Last quarter’s economic growth, however anemic, means the nation is not in recession, which could help presidential candidate John McCain, even though he has already declared a recession.
The Commerce Department reported Wednesday that the gross domestic product grew 0.6 percent during the first quarter of 2008, marking six-and-a-half years of uninterrupted economic expansion. A recession is commonly defined as two consecutive quarters of decline in GDP.
But McCain spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker said a recession can also be defined as a “broad and prolonged decline in economic activity.” With consumer confidence down, gas prices up and the mortgage meltdown wreaking havoc in the housing and credit markets, McCain has no intention of taking back his April 14 declaration of recession.
“One positive report does not constitute a reversal of the other evidence we see of economic distress,” Hazelbaker said. “Every day on the campaign trail, McCain meets people who have lost their jobs, who are paying more at the pump, who are faced with higher prices at the grocery store. And his focus remains on making the economy grow faster.”
David Frum, a former economic speechwriter for PresidentBush, said McCain does not want to be seen as the candidate in denial about the economy, especially when individual states like Ohio and Michigan are suffering more than most. Frum pointed out that former President George H.W. Bush lost his re-election bid in 1992 even though the economy had been expanding for more than a year and a half.
“Then-President Bush spent a lot of time arguing whether the economy was in a recession and it did him no good whatsoever — he just looked out of touch,” said Frum, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. “What McCain is probably doing is overlearning the lesson of 1992.”
Club for Growth President Pat Toomey said McCain’s continued insistence that the United States is in recession is “unfortunate,” but “understandable.”
“It’s a real dilemma for McCain because if he points to the truth and says, ‘Look we’re growing, not as fast as we like, but we are growing,’ then the danger is that they portray him as out of touch,” Toomey said. “However, if he goes along with the yeah-we’re-in-a-recession crowd, then how does he explain a continuation of President Bush’s economic policies, like the tax rates and expanding trade?”
