For the last two-plus years, Donald Trump has taken the “jobs, jobs, jobs!” mantra and made it his own. After all, he ran for president on a promise to create jobs. Specifically, 25 million of them. But now we know that Trump’s supposed prowess as a job creator is an alternative fact.
On Friday morning, we learned that the economy added 148,000 jobs in December–over 40,000 fewer than predicted. Apparently in an effort to soften the blow, Fox News’ research unit crunched the numbers for average monthly job growth over the last eight years.
Average Monthly #Job Gains
-by year•2017: 171,000
•2016: 187,000
•2015: 226,000
•2014: 250,000
•2013: 192,000
•2012: 179,000
•2011: 174,000
•2010: 88,000#JobsReport— Fox News Research (@FoxNewsResearch) January 5, 2018
The numbers couldn’t be more stark. The economy actually created fewer jobs in 2017 than it did in 2016. Moreover, job growth in Obama’s last six years far outstripped Trump’s first year.
All of this gave liberal Twitter another chance to point at Trump and laugh.
https://twitter.com/BackupBookerT/status/949294858132475904
https://twitter.com/ehprewitt/status/949284248086859777
Um, @FoxNews , you know this doesn't look great for @realDonaldTrump right? Are you allowed to post this?
— Brian Ferguson (@brianpferguson) January 5, 2018
So, what you're saying is we've had the worst job creation since 2011? Rad.
— Casey Hines (@caseyhines) January 5, 2018
https://twitter.com/Alt_Spicerlies/status/949656845089755137
As bad as this looks, the larger picture is even worse. The White House was quick to seize on The Washington Post complimenting Trump’s first-year jobs numbers.
The African American unemployment rate fell to 6.8%, the lowest rate in 45 years. I am so happy about this News! And, in the Washington Post (of all places), headline states, “Trumps first year jobs numbers were very, very good.”
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 6, 2018
But as they say, the devil is in the details. The economy added 2.06 million jobs in 2017–the fewest in any year since 2011. CNN’s Keith Boykin crunched the numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Job growth has slowed since Trump took office.
Jobs created in 2016: 2.24 million
Jobs created in 2017: 2.06 million2016: 187,00 jobs/month
2017: 171,000 jobs/monthDecember 2017 job numbers are lowest in four years.#JobsReporthttps://t.co/kVDu6AQb4n pic.twitter.com/Z9riMIFPfn
— Keith Boykin (@keithboykin) January 5, 2018
ThinkProgress put these numbers into an easy-to-understand chart.
This is the Trump 2017 "jobs boom"
It's the slowest job growth since 2010.
Trump loves to talk about jobs so I'm sure he'd appreciate if this chart was shared widely. https://t.co/7VBGy1NeNe pic.twitter.com/3WzsvWGFMo
— Judd Legum (@JuddLegum) January 5, 2018
We haven’t heard any angry tweets from Trump claiming that this comparison is fake news. According to ThinkProgress’ Aaron Rupar, it’s probably because Trump knows he can’t get away with making that claim. Remember, Trump long claimed that the numbers showing that the economy was gradually pulling out of the Great Recession under Obama were bogus. But last March, then-Press Secretary Sean Spicer said that the jobs numbers were real now that Trump was in the White House.
Then again, we shouldn’t be that surprised at these numbers. Remember, this is a man who is $350 million in debt and has filed for bankruptcy six times. Now we have hard proof that he’s not as good as creating jobs as he says he is. And we wouldn’t have known this without the help of the GOP’s favorite network.
(featured image courtesy Gage Skidmore, available under a Creative Commons BY-SA license)