Brown’s not the only one

There’s an article in the latest New Republic which (perhaps unintentionally) highlights a key similarity between George Bush’s and Gordon Brown’s difficulties.  Jonathon Chait points out that Republican claims that America underwent an economic ‘boom’ under Bush are totally hollow.  He writes:

“The whole trick here was to start at the bottom point of the economic cycle and assume that any subsequent improvement was the result of his policies. Of course, this is a ludicrously forgiving measure. Over time, the economy tends to grow, and it also goes through cycles. To point out that we’re better off at the peak of a cycle than at the trough is something that could be said of any economic cycle. Bush was claiming his miracle fertilizer succeeded because his plants were taller at the end of the summer than at the beginning of spring.”

In spite of the fact that Bush sits on the opposite side of the economic divide from Brown, this is almost exactly the same situation Brown finds himself in.  His Treasury cheered itself on through years of growth – leaving it listless now that an economic downturn has hit.  Similarly the wider public doesn’t feel all that grateful for the economic programmes which ‘oversaw’ that growth now that recession is looming.

Perhaps the public and media responses on both sides of the Atlantic mean that there’ll be less complacency during the next period of global growth – anyone can boast about success when the economy is expanding at the peak of an economic cycle.  I wouldn’t count on it, though.