[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 1]
[Senate]
[Page 1003]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                    THANKING FORMER PRESIDENT OBAMA

  Mr. CASEY. Mr. President, I rise to offer my words of gratitude to 
President Obama as his service to our Nation comes to a close. I want 
to commend him for his 8 years of dedicated public service. From the 
first time we met in 2005, I was struck by his integrity, his intellect 
and his decency. His achievements as President are too numerous to 
list, but 3 are significant. Over 15 million jobs created since the end 
of the great recession, 20 million more Americans with health care, and 
a $1 trillion reduction in the deficit.
  President Obama was a strong fighter for the middle class and the 
vulnerable. Our Nation and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania are in a 
stronger position today than when President Obama took the oath of 
office in January 2009. As a nation, we have made progress, but we 
still face substantial challenges in order to grow incomes, provide a 
quality education for more children, and keep our nation safe. We will 
miss President Obama's principled leadership and enduring commitment to 
strengthening America.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a CNN article about 
President Obama be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From CNNMoney (New York), Dec. 2, 2016]

            Obama's Gift to Trump: A `Pretty Solid' Economy

                           (by Heather Long)

       President Obama is giving President-elect Trump a welcome 
     gift: A pretty good economy.
       Unemployment is at its lowest level since 2007.
       Home prices are back at all-time highs.
       Growth is picking up. The economy expanded at a 3.2% annual 
     rate from July through September.
       Even the middle class is (finally) getting a raise in pay.
       ``President Trump really is inheriting an economy that's 
     pretty solid,'' said Kevin Hassett, an economist at the 
     conservative American Enterprise Institute, on CNBC Friday.
       The ``Obama economy'' deserves a ``B or B+'' grade, says 
     Paul Ashworth, chief economist at Capital Economics.


                       grading the obama economy

       That's not an A, but the economy is certainly better off 
     than it was when Obama walked into the Oval Office in 2009. 
     Back then, the country was in the midst of a deep financial 
     crisis and recession. The very month Obama took office, 
     nearly 800,000 Americans lost their jobs.
       Obama believes he hasn't received enough credit for the big 
     turnaround. ``Anyone claiming that America's economy is in 
     decline is peddling fiction,'' Obama said earlier this year.
       Unemployment has fallen dramatically from 10% to just 4.6% 
     now. America has gained over 11 million new jobs since Obama 
     took office.


             trump points to those left behind in recovery

       Trump has repeatedly called the unemployment rate ``a 
     joke'' and ``a hoax.'' It's unclear whether he will change 
     that message when he takes office. Then he would be able to 
     take credit for keeping unemployment down--or even causing it 
     to go lower.
       For now, Trump continues to hammer the Obama economy as 
     terrible. ``Companies are not going to leave the United 
     States anymore without consequences,'' Trump said at a speech 
     at a Carrier factory in Indianapolis, Indiana. ``We're losing 
     so much.''
       While hiring has picked up rapidly under President Obama--
     2014 and 2015 were the best years of job growth since the 
     late 1990s--the gains have almost all come in the so-called 
     ``service sector,'' not in manufacturing and blue collar 
     work.
       ``There are some people doing fabulously well and others on 
     death's doorstep. And there's a heck of a gulf in between,'' 
     says Mark Hamrick, senior economic analyst at Bankrate.com.
       The U.S. has 54,000 fewer manufacturing jobs now than a 
     year ago, according to the Labor Department.
       Trump is trying to stem that decline. He and vice 
     President-elect Mike Pence negotiated a deal with Carrier to 
     keep about 1,000 jobs in Indiana. Some of those jobs would 
     have gone to Mexico.
       The Obama team counters that 1,000 jobs is small compared 
     to the 178,000 jobs added in November alone. It was the 74th 
     consecutive month of job gains under Obama.


                          can trump do better?

       Trump and his new team of economic advisers promise to 
     hypercharge U.S. growth. They say they can get it to 4%--
     stronger than recent years when the economy has grown only 
     2%.
       The question is how.
       Trump wants big tax cuts for businesses and individuals. 
     He's also planning to roll back regulation and spend more on 
     roads and bridges.
     Wall Street has given these plans a big thumbs up. The stock 
     market rallied to record levels in November after Trump won 
     the presidency. Business and consumer confidence has also 
     shot up since the momentous win.


                       the big problem for trump

       There's just one catch: The U.S. economy has less potential 
     to grow now than in the past, argues economist Ashworth.
       Two key factors drive growth: More people entering the 
     workforce and workers being more productive on the job.
       Right now, the U.S. has an aging population and little 
     appetite for much more immigration, so it's hard to see more 
     workers flooding into the workforce. Trump likes to claim 94 
     million Americans are out of work and need jobs, but that's 
     not correct. That number includes retirees, people in school 
     and those who have chosen not to work in order to take care 
     of their family.
       In reality, about 2.1 million lost their jobs in recent 
     years and appear to have simply given up looking. They are 
     the hidden unemployed. Getting them jobs won't be easy as 
     many jobs today require specialized skills.
       Trump's big hope is to get productivity up by encouraging 
     businesses to invest more in their factories, research and 
     workers. Business investment has been one of the missing 
     parts of the recovery.
       ``We're not quite there yet, but we've made a considerable 
     amount of progress,'' says Ashworth.

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