the unemployment rate under Democratic presidents averages 5.1 percent while the Republican average was 6.1 percent. The probability of finding this result due to random chance alone was eleven out of 1000.For those who are interested in individual presidents, Truman (3.8 percent) and Johnson (4.2 percent) had the lowest average unemployment rates for the Democrats while Eisenhower (4.9 percent) percent and George W. Bush (5.3 percent) had the lowest average unemployment for the Republican presidents. Carter (6.7 percent) and Kennedy (6.0 percent) had the highest unemployment rates for the Democrats while Ford (7.8) and Regan (7.3) had the worst Republican rates in the post war period.
Certainly, anyone who has spent more than a few weeks unemployed would argue that the unemployment rate in this country is too high regardless of which party occupies the White House. However, of the two parties, the evidence strongly suggests the Democratic Party has been the most effective in minimizing unemployment in the post war era.
Dr. Carl Summers is an independent consultant and research methodologist. His background spans the worlds of academia, evaluation consulting and public sector evaluation. He specializes in psychometrics, evaluation design, proposal writing and program evaluation. His portfolio of projects includes such diverse topic areas as high stakes testing, international program evaluation, health program evaluation including HIV/AIDS and alcohol abuse, and educational program effectiveness. He writes the weekly commentary A Voter's Guide to Political Party Performance using official government and industry statistics to evaluate the two political parties in the online magazine www.outsidersdc.com
Voter's Guide to Political Party Performance:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 2a
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
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