"[T]he administration's economics suggest mistakes of diagnosis or cure, or both." –Kevin Hassett and Glenn Hubbard

In case you missed it, American Enterprise Institute (AEI) economists Kevin Hassett and Glenn Hubbard recently explained in the Washington Post why President Obama's excuse narrative for the sluggish economic recovery -- that countries typically take up to 10 years to recover from financial crises -- makes policies such as his 2009 stimulus and proposed higher taxes hard to justify.

The authors explain:

Wrong diagnosis: Despite the campaign message of slow recovery, the president's economic team continues to predict strong GDP growth (over 4% in 2015) and has based policy proposals -- such as the 2009 stimulus -- on these rosy assumptions. Since economic growth has been sluggish, President Obama's excuse narrative on the campaign trail attempts to avoid blame even though "the more likely explanation is the failure of his own policies."

Wrong prescription: If the president is correct in his claims that economic recovery is always slow after financial crises, then proposed policies such as increasing taxes on the wealthy are questionable. Policy solutions that promote long term growth such as fiscal consolidation and tax reform are clearly preferable to the administration's suggestions, which would be more appropriate for a short recession that is followed by strong growth.

Read the full article here.

Kevin Hassett is director of economic policy studies at AEI. He previously served as a senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank and a policy consultant to the Treasury Department. Glenn Hubbard is a visiting scholar at AEI, dean of the Columbia Business School, and a former chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers. Both are economic advisers to Mitt Romney and are available through veronika.polakova@aei.org / 202.862.4880

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