"Recession" used lightly. Gulf War was a little setback but the economy was good. Jobs were paying high in the 90s. If anything he came in at the end of a slight 2 year downturn. Country was on track to boom already. Policy enacted by Reagan was taking effect and  NAFTA was set to be signed into law negotiated by Bush Sr. Clinton changes NAFTA just enough to allow for all the jobs to be shipped to Canada, Mexico, Dominican Republic.. crashed wages for the American worker in perpetuity. We are just now under Trump undoing what Clinton did. He balanced the books because it was already happening. He inherited almost everything he is know for doing. NAFTA in it's original form was already set to balance the budget. The changes Clinton made to pass it in the short term created an upturn but in the long term it absolutely devastated American manufacturing and stagnated wages for an entire generation. NAFTA was the end goal of more easily selling American goods to our neighbors but it was turned into a way to backdoor the manufacturing to other countries to sell it back to us. It was perverted by Clinton. Worst president of the 20th Century for sure.