Required Reading

George Will on how to produce a recovery:

June begins the sixth year of the anemic recovery from an 18-month recession. Even if what Obama’s administration calls “historically severe” weather — aka, winter — reduced GDP growth by up to 1.4 percentage points, growth of 1.5 percent would still be grotesque.

The reason unemployment fell by four-tenths of a point (to 6.3 percent) in April while growth stalled is that 806,000 people left the labor force. There are about 14.5 million more Americans than before the recession but nearly 300,000 fewer jobs, and household income remains below the pre-recession peak.

Paul Volcker, whose nomination to be chairman of the Federal Reserve Board was Jimmy Carter’s best presidential decision, raised interest rates to put the nation through a recession to extinguish the inflation that, combined with stagnant growth, ruined Carter’s presidency. Then came the 1983-88 expansion, when growth averaged 4.6 percent, including five quarters over 7 percent.

Ronald Reagan lightened the weight of government as measured by taxation and regulation. Obama has done the opposite.

But giving goodies and power to Democrats is more important than generating jobs and growth for you and me.