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Economist William Niskanen has looked into one party control vs. 'divided' government (one party controls the Congress, and the other controls the WH). It turns out that invariably when one party controls everything, the result is a spending binge.
United vs. divided gov't (1965-2006)
(avg annual change in real per capita expenditures)
United gov't (avg)......................3.4%
Dem Pres. and Dem Congress......3.3%
GOP Pres. and GOP Congress.......3.6%
Divided gov't (avg)......................1.5%
Dem Pres. and GOP Congress.......0.4%
GOP Pres, D House, R Senate......1.5%
GOP Pres, Dem Congress.............1.6%
GOP Pres, R House, D Senate.......4.3%
The GOP from 2000-2006 were the worst in this table, although I believe that they were eclipsed by the 2006-2008 Obama/Pelosi/Reid record. So the answer is yes--one party rule is a bad thing. I think an exception could occur if we had an R House, R Senate, and sufficiently conservative R prez, such as Ron Paul.
I like to note that even with an extremely partisan, divided legislature, which we've had before in our history, that Congress still passes a tremendous amount of bipartisan legislation. Because of that I give the legislature a score of 25 out of 100. Which is actually a better score than most Americans are giving them these days. But I think that in part that's due to the media coverage which focuses on the partisanship and divisiveness, and not on the legislation that has had bipartisan support.
i don't know what legislation they have passed which has been productive to america.
most of it has just dug us deeper in debt, with higher interest payments, and less confidence in our leaders and country.
bad behavior has been repeatedly rewarded.
obamacare was also a disaster IMO.
america is losing its freedom one piece of legislation at a time.
Well I agree with that, but that does not help our economy at all. One good thing that could happen is that the triggers will take place and will will have 1.2 trillion in cuts which will include the defense budget and then in 2013 the bush tax cuts will expire. So it may not be a totally bad thing.
"There is no interest like self interest".
I am all for cutting spending but, I think the defense cuts go to far.
Remember the cuts are not actually cuts, but, just a reduction in the proposed increase.
for clarity they are not the "Bush" tax cuts anymore. they are technically the Obama tax cuts.
Keep in mong if these cuts expire ALL taxpayers will have their taxes increased.
Well then it would probably be a bad thing if the house, senate and the white house were all controlled by one party.
for once we agree. Look at what happened the last time when we had Obama, Reid and Pelosi in charge. Spending increased in excess of 24% (I believe is the number).
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