Since the Great Depression, recessions in America before this last one have lasted an average of 10 months. The longest previously has been 16 months. But here we are 46 months after the last recession started, and there is still no real recovery.
We are instead suffering the longest period with unemployment at 8.5% or above since the Great Depression. Real wages and family incomes are persistently falling. More Americans are in poverty today than at any time since the Census Bureau began keeping records on it over 50 years ago.
President Obama and his administration have tried to blame the persistent unemployment and economic stagnation on the severity of the recession they inherited. However, the historical record shows us that the deeper the recession the stronger the recovery. America should at worst be finishing the second year of a booming recovery by now.
We know how to create economic growth. Ronald Reagan did it, with arguably worse circumstances than today: double digit inflation, double digit unemployment and double digit interest rates. We did it when I was Speaker of the House, when the American people created 11 million new jobs in four years. Returning to these principles would restore another economic boom within a year.
My plan for the restoration of traditional, booming, American economic growth is straight from the same playbook that worked during Ronald Reagan’s presidency and during my term as Speaker. It begins with reducing tax rates to maximize incentives for increased production, job creation, and prosperity. America today suffers from virtually the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world, nearly 40% on average counting state corporate rates.