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NationofChange / Op-Ed
Published: Saturday 1 October 2011
America’s ongoing jobs depression - which is what it deserves to be called - is the worst economic calamity to hit this nation since the Great Depression.
The American Jobs Depression, And How to Get Out of It
The Reverend Al Sharpton and various labor unions have announced a March for Jobs. But I’m afraid we’ll need more than marches to get jobs back.
Since the start of the Great Recession at the end of 2007, America’s potential labor force – that is, working-age people who want jobs - has grown by over 7 million. But since then, the number of Americans who actually have jobs has shrunk by more than 300,000.
In other words, we’re in a deep hole and the hole is deepening. In August, the United States created no jobs at all. Zero.
America’s ongoing jobs depression - which is what it deserves to be called - is the worst economic calamity to hit this nation since the Great Depression. It’s also terrible news for President Obama, whose chances for re-election now depend almost entirely on the Republican party putting up someone so vacuous and extremist that the nation rallies to Obama regardless.
The problem is on the demand side. Consumers (whose spending is 70% of the economy) can’t boost the American economy on their own. They’re still too burdened by debt, especially on homes that are worth less than their mortgages. In addition, their jobs are disappearing, their pay is dropping, their medical bills are soaring.
Consumer spending slowed again in August as incomes dropped.
Businesses, for their part, won’t hire without more sales. So we’re in a vicious cycle. The question is what to do about it.
When consumers and businesses can’t boost the economy on their own, the responsibility must fall to the purchaser of last resort. As John Maynard Keynes informed us 75 years ago, that purchaser is the government.
Government can hire people directly to maintain the nation’s parks and playgrounds and to help in schools and hospitals. It can funnel money to help cash-starved states and local government so they don’t have to continue to slash payrolls and public services. And it can hire indirectly - contracting with companies to build schools, revamp public transportation and rebuild the nation’s crumbling highways, bridges and ports.
Not only does this create jobs but also puts money in the hands of all the people who get the jobs, so they can turn around and buy the goods and services they need - generating more jobs. Not exactly rocket science.
But congressional Republicans are firmly opposed. Why don’t Republicans get it? Either they’re knaves - they want the economy to stay awful through next election day so Obama gets the boot. Or they’re fools - they’ve bought the lie that reducing the deficit now creates more jobs.
Republicans claim businesses aren’t hiring because they’re uncertain about regulatory costs, or their taxes are too high, or they can’t find the skilled workers they need. But if these were the reasons businesses weren’t hiring - and consumer demand were growing - we’d expect companies to make more use of their current employees. The average number of hours worked per week by the typical employee would be increasing.
In fact, the length of the average workweek has been dropping. In August, it declined for the third month in a row, to 34.2 hours. That’s back to where it was at the start of the year - barely longer than what it was at its shortest point two years ago (33.7 hours in June 2009).
Republicans say America can’t afford to spend more. In truth, we’ll be in worse shape if we don’t. If the economy remains dead in the water, the ratio of public debt to the total economy balloons.
Besides, the United States can now borrow money from the rest of the world at fire-sale rates. Interest on the ten-year Treasury bill is now under 2%. That’s an almost unprecedented deal. With so many Americans unemployed and so much of our infrastructure in disrepair, this is the ideal time to get on with the work of rebuilding the nation.
But it won’t be enough for government to become the buyer of last resort – in Keynes’s words, to prime the pump. If the economy is to continue to grow and create jobs after the government has stopped the priming, there must be enough water in the well. Yet, now and in the foreseeable future, America’s vast middle class doesn’t have the purchasing power to keep the mechanism going.
For more than 30 years, the median wage in America has barely increased, adjusted for inflation – even though the economy is twice as large as it was three decades ago. Almost all the gains have gone to the top - especially the top 1%, who now receive over 20% of total income (it was just 10% in 1980).
As long as America’s vast middle class could continue to borrow on the rising value of their homes, they continued to spend - thereby keeping the economy going. But going deeper into debt is not a sustainable strategy. Now, after the bubble burst, America’s middle class doesn’t have enough money to maintain the economy at or near full employment.
Any long-term strategy for rescuing the American economy must therefore seek to reverse the widening gap in income and wealth. One place to start is tax reform. The earned income tax credit - a wage subsidy for lower-income workers - should be enlarged and expanded. Taxes on the middle class should be reduced - including social security payroll taxes (80% of Americans pay more in payroll taxes than they do in income taxes).
Taxes on the wealthy, on the other hand, should be increased. The president has proposed closing some tax loopholes that allow the super-rich to reduce their tax liability, and to end the tax cut on the rich put in place by George W Bush in 2001 (thereby increasing the top marginal tax rate to what it was under Bill Clinton - 39%).
But the nation should go much further, particularly in light of the large budget deficit projected several years from now. We need more tax brackets at the top, with higher marginal rates. The capital-gains tax (now at 15%) should be raised to match the income tax rate. And a wealth surtax of 2% should be applied to all wealth in excess of $7 million.
Needless to say, Republicans won’t go along with anything like this. They balk even at the president’s modest plan.
It would be better for President Obama to assume that he will get no Republican support this year and next, and build his 2012 election campaign around a bold plan to revive jobs and the American middle class — and end the American Jobs Depression.
This article was originally posted on Robert Reich's blog.
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ABOUT Robert Reich
ROBERT B. REICH, one of the nation’s leading experts on work and the economy, is Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Bill Clinton. Time Magazine has named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He has written thirteen books, including his latest best-seller, “Aftershock: The Next Economy and America’s Future;” “The Work of Nations,” which has been translated into 22 languages; and his newest, an e-book, “Beyond Outrage.” His syndicated columns, television appearances, and public radio commentaries reach millions of people each week. He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine, and Chairman of the citizen’s group Common Cause. His widely-read blog can be found at www.robertreich.org.
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51 comments on "The American Jobs Depression, And How to Get Out of It"
October 20, 2011 7:16am
. just because the repub's can't mention
the OPP word (over-population persistently)
doesn't mean they can't be reaching for
a solution that intends on
forcing population reductions .
. this article seems to assume
that the repub's couldn't be intending that:
Reich practically said: "(can't they see
that if the shrinking middle class got paid like CEO's
then they could afford to pay more to China and India,
and also pay the taxes to feed an
ever-pro-life.rating unemployed class?!).
. the free trade agreements have been here
for decades now, but we seem to have been
the frog in the pot:
the kitchen doesn't seem that hot
when the losses are incremental .
. let's be real, unless you can coordinate
people production with job creation,
you are a cooked frog .
. you need to either really listen to
what BigMoney has planned for us,
or drum up a constitutional amendment
that does insure relocalization
http://www.postcarbon.org/relocalize
with a dual policy of:
# you-use-it, you make half of it, and
# some form of population control:
either meritocracy, or capitalism
(let BigMoney do the breeding)
or Chinese quotas -- whatever !
. don't be fooled,
breeding as an outlaw is child abuse;
because,
while there will definitely be charity
to back you up in your parenting choices,
there can't possibly be
growing charity indefinitely .
. the environmentalists should be
siding with BigMoney here:
if the wealth is distributed to
ever-pro-life.erators
then eventually we simply lose all wealth,
plus we overstress the environment .
. but I should be real too, right?
how do we control population
when we can't even control exotic drugs?
my friend, at least if you
imprisoned the child abusers,
your prisons would stop growing .
October 15, 2011 12:31pm
What is successful Capitalism who many say it is driven by greed. It is called motivation by most. The drive to American superior productivity is motivated by rewards. We are born with the desire to please and exceed. Greed is taking your reward and wanting to take the next guys and the next and the nexr. For some reason we have evolved in America to have empathy and compassion and mostly direct our efforts in a way that we do not intentionally hurt our fellow Americans. Investing in innovation, which has been America's centerpeace, is done by mostly our Capitalist Stock Market. All Americans are able to participate by purching stock. Successful development and application of the innovation translates into sales that rewards investors with profit. It is reward is what motivatres our system. Greed is to take it from your neighbors and deny them the rewards also. Greed is lettting the ever widening wealth gap between the middle class and the wealthy expand further untill we have a sitiuatioon that we are now approaching that creates a class warfare. When there was a controlled balance approach to our economic systems, people were eager to succeed and were content. Now we have mass protests on Wall Street and Main Street. How we balance this is taxation by having those most able to pay carry the largest burden. When we have balance everyone succeeds and it is a win win situation.
October 02, 2011 3:02pm
Gee, a lot of ranting going on, with very little real impact. How many "unemployed" people are working cash jobs? How many small businesses are cash businesses not paying anywhere near the tax they should? I'm not a rich guy. I need work done around the house. I'm too old and infirm to do it myself. Where can I find a person willing to work at minimum wage to help me out? Would or should I het a tax credit for hiring this person?
I have to pay tax on my social security. I have to pay tax on my pension. I have to pay tax on my 401k savings. I have to pay tax on my savings interest. I have to pay tax on my dividends. I have to pay tax on the value of my home. I have to pay state and local taxes. I might get a break on my personal stock as long term capital gain, but only if I sell it. Assuming the stock is worth more than what I paid for it.
At least I have a house, pension, savings and stock. But how did I get them? I didn't get them by spending. No big vacations. No major travel. I used to go camping with my kids. I was lucky that they get into state schools. They were smart and got good educations and they are all doing better than me.
So I am content, even with the taxes I pay. But the reforms proposed will probably hurt me. Why should that be?
October 02, 2011 1:02pm
Fast forward to a time when we can produce all we want without working. Technology has moved quite a way on that scenario. In 1945, who would have thought that we could produced automobiles without all those union workers who maintained the status quo to save their jobs? Who would have thought that we could mine tons of coal without picks and shovels? Who would have thought that we could do millions of lab tests on patient blood samples without using pipettes and glass test tubes? who would have thought that we could automate telephone conversations to the point that it cost practically nothing to speak to someone anywhere in the world and even in a space station high above earth? Who would have thought that you could mass produce sandwiches and other snacks with no hands of workers to stuff the bags?So, when machines produce all we use and automatically produce even the machines that replace the worker's hands, minds and bodies, who will be paid to buy the products made by the automatically produced machines that produce the automatic machines and automatically print the money automatically borrowed from whom to buy the illusion that we have an economy? The word economy comes from the meaning of ecology. Human ecology is a system of money driven production that fails when the meaning of money fails or takes on a meaning of its own. Money is a measure of value and a medium of exchange for exchanging human time and effort for useful products. To keep the machines going, we have to rethink the meaning of money. We have to rethink the value of labor as opposed to human subsistence and rights. Let us automate our thinking to only consider truth driven solutions and find a way to automate our environment to produce a human driven ecology that provides essential nutrients and allows the survivors to invent what they can to make their life lovely and carefree. Ladies and gentlemen start your engines (computers), and get the race under way. What race? The human race.
October 02, 2011 6:56am
Business most certainly can save itself, all the business community has to do is increase wages 10% across the board for, let's say, everyone making less than $100k/year, or pick your cutoff point really - the less someone makes, the more likely it is the increase will go immediately back into the economy, creating demand, creating jobs. Business sits back and waits for you and I to pay them to give you and I jobs. The business community plays us for the fools we are.
October 02, 2011 12:47am
As a Republican I am very disgusted with the way my party is ignoring the problems that are being felt in every household in the nation. Even the extremely wealthy must realize their wealth is threatened by the loss of prestige we are experiencing world wide. Type in Douglas Helms 1934 CCC and see the positive approach that got people back to work after the Great Depression. Mr. Helms, Our National Historian, has done a remarkable job of documenting the work the Civilian Conservation Corps and WPA did in communities through out the nation. Wake up fellow Republicans, our party is going in the wrong direction. Now is the time to look at the positive results that were accomplished in 1934. Dr. Reich is right we have to be bold if we are ever to regain our prestige at home and abroad.
Stan Honeycutt
October 01, 2011 11:05pm
I love you, Robert, but like all other economists, you're barking up the wrong tree when you write about the need to return to growth, "If the economy is to continue to grow," as if it were a good thing.
Where does such "growth" come from? If a baby were to continue to grow its entire life, you'd have a freakish 18' tall person, weighing some 450 pounds, by the time they hit their mid-50's.
Infinite growth on a finite planet is not possible. "Ah, but we're talking 'economic' growth here, not 'real' growth." Stop fooling yourself. If the economy grows, people buy more stuff, which eventually comes from the earth, which is finite.
Here's a better plan for each and every one of you: start planing now for never-ending contraction. This double-dip recession will become a triple-dip one in three years, and a quadruple-dip recession before the next decade is up.
Because growth is fundamentally based on resources -- primarily energy -- and fossil sunlight is about to go into permanent, irrevocable decline. No amount of efficiency or renewable energy sources can reverse the incredible spike of energy we've had for 150 years or so, and by all measures, we've used half of it up, and the next half is going to be increasingly dear.
Oil at $147 a barrel cause the last recession and nearly brought the global finance system to its knees. It's been hovering around $90 for many months now, and growth is simply not possible without cheap energy.
Oh, things will get very bad, and "demand destruction" will cause oil to dip again, which will make it look like growth is re-starting, but as soon as the economy starts to show some life, we'll bounce off the "glass ceiling" of energy, except this time, it will be at perhaps 80 million barrels per day, versus the 87 million barrels per day we peaked at in 2007 or so.
Lather, rinse, repeat, until fossil sunlight is virtually unobtainable.
Rather than hope hiring starts up again, you'd best be planning to supply yourself and your family with your own food and energy. Or if you feel you must remain "in the economy," better stop practicing "fiscal monoculture" and take up several diverse jobs, so that if any one of them goes away, you can still get by on the others.
October 01, 2011 8:11pm
" America’s middle class doesn’t have enough money
to maintain the economy at or near full employment."
. does the Dr actually know
what jobs have been lost due to
this lack of consumer spending power?
. what services are consumers missing?
. once the capitalists had this crisis,
they are using it as an excuse
to dump the inefficient jobs -- forever;
if the consumer mania starts up again,
they will only be employing more
machines and foreigners
-- not their fellow citizens .
" Obama will get no Republican support this year and next,
so he should build his 2012 election campaign around
a bold plan to revive jobs
and the American middle class
— and end the American Jobs Depression."
. is the Dr being sarcastic?
where could Obama expect to be
after winning the next election?
right back with the same no-support Republicans !
. in this age of automation and high-tech policing
why are we still believing like pioneers
that the working class can have more kids,
and the owners of the nation's wealth
will just keep on supplying them with more jobs ?
October 01, 2011 8:46pm
http://amerdreamduh.blogspot.com/2011/10/equal-free-polspeech-getmoneyou...
October 01, 2011 7:57pm
" America’s middle class doesn’t have enough money
to maintain the economy at or near full employment."
. does the Dr actually know
what jobs have been lost due to
this lack of consumer spending power?
. what services are consumers missing?
. once the capitalists had this crisis,
they are using it as an excuse
to dump the inefficient jobs -- forever;
if the consumer mania starts up again,
they will only be employing more
machines and foreigners
-- not their fellow citizens .
"Obama will get no Republican support this year and next,
so he should build his 2012 election campaign around
a bold plan to revive jobs
and the American middle class
— and end the American Jobs Depression."
. is the Dr being sarcastic?
where could Obama expect to be
after winning the next election?
right back with the same no-support Republicans !]
. in this age of automation and high-tech policing
why are we still believing like pioneers
that the working class can have more kids,
and the owners of the nation's wealth
will just keep on supplying them with more jobs ?
October 01, 2011 7:56pm
> America’s middle class doesn’t have enough money
to maintain the economy at or near full employment.
[. does the Dr actually know
what jobs have been lost due to
this lack of consumer spending power?
. what services are consumers missing?
. once the capitalists had this crisis,
they are using it as an excuse
to dump the inefficient jobs -- forever;
if the consumer mania starts up again,
they will only be employing more
machines and foreigners
-- not their fellow citizens .]
> Obama will get no Republican support this year and next,
so he should build his 2012 election campaign around
a bold plan to revive jobs
and the American middle class
— and end the American Jobs Depression.
[. is the Dr being sarcastic?
where could Obama expect to be
after winning the next election?
right back with the same no-support Republicans !]
. in this age of automation and high-tech policing
why are we still believing like pioneers
that the working class can have more kids,
and the owners of the nation's wealth
will just keep on supplying them with more jobs ?
October 01, 2011 7:54pm
> America’s middle class doesn’t have enough money
to maintain the economy at or near full employment.
[. does the Dr actually know
what jobs have been lost due to
this lack of consumer spending power?
. what services are consumers missing?
. once the capitalists had this crisis,
they are using it as an excuse
to dump the inefficient jobs -- forever;
if the consumer mania starts up again,
they will only be employing more
machines and foreigners
-- not their fellow citizens .]
> Obama will get no Republican support this year and next,
so he should build his 2012 election campaign around
a bold plan to revive jobs
and the American middle class
— and end the American Jobs Depression.
[. is the Dr being sarcastic?
where could Obama expect to be
after winning the next election?
right back with the same no-support Republicans !]
. in this age of automation and high-tech policing
why are we still believing like pioneers
that the working class can have more kids,
and the owners of the nation's wealth
will just keep on supplying them with more jobs ?
October 01, 2011 6:38pm
I was in a grocery store today that carries things like imported Italian pasta and I overheard one of the managers saying "Nobody wants dollars now, they want to be paid in euros."
I wonder who is considering alternatives to the dollar for exchanges between under or unemployed people with skills who don't have many dollars to spend, but have lots of time to do real work. There are a number of barter systems out there and I want to learn more about P2P digital currency systems like BitCoin.org - I would love to see this sort of thing grow, where people who produce real value create real growth by exchanging goods and services. P2P exchanges would diminish things like speculation and day-trading, which produce no value for society.
It is also clear from #occupywallstreet that people are hungering for real change and that they are using new technologies to get real results. Today 50,000 copies of a newspaper were distributed for #occupywallstreet Media and they raised $28,106 using Kickstarter.com ($12,000 was raised in just 8 hours).
October 01, 2011 6:36pm
You are right sir. Now here is how to get consumer spending going again. It is a fact that the top 1/4 pay 86% of US income tax. That is after the Bush cuts in income and capital gains tax rates of 10% and 25% respectively. Reset these rates to pre Bush rates and the top 1/4 would pay 96% of US income tax. Add a tiny progressive rate increase to the top 1/4 and we could eliminate income tax for everybody making under $50K a year. Where else would that money go but consumer spending?What firm would not be forced to hire new people? And the rich would still be rich. Worse yet, the rich would benefit from a booming economy and likely get richer.
October 01, 2011 5:55pm
Reich does not go far enough with his recommendations and falls short of real reform of the monetary system. Real reform would allow us to issue money without debt to re-build our infrastructure and pay off our bonds or debt as it comes due. I would recommend that he adopt the recommendations of the American Monetary Institute and start supporting the NEED bill now offered by Dennis Kucinich. Their reforms would involve initiating a monetary authority within the Treasury to monitor inflation and establish criteria for the direct issuance of new money for programs that add value to our society. Bob Schmitz, Oakdale MN
October 01, 2011 3:59pm
Question: Why aren't most of the mainstream media speaking truth to power in their editorials? Journalism students all take economics and political science in their solid liberal arts curriculum. They all know how FDR used Keynesian economics to lift us out of the Great Depression. That is, government job creation to prime the pump. Why their pretense at "balance" when they know full well that the GOP/TP ideas are ruinous. Who and what are they afraid of? And should they be afraid when they bear the responsibility for setting the agenda for America? The are in fact the real voice of America. Of course, obviously they stand to make enormous profits from campaign advertising and coverage.
October 01, 2011 3:27pm
While everything that Robert Reich says is true, we still need to think about what the government ought to invest in. It should primarily be things that will provide real worth. If we look around us it is not hard to see that we are living in a pretty unsustainable manner, using up natural resources as if there was no tomorrow. The best thing we could do as a nation would be to invest in creating a sustainable America.
We should be adopting a policy of zero waste, transitioning rapidly to 100% renewable energy, phasing out the use of toxic chemicals, and restoring the natural environment, etc. There are hundreds of things that we need to do in every community all across America. But the first thing that we ought to do is to fund the development of local, regional and national planning processes that focus on how we can best make the transition to a sustainable America. Now that is something that could provide real worth and value over the long term and establish real American prosperity for years and decades to come.
If you are interested in discussing this further please contact Rob Wheeler, robwheeler22@gmail.com
October 01, 2011 3:29pm
THE NEW AMERICAN PIRATES, ARE KILLING AMERICANS.
This story is not about glamorized or fictional piracy. This is, “real piracy.”
Hundreds of our wealthiest leaders and most powerful corporations know that in the next few years, they will be able to siphon, skim, and steal, so much “NEW CASH,” that they and their progeny will be ultra-rich for generations to come.
No, this is not funny, or fiction, or a conspiracy, it is just simple greed and simple theft. The new pirates of America have launched an all-out siege on us in order to capture, amass, and hold trillions of dollars for themselves.
All of the recent political power grabs and nonsensical debating is purely a slight-of-hand deflection. President Obama, Democrats, Republicans, the International Press, and even the Tea Party, are watching the tiny pea in the shell game…while the rich and powerful “Piratical Right” is stealing America right out from under us.
Consider that their combined total plunder from corporate flipping, downsizing, offshore labor, speculation, price fixing of oil and energy plus, corruption in defense, health care, banking, student loans, foreclosures, etc., etc., is a trillion dollar treasure for these pirates. Go ahead, put your own calculator to it.
Are they smarter than we are? Yes, and they are laughing at us. I, we, you, and all of us, have not been able see the big picture of what is happening to our own country and to our own people. The rape and theft of America, has been cleverly packaged, promoted, and sold under the guise of “cost-cutting,” “deregulation,” and “free enterprise.”
The “Piratical Right” is directly responsible for millions of people dying, getting sick, losing their jobs and homes, losing their ability to fight, their spirit, and even losing their will to live. The sick smell of this carnage now permeates the air across America.
To us, this is all unimaginable, because we look for some sense or the morality of things. These modern-day American pirates however, have no moral compass. They are devoid of any conscience, humanity or soul, and are feeding on the flesh of the American people.
Don’t look to the President, the Senate, Congress, the press, or any political party to help. Sadly, they just don’t see it, don’t care, or are part of it. “We the people” are on our own. Start asking questions. Demand answers. If we don’t fight back America…who will?
History has taught us how to stop piracy.
By Mr. S. Pimpernel 09/25/2011
October 01, 2011 5:01pm
As crazy as it sounds, the pimpernel hits it right on the head. People have to start talking about class warfare for real, because this is what it is and they've just about won. I think things are going to get ugly as nonviolent protest will not change anything...
October 01, 2011 3:15pm
Reich's opinions make sense, if only we had a government that was responsive to the people! Nothing can be done as long as Wall Street holds the power of the dollar over elected officials, and I see no sign that will change.Eventually, the American economy will collapse, and it will take Wall Street down with it. Then we can start over. I hope we can transition without violence, but I'm not optimistic about it.
October 01, 2011 2:46pm
We could ask the communist in China to take over. They seem to be on the correct path. The last thirty years they have gained every year under communism. In capitalism the last thirty years all we have had is wars and unemployment for those not in the defense industry. We have lost in the last thirty years. Maybe capitalism is not the answer. Communist are soldiers, workers and poor people. Fascist are the few ruling the many.
October 01, 2011 2:38pm
The guy on BBC news said he dreamed of a recession so he could make money. Makes sense to me that the republicans have the same dream. The worst it gets for everyone else the cheaper they buy. During the depression people who had money made a killing. He also said that Goldman Sachs rules the world by manipulating recessions and depressions. Seems to me we should outlaw Goldman Sachs or hire them to make money for all of us.
October 01, 2011 2:11pm
As long as Wall/Bank Street is paying off their constituencies (ie All 3 branches of our Federal Government) to do their work, what can anyone do to stop this train wreck economy??? Fact is, the majority of workers who make the wealth possible on Wall Street don't even have a zip code here!!! THAT is a global problem. Frankly, we are WAY beyond taxes as a cure or government jobs! Think about it, it was WORK/JOBS available HERE, in America after WW TWO, that built and sustained a growing economy. This time around, many of those same industries are either gone, overseas, or merged into an entirely different beast. Folks, we are in deeper sh*t than anyone is willing to either admit or understand. I don't think it matters WHO gets elected. Sustainable manufacturing jobs JUST ARE NOT HERE!!! PERIOD!
October 01, 2011 1:54pm
I agree that the wealthy should pay the same, or a greater percentage than the rest of us. But why tax anyone at all? When the government prints $100 it gives it to the FED in exchange for a $100 note. We now owe the FED $100. Since 1913 we have amassed $15 trillion of these IOUs. The FED does back up the money, with the IOUs from us. If we authorized our own money we could print our way out of unemployment and debt. A huge part of the tax collected goes to pay the interest on the surreal debt to the FED. ONE ENGRAVING CHANGE on our printed currency and we are done with this farce.
Monies collected by taxation could then pay for real services for the people. The republicans call programs for the people domestic spending and want to eliminate it. Our social security should be funded with real dollars earning a real return. Medicare and Medicaid need to be funded with real dollars.
40,000 people in Michigan were eliminated from welfare assistance today. I can't say this added to Poverty because these people just got demoted from poverty. Is that not class warfare? Governor Snyder has a large home, maybe they can live there.
If you make minimum wage you have 15.3% taken off the top for FICA and Medicare. The top 47% of the income in this country has zero. The cap should be lifted.
The point is this. The wealthiest on the planet are making us poor and unemployed. This is intentional. They want us so far in debt and homeless so we can't join the march on Wall Street. The tactic of Depressions has been used for 200 years as a ploy of the banks to control the populace. This is the Class Warfare O'Reilly and Hannity and Beck refer to. And every dollar spent under citizens united is another bomb dropped on the lower and middle classes.
We need to print our own money. Dissolve the Debt. Let the big banks fail. Tax the rich accordingly to pay for the health and welfare of all Americans. And get the money out of politics.
October 01, 2011 1:26pm
The answer becomes more clear to me every day. I'll call it the HAL-9000 approach to politics. Let the right wing republicans have their way, and implement every policy they wish over the next year. I guarantee that within a year, any illusion about the wisdom or efficacy of right-wing politics will be destroyed, and the real soul of their platform and policies will be ever so clear to America. If we stay the current course, I guarantee that a year from now there will still be tax loopholes. I guarantee that the top 1% of Americans will pay no axes, I guarantee we will still be in a 'middle class recession/ low class depression'. I guarantee republicans will win the presidency.
Look at the wisdom of mashall arts - you use the ill guided momentum of your opponent to their demise.
October 01, 2011 2:50pm
How about attacking the source of so much misery in this country, the insatiable greed by the psychopaths who run things? Why not initiate the Eisenhower solution for taxes by returning to the rates in effect during his presidency? How about putting an absolute cap on the amount of wealth that any person or family can accumulate? How about limiting any inheritance to some reasonable figure, say 1o million, and confiscate the rest so that we don't perpetuate the aristocracy here?
Until and unless we recognize human greed for the evil that it is, we're not going to solve any of the other problems. Oh, and we need to start talking about limiting the human population, too, because the Earth cannot sustain the projected number of humans in 2050. Soylent Green, anyone? I'm glad I'll be under ground by that time.
October 01, 2011 2:40pm
I think you underestimate the stupidity of the right wing masses in this country, grasshopper. Their brains don't work right. They can't think. They believe they are continually persecuted. They will always blame "the other" when things don't work out the way they were told they would by their leaders. Look at the past ten years -- do they have any sense at all of cause and effect? This is the dumbest industrialized country on Earth, and the corporate elite knows which buttons to push to get their ignorant electorate to the polls. They are also passing restrictive voting laws that will suppress the vote of the other side. When nothing else works, they rig the elections like they did in Florida in 2000 and in Ohio in 2004. We're descending into fascism, and I'm not sure that there will be a peaceful way to stop it, marshal art techniques notwithstanding.
October 01, 2011 1:42pm
Very good.
October 01, 2011 1:24pm
I cannot agree that having Al Sharpton join the debate is to the movement's best interest because the only thing Sharpton sees is his own self-interest in all the issues he supposingly backs by having his face in front of the different media outlets so he's not forgotten.
October 01, 2011 2:30pm
It's really too bad that you don't listen to Sharpton, Don. Or watch the work that he does. Or pay attention to who he advocates for. Unfortunately, if you want to make any kind of difference in this pathetic country, you have to play the media game to some extent. Still, you have to ask yourself, who is Sharpton playing for? Is he personally profiting from his actions? I don't think so. Is he famous to the extent of a Limbaugh or O'Reilly? No. Does he preach the politics of hatred and exclusion that those clowns do? No. If you disagree with the man on issues, state your case, but state it clearly, because at least you know where Sharpton stands. He is not a corporate stooge, he doesn't represent the rich asses who are ruining this country, and he stays pretty darn consistent over time with his message.
October 01, 2011 2:09pm
What? You don't like AL?
October 01, 2011 1:15pm
Right on with the wealth tax! Any idea how much revenue it would raise?
October 01, 2011 12:56pm
@Steve - YEAH! Let's just tax the wealthy into oblivion and be bitter and vindictive about it! That will solve our problems. I just laugh when I read comments like yours. CLEARLY, there is a problem with our tax system that needs to be fixed. But to pillory the wealthy is just childish, naive and destructive. I'll be the first in line to vote for a tax code that eliminates ALL deductions (no mortgage deductions, no child tax credits, no carve-outs for solar nor oil and gas, etc), taxes labor less than or equally to capital (as opposed to the inverse that currently exists), and offers either a flat tax or simple graduated tax that excludes the first $30k or so of income. But at the same time I will expect that our politicians will reign in the ridiculous orgy of spending, whether it be on overstretched wars, scholarships for illegal immigrants, distorted public pensions or the miserably-conceived national healthcare program. And at the same time, I'll be a champion for anyone who strives for success and gains wealth, whether $5k, $500k, $50m or $5B!
October 01, 2011 2:08pm
This comment might get more consideration if it contained any factual information.
October 01, 2011 3:47pm
factual information?
October 01, 2011 12:34pm
The numbers on the jobs crisis are accurate. The shortfall in consumer demand is accurate. But we may want to consider whether or not this is a jobs crisis that can be solved through the kind of fiscal policy that is advocated. There is also evidence that we have too much global demand due to a human population approaching 7 billion who are consuming at an unprecedented average (not necessarily median) rate. At the same time we may be in a supply shortage as well though not in capital or buildings or manufactured goods. What is in short supply is water, affordable food and cheap energy. Food and energy in particular are essentials that drive economic fundamentals more than we have had to admit for a very long time. But there is one further category of supply that is dwindling that is usually externalized from economic computations. That is our reliance on natural sinks and cycles. Our physical world is changing as a result of our pollutants and the inability of the environment to reduce their toxicity. Unless we find a jobs solution that does addresses these underlying issues, we will only be buying a little time.
October 01, 2011 2:17pm
The Banks are causing the food costs and the energy cost to escalate by speculation. Alternative energy needs to be pursued, and when we do the Chinese, the banks and American Corporations sabotage it. The sun never sets on Mother Earth, the wind blows, the rains fall and the water flows. The planet is about energy. But the wealthy are about control. Multinational corporations ARE the British Empire of the 21st century. And they will exploit every colony on the planet. If the United States pulls the plug on the banks, they all go down.
October 01, 2011 12:31pm
As businesses, universities, states, counties, cities stumble through the recession some find themselves in a phase of creative disassembly. Hundreds of thousands of jobs are shed. World class University of California Berkeley Chancellor Birgeneau ($500,000 salary) and his $7 million outside consultants are firing employees via Birgeneau’s “Operational Excellence (OE)”: 2,000 axed by end 2011. Yet many cling to an old assumption: the implied, unwritten management-employee contract.
Management promised work, upward progress for employees fitting in, employees accepted lower wages, performing in prescribed ways, sticking around. Longevity was good employer-employee relations; turnover a dysfunction. None of these assumptions apply in the 21 century economy. Businesses, universities, public institutions can no longer guarantee careers, even if they want to. Managements paralyzed themselves with a strategy of “success brings successes” rather than “successes brings failure’ and are now forced to break implied contract with employees – a contract nurtured by management that future can be controlled.
Jettisoned employees are discovering that hard won knowledge earned while loyal is no longer desired in employment markets. What contract can employers, employees make with each other?
The central idea is simple, powerful: job is a shared partnership.
• Employers, employees face financial conditions together; longevity of partnership depends on how well customers, constituencies needs are met.
• Neither management nor employee has future obligation to the other.
• Organizations train people.
• Employees create security they really need – skills, knowledge that creates employability in 21st century economies
• The management-employee loyalty partnership can be dissolved without either party considering the other a traitor.
Sustained employability in the 21st century economy is not loyalty to management, company, university, public agency or union. Employability: are you employable?
October 01, 2011 2:19pm
You are employable if you are over educated, over worked and under paid.. and agree to it.
October 01, 2011 12:24pm
Well yes. Government spending br0ought us out of the Great Depression and it will bring us out of the Great Recession. Yes the middle class is depleted of resources and not spending out of need rather than other concerns. We have an economic structure much like the 1920's when the disparity between the wealthy and the middle class was great like it is today. Either we accept the Lockian principal that we come together to form a social contract or we go down the tubes following the wild west dreams of the far right. It's as simple as that. Nothing about pre-Great Depression Era America shows those were days that benefited the majority of Americans or presented any economic stability at all. The longest period of sustained growth in America came as a result of the New Deal and it was a horrible mistake to begin dismantling the New Deal.John Maynard Keynes was right 75 years ago and he is right today. The results are the answer and the results since 1980 have generally shown a decline. Now look where we are.
October 01, 2011 12:19pm
to obama bold is how much $ i can give my buddies
October 01, 2011 12:06pm
Might it be possible for someone to hand the last paragraph of this piece to Obama so he gets it that either he boldly stands forth for the greater good...or he goes?
October 01, 2011 12:36pm
The approximately $4.5 trillion overall tax cuts over eight years of the Bush regime and continued over the past two years of the post crunch helpless Obama Administration should have resulted in a 'Reaganomics' economic bonanza and wealth/job creation. The Bush senior term voodoo economics comes to mind. All this extra capital in the hands of the rich has resulted in nothing except perhaps an extra bait gaffers job (for a Mexican?) on some sport-fishing trips ! Yet the average voter gave the Republicans the edge in the mid-term elections ???! Really the first step is to bring under control the right wing media and its lackey mouthpieces who have sold their souls for a few shekels !!
October 01, 2011 2:04pm
One third of the voting machines in the country are hacked.
Citizens United lets the People give unlimited funds to campaigns, while human beings have to account for every $5 pledge.
Voting restrictions are being passed in 27 states this year.
So who wins the election? Whoever they say wins is in. Who are they? The ones controlling Obama by the looks of things. Bold might make him popular, but submissive might make him in.
October 01, 2011 12:03pm
Might it be possible to hand Obama the last paragraph of this piece so he gets it that either he boldly stands forth for the greater good...or he goes!
If you ever needed a plan B in your life, now is definitely the time.
October 01, 2011 1:59pm
Hell, Plan B was ditched two weeks after Reagan took office. I am working on a new plan, since the one I ditched with Bush and the one I started under Obama aren't gonna make it.
October 01, 2011 11:46am
Half of the Republicans are knaves and the other half are fools.
Obama is a liar and an idiot and, had he learned ANYTHING in the last couple of years he would already know that he needs to look up the definition of "Bold".
Anybody who can count knows that a program that gets the 25 million back to REAL jobs gets their 25 million votes, and the votes of their spouses, any grown children, any parents who might be helping to support them and so on. If each one of the 25 million unemployed has only three friends or family members who are happy that they found a job it tops out at 100 million votes.
More of that "rocket science" that explains that people without money cannot spend it.
October 01, 2011 7:36pm
@Andrea Chisari:
the liar and idiot in this picture
is not our leadership;
it would in fact be,
our own beloved familiar common sense
believing that in this age of
automation and high-tech policing
the working class can have more kids,
and the owners of the nation's wealth
will just keep on supplying them with more jobs .
October 01, 2011 11:43am
You are now catching up to where I was on August 26, 2010, when I blogged about the need for a wealth tax. On July of this year, I reblogged after reading Aftershock.
Other taxes we could consider in addition or as alternatives are taxes on unrealized capital gains. The IRS could just insist on a mark to market evaluation of your net worth and tax any increase on a yearly basis.
What about the zero taxes the wealthy pay on their government bond interest?
I am sure we can come up with enough ways to tax the wealthy that they might just accept a reasonable tax level to quiet down the restless natives.