D,

Personal experience or my amateur economist evaluation?

Either way I do not have a favorable opinion of the current state of the economy. If you analyze where the "growth" has been and really look at who is benefiting from the growth in my opinion it exposes the stupidity of the "trickle down theory".

You can pretend that unemployment is a valid measure of the state of the economy but keep in mind when you change the rules on how unemployment is determined then validity becomes relative.

You can pretend that tax cuts have been the spark that created jobs but wouldn't it be more interesting to really see/measure how many jobs it actually created domestically versus how many jobs it created in foreign countries. I'd be willing to bet that even "man on dog" would not like the outcome of that comparison.

In any event that is a partial response to your question.

I could go on and on looking for factual numbers or data that supported by suspect opinion of the economy but I will stick with just opinions since I think that is what you were after.