This is Life: Revolutions Around the Cruciform Axis

What? You Mean the Tax Cuts Are Working?

Here's a little bit of good news: Economy seen growing faster

Near rock-bottom short-term interest rates and President Bush’s third round of tax cuts motivated businesses and consumers to spend and invest more, helping the economy to move at such a fast clip in the third quarter, economists say.

Color me naive, but isn't this exactly what President Bush said the tax cuts would do? And now we have economists putting their imprimatur on what Bush said. So, then, gosh, maybe those tax cuts weren't for the rich after all, but for all Americans and their economy? (Please note: This is the AP writing this. Not some radical right conservative commentator. Though if it were Reuters or the NYTimes it would be really astounding.)

For out-of-work Americans, though, it probably doesn’t feel like much of an economic recovery. Only recently has the battered labor market shown signs of improving. In October, the unemployment rate improved fractionally, to 6 percent, as the economy added jobs for the third straight month. (Emphasis added)

Note the beginning: "Gosh, all those 2-point-whatever million jobs gone. Economy's doing great, but people are still standing in welfare lines." Okay, there wasn't record job growth. But note the last phrase in bold: jobs added for the third straight month. That is to say, it has not been, in the third quarter, a jobless recovery. While the economy has been white hot, the jobs have been added as well. One is willing to guess that if the growth predicted for the coming year pans out, the jobs will follow suit. Typically job growth is the last come-lately factor of economic recovery.