America woke up Friday to an excellent jobs report. The U.S. economy added 313,000 new jobs in February, keeping unemployment at a steady 4.1 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The report, which was the strongest since July 2016, easily surpassed initial forecasts that called for roughly 205,000 new jobs. It also features the highest employment-to-population ratio since January 2009. An excellent report, all in all. And that’s good news for the Trump administration because, whether it makes sense or not, every White House owns the jobs report, good or bad. When the reports are lackluster or downright miserable, presidents are criticized. When they’re upbeat, the White House is pleased and takes credit. But believe it or not, some people tossed all that aside Friday morning because they’re apparently that unwilling to give the Trump White House credit for the new jobs report.
“U.S. Added 313,000 Jobs in February; Unemployment Steady at 4.1% – thank you Obama!” tweeted former actress and political activist Mia Farrow.
Thanking a president who has been out of office for 13 months seems a bit silly — laughable even. But Farrow is not alone in crediting the former administration for Friday’s good news. The New York Times’ Upshot blog took a similar route in its coverage of the jobs numbers. “The Economy Is Looking Awfully Strong,” read the blog post headline. “Blockbuster job growth in February suggests this economy, already nine years into expansion, may yet have room to run,” it added. “This is not the kind of data you expect in an expansion that is nine years old, or out of a labor market that is already at full employment.”
In case you didn’t catch it, that key phrase is then repeated: “Nine years into an economic expansion, jobs reports don’t get much better than this,” the post concluded.
This is a fun game. It was fun in March when the New Republic ran its “Trump did not add 235,000 jobs to the economy. Obama did” story. “If the president were honest,” staff writer Graham Vyse wrote, “he’d be saying what all Americans should be saying about this good economic news: Thanks, Obama.”
It was also fun during the eight years of the Obama administration, when the president and his White House staff reminding us constantly that he was not responsible for lackluster economic reports, because he “inherited” a broken system. In fact, even in late 2016, when Bush had been out of office for nearly eight years, Obama’s defenders were still using this same excuse to explain away slow growth and workplace attrition.
So, then, what’s the shelf life on thanking President Obama for data released under the Trump White House? Or can we just pick and choose? Or perhaps, by astounding coincidence, every good report will continue to be due to Obama’s wise reign, and every bad one will be because of someone else, probably Trump.
