Byron York draws a parallel between today and what had previously been considered the worst recession since the Depression:

[W]hen unemployment began to rise during Reagan’s watch, the GOP paid a political price. In the 1982 mid-term elections, the president’s party lost 26 seats in the House.
Today, the key for Obama, as it was for Reagan, is unemployment. The talking heads in Washington say unemployment is a “lagging indicator” of economic improvement. Maybe so, but the rest of the country doesn’t see it that way. “It may be a lagging indicator to economists, but to Americans out there, it’s a front-and-center indicator,” one plugged-in GOP pollster told me. If unemployment doesn’t improve by the end of this year, Obama’s popularity will drop.

I don’t buy it. First, the effect of unemployment in the 1982 elections is often exaggerated. It has been estimated that 15 of the seats House Republicans lost that year were the result of redistricting. (Republicans lost no Senate seats in aggregate.) Republicans also raised taxes and broached the topic of Social Security cuts that year. Second, it is telling that nobody cites any other election in the intervening 27 years as an example of a race that turned on unemployment. Third, the leading econometric models for predicting elections don’t treat unemployment as an important independent factor.

I’m not denying that the economy will affect Obama’s political fortunes. Wage cuts, a long bear market, and low growth could all hurt him eventually. But I don’t see any reason to focus on the unemployment rate in particular. Politically, it’s not a leading indicator.