President Clinton's “New Directions” Economic Plan
In 1992, America was under economic distress and uncertainty as a country. America had experienced high unemployment, big deficits, high interest rates, low productivity gains and falling real wages for average Americans. After twelve years of national drift and economic decline, President Clinton charted a path to growth with the “New Directions” economic plan designed to create jobs, boost incomes, move our economy from consumption to investment, and reduce our deficit. His three-part economic strategy focused on three objectives: fiscal discipline, investing in education, health care, science and technology, and opening foreign markets. This strategy has helped foster the conditions for what is now the longest expansion in US history.
Fiscal discipline set out to rid our economy of its deficit and get interest rates back down and investment up. In 1992, America experienced the highest dollar level in history--$290 billion deficit. In 1999, we had a budget surplus of $124 billion—the largest dollar surplus on record and the largest as a share of our economy since 1951. The National Debt should be eliminated by Y2015 if we stay on track with this economic plan. Continuing the strategy has in turn lowered interest rates that help ordinary Americans. It cut the price of the average home mortgage, the price of the average car payment and the average college loan repayment.
American Technology has moved in a new direction, which has fostered economic growth. Information Technology has helped transform the economy. Information Technology has made a crucial contribution to the new economy, helping fuel record growth, higher wages, and changes in the way business is done throughout the economy. Information Technology accounts for only 8% of the total jobs but has been responsible for nearly one-third of US economic growth. Wages in the Information Technology industry are 77% higher than the private sector average wage. Declining Information technology prices have lowered the overall inflation rate by nearly one percentage point. Information Technology now accounts for nearly half of business investments. Adjusted for inflation, American companies invested three times more in Information Technology in 1999 than in 1992.
The Clinton-Gore Administration has opened foreign markets for high tech goods, cracked down on foreign piracy and liberalized export controls on computers and telecommunications equipment. At the same time negotiating over 270 trade agreements, including those involving high technology issues. By eliminating hundreds of programs, the investment in education and training has doubled.
This deficit has to do with having responsible leader who are willing to increase awareness and make beneficial changes in the nation. In my opinion, the federal debt is a serious threat to the US that must be politically address whenever possible. I believe that the candidates of the 2016 presidential election should make this issue one of the top priorities to discuss and to dictate a considerable amount of work to fix it. That is because the worse the federal debt is, the worse the future would be to the nation. Also, voters must be well educated about this issue in order to shape their decision in voting for the candidate that seems most powerful and confident about this problem. Solving this problem may be difficult and would take time and so much effort. Therefore, the changes and solution must be on both a national and individual levels as
Americans and people around the world may wonder what caused President Bill Clinton to improve the economy in the United States of America, and actually work hard, be persistent, and have courage in the face of adversity. The majority of the American people would have thought that recently elected President Bill Clinton would have not been a “people’s president” and just wanted to be elected president to gain power, and get rich; but they were completely wrong. On the other hand, as soon as president Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore were elected into office, they immediately launched their economic strategy, which was split into three sections. The first section contained, “establishing fiscal discipline eliminating the budget deficit and keeping interest rates low”. Equally important, the second section included, “investing in people through education, training, science, and
For the past century, the United States has been regarded as the greatest hegemonic power in the world. The U.S. played the most important role in the advancement of mankind from social, political, scientific, military, and economic standpoint. Unfortunately, today this is no longer true. Since the 1980’s the U.S. has been on a gradual decline. The introduction and implementation of trickle down economics, otherwise known as “Reaganomics,” has contributed greatly to the systemic dismantling of the socioeconomic structure that made America great.
Trade is essential to overcome the dollar gap that prevented foreign marketing of United States goods (Melanson and Mayers, 159). There are many economic issues which face the nation at this time. A recovery from World War II and the Korean War, a recession, a change in the political party of the president, and several other issues. Thus, this must be a time of strong economic leadership. The policies made and legislature passed must steer the United States through this apparent storm and give the nation a chance to rest from the hecticness of the first half of the century.
A large increase in government debt occurred during Ronald Reagan’s presidency in the 1980’s. Ronald Reagan was dedicated to decreasing taxes a...
Essentially, the New Deal did not work to include and employ as many people as it could or should have, even excluding major population types from any possible benefit from the programs. It failed to provide hard-working citizens with a steady job and food to eat. This question of whether or not the New Deal was a success has a substantial significance. If any country goes into a economic collapse like one of the Great Depression, one could use America’s experience as an example as to what steps should or should not be taken though such a time. Afterall, the importance of studying history is to learn from mistakes made in the
The US has been in and out of debt countless times throughout history, going as far back as the Civil War. However, debt did not become a truly relevant problem until much later, in the 1980s (Budget Deficits). Up to that point, large budget deficits were generally only allowed during wartime, but this pattern ended after the Great Depression. Roosevelt’s New Deal meant that the government spent much more than it previously did, even after the economy improved (Budget De...
The national debt is usually a frightening topic citizens of any country, however, in the United States, twenty trillion dollars of national debt is one of the major fears of the economy. Along with this fear comes every politician claiming to be the person to lower this astronomical debt to ease concerns in the modern American economy. In Hamilton’s Blessing, John Steele Gordon tries to alleviate these concerns by showing a plethora of benefits and good the debt has been able to do throughout the history of the United States. The central premise of the book and the main guideline for John Steele Gordon’s thinking is that the debt was used to save the Union in the 1860’s, the American economy in the 1930’s, and the wellbeing of mankind during
Not only did Carter and Reagan Administrations help cause the Recession, President Clinton helped. “Clinton then established official government poli...
There was general prosperity in America following the Second World War, however in the 1970s inflation rose, productivity decreased, and corporate debt increased. Individual incomes slipped as oil prices raised. Popular dissent surrounding the economic crisis helped Reagan win the 1980 election under promises to lower taxes, deregulate, and bring America out of stagnation. Many New Right supporters put their faith in him to change the system. To start his tenure, Reagan passed significant tax cuts for the rich to encourage investment. Next he passed the Economy Recovery Tax Act that cut tax rates by 25% with special provisions that favored business. Reagan’s economic measures were based on his belief in supply-side economics, which argued that tax cuts for the wealthy and for business stimulates investment, with the benefits eventually tricking down to the popular masses. His supply-side economic policies were generally consistent with the establishment’s support of free market, ...
The U.S budget deficit over the years has been a problem but lately the deficit has shrunk. However, what made the U.S budget deficit get to where it is today and what will it be like in the years to come. Throughout the past the U.S has operated under a deficit. This means that the U.S Spent more money than it was taking in. The cause of the excess in spending was different depending on which year. Some of the causes were war, increase in spending , and economic downturns. There were different acts passed to try and control the deficit problem. The deficit at the present time is declining. This decline is due to the improving economy, sequester, and a tax increase on high-income households. The big factor that went into the decline in the deficit for 2013 was the payment that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac made. The deficit decline in the present time may make some think the U.S could get out of debt but it has been projected that the U.S deficit will start to increase once again.
The United States economy is racing ahead at dangerous speeds, and it may be too late to prevent the return of widespread inflation. Ideally the economy should move ahead gradually and grow at a steady manageable rate. Mae West once stated “Too much of a good thing can be wonderful” and it seems the U.S. Treasury Secretary agrees. The Secretary announced that due to our increasing surplus and booming economy, instead of having an outsized tax cut, we should use the surplus to further pay down the national debt. A tax cut, though most Americans would favor it initially, would prove counter productive. Cutting taxes would over stimulate an already raging economy, and enhance the possibilities of an increase in the rate of inflation. Paying off the national debt would actually help lower interest rates and boost investments, and therefore further increase the wealth of the population, while keeping inflation at bay.
Information technology has advanced in multiple ways in society, where organizations has implement the structure into their work environment. Industries have outsource their manufacturing to other places in the world and rely on telecommunication to keep the marketing. The geographic distribution has changed significantly by reducing the distance it takes to complete an operation, due to information technology. These are just a couple of examples of how this advanced technology has reshape our society and continuing.
NERSISYAN, Yeva and L. Randall Wray (2010). Deficit Hysteria Redux? Why We Should Stop Worrying About U.S. Government Deficits. Nova York: The Levy Economics Institute, Public Policy Brief, Nº. 111. http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/ppb_111.pdf.
Brynjolfsson, E., & McAfee, A. (2011). Race Against the Machine: How Digital Revolution is Accelerating Innovation, Driving Productivity and Ireversibly Tranforming Employment and the Economy. Lexington, Massachusetts: Digital Frontier Press.