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The U.S. is back in the driver’s seat of the global economy after 15 years of watching China and emerging markets take the lead.

The world’s biggest economy will expand by 3.2 percent or more this year, its best performance since at least 2005, as an improving job market leads to stepped-up consumer spending, according to economists at JPMorgan Chase & Co., Deutsche Bank AG and BNP Paribas SA. That outcome would be about what each foresees for the world economy as a whole and would be the first time since 1999 that America hasn’t lagged behind global growth, based on data from the International Monetary Fund.

“The U.S. is again the engine of global growth,” said Allen Sinai, chief executive officer of Decision Economics in New York. “The economy is looking stellar and is in its best shape since the 1990s.”

Policies Superior

The U.S. has pulled ahead of other industrial nations partly because its policy-making has been better, according to Paul Mortimer-Lee, chief economist for North America at BNP Paribas in New York.

European Central Bank President Mario Draghi and his colleagues are still weighing whether they should buy government bonds to fight off the danger of deflation -- a step that the Federal Reserve first took back in 2009.

U.S. budget policy also has been more effective than the euro region’s austerity strategy, which undercut the continent’s economy, Mortimer-Lee added.

Even Alberto Alesina, a long-time proponent of government spending cuts, thinks the euro area should adopt a more expansionary fiscal stance. Alesina, who is a professor at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, told the AEA conference on Jan. 5 that he favors more “aggressive” tax cuts by the region’s policy makers.

Ibanez wrote:How do we know the policies of Dubya aren't finally working out? HOW? RED HERRING!!! SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE!

ASUG8 wrote:The Fed has kept money artificially cheap, so mortgages are easier to come by, construction is up on new housing, cars are at less than 3% financing, etc. Gas prices, thanks to domestic drilling and the near dissolution of OPEC, have put billions back in the pockets of transportation companies and consumers. I'm not really seeing a correlation with any executive action.

Cap'n Cat wrote:

ASUG8 wrote:The Fed has kept money artificially cheap, so mortgages are easier to come by, construction is up on new housing, cars are at less than 3% financing, etc. Gas prices, thanks to domestic drilling and the near dissolution of OPEC, have put billions back in the pockets of transportation companies and consumers. I'm not really seeing a correlation with any executive action.

If this was Romney, you'd blow him, you Conk meathead.

But, it's NOT!!! GObama!!!!!!!

ASUG8 wrote:

Cap'n Cat wrote:


If this was Romney, you'd blow him, you Conk meathead.

But, it's NOT!!! GObama!!!!!!!

Nice try, but no. It's cute that you think ANY president directly manipulates oil prices, the stock market, the Fed, or the business cycle.

ASUG8 wrote:

Cap'n Cat wrote:


If this was Romney, you'd blow him, you Conk meathead.

But, it's NOT!!! GObama!!!!!!!

Nice try, but no. It's cute that you think ANY president directly manipulates oil prices, the stock market, the Fed, or the business cycle.

Cap'n Cat wrote:

ASUG8 wrote:
Nice try, but no. It's cute that you think ANY president directly manipulates oil prices, the stock market, the Fed, or the business cycle.

Again - and you know it's true - if this was Romney, you'd be first in line under his desk with a terry cloth just like every other Conk here!!!

kalm wrote:

ASUG8 wrote:
Nice try, but no. It's cute that you think ANY president directly manipulates oil prices, the stock market, the Fed, or the business cycle.

Reagan did.

ASUG8 wrote:

kalm wrote:
Reagan did.

Then Reagan was wrong too.