Applications for unemployment benefits have hit their lowest level in the United States in more than 50 years, indicating that the Biden administration’s economic policies are delivering the goods for Americans. As explained by the Associated Press, “Jobless claims fell by 28,000 to 187,000 for the week ending March 19, the lowest since September of 1969, the Labor Department reported Thursday.” Ahead of Biden’s election to the presidency, claims widely circulated about some kind of impending economic collapse in the United States in the event that Biden won the White House — but well, that hasn’t happened. The “policies of the Left would unleash an economic disaster of epic proportions,” Trump claimed in a late 2020 speech. Again, that simply hasn’t happened (although it’s not exactly accurate to identify Biden with “the Left” anyway).
Our economic strategy has worked — and it’s still working.
– We created 6.7 million jobs last year
– Unemployment is down to 3.8%
– Our economy grew at 5.7% last year
– We reduced the deficit by $360 billion last year— President Biden (@POTUS) March 21, 2022
Other numbers — including the four-week average of weekly unemployment claims and the total number of individuals receiving unemployment benefits — have also hit levels that are the lowest in decades. The four-week average hit 211,750 after standing at 223,250 the previous week, and 1.35 million Americans were receiving unemployment benefits the week that concluded March 12. February jobs numbers also revealed positive signs for the economy — 678,000 jobs were added to the economy in February, and the unemployment rate ticked down to 3.8 percent from 4 percent. Inflation has also been high, adding another factor complicating the economic recovery following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and President Joe Biden “has pledged to try to lower costs by increasing competition in the shipping industry, which is dominated by a handful of foreign-owned ocean carriers. He has cited the industry’s record profits and directed his administration to provide more support for investigations into antitrust violations and other unfair practices,” The New York Times explains.
The Biden economy has created millions of good-paying jobs, raised salaries for everyday Americans and cut the deficit by more than $350 billion.
— Hakeem Jeffries (@RepJeffries) March 23, 2022
One other point of particular concern is gas prices, which have overall been on the rise around the U.S. amid the war in Ukraine that Russian President Vladimir Putin recently launched. Biden administration press secretary Jen Psaki has pushed back on the notion that the Biden team’s clean energy policies have been a main driver of gas prices’ rise. Thousands of unused drilling permits for federal lands are out there, she’s noted, and most oil and gas drilling doesn’t even take place on federal property, so the Biden administration’s decision to stop issuing new drilling leases for federal lands appears poised to have less of an impact than Republicans might claim, according to her explanation. Also, the Keystone XL pipeline, work for which the Biden administration stopped, isn’t set to have a swift effect on gas prices if it was to be revived — “this Keystone Pipeline — it would take years for that to have an impact on prices… It wasn’t functioning, isn’t functioning — it would take years,” as Psaki recently explained it.
BREAKING: The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits last week fell to its lowest level in 52 years as the U.S. job market continues to show strength. Jobless claims fell by 28,000 to 187,000 for the week ending March 19. https://t.co/jf0bzoHK2v
— The Associated Press (@AP) March 24, 2022
