Opinion articles provide independent perspectives on key community issues, separate from our newsroom reporting.

Letters to the Editor

Unemployment went down under Obama

In response to “I wanted to better understand Trump voters; now I do” (March 14 For the Record):

Judy Kincaid wrote “unemployment was an insignificant bit higher when President Obama left office compared to when he took office…” In fact, the unemployment rate was 2.8 percentage points lower when Obama left office than when he took office. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the unemployment rate in January 2009 was 7.6 percent; in January 2017 it was 4.8 percent.

Ben Russo, Charlotte

This story was originally published March 14, 2017 at 1:31 PM with the headline "Unemployment went down under Obama."

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