Beginning in 2009, Obama's longest con was on young people, a 36% increase in Youth Misery Index

New Guard
Tue, 17 Jan 2017 00:00 UTC

© Young America's Foundation

When snowflakes fall.

The Youth Misery Index (YMI), a figure calculated annually by Young America's Foundation, spiked to a record high of 113.4 in early 2017, up from 109.9 last January, and 83.5 in 2009 when President Obama took office. The Index is calculated by adding youth unemployment, student loan debt, and national debt per capita numbers.

Over the course of Obama's presidency, the YMI has spiked an alarming 29.9 points, an increase of 36 percent.

Young Americans, a generation that provided critical support to the President in 2008 and 2012, have slogged through the last eight years, and will be chained to its impact on their futures for years to come. The youth unemployment rate is almost 15 percent and the average student in the class of 2016 graduated with a record $37,000 in student loan debt. National debt per capita, a remarkable burden that will fall squarely on the shoulders of millennials, is approaching $62,000.

Young Americans are struggling to find employment, drowning in tens of thousands of dollars of personal debt, and facing the prospect of paying off an $18 trillion national debt.

Barack Obama's Presidency has been a boon for youth misery and a disaster for millennials. It's no wonder young people, a critical component of the so-called "Obama Coalition," failed to support Hillary Clinton at the same rate last November.

"President Obama has done his young supporters a remarkable disservice by running up the national debt at an incredible rate while failing to adequately address the student loan crisis," said Ron Robinson, president of Young America's Foundation. "Young people are increasingly conscious of the Left's inability to offer practical solutions to the problems they face every single day."

This Friday, January 20, marks the final day of Barack Obama's Presidency. Young America's Foundation urges the incoming wave of conservative leaders to stop the boundless climb of the Youth Misery Index immediately. America's young people deserve better.

Comment: For his own narcissistic reasons, Obama cajoled his audiences, set himself up as an idol, made promises that were unrealistic -- most he never kept. When the man defines the rhetoric, you'd best be listening instead to the rhetoric that defines the man.