Competitive US Senate Races and State's Economic Progress Subsequent to US Financial Meltdown

US Senators run every six years.  The next election will be held in November 2014.

The start of the most recent full six-year US Senate term was January 1, 2009.

The US financial meltdown occurred in the fourth quarter of 2008.

The Bottom for the US Stock Market resulting from the US financial meltdown was March 6, 2009.

With the normally occurring lagging effect of the US financial meltdown on US employment, the US unemployment rate topped out at 10.0% in October 2009.

Granted actions of the current Obama Administration, whose term precisely paralleled that of the full six-year term US Senator, very substantially impacted the economy of each US State.  And so did actions of the State's Governor and the State's legislature.  Also, so did actions of the US Congress.....both US Senators and all US House members.  And clearly US Fed Quantitative Easing was a huge State economic help, especially on State Company stock market prices.

Given the above dates, if you wanted to objectively evaluate the extent a given US Senator was likely to have helped his/her US State perform economically from the State's economic abyss at the beginning of the US Senator's term in 2009 to the current date roughly five years later, you should simply compare key economic measures like the State's unemployment rate and the economic performance of the State's companies from the economic low point in the first year of the US Senator's six-year term starting in 2009 to the most recent date.

The following 18 US State separate posts do just that.

Based on the polls, there are presently extremely competitive US Senate Races in the following ten US States, shown in alphabetical order below.  I will be making separate comparative economic performance posts on each of these ten US States.

• Alaska
• Arkansas
• Colorado
• Georgia
• Iowa
• Kentucky
• Louisiana
• Michigan
• New Hampshire
• North Carolina

Also, based on the past polls and recent trends, there are eight US Senate races, shown below in alphabetical order, which appear to be not that close currently, but which I think have a decent chance of getting much closer in the future.  I will also be making separate comparative economic performance posts on each of these eight US States.

• Illinois
• Minnesota
• Montana
• New Jersey
• Oregon
• South Dakota
• Virginia
• West Virginia

Thus the above eight and the earlier above other ten comprise the 18 US States I will be making  separate comparative economic performance posts on.

Also, things could conceivably change, but based on the polls or lack of solid or any opposition, there are 18 US Senate races in 16 other US States where there are very comfortable leads held.....13 Republicans (in Alabama, Idaho, Kansas, Maine, Mississippi, Nebraska, 2 in Oklahoma, 2 in South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Wyoming) and 5 Democrats (in Delaware, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Mexico and Rhode Island).  Thus, I chose to not make separate comparative economic performance posts on any of these 16 other US States.