By Tim Benson
A new study from the American Petroleum Institute (API), with modeling data provided by the consulting firm OnLocation, details how a nationwide ban on hydraulic fracturing (colloquially known as “fracking”) could trigger a recession, would seriously damage U.S. economic and industrial output, considerably increase household energy costs, and make life much harder and costlier for American farmers.
In America’s Progress at Risk: An Economic Analysis of a Ban on Fracking and Federal Leasing for Natural Gas and Oil Development, API argues that a fracking ban would lead to a cumulative loss in gross domestic product (GDP) of $7.1 trillion by 2030, including $1.2 trillion in 2022 alone. Per capita GDP would also decline by $3,500 in 2022, with an annual average decline of $1,950 through 2030. Annual household income would also decline by $5,040.
In 2022 alone, 7.5 million jobs would be lost (almost 5 percent of the U.S. total workforce), while annual job losses would average roughly 3.8 million through 2030. More than 3.6 million jobs would be lost in five states alone in 2022: 1.103 million in Texas, 765,000 in California, 711,000 in Florida, 551,000 in Pennsylvania, and 500,000 in Ohio. States with the highest job losses as a share of overall employment would be North Dakota (76,000), Oklahoma (319,000), New Mexico (149,000), Wyoming (48,000), Louisiana (321,000), West Virginia (109,000), Kansas (208,000), and Colorado (353,000).
Household energy costs would also increase significantly, 14 percent by 2030, even though household energy use is projected to decline by 12 percent. American families would see, on average, a $618 annual increase in their energy costs, as electricity prices would rise by, on average, 20 percent annually. Gasoline prices would also increase by 15 percent.
Farm incomes would decline by 43 percent, with a cumulative loss in farm income of $275 billion, or more than $25 billion on average annually. The costs of wheat farming would increase by 64 percent, while corn farming costs would increase by 54 percent and the costs of soybean farming would increase by 48 percent.
This is not the only recent study to highlight the immense economic costs of a ban on hydraulic fracturing. A report released in November 2019 by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Global Energy Institute concludes a ban would eliminate 19 million jobs through 2025 and reduce GDP by $7.1 trillion. The report also estimates household incomes would be reduced by $3.7 trillion by 2025. Consumers would be paying $5,661 more per capita for energy and goods and services thanks to a doubling of gasoline prices and a 324 percent increase in the price of natural gas over that same time period.
The fracking revolution of the past dozen years has considerably spurred economic development throughout the United States. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, the shale industry alone drove 10 percent of U.S. GDP from 2010 to 2015. In 2018, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, oil and gas extraction accounted for $218 billion of U.S. economic output.
A September 2019 report conducted by Kleinhenz & Associates for the Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Education Program shows increased oil and natural gas production from fracking has saved American consumers $1.1 trillion in the decade from 2008 to 2018. This breaks down to more than $900 in annual savings to each American family, or $9,000 in cumulative savings.
Meanwhile, the White House Council of Economic Advisors estimated in October 2019 that fracking saves American families $203 billion annually on gasoline and electricity bills, roughly $2,500 per family. For low-income families, who spend the largest share of their income on energy costs, these savings are very significant. For those families in the lowest income quintile, it represents a savings of 6.8 percent of their total income.
Hydraulic fracturing activity delivers $1,300 to $1,900 in annual benefits to local households, including “a 7 percent increase in average income, driven by rises in wages and royalty payments, a 10 percent increase in employment, and a 6 percent increase in housing prices,” according to a December 2016 study conducted by researchers at the University of Chicago, Princeton University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Another study published in the American Economic Review in April 2017 found “each million dollars of new [oil and gas] production produces $80,000 in wage income and $132,000 in royalty and business income within a county. Within 100 miles, one million dollars of new production generates $257,000 in wages and $286,000 in royalty and business income.”
Hydraulic fracturing enables the cost-effective extraction of once-inaccessible oil and natural gas deposits. These energy sources are abundant, inexpensive, environmentally safe, and can ensure the United States remains a leading energy producer for years to come. Therefore, policymakers across the country should refrain from considering any sort of fracking ban or moratorium, while also making sure not to place unnecessary burdens on the natural gas and oil industries, which are safe and positively impact their states’ economies.
The following documents provide more information about fracking and fossil fuels.
America’s Progress at Risk: An Economic Analysis of a Ban on Fracking and Federal Leasing for Natural Gas and Oil Development
The study from the American Petroleum Institute (conducted by economic modeling firm OnLocation) warns that banning federal leasing and fracking on public and private lands, which some presidential candidates have proposed, would cost up to 7.5 million American jobs in 2022 alone, lead to a cumulative GDP loss of $7.1 trillion by 2030, slash household incomes by $5,400 annually, increase household energy costs by more than $600 per year and reduce farm incomes by 43 percent due to higher energy costs. If a ban is enacted, the U.S. would flip from being a net exporter of oil and petroleum products to importing more than 40 percent of supplies by 2030
What If…Hydraulic Fracturing Were Banned? (2020 Edition)
https://www.globalenergyinstitute.org/sites/default/files/2019-12/hf_ban_report_final.pdf
This study from the Global Energy Institute at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce says a ban on fracking in the United States would be catastrophic for our economy. Their analysis shows that if such a ban were imposed in 2021, by 2025 it would eliminate 19 million
jobs and reduce U.S. Gross Domestic Product by $7.1 trillion. Tax revenue at the local, state, and federal levels would decline by nearly a combined $1.9 trillion. Natural gas prices would leap by 324 percent, causing household energy bills to more than quadruple.
By 2025, motorists would pay twice as much at the pump for gasoline as oil prices spike to $130 per barrel, while less domestic energy production would also mean less energy security.
The Value of U.S. Energy Innovation and Policies Supporting the Shale Revolution
https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/The-Value-of-U.S.-Energy-Innovation-and-Policies-Supporting-the-Shale-Revolution.pdf
This report from the White House Council of Economic Advisors estimates that increased oil and natural gas production due to the fracking revolution is saving American families a combined $203 billion annually, or around $2,500 per family. On top of this, the
fracking revolution is benefitting the environment, lowering energy-related greenhouse gas emissions by 527 million metric tons between 2005 and 2017.
Natural Gas Savings to End-users: 2008-2018 A Technical Briefing Paper
This report prepared by Kleinhenz & Associates for the Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Education Program shows increased oil and natural gas production from hydraulic fracturing saves American families $203 billion annually on gasoline and electricity bills. This breaks down to $2,500 in savings per family per year.
Debunking Four Persistent Myths about Hydraulic Fracturing
https://www.heartland.org/publications-resources/publications/debunking-four-persistent-myths-about-hydraulic-fracturing
This Heartland Institute Policy Brief by Policy Analyst Timothy Benson and former Heartland communications intern Linnea Lueken outlines the basic elements of the fracking process and then refutes the four most widespread fracking myths, providing lawmakers
and the public with the research and data they need to make informed decisions about hydraulic fracturing.
The Local Economic and Welfare Consequences of Hydraulic Fracturing
https://www.heartland.org/publications-resources/publications/the-local-economic-and-welfare-consequences-of-hydraulic-fracturing
This comprehensive study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research says fracking brings, on average, $1,300 to $1,900 in annual benefits to local households, including a 7 percent increase in average income, a 10 percent increase in employment,
and a 6 percent increase in housing prices.
Local Fiscal Effects of a Drilling Downturn: Local Government Impacts of Decreased Oil and Gas Activity
in Five U.S. Shale Regions
http://www.rff.org/files/document/file/RFF%20Rpt-SPF.pdf
This study from Resources for the Future finds 82 percent of communities in the five largest shale regions in the United States experienced a net fiscal benefit from hydraulic fracturing despite a large drop in oil and natural gas commodity prices starting
in 2014.
Impacts of the Natural Gas and Oil Industry on the U.S. Economy in 2015
https://www.heartland.org/publications-resources/publications/impacts-of-the-natural-gas-and-oil-industry-on-the-us-economy-in-2015
This study, conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers and commissioned by the American Petroleum Institute, shows that the natural gas and oil industry supported 10.3 million U.S. jobs in 2015. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average wage paid by
the natural gas and oil industry, excluding retail station jobs, was $101,181 in 2016, which is nearly 90 percent more than the national average. The study also shows the natural gas and oil industry has had widespread impacts in each of the 50 states.
The U.S. Leads the World in Clean Air: The Case for Environmental Optimism
https://files.texaspolicy.com/uploads/2018/11/27165514/2018-11-RR-US-Leads-the-World-in-Clean-Air-ACEE-White.pdf
This paper from the Texas Public Policy Foundation examines how the United States achieved robust economic growth while dramatically reducing emissions of air pollutants. The paper states that these achievements should be celebrated as a public policy success
story, but instead the prevailing narrative among political and environmental leaders is one of environmental decline that can only be reversed with a more stringent regulatory approach. Instead, the paper urges for the data to be considered and applied to
the narrative.
Climate Change Reconsidered II: Fossil Fuels – Summary for Policymakers
https://www.heartland.org/publications-resources/publications/climate-change-reconsidered-ii-fossil-fuels—summary-for-policymakers
In this fifth volume of the Climate Change Reconsidered series, 117 scientists, economists, and other experts assess the costs and benefits of the use of fossil fuels by reviewing scientific and economic literature on organic chemistry, climate science,
public health, economic history, human security, and theoretical studies based on integrated assessment models (IAMs) and cost-benefit analysis (CBA).
The Social Benefits of Fossil Fuels
https://www.heartland.org/publications-resources/publications/the-social-benefits-of-fossil-fuels
This Heartland Policy Brief by Joseph Bast and Peter Ferrara documents the many benefits from the historic and still ongoing use of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are lifting billions of people out of poverty, reducing all the negative effects of poverty
on human health, and vastly improving human well-being and safety by powering labor-saving and life-protecting technologies, such as air conditioning, modern medicine, and cars and trucks. They are dramatically increasing the quantity of food humans produce
and improving the reliability of the food supply, directly benefiting human health. Further, fossil fuel emissions are possibly contributing to a “Greening of the Earth,” benefiting all the plants and wildlife on the planet.
Nothing in this Research & Commentary is intended to influence the passage of legislation, and it does not necessarily represent the views of The Heartland Institute. For further information on this subject, visit Environment & Climate News, The Heartland Institute’s website, and PolicyBot, Heartland’s free online research database.
Obama and his policies were a serious drag on the economy. Trump took over with the promise of boosting growth and did all the right things to make that happen. But, job creation actually fell slightly under Trump as compared to his predecessor. So what happened?
http://joehoft.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Fed-Funds-Rate-256×300.jpg
(and the donald is not happy about dat)…
In the very same way, any economic analysis about future growth is not worth the paper it’s written on without taking into consideration the actions of the central bank.
President Obama created 8.9 million jobs by the end of December 2016 after 8 years in office. President Trump created 4.7 million jobs in just his first three years.
But that doesn’t give the total picture. The economy lost 8.5 million jobs as a result of the 2008 financial crisis. It kept shedding them until December 2009. From that 2009 low point, Obama created 16 million jobs, an 11.6% increase. If measured that way, Obama was the third-largest job creator in terms of numbers.
Trying to compare percentages, which are just ratios, the analysis of the denominator is critical. And an understanding of the denominator in Obama’s case %-age, is of course the unfortunate beneficiary of the financial crisis that no one wants to see repeated. But it was a crisis that was born on Democrat’s Liberal fantasies in the first Bush term about making mortgages available to far too many people who had no business taking mortgages.
To your point on Central banks.
There is only so much monetary accommodation a Central Bank can do. As in Europe where interest rates went negative (people paid banks to hold their money) and stayed there for 5 years, once they reach a point of effectively zero interest rates, it falls to other factors to how an economy shrinks or grows. And now in Europe they are facing another decade of no/slow growth, and another very expensive migrant crisis is coming too. This one will be worse than the 2015 crisis, is about to unfold as Turkey is now unleashing the Syrian refuge spigot on Europe.
-Europe is destroying its own access to affordable, secure energy supplies. So it’s manufacturing base is shrinking leaving.
– Europe’s Green emissions targets with carbon taxes and cap and trade schemes further shrink their domestic industrial output by off-shoring those emissions to China, and Asia in general, and their economy is poorer for it.
There are at least 3 critical areas beyond monetary policy.
The domestic energy Regulatory environment is critical.
Obama cranked up the regulations on the US economy and energy production, and despite Bernanke pulling every accommodative-stimulus action he could, the US economy just sputtered along under Obama. The only thing that saved Obama’s ass in his 2012 re-election was the beginning of the US shale energy revolution beginning after 2010 with the GoM permitting shutdown by Obama which gave frackers the financial incentive to start their revolution.
The tax environment is critical. Heavy corporate taxation keeps offshore earned profits overseas, precluding capital investments. The US Congress and Trump helped fix that in the US, and repatriated corporate profits began returning to US.
Finally the trading environment is critical. For the US, past unfavorable trade agreements for both manufactured goods and agricultural products simply incentivized domestic manufacturers to send their plants and jobs to Mexico, Latin America, or Asia and not recognizing that lower environmental and working conditions in those countries. This simply put Americans at a distinct disadvantage with nothing to show for it environmentally, while the globalists made out like bandits. This is a slower to turn-around/repair as trade negotiations wear on for years as we saw with the recent USMCA agreement.
Obama was failing on all three critical factors. His environmental agenda driven by Green radicals and crony capitalists surrounding was in the processes of economy destroying regulations that got shutdown both by the Supreme Court and by the next President.
His attempts at the failed Trans-Pacific Trade Agreement was in effect going to put US energy policies under the control of an unaccountable 3 member committee, rather than the US Congress. A major genuflection to the globalists. And Obama and his Democrats certainly had inclination to bring US corporate tax rates back in line with the rest of the OECD, again a genuflection to Globalists and billionaire class that controls the Democratic Party still to this day.
It’s a lot harder to maintain…or add new jobs…when the job market is approaching full
…the fact that Trump added even more jobs is what’s striking
you’re right…Obama started at the bottom
you’re right . . . Obama started at the bottom
And he “didn’t build that!” 😉
Lat, i think you’re not quite getting something here. (let me attempt to explain) When it gets crunch time with the economy & we’re nearing full employment, the federal reserve takes over, period(.) They control the rate of growth. It’s really not that hard to add jobs, the fed just makes it seem that way. Ordinarily, with low unemployment we get inflation. And with that inflation, the fed raises interest rates to counter the inflation. (their belief is that inflation is caused by the ramifications of philips’ curve, so they raise rates to effectively stall the economy) This time around, for whatever reason, the inflation never came. Therefore, they have continued to let the economy grow. Here is what i’m talking about depicted in one nice neat graph:
You can see that before every recession depicted, interest rates are high. That’s the fed combating inflation. Had the usual inflation showed up as expected, the fed would have raised rates and we would have been in a recession by now. And there would have been nothing that Trump could have done about it, except tweet. (hate to say it, but twitter don’t account for much here… 😉) Now, were the fed not in the habit of doing this, then eventually we would run up against the natural unemployment rate, say, somewhere south of 2%. At that point, it would be difficult (yea, impossible) to add jobs. But, we’re not quite near there yet…
There is only so much monetary accommodation a Central Bank can do
Not exactly so (and for reasons that you’ve laid out more eloquently than i could ever hope to). Obama was a disaster, thus the central bank was very accommodating. And, at least, it worked — it should be noted that the fed began raising rates under Obama, not Trump. (the one thing i think you left out was that obama was horrible at instilling consumer confidence, both in word & in deed)…
My rap on any analysis of future economic growth is that the accommodating actions of the fed are consistently left out. This, in the exact same way that it was left out when anticipating greater job growth under Trump. (we should have seen much greater economic growth under trump & we didn’t because of the fed)…
The economy began its recovery late in Obama’s second term. You see, investors are smart people. They knew that – no matter what happened – after the next election… he wouldn’t be President anymore.
That’s an interesting thought. Don’t think it’s true though… By 2011 the economy was adding 200,000 jobs a month and it’s essentially stayed there since. (unless you have some other metric for when the economy began its recovery)
It’s just the source of the takers for those 200,000 jobs shifted from people put out of work by the recession to new jobs formed by new entrepreneurs in sync with the new President’s rhetoric and actions.
You can’t hire people between jobs to more than one job when unemployment is low. That was the status shortly after Trump took office. The unemployment rate was so low that people couldn’t pull it down further by switching jobs of going back to work. There were too few people willing or able to go back to work so the only source of workers was new workers, increasing overall employment rate.
i really hate posting bls links (like a box of chocolates, you never know what your gonna get), but here goes:
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001?output_view=net_1mth
Rate of job creation peaked @2015. Tepid growth continues to this day. (trump’s p*ssed… 😖)
Great (it worked)… Now let me try the 12 month average. (bet my bottom dollar it don’t work):
https://data.bls.gov/pdq/SurveyOutputServlet
(it didn’t… ☹️) Click on more formatting options and you can change it from 1 month to 12. That’ll give you a better look at the trend. (click on retrieve data after making the change)
Central bank actions aside (which go well beyond interest rates)…low-hanging fruit is the easiest to pick. Generally-speaking, the lower the unemployment, the tougher it is to push it even lower. Inheriting an economy bottoming-out means it only has one way to go.
True (very true), but we weren’t quite there yet. We did get growth very similar to Obama’s under Trump. Without the fed stepping on the economy, we would have gotten greater growth. Trump, himself, thought rates should have been 1% lower. (and is mad as all hell that he didn’t get it) Bottom line is that we expected greater growth under Trump and we didn’t get it. All because of the fed…
Blue collar and working class wages have actually risen more in the last three years than white collar and professional wages have. That contrasts with the previous years when white collar and professional wages rose more than blue collar and working class wages.
Valid point, Luke… In the old days, before the fed began obsessing over inflation (in the 1970s), real wages/ median household income grew. Once the fed stopped allowing lower unemployment (to curb inflation), real wages went flat. This time ’round, inflation never showed up, so we have low unemployment again.
Under Obama the jobs created were behind the counter Macdonald jobs. Under Trump the better paying manufacturing jobs are making a comeback.
I find it curious that when Obama was president the republicans were clamoring for the voting public to look at the job creation statistics and not the % unemployment numbers. The jobs created numbers showed each month that there were not enough jobs being created to positively effect the unemployment number. It was only after the Bureau of Lalor Statistics “refined” the jobs report that there was a significant increases in created jobs. Funny that. Was the Swamp a factor in manipulating job creation reports?
I personnally remember one month when Romney was running against Obama that there were zero jobs created. And the unemployment number went down that month. How is that?
The reason that the unemployment numbers were going down was that those with unemployment benefits were losing those benefits because they had been on them so long they no longer were able to qualify. And once you were no longer receiving benefits, you were not counted as unemployed.
Obama oversaw the worst recovery coming out of a major recession “ever”. His administration piled regulation after regulation on industry. Killing jobs, not creating them. Obama was a job killer.
Who is this study aimed at? The people who want to ban fracking don’t give a crap about the economic damage such a ban would cause.
Max
They are a minority. This is so obvious that most people will be appalled at what’s in store for them if fracking is banned.
So, you can have continued prosperity or you can snakes-and-ladders back to where you were in 2010. The memory of the pain of the Global Financial Crisis should still be stinging for a sizeable proportion of the public. This should be an easy sell for The Donald. All he has to do is convince the voters that most of the Democrat party thinks like AOC.
I had two children that if you said, “Don’t touch the stove it will burn you!, their response was OK don’t touch the stove.
I had two other children whose response was to immediately touch the stove upon the parents leaving the room and suffering burned fingers.
I fear that an increasing proportion of the U.S. population is not capable of learning a lesson without first suffering some EXTREME PAIN. This is despite being informed of the lesson by people they know and trust.
It is tough on a society to have a low “collective” IQ where someone has to re-invent the wheel every single day.
Understatement. They not only do not care about the damage, they regard it as the main feature.
Their entire motive is to impoverish, humiliate, and demoralize the working class.
Two graphs:
1 – Real household median income USA: link
2 – US crude oil production: link
Note the inflection point about 2012. I realize correlation is not causality but …
Even widows and orphans should be able to understand the reason for the country’s current prosperity.
A ban on fracking would force the US to have to make a decision between using coal or damaging the economy by using much more expensive “renewable” sources of energy. The latter choice would not only affect the US it would cause a massive recession/depression worldwide because the US is still the engine of the world economy.
Barack Obama probably owes his second term to fracking. He really lucked out!
Anybody that would vote for a Democrat has suicidal intentions!
Remember, every single Dem running for president has stated they’d support a nation-wide ban on fracking!
The only difference is that Joe Biden has to be constantly reminded!
What many people don’t realize is that hydraulic fracing is not new. It has been a routine step in the completion of any oil or gas well for over 60 years–with NO adverse consequences. The only thing that’s new is using it in conjunction with horizontal drilling in shale formations to extract hydrocarbons from their source bed.
Extracting hydrocarbon fuel/chemicals from the shale formations is a transformational paradigm shift from conventional drilling at least as profound as the shift to drilling for oil instead of simply harvesting it from surface seeps. It’s easy to argue that this technology will allow the production and use of hydrocarbon fuels and chemicals for the next thousand + years.
If anything these numbers understate the ripple effect throughout the economy. For example the local solons (progressives) have been showering tax breaks on new hotel construction and tout tourism. It is a large segment of the Montana economy but they are too stupid to realize their Greenie pipedreams will make vacation travel for Joe and Josephine Middle class cost prohibitive and destroy the very industry they want to promote. Virtue signaling rots the brain.
America’s position on crude oil production fits right in with Putin’s goal to control energy. Russia is adamantly against U.S. fracking efforts and very supportive of any environmentalist group or wealthy individual efforts to slow or stop crude oil and natural gas exploration and production within the U.S. and European borders. Recently a Russian funded environmental group gave millions to anti-fracking groups to stop, curtail or severely weaken US fracking of crude oil and natural gas in states like Texas, North Dakota, Colorado, Oklahoma, Louisiana and Pennsylvania. As reported in the Washington Examiner, congress is well aware that Russia wants the USA to be dependent on foreign oil. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/russian-funded-environmental-group-gave-millions-to-anti-fracking-groups
The entire intent of a fracking ban is to “wreak havoc on the US economy”, that has been the intent all along it is just that you have not been listening.
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/climate-change-scare-tool-to-destroy-capitalism/
The reason for all the toys being thrown out of the crib when Trump was elected and the increasingly desperate attempts to remove him from office – is that had he not been elected the US economy would already be in its post havoc international treaty controlled state. Both TPP and TTIP as treaties would have been signed and as treaties been superior to The Constitution. The US would by now be controlled by ‘captains of industry’ forming the controlling authorities of the two (really one) treaty block. They were so close they could taste it and the election went to Trump.
The same is the reason for the upset about Brexit and the continuing attempts to derail it. As with US and UK outside these treaties they become increasingly meaningless. Expect more overt attempts to throw grit in the gears like fracking bans.
Populism and over reach leadership don’t have time for such reality checks and fact checking.
Those like “Fonzie” trying to credit Obama for the fracking boom or the economic expansion need to realize that oil production increased despite Obama’s policies, not because of them. The Obama administration limited oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, banned oil exploration on Federally owned land, and blocked construction of two major oil pipelines from Canada due to interference from Hillary Clinton’s State Department, but Obama could not prevent fracking on privately owned land, including some owned by farmers in northern Pennsylvania who received handsome royalties for allowing natural gas fracking on their land, and Native American tribes in North Dakota who have also been enriched by oil and gas drilling on their land.
The Trump administration quickly approved the construction of the oil pipelines, has re-opened and expanded leases for offshore drilling, and also allowed limited drilling on Federally owned land.
We can also see the effects of “liberal” politics on energy policy on the state level. New York governor Cuomo has blocked the construction of natural gas pipelines through his state, and has banned fracking, while utility companies have had increasing demand for natural gas, but don’t have enough gas to sell to their customers (due to lack of pipelines).
South of the border in Pennsylvania (where fracking is allowed, even with a Democrat governor), there is more natural gas available than the market can absorb, but not enough pipelines available to ship it to gas-starved New York and New England, so New England states have to import natural gas from Canada, from a large LNG terminal on the New Brunswick coast about 15 miles from the Maine border.
With a well-informed electorate, that might be enough to get Governor Cuomo voted out of office, but since his brother works for CNN, few New Yorkers will ever hear about this problem.
Those like “Fonzie” trying to credit Obama for the fracking boom or the economic expansion…
Say what?!
Where the hell did i do anything like that? Here’s what i did say:
Obama and his policies were a serious drag on the economy.
Obama was a disaster, thus the central bank was very accommodating.
(the one thing i think you left out was that obama was horrible at instilling consumer confidence, both in word & in deed)…
We did get growth very similar to Obama’s under Trump. Without the fed stepping on the economy, we would have gotten greater growth.
Tepid growth continues to this day. (trump’s p*ssed… 😖)
My entire point was, that despite him being a total disaster for the economy, the fed made up for it. And with Trump, in spite of doing all things right, we got the exact same growth as under Obama. The Fed (not obama nor trump) was the maker or braker in both’s economies. And that should never be overlooked in any analysis of impacts to economic growth (which is the subject of this particular post)…
Pull your head out of your backside when you read my comments (it’s a lot easier to see that way)…