President Bush’s economic team is scheduled to bring its public relations bus tour to Oregon this coming Wednesday, February 18, 2004. Analysts at the Oregon Center for Public Policy welcome the Bush team to Oregon so that the Bush Administration can witness first hand the failure of its economic policies.

“When Bush’s economic team sees how its massive tax cuts for the rich have failed to produce jobs, how its mounting deficits are threatening funding for important domestic programs, and how its refusal to extend federal unemployment benefits is leaving tens of thousands of unemployed Oregonians with nothing, maybe then the Bush team will accept reality and embark on a radical change of course in their economic policy,” commented Jeff Thompson, economist with the OCPP.

Nationally, the Bush administration has the worst jobs record since the Great Depression, losing 2.4 millions jobs since the start of the recession in March 2001. Employment in Oregon remains 42,500 below levels from March 2001.

“If they are willing to witness and accept Oregon’s economic reality and change course, then it is a great thing that they are coming,” Thomson continued. “If they are simply trying to sell more tax cuts and a failed economic policy, then I doubt many Oregonians will be interested in buying what they are selling.”

The Oregon Center for Public Policy is a Silverton, Oregon-based non-profit research institute that uses research and analysis to advance policies and practices that improve the economic and social prospects of low- and moderate-income Oregonians, the majority of Oregonians.