Analyzing the economy's promising recovery

We've been burned by false starts before, but "right now it looks like we are headed into a very happy new year indeed"

Gas prices
(Image credit: (Joe Raedle/Getty Images))

Finally, said Annie Lowrey at New York. The economic recovery not only looks real — it looks strong. In the past few weeks, we've seen a series of promising economic milestones: The Dow Jones industrial average hit a record 18,000, the average price of gas fell below $2 a gallon, and GDP growth was revised up to an impressive 5 percent. It should be clear to everyone now that this streak of encouraging economic figures is no "one-time fluke." Unemployment continues to fall, wages are slowly beginning to creep up, and cheaper gas means more cash in consumers' pockets to "amp up" their spending. We've been burned by false starts before, but "right now it looks like we are headed into a very happy new year indeed." 2015 could be the year the economy finally fires on all cylinders.

This spate of good news should settle once and for all that "everything you've heard about President Obama's economic policies is wrong," said Paul Krugman at The New York Times. No, ObamaCare is not a "job killer," and record corporate profits clearly contradict the story line that Obama is anti-business. The economy's bounce leaves Republicans in a tricky spot, said Reihan Salam at Slate. For years, the GOP has blamed Obama for persistently high unemployment, an "eye-poppingly huge" federal deficit, and $4 per gallon gas. Now that GDP is growing, the deficit is shrinking, and gas prices are falling, that "strategy is unlikely to work so well." If conservatives want to hold on to their newfound power, they need to "explain why they can do a better job than the Democrats of steering the American economy."

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