From ThinkProgress:
- Since the last SOTU, the economy has created 1.9 million private sector jobs.
- The top 1 percent take home 24 percent of the nation’s income, up from about 9 percent in 1976.
- Private sector job creation under Obama in 2011 was larger than seven out of the eight years Bush was president.
- The top 1 percent of Americans own 40 percent of our country’s wealth while the bottom 80 percent owns only 7 percent.
- Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, 2.5 million young adults gained health insurance.
- For every one job opening, there are four people looking for work.
- Last year, China spent 9 percent of its GDP on infrastructure. The U.S. spent 2.5 percent.
- 2.65 million seniors saved an average of $569 on prescriptions last year thanks to the Affordable Care Act.
- “In 2011, the United States killed Al Qaeda’s most effective propagandist, Anwar al-Awlaki; its operating chief, Atiyah Abd al-Rahman; and of course its founder, chief executive and spiritual leader, Osama bin Laden.”
- Union membership is at a 70-year low.
- Unemployment benefits have lifted 3.2 million people out of poverty.
- The United States used to have the world’s largest percentage of college graduates. We’re now #14.
- One quarter of all contributions to federal campaigns come from 0.01 percent of Americans.
- 47.8 percent of households that receive food stamps are working, because having a job is not enough to keep them out of poverty.
- In the last three years, 30 major corporations spent more on lobbying than they paid in taxes.
- 50 percent of U.S. workers make less than $26,364 per year.
- More than one in 70 homes faced foreclosure last year.
- Since 1985, the federal tax rate for the 400 wealthiest Americans dropped from 29 percent to 18 percent.
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