Washington ( CNN ) -- As the House and the Senate debated and passed budgets recently , one person was notably absent from the debate : President Barack Obama . For the fourth time in five years , the president is late submitting his budget to Congress . So late , in fact , this year both the House and Senate were forced to move forward without him , rendering the president 's budget request completely irrelevant . Unfortunately , the president 's tardiness is reflective of his fundamental lack of seriousness when it comes to budgeting . Families and businesses have to ensure that their spending , including their debt payments , does n't exceed their income , but the president acts as if he does n't think that should apply to the federal government . Recently , when speaking about his budget ( which the White House says will be out next week , a full two months after the deadline ) , the president said that he did n't want `` to chase a balanced budget just for the sake of balance . '' Well , perhaps he should chase a balanced budget for the sake of our economy . For four years now , the president 's agenda has been out-of-control spending , massive tax hikes on Americans and burdensome regulations on job creators . Since the president took office , we 've seen more than $ 1.7 trillion in new tax hikes , $ 518 billion in new regulations , and $ 6 trillion added to the national debt . The impact of those policies has not been pretty . Economic growth under this president has averaged just 0.8 % . That is n't anywhere close to the 5 % growth needed for a real recovery . While it 's certainly true that the president inherited a bad economy , it 's important to note that he inherited it more than four years ago . What has he been doing since ? Let 's put this in perspective . Ronald Reagan inherited a bad economy . But Reagan put in place growth-oriented economic policies such as fundamental tax reform and fewer regulations , which turned the economy around . During the Reagan recovery , the economy grew nearly three times as fast as it has under Obama 's watch . During the fourth year of Reagan 's presidency , the economy experienced robust 7.2 % growth . In contrast , the fourth year of Obama 's presidency produced economic growth of just 2.2 % . If the Obama recovery were as strong as Reagan 's , our economy would be $ 1.5 trillion larger today -- meaning more jobs , more opportunity , and more take-home pay for Americans . The fact is Obama 's spending , tax and regulatory policies are smothering economic recovery , jobs and opportunity . Just take the president 's $ 2.6 trillion health care overhaul signed into law three years ago . The Federal Reserve recently issued a report stating employers in several regions are laying off workers and cutting back on new hires as a direct result of the president 's health care law . Four years into the president 's term , 12 million Americans are still out of work and the labor force participation rate has declined to 63.5 % . Americans are becoming so discouraged in the Obama economy that they simply stop looking for work . If the labor force participation rate today were the same as when the president took office , the real unemployment rate would be 10.7 % . Yet despite the abysmal failures of the president 's policies , he continues to argue for more of the same . It 's time to try something new : Time to balance the budget , rein in Washington 's dangerous levels of spending and unleash economic growth by expanding energy production being held back by the Obama administration , such as the Keystone XL pipeline . It 's time to cut excessive government red tape strangling our small businesses and to truly reform our tax code to make rates lower and fairer for all Americans . We should be taking an honest look at the relationship between the president 's policies and economic growth . The president 's tax hikes , runaway spending and onslaught of new and burdensome regulations are preventing a real economic recovery . It 's time for the president to get out of the way of the American people and let our economy take off . It 's time to do better than 0.8 % growth . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of John Thune .
Sen. John Thune : President Obama is late submitting budget to Congress . He says White House is n't serious about government living by a budget . He says higher taxes , more regulations , higher debt are hurting economic recovery . Thune : Recovery from recession under Obama is much slower than under Reagan .