Last year J.P. Morgan thought it might be interesting to look into the private sector experience of Obama's Cabinet. America, after all, was in the middle of an economic disaster and the thought was that the president might actually look to some people with a record of success in the private sector for advice. So a study is done comparing Obama's Cabinet to the cabinets of presidents going back to 1900. secretaries of State, Commerce, Treasury, Agriculture, Interior, Labor, Transportation, Energy and Housing and Urban Development were included. The J.P Morgan study looked at the percentages of cabinet members with prior private sector experience, and the results were amazing.
The presidential cabinet with the highest percentage of private sector experience was that of Dwight Eisenhower at around 58%. The lowest --- until Obama --- was Kennedy at about 28%. The average ran between 35% and 40% ... until, as I said, Obama. Care to guess what percentage of Obama's cabinet has prior private sector experience? Try 7%.
So ... now you might have a better idea why Obama can't quite figure out how to grow jobs in the private sector. He's a big-government president with a bit-government cabinet. When your cabinet is made up almost wholly of people with nothing but government experience with a sprinkling of academia behind them you have to know that the private sector is going to not only get short shrift .. but it's going to be pretty much abused or ignored. To Obama and his advisors the private sector exists to support and fund the federal government ... and little more.
Welcome to the wonderful world of centrally planned economies.
