Mark Whitehouse, Columnist

Obama's Jobs Legacy, in One Chart

Based on the employment gap, he did pretty well.

January 6, 2017 at 3:03 PM UTC

Mark Whitehouse is a member of the editorial board covering global economics and finance. Previously, he reported on economics for the Wall Street Journal and was managing editor of Vedomosti, a Russian-language business daily.

It could have been worse.
Photographer: Mark Kauzlarich/Bloomberg

Provide news feedback or report an error

Site feedback:

Take our Survey

This article is for subscribers only.

If President-elect Donald Trump wants to create more jobs than his predecessor, he has his work cut out for him. By at least one measure, Americans fared better under Barack Obama than they did under most presidents during the past six decades.

The December jobs report -- with estimated payroll growth of 156,000 and accelerating wage gains -- marks the last full month of what has been a pretty impressive eight-year performance. Despite coming to power in the middle of the worst recession since the 1930s, Obama has presided over the creation of more than 11 million jobs and a 3.1-percentage-point decline in the unemployment rate.