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Reasons to feel hopeful

Two news stories caught my eye.

1. An op-ed by Robert Reich in today's NYT titled "Totally Spent". He writes:

The only lasting remedy, other than for Americans to accept a lower standard of living and for businesses to adjust to a smaller economy, is to give middle- and lower-income Americans more buying power — and not just temporarily.

The only way to keep the economy going over the long run is to increase the wages of the bottom two-thirds of Americans. The answer is not to protect jobs through trade protection. That would only drive up the prices of everything purchased from abroad. Most routine jobs are being automated anyway.

I'm From the Government, and I'm Here to Help - Ronald Reagan

The government is at it again and as usual, they are bowing to industries whim. First they wanted to give us 'tax rebate' checks that will assist with either making a car payment or buying a few Chinese-made goods (hold the lead, please). Now they want to put a moratorium on home foreclosures.

While I like 'free' money as much as the next person, this cash-back plan is flawed. Theoretically, pumping a whole bunch of money into the economy should prop the economy up. The reality is that our society is mostly based on debt. House payments, car payments, credit card payments, second mortgages, student loans, personal loans, and any other payment made to pay off a debt consume a vast amount of most people's income. So when you get your check, are you going to pay down a debt or buy a big-ticket item? If you buy something, will it be American made? Or are the profits leaving our shores?

Obama's Economic Advisers

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While the political rhetoric spews and folks decide their religion, some of us are looking at the policy beneath. People, it ain't pretty. It appears we have more of the talkin' the talk instead of walkin' the walk rhetoric and the keyword change is now redefined to mean status quo

Obama's Economic Advisers

  • Austan Goolsbee: U. of Chicago neoclassicist and “single payer universal health care critic claiming "it doesn't follow free market principles"
  • David Cutler: Harvard economist who believes that high health costs are good for the economy
  • Jeffrey Liebman: another Harvard economist and former Clinton adviser who favors privatizing social security

From Real Clear Poliitics

Goolsbee, however, says globalization is responsible for "a small fraction" of today's income disparities. He says "60 to 70 percent of the economy faces virtually no international competition." America's 18.5 million government employees have little to fear from free trade; neither do auto mechanics, dentists and many others

So is that to imply that 40% to 30% Americans being negatively affected by globalization is ok? and yes we are offshore outsourcing state and government jobs. Remember Alan Blinder projects that 40M US jobs are vulnerable to global labor arbitrage (offshore outsourcing). I'll assume wage stagnation is being ignored as well in this above quote.

The Nation's article Subprime Obama points out:

Hours Worked Declined Sharply and Wages Fell

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Today's BLS report: total hours worked DECLINED sharply in Q4 and AVERAGE real wage/benefit compensation per hour FELL.

After years of denial and spin about the financial condition of US households/consumers, you might think the newswires and salesmen on cable would be buzzing with the key findings in today’s BLS report on US hours worked, real compensation, output and productivity. You would be wrong; the debt industry’s misleading confidence game prevails with the key findings either not mentioned at all or they are relegated to an afterthought as space permits.

The key finding in today’s report is that the total number of hours worked (and paid) in non-farm businesses during 2007-Q4 FELL at an annual rate of -1.5%. Indeed, THE TOTAL NUMBER OF HOURS WORKED IN Q4 WAS LESS THAN IN 2006-Q4. The report shows total non-farm jobs also falling at a -0.5% annualized rate in Q4 and rising by only 0.4% yr/yr.

Two Simple Proposals for Restoring Middle Class Market Power

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The U.S. jobs market is broken. The causes of the breakdown are readily identifiable, and there are simple cures that would go a long way towards fixing them without undermining the general benefits of a free market. The Shared Economic Growth proposal (explained below and further at www.sharedeconomicgrowth.org) would be particularly helpful. As with antitrust enforcement, product safety regulation, and other facilitators of an efficient market, these steps would increase wealth for everyone, but particularly for middle class and working class people, helping our nation to deliver on the promise of the American dream. Further, like those other basic underpinnings of the success of the U.S. economy, they do not require “Big Government” interference, but rather just some simple common sense changes to address basic problems.

The Rising Tide of Reality

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God Helps Those Who Help Themselves

Brad DeLong is generating some sharp criticism for his Would Marx Say A Rising Tide Raises All Boats article which tries to rationalize the growing wealth inequality distribution and that the solution to our current economic malaise is market competition

DeLong states:

The consequence has been a loss of morale among those of us who trusted market forces and social-democratic governments to prove Marx wrong about income distribution in the long run - and a search for new and different tools of economic management

and concludes:

How Long, How Deep?

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Two economic reports today show the deeply indebted US economy is in a decline that is likely to stretch into a recession that could be quite severe.

The BLS jobs report shows a loss of -17,000 jobs in January, an even sharper -0.3% loss in total hours worked and a decline in average weekly wages even before considering the effects of inflation. Annual revisions to data back to 1990 that are included in today’s report, shows the economy had -376,000 fewer jobs in December than previously estimated. Only 994,000 new jobs were created over the past year and of these, only 809,000 were created by the private sector.

Manufacturing Jobs - US Wages Dramatic Decline

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Along with the loss of -3.3 million Manufacturing jobs over the last seven years, a report just released by the BLS shows average hourly compensation for US Manufacturing jobs fell from the world’s 4th highest in 2000 to the world’s 14th highest in 2006. Japan’s Manufacturing jobs were the 2nd highest paid in 2000 but plunged to rank only 16th in 2006.

Make Sense of out This

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While talking heads pile on the cable shows, blogs and discuss identity politics, what about policy?

Only Romney is mentioning outsourcing and his solutions are part of the problem. He also vetoed a MA amendment to stop state jobs from being outsourced. You know the idea that money recycled into local economies stimulates that economy? Not when it comes to real jobs it seems. Although at least he is aware of it, and seemingly the other major candidates, both parties are ignoring the global labor arbitrage agenda and what it is doing to the United States middle class.

Job losses jump in largest 1 week increase since Hurricane Katrina.

Bubbles, Tiny Bubbles - Bush's Real Economic Performance

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The House of Representatives Democratic Caucus released the below summary table to the press. This economic summary on the major economic indicators of the last 7 years deserves reposting. That said, the title should read Corporate lobbyists policy and legislation, the real Economic performance. One must note that Democratic leadership is pushing for more bad trade deals, more guest worker Visas and enabling more offshore outsourcing as well. If you notice in the Presidential campaigns, a dramatic and much needed strategic change in trade, fiscal and labor policy is not discussed. One might get the token "labor and environmental standards" sound bytes without nary a question on the reality those cannot be enforced in other nations. Both administrations in the last 15 years had bubble economies, the dot con and now the housing bubble.

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