Historical Unemployment Rates By Political Party

The last article that I wrote, "1946-2010 Average Inflation Adjusted Deficits By President, Controlling Senate Party and Controlling House Party" ended up being pretty popular, so I have decided to write two similar articles over the coming days that will look at average unemployment rates and average GBP growth depending on which party controlled the White House, Senate and House of Representatives.

For today, we are going to look at the historical average monthly unemployment rates depending on which party controlled the White House, Senate and House of Representatives.

The data starts at January of 1948 and runs until August of 2010.

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First off, let's look at the average unemployment rate depending on which party is in the White House:

Democratic President
Total Months: 320
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.4%

Republican President
Total Months: 432
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.9%

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Average unemployment rate based on which party is controlling the Senate:

Republican Senate Control
Total Months: 228
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.8%

Democratic Senate Control
Total Months: 524
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.6%

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Average unemployment rate based on which party is controlling the House:

Republican House Control
Total Months: 156
Average Unemployment Rate: 4.9%

Democratic House Control
Total Months: 596
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.9%

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Average unemployment rate when one party is controlling both the House AND the Senate:

Republican House AND Senate Control
Total Months: 132
Average Unemployment Rate: 4.9%

Democratic House AND Senate Control
Total Months: 500
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.7%

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Average unemployment rate when one party has the White House, House AND the Senate:

Republican House AND Senate Control AND Republican President
Total Months: 48
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.3%

Democratic House AND Senate Control AND Democratic President
Total Months: 236
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.7%

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Average unemployment rate when one party controls the House and Senate but doesn't have the White House:

Republican House AND Senate Control, Democratic President
Total Months: 84
Average Unemployment Rate: 4.6

Democratic House AND Senate Control, Republican President
Total Months: 264
Average Unemployment Rate: 5.7

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Source: Historical Unemployment Rates


Filed under: General Knowledge