Preparing for the Global Challenge: National Competitors in the US - Essay Sample

Introduction

Across the United States political environment, it is noted that the nation has a number of problems concerning the competition they face. George W. Bush noted that the nation should wholly prepare for the competition ahead so that everyone could be sharing the common goal of the nation. The president added that they are facing a number of competitors like China and India and this could create uncertainty. Similarly, president Barrack Obama made like comments as he noted the level of competition that the nation was facing or it expected. Currently, the United States Micro policy is being part of the larger problem than t is offering a solution. Particularly, the two administrations had their persuasions that hindered their goals. These are; unrealistic spending for some long period of time, the number of investments was minimal mostly in sectors such as public investments, uncertain taxes, socially declined mobility, and also international trade deficits (Econ 102 Macro Principles, 2019). The two administrations thus share the setbacks of the above factors but they have a number of differences.

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A nation's competitiveness explains how much the companies are in a position to compete with other companies all over the world as the other citizens get good terms of the hiking living standards. The firms operating in a certain country base their competitiveness on unit labor costs which are the cost required to hire the required labor in production units and the output expected. The only way that the two administrations did to make sure they are in the competition was by lowering the costs of production as they tried to sustain and raising the living standards of workers so that they could also be productive.

The two administrations had a common goal in developing their infrastructure. Good infrastructure ensures that people move efficiently with their goods and services are offered in a more productive manner. Secondly, the nation transactions are more efficient where there is a vibrant infrastructure. During the two administrations, the federal government funding included works such as the Army Corp Engineers and also the Bureau of Reclamation that makes navigation of rivers and other harbors easy. Secondly, both administrations assisted in building and maintaining dams which were sources of power and irrigation. The Federal Communications Commission set budgets that allocated airwaves as it supervised the networks in telecommunications that included internet connections. This shows that President Obama and George W. Bush had a common goal of improving technology for its citizens.

During the Bush administration in the year 2004, the estimates by the Congressional Budget Office had their total infrastructure consumption at $406 billion. This was a total that included federal consumption of $62 billion as well as consumption by the local governments of $170 billion. Private spenders also were inclusive at $174 billion. This becomes a hard explanation when making judgments on total spending and its contribution to productivity growth. In the year 2012 during the Obama administration, the American Society of engineers in the civil department had reports on American infrastructure. The Obama administration had critical thoughts of dams, pure drinking water, proper roads, and levees. All these made ASCE have estimations that required the federal investment to have more than $2.2 trillion in a period of five years. As pointed above, the two administrations had good policies towards infrastructure even if they were of different political parties. Further, they had a common goal that was geared towards helping the citizens of their country as they provided good services to them.

The defense is also something that is comparable to the two governments. The two presidents had more spending on issues concerning defense than any other administration that was in operation since the period of World War II. Comparably, it is clear to many people that Obama spent more on defense than his other president. It is estimated that Obama spent more than $700 billion a year compared to Bush's spending of $500 billion. Thus, the two presidents spending show that spending by the military department comes being second to social security and its one of the biggest in the United States budgets. On defense matters, George Bush initiated the Iraq and Afghanistan wars as he responded to 9/11 attacks by terrorists. This war against the terrorists cost the United States government a total of $2.4 trillion since its start in 2004. On the other side, President Obama during his term cut back the two fights against terrorists. Obama instead relied on the intelligence gathered from the military officers as well as the use of technology to capture and kill Osama bin Laden. However, the many strategies that the two presidents have used, the involvement of the United States in the Middle East may not come into an ending. The two presidents forgot that the negative issues in the Middle East are persistent because of the Sunni-Shia split.

The two administrations had deficits and debts as well. The two administrations had deficits in the budget that they set which was a record as not many others had the same deficits. The deficits by President Bush went up to $3.3 trillion which was a hike of almost 57 percent. On the other hand, Obama's administration deficits went as high as $6.9 trillion which was 57%, similar to George Bush deficits (Jonathan, 2019). The final year budget by Bush in the year 2008 remained untouched by recession wars. Even if it was the case, the budget ran to a $459 billion in terms of deficits which was used in funding the war against terrorists. This was a big and shocking amount during that period. The Bush last budget in 2009 beginning at $407 billion in deficits and the Congress were forced to approve $350 billion for funding TARP. The only amount used in the stated budget was $151 billion in 2009. After President Obama took over the administration of the office, the national congress added the economic stimulus budget so that it could bring an end into recession. The end in a recession brought additions of $253 billion in the financial year 2009. The revenue collection became lower to almost $600 billion than expected during that year. As a result of the recession that took place after Obama took over office, the 2009 financial year deficits of the budget went as low as $1.4 trillion is one of the largest budget deficits in the history of the United States.

Obama's administration 2009 financial year deficit was totaling to $1.294 trillion. Then financial year budgets for the year 2011 deficits were $1.3 trillion. This was as a result of delays by the republican house until it hit the mark of a mere $38 billion which was skimmed in March 2011. As the economy was claimed to be on the rise, every year's deficit went lower in those years. The two presidents were responsible for the deficits that befell them and thus it brings our attention towards comparing the deficits incurred by each and every president.

All the above show some similarities only that the figures differentiate the two presidents. As a result, the debts by the United States went higher during the administration of both presidents. A more detailed reason was that in every deficit experienced every year, there were debts associated with it. The rising costs of social security were not being included in the total budgets of the administrations as being deficits. The off-budget revenue lowered the deficits of all the years but it never brought down the debts. Thus, the two presidents contributed to their debts which were higher than their anticipated deficits all put together. Comparing the two of them, it seems that Obama had an addition of $9.6 trillion to the total debt as Bush added $5.8 trillion.

In the year 2005, Bush had a chance of acting towards Hurricane Katrina and he missed that opportunity. Many economists argued that the economic impact was totaling to $200 billion. That being the issue, there was lowered gross domestic product which went as low as 1.5 % in the quarter of the year 2005. In addition, Bush gave out more $33 billion to the fiscal budgets of the year 2006 so that it could be used for cleaning up the mess. If he did that earlier, it could be a boost in the economy in the year 2005. As a result of the mess and the witnessed cleanup, the president left that up to the federal reserve banking which made comments on the crisis experienced in banking and the policies that controlled money handling. On the other hand, Obama passed an economic stimulus act which totaled to $787 billion. The act created more jobs in sectors such as education sectors and also infrastructure. The passing of the act by the president ended the experienced recession in the third quarter of 2009. Obama used the funds collected from TARP that subsidized the owners of houses that were stuck with mortgages upside down.

The two administrations had interests in healthcare. The administrations acted upon addressing the high costs of offering healthcare. The estimated costs that were meant for Medicare and Medicaid had threats on the budgets of the United States. Bush administration made up the Medicare part D prescription that was mainly for drug program (Chriss, 2019). The program assisted the older people in affording the costs of drugs to certain levels which were referred to as the doughnut hole. The president was lenient and he never created any hiking in taxations when he was funding the Medicare program. This being the results, it caused additions of $550 billion to the debt. Similarly, President Obama started and supported the Affordable Care Act in the year 2010. The benefits of the act had its fruits in the year 2014 as this was the time people understood it. The Obamacare brought to an end the Medicare doughnut hole. More significantly, Obamacare has a provision of health insurance to many people. The health insurance acts as a cost reduction strategy which allows the beneficiaries to have reachable preventive health care.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the two administrations tried to avoid add fiscal reforms as well as the long-term fiscal challenges that required the making of hard choices. They both tried to make the choices in the accepted ways that were essential. Conversely, the differences in administrations were experienced in terms of the output in each leadership. There were more deficits in a particular administration than the other.

Work Cited

"Fiscal Policy Comparisons: Obama V. Bush, Where Are We Now?". Econ 102 Macro Principles, 2019, https://econ102.academic.wlu.edu/2018/03/20/fiscal-policy-comparisons-obama-v-bush-where-are-we-now/.

Cohn, Jonathan. "Don't Compare Obamacare To Bush's Medicare Part D". The New Republic, 2019, https://newrepublic.com/article/115646/obamacare-vs-medicare-part-d-comparing-two-health-care-reforms.

Street, Chriss. "Obama Administration To Revise Total GDP Growth Down 2%". Breitbart, 2019, https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2016/06/16/obama-administration-massively-revise-gdp-downward/.