silver faulted research based solely on economic factors. "Models that look at both polls and economic data have generally done reasonably well," Silver said. "But models like this one that try to make predictions based on economic data alone have a poor track record." He also said it was "odd" to argue unemployment rates would hurt Democratic incumbents more than Republicans. (Apparently he doesn't remember the Carter/Reagan election--lol)

"That doesn't correspond to most of the other literature on the topic, which suggests that voters are responsive to economic conditions regardless of which party is in charge," Silver said.

Bickers, though, argued that analysts like Silver rely too much on "horse race" polls."They're not terribly predictive until after the two nominating conventions," Bickers said. Republicans hold their national convention in Tampa, Fla., next week while the Democratic National Convention kicks off in Charlotte, N.C., the following week.

Denver pollster Floyd Ciruli also questioned relying on economic factors, saying that after the most recent recession, Americans "may have recalibrated at a higher new normal" for unemployment. "I've become, frankly, surprised that Obama's not in more trouble," Ciruli said.
CU analysis: Romney wins presidency because of economy - The Denver Post

It looks like the fat lady is warming up for a Romney victory in November. And no one--and I mean no one can accuse this of being a right wing report--this is coming from the University of Colorado.

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"When you don't have a record to run on, you need to paint your opponent as someone people should run from"--Barack Obama
 
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Racist much?

FDR won 4 times after the last Pub Great Depression. Do dupes know what a 9% economic retraction is? Thank god the Dems got in fast this time. MORONS.
 
Racist much?

FDR won 4 times after the last Pub Great Depression. Do dupes know what a 9% economic retraction is? Thank god the Dems got in fast this time. MORONS.


It's pretty bad when you have to go back 80 years ago to make a comparison--lol. The article is right--I am 59 years old and really can't remember a President getting reelected with 8.3% unemployment--real unemployment at 11% if you count those that have run out of unemployment benefits and are no longer counted in the stats. The last time we had that kind of unemployment in this country--this happened.

images


Carter/Reagan--1980 election results
 
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Unemployment projected to go up...
:eusa_eh:
CBO: Under Current Law, Unemployment Will Rise Next Year to 9.1%
September 6, 2012 – The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is projecting that if changes in federal taxing-and-spending policies already enacted and set to take effect at the beginning of next year do in fact take place, the unemployment rate will climb to 9.1 percent.
In a report released on Aug. 22, An Update to the Budget and Economic Outlook: Fiscal Years 2012 to 2022, CBO’s baseline projections show that by the fourth quarter of 2013 the national unemployment rate will be 9.1 percent. The estimate is based on the assumptions that the automatic caps on federal spending mandated under the Budget Control Act will take effect and that the extensions of the Bush-era tax rates enacted in 2010 will also be allowed to expires as they are set to do after Dec. 31.

CBO also provides projections for an “alternative fiscal scenario,” in which the Bush tax rates are extended indefinitely, automatic spending cuts are averted and either the Medicare “doc fix” is reinstated or the current Medicare payment rates are extended. Even in this scenario, which CBO calls “unsustainable,” the unemployment rate would still be about 8 percent by the end of 2013.

Deficits would be much higher under the alternative scenario as well, averaging about 5 percent of GDP rather than the projected 1 percent if the laws stay the same. “The persistence of large budget deficits and rapidly escalating federal debt” would “hinder national saving and investment,” CBO said. “Ultimately, the policies assumed in the alternative fiscal scenario would lead to a level of federal debt that would be unsustainable from both a budgetary and an economic perspective,” the report concluded.

Overall, after assessing the budget and economy according to the current baseline, the CBO reported that the unemployment rate would stay above 8 percent for the remainder of this year. The unemployment rate currently stands at 8.3 percent. The agency also said the economy would continue to recover at a “modest pace” in the remaining months of 2012, clocking a GDP growth rate of 2-1/4 percent for the second half of the year. Widely referred to as the “fiscal cliff,” the expiration of the Bush tax cuts and over $1 trillion in automatic defense and discretionary cuts as a result of last year’s failed budget deal are set to take effect in January 2013.

MORE
 
Good economic news - for gov't. employees...
:eusa_eh:
Unemployment Rate Plummets to 4.3%--For Government Workers
October 5, 2012 - The best news anywhere in the U.S. economy over the past three months has been in the government sector, where unemployment has dropped dramatically from 5.7 percent in July to 5.1 percent in August to 4.3 percent in September, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Both the federal and state governments increased their employees in July, August and September. The Obama administration has added 10,000 civilian workers to the federal government's payroll since July, according to BLS. In that month, the federal government employed 2,804,000 civilian workers. In August, that increased to 2,810,000. And, in September, the number of civilian federal employees increased again to 2,814,000.

The BLS's count of civilian federal employees does not include members of the military or individuals who work for certain intelligence gathering agencies, including the Central Intelligence Agency and the NSA.

The Obama administration has been able to accomplish a net increase in federal employees over the past three months even while the U.S. Postal Service--whose employees are considered part of the federal workforce--eliminated jobs and decreased its payroll. In July, according to BLS, the Postal Service employed 610,000 people. In August, that declined to 609,900, and in September that declined to 606,900.

State governments have added a net of 17,000 new workers to their taxpayer-funded payrolls over the past three months. In July, state government around the nation employed 5,052,000 people. In August, that climbed to 5,056,000, and in September it climbed again to 5,069,000.

Source

See also:

1,035,000: Construction Jobs Lost Under Obama
October 5, 2012 - When President Barack Obama signed his economic stimulus legislation on Feb. 17, 2009, he said that one impact of the act would be to create jobs for 400,000 people building and rebuilding the nation's infrastructure.
But despite a price tag that the Congressional Budget Office now says was $833 billion, the economic stimulus of February 2009 did not create 400,000 new construction jobs. In fact, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics there are now 1,035,000 fewer construction jobs in the United States than there were in January 2009, when Obama was inaugurated, and 925,000 less than in February 2009 when Obama signed his stimulus act. The decline in construction jobs in the United States did not start when President Obama took office, but the $833 billion stimulus act he pushed through Congress and signed did not stop or reverse that decline.

According to the National Bureau of Economic Research--on which Obama's former top economic adviser Christina Romer serves--says that the last recession ended in June 2009. Since then, according to BLS, America has lost 484,000 construction jobs. In September 2012, according to BLS, 5,523,000 Americans had jobs in the construction industry. That is down from 6,558,000 in January 2009, when Obama took office; it is down from6,448,000 in February 2009, when Obama signed the $833 billion stimulus; it is down from 6,007,000 when the recession ended in June 2009; and it is down from 5,564,000 from January of this year, when Obama started the fourth year of his presidential term.

When Obama signed the stimulus, he said it would put 400,000 to work rebuilding and expanding infrastructure. "Because we know we can't build our economic future on the transportation and information networks of the past, we are remaking the American landscape with the largest new investment in our nation's infrastructure since Eisenhower built an Interstate Highway System in the 1950s," Obama told a crowd in Denver, Colo., where he signed the bill. "Because of this investment," he said, "nearly 400,000 men and women will go to work rebuilding our crumbling roads and bridges, repairing our faulty dams and levees, bringing critical broadband connections to businesses and homes in nearly every community in America, upgrading mass transit, building high-speed rail lines that will improve travel and commerce throughout our nation."

Construction jobs in the United States started declining before Obama entered office, having peaked at 7,726,000 in April 2006. By January 2009, when Obama was inaugurated, that had declined by 1,168,000 to 6,558,000. Since then, as noted, it has declined an additional 1,035,000 to the current level of 5,523,000.

1,035,000: Construction Jobs Lost Under Obama | CNSNews.com
 

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