Why poor people stay poor: A firsthand account

[HT: GP].  My Tea Partying friends need to read this firsthand account of real life in America and try for one millisecond to get out of their own self-righteous skin and imagine the lives of America's working poor, who walk the knife edge of bankruptcy, joblessness and homelessness.

Related but unrelated... Sometimes I listen in the car to the show "Simply Money" on conservative talk radio, the running theme of which is useful and "true," as far as it goes: to have a household budget and stick to it. 

Often the hosts chastise their listeners for not setting aside an "emergency fund" of at least $20,000. And again, that's true as far as it goes, an emergency fund is definitely a good thing to have... assuming you could possibly manage, by Hurculean efforts and monastic self-denial, to earn and set aside such an amount if you're working two part-time jobs in America. Yet the real truth is that rainy day funds and savings accounts are a fantasy for most working Americans. We're all living hand to mouth.

Until conservatives and the GOP acknowledge real life in America, they will never be trusted by the majority. They may win midterm elections with low turnout in gerrymandered districts, but they won't be trusted, they won't win support except from the already comfortably converted.

Why Poor People Stay Poor

By Linda Tirado

December 5, 2014 | Slate

URL: http://www.slate.com/articles/life/family/2014/12/linda_tirado_on_the_realities_of_living_in_bootstrap_america_daily_annoyances.html?wpsrc=fol_fb

Snyder: Russia seeks to undermine the West's faith in itself (VIDEO)

[HT: AB] Snyder calls Russia's current tactic "strategic relativism": Russia knows it cannot make itself stronger, so it is trying to undermine the West's faith in itself, in what it knows to be true, and make the West weaker. 

So in that sense, historian Timothy Snyder argues, Russia's war against Ukraine really is  a war with the West, just as Moscow contends. Watch as he explains how....

Ukraine: From Propaganda to Reality

By Chicago Humanities Festival

URL: http://youtu.be/eKFObB6_naw?t=31m49s

Putin wants a new world order

(HT: TK). It wouldn't be the first time the West gave into a little bully. Sometimes, however, acquiescence don't satisfy bullies, it emboldens them.

Vladi­mir Putin’s new world order with the West

By Lilia Shevtsova

May 8, 2014 | Washington Post

Lilia Shevtsova is a senior associate at the Carnegie Moscow Center and author of “Putin’s Russia.”

The post-Cold War order that emerged from the breakup of the Soviet Union was doomed to fail because it rested on a belief that post-Soviet Russia was no longer a problem. Even when Western leaders realized that Russia under Vladimir Putin was becoming a problem, they exchanged political acquiescence with the Kremlin for economic benefits. Liberal democracies agreed to play a game of “let’s pretend,” in which they viewed Russia as a “normal country” while the Russian elite became integrated into the West — and corrupted the Western system from within.

That trade-off, many Western observers hoped, would keep Moscow from stirring up trouble beyond Russia’s borders. How could people whose ill-gotten gains are kept in Western banks and whose children attend Western schools be ill-disposed toward the West?

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine made it clear that he has stopped pretending. The Kremlin will not limit itself to cracking down on opposition within Russia’s borders.

The survival of Putin’s system is based on a permanent search for internal and external enemies. Ukraine has become the testing ground for a Kremlin that seeks to eliminate the very idea of revolution — not only in Russia but also in the former Soviet bloc — and to force the West to accept its right to do so.

The dismemberment of Ukraine also exposes the mechanism of the Russian matrix, in which foreign policy is the main instrument of domestic agenda. Those worrying only about Russian imperialism are wrong: Land-grabbing and “defending” the Russian-speaking population in other countries are the means to turn Russia into a state at war, making Putin a wartime president and strengthening his position at home.

Putin not only seeks to revisit the results of the end of the Cold War; he also wants a final say in establishing the new world order.Briefly, the Kremlin offers a new trade-off: In return for continued economic benefits for the West, Russia wants Western consent to its interpretation of the rules of the game.

This does not only undermine the Western vision of Kantian perpetual peace. It also creates new traps — for both sides.

On Russia’s side, the Kremlin has appropriated liberal rhetoric to legitimize its intervention in Ukraine. It demands that Kiev reform the Ukrainian constitution and allow for regional referendums on the right to secession and federalization.  Meanwhile, however, Russian citizens do not have such rights; advocating for them, in fact, can land one in jail.

So the Kremlin’s external rhetoric is undermining the legitimacy of the Russian regime. There will come a time when Russia’s Tatarswill say, “Why can’t we have a right to self-determination?” There will come a time when Russians will ask, “Why can’t we have a right to a referendum and a right to oppose the authorities?” In other words, we are witnessing a situation in which the Kremlin’s bid for survival is turning into a suicidal marathon.

The liberal democracies are not doing much better. Caught off-guard by Putin’s maneuvering, liberal democracies tell the Kremlin that if it stops further aggression, the West just might accept the new status quo. In fact, the April 17 Geneva agreement among the United States, European Union and Russia revealed the West’s inability to stop Russia’s efforts to destabilize Ukraine. Western demands for “de-escalation,” demarcated with fuzzy “red lines,” only provoked Moscow into moving further. By refusing to offer Ukraine real prospects for joining the Euro-Atlantic community through either European Union and/or NATO membership, the West is leaving Ukraine in a gray zone of uncertainty, vulnerable to falling into the Russian orbit.

While the Western sanctions that have been imposed so far have started to bite, they paradoxically strengthen Putin’s “besieged fortress” logic of survival. The Russian leader’s call this week for pro-Russian separatists in Donetsk to put their independence referendum on hold was not a surrender; it is an invitation to Kiev to accommodate the Kremlin’s interests, this time through “dialogue.”

[Meanwhile, Russia's state television Channel 24 in Donbas was telling people in each town where and when to find polling stations to vote on the referendums, so Putin's statements cannot be taken seriously. - J]

This call for dialogue by a leader who has limited political life in Russia to his own monologue sounds like cognitive dissonance. However, the Kremlin’s goal is more likely pragmatic: to switch to the role of peacemaker and strike a new Faustian bargain with the West, persuading it to agree to Ukrainian limited sovereignty and the right of external forces to teach Ukrainians what is right and what is wrong.

I’ll bet that Western leaders, tired of their Ukrainian headache, might agree with the bargain. And the Kremlin will join the Ukrainian “round table” moderators. Instead of an invader, Putin will be seen as the architect of the new postmodern reality.

Isn’t it hilarious?

World Bank: U.S. a great place for doing business

At the same time that corporations and right-wing politicians' argue that "job-killing regulations" are to blame for America's current economic malaise, the USA has moved up in the annual Doing Business rankings by the World Bank -- from 5th place to 4th.

As last year, only tiny islands managed to be more business-friendly than the good ole US of A.

Looks like somebody doesn't know what the hell they're talking about.

Doing Business 2012: Doing Business in a More Transparent World

The World Bank Group

October 20, 2011

Firms confirm: U.S. middle class is gone

WSJ cites some cheerful statistics about the U.S. middle class, or what's left of it:

At the end of March, Americans had $6.1 trillion in equity in their houses—the value of the house minus mortgages—half the 2006 level, according to the Federal Reserve. ... [T]he net worth—household assets minus debts—of the middle fifth of American households grew by 2.4% a year between 2001 and 2007 and plunged by 26.2% in the following two years.

Since the private sector knows best, and since Proctor & Gamble is perhaps #1 at consumer marketing, then P&G's decision to exclude the middle class from its future marketing efforts is very telling. Wal-Mart and Target are losing customers while Dollar General stores are selling more food items than ever. Meanwhile, luxury retailers like Estee Lauder, Saks, Neiman Marcus, and Tiffany & Co. are going more high-end because only their rich customers have any money.

It turns out that bailed-out TBTF bank Citigroup has been preaching its "Consumer Hourglass Theory" to its investment clients since 2009.

Said Citigroup analyst Deborah Weinswig: "Companies have thought that if you're in the middle, you're safe. But that's not where the consumer is any more—the consumer hourglass is more pronounced now than ever."

That's not where the consumer is anymore. Chilling words, if you think about them.

As Middle Class Shrinks, P&G Aims High and Low

By Ellen Byron

September 12, 2011 | Wall Street Journal

URL: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904836104576558861943984924.html

Man robs $1 to get health care in jail

Do I really need to explain how this is a sign of the times?

N.C. Man Allegedly Robs Bank of $1 to Get Health Care in Jail

By Katie Moisse

June 20, 2011 | ABC News

URL: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Wellness/nc-man-allegedly-robs-bank-health-care-jail/story?id=13887040

Is college worth it?

It's clear that a college education pays dividends in the long term, historically speaking, but something new has been afoot since the '80s: the cost of college has tripled.

Meanwhile, more and more students are saddled with huge debts upon graduation. They optimistically take on those debts with promises from colleges that their lifetime earnings will more than compensate them.

You know, when evaluating business schools, it's quite common for graduates to look at the return on investment (ROI) of two years of education expenses, based on average starting and lifetime salaries of graduates of a particular business school. Indeed thinking in terms of money and payoffs jibes with a business education. Yet we need more of that in other academic disciplines, including the Humanities. Because undergrad students are spending about the same amount of money on tuition and getting drastically different ROI. They deserve to know what they're in for, no sugar-coating it.

Making Headlines Since The '70s: Is College Worth It?

By NPR Staff

June 18, 2011 | All Things Considered

URL: http://www.npr.org/137257390

Hidden history: 60,000 Americans forcibly sterilized over 70 years

Yeah, sure the bad old days of gross racial discrimination in America are over... since 1979.

Seriously, this is ghastly and wrong and everybody should know about it. They certainly don't teach these facts in "liberal" U.S. history courses:

"Beginning with Indiana in 1907, 32 states eventually passed laws allowing authorities to order the sterilisation of people deemed unfit to breed. The last programme ended in 1979.

"The victims were criminals and juvenile delinquents, women deemed sexual deviants, homosexual men, poor people on welfare, people who were mentally ill or suffered from epilepsy. African Americans and Hispanic Americans were disproportionately targeted in some states."

In a 1927 decision, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote: "It is better for all the world if, instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind."

"All told, scholars estimate more than 60,000 Americans were sterilised under eugenics laws in the 20th Century."

Sterilisation: North Carolina grapples with legacy

By Daniel Nasaw

June 14, 2011 | BBC News

URL: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13700490

Russia Today: U.S. taxes used to depose foreign gov't's?

Russia Today says that the U.S. has spent $9 billion on democracy promotion efforts over the past 20 years. According to RT, USAID and its grantees are all bad guys and a soft cover for the CIA's regime change efforts; moreover, Obama's "smart power" concept is just a continuation of a long-standing U.S. policy of regime change.

RT cites Americans like Ron Paul and Lawrence Wilkerson in criticizing U.S. democracy-spreading efforts. Said Paul to RT:

"It is particularly Orwellian to call US manipulation of foreign elections 'promoting democracy.' How would we Americans feel if for example the Chinese arrived with millions of dollars to support certain candidates deemed friendly to China?"

"I think it's terrible, we use taxpayer's money to go over and use our military and the CIA these programs that say 'this is what you outta do' and influence them. There is no authority for that, it doesn't work, it teaches a lot of people to despise us."

If it didn't work though, would it bother Russia so much?

Just interesting to read the official Russian state propaganda....

Democracy promotion: America's new regime change formula

November 18, 2010 Russia Today

URL: http://rt.com/usa/news/democracy-promotion-usa-regime/

2010 Corruption Perceptions Index

Transparency International released its 2010 Corruption Perceptions Index. Nearly three quarters of the 178 countries in the index score below five, on a scale from 10 (highly clean) to 0 (highly corrupt).

The USA is tied for 22nd place with Belgium.

That goody two-shoes to the north, Canada, ranks a squeaky clean 6th.

Ukraine is in a 9-way tie for 134th place with the likes of Togo, Bangladesh, and Zimbabwe.

Russia is in a 10-way tie for 154th place with the likes of Papua New Guniea, Tajikistan, and Congo-Brazzaville.

Georgia, which has made great efforts to fight corruption, is in 68th place, just behind Italy, but less corrupt than other EU countries like Greece, Bulgaria, and Romania.

URL: http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi/2010/results

Economist: U.S. should spend like Japan did

"In this type of recession, the amount of money the government has to borrow and spend is exactly equal to the excess saving in the private sector," said Prof. Koo.

That's scary. I'd guess that amount must be in the $ trillions. Just getting another $800 billion stimulus (even with 36 percent of it tax cuts, again!) seems impossible in the current political environment. Economists like Paul Krugman unapologetically call for more and bigger stimulus, and cite estimates that the first stimulus created 2.7 million jobs and added $460 billion to U.S. GDP.

Opposing any stimulus at all is Nassim Taleb, whom I really like, at least for his creativity and direct speech. He tells us we're taken on all kinds of hidden risks and we don't know what could happen with so much debt. Certainly, this frightens me. On the other hand, economists like Koo say they can definitely tell us what we'll lose if we don't do more stimulus, in terms of $ trillions in lost GDP. I tend to find their argument more persuasive, since it's not based on what we can't know, (aka "black swan" event), but rather on experience and economic models. Indeed, there is a lot of unused capacity and idle labor sitting out there, wasting, for no good reason. There is nothing inherently wrong with all these industries which are down across the board -- it's simply a lack of demand preventing a business comeback. That's the catch-22 we're in right now: businesses won't recover enough to hire the unemployed until people (or governments) start buying stuff again; and people won't start buying stuff again until they are employed and feel secure about their economic future.

Even without any government action, the economy will get better. The questions ar how much, and how long will it take? Krugman and others argue that the "new normal" will be higher structural unemployment with still growing inflation. And it's totally unnecessary, they say. All it takes is political will to avoid it.

Economist: U.S. Could Learn From Japan's Fiscal Gap

October 9, 2010 | All Things Considered on NPR

GUY RAZ, host: Almost two decades ago, Japan was hit by two potentially catastrophic events. The first was a crash in real estate values. The financial sector responded by hoarding cash and using it to pay down debts rather than spend it on new investments.

It took Richard Koo and other Japanese economists a few years to figure out that this combination was driving Japan's economy into the ground. And so, they advised the Japanese government to start spending money and ignore growing deficits. And Koo argues that it worked. He wrote a book about it and is now trying to convince economic policymakers in this country that we're in the exact same spot.

Mr. RICHARD KOO (Chief Economist, Nomura Research Institute): This disease is actually the same disease hit Japan 15 years earlier.

RAZ: The same exact disease?

Mr. KOO: Exactly the same disease.

RAZ: It's like nobody knew what it was.

Mr. KOO: Those of us in Japan were flabbergasted. The (unintelligible) raced down to zero, lots of quantitative easing, nothing helped.

RAZ: And you can recognize it instantly here in the U.S. now?

Mr. KOO: Yes, because the key feature of this disease is that people - meaning private sector is still leveraging or paying down debt under zero interest rate condition.

RAZ: Instead of spending money making investments.

Mr. KOO: Exactly.

RAZ: And you didn't know why.

Mr. KOO: Well, the reason actually, when you think about it, is quite simple. Those people bought assets with borrowed money during the bubble days. The asset price collapsed after the bubble, liabilities remain and people suddenly realized that their balance sheet's underwater. What do you do? You used the cash flow to pay down debt.

RAZ: Mm-hmm.

Mr. KOO: And that's the right thing to do for people in that circumstances.

But when everybody does it all at the same time, we enter what we call fallacy of composition in that what is right for the individual taken together is bad for the group.

RAZ: Many economists look to Japan's past two decades as a cautionary tale. But you actually see Japan as a success story, an example for the United States. How so?

Mr. KOO: Those people don't realize what happened to asset values. Commercial real estate in Japan - Tokyo, Osaka...

RAZ: Collapsed.

Mr. KOO: ...all cities - fell 87 percent.

RAZ: Eighty-seven percent, the value of a home in some cities fell 87 percent?

Mr. KOO: Eighty-seven percent. What kind of economy do you think you have left in the United States if Manhattan prices are down 87, Washington down 87, San Francisco down 87?

RAZ: There'd be nothing left.

Mr. KOO: There'd be nothing left. We managed to keep our GDP from falling below the peak of the bubble for the entire 20-year period. Our employment rate never went beyond 5.5 percent because government came in and borrow the money that people were all saving.

RAZ: Japan, at certain times, has (unintelligible) huge budget deficits, has a ballooning national debt, that's not a problem?

Mr. KOO: It's a problem, but it's the best of the possible choices in that government budget deficit increased by something like 460 trillion yen. That means about 92 percent of Japan's GDP.

RAZ: Wow.

Mr. KOO: But what's missing in the debate is that this 460 trillion yen deficit saved the GDP at least 2,000 trillion.

RAZ: Richard Koo, how long could the United States, though, run massive budget deficits?

Mr. KOO: In this type of recession, the amount of money the government has to borrow and spend is exactly equal to the excess saving in the private sector.

RAZ: So when the private sector is saving and not spending, the government has to come in and borrow the equivalent amount and spend it?

Mr. KOO: If you want to keep the GDP from collapsing, yes.

RAZ: That's Richard Koo. He's been an adviser to five Japanese prime ministers. He's the chief economist at the Nomura Research Institute and the author of "The Holy Grail of Macroeconomics: Lessons from Japan's Great Recession."

CEOs reveal why they're not hiring

So maybe fiscal stimulus won't help in the long run, but cutting taxes to the bone would be a disaster for sure. We tried this in the 1980s, and again from 2001-2010, funding tax cuts with deficits, and look where we are now. We can't afford it anymore. The party's over.

With consumers slow to spend, businesses are slow to hire

By Neil Irwin
August 21, 2010 | Washington Post

[...]

Many Democrats say the economy needs more stimulus. Business lobbyists and their Republican allies say it needs less regulation and lower taxes.

But here in the heartland of America, senior executives say neither side's assessment fits.

They blame their profound caution on their view that U.S. consumers are destined to disappoint for many years. As a result, they say, the economy is unlikely to see the kind of almost unbroken prosperity of the quarter-century that preceded the financial crisis.

Across the industrial parks and office towers of the Chicago region, in a more than a dozen interviews, senior executives said they see Americans for years ahead paying down debts incurred during the now-ended credit boom and adjusting spending to match their often-reduced incomes.

[...]

"It took us a decade to get in the ditch we are in. There isn't going to be instant gratification to get us out of it. We're going to have to get used to a lower growth economy, and that is going to be a big adjustment for all of us."

Reich: Parallels of 1929 and 2008

Reich has written a long op-ed but the excerpts below were the most interesting to me.

We're in a Recession Because the Rich Are Raking in an Absurd Portion of Wealth

Our economy can't thrive when the richest 1% get an ever larger share of the nation's income and wealth, and everyone else's share shrinks.

By Robert Reich

July 7, 2010 | The Nation

[...]

Each of America's two biggest economic crashes occurred in the year immediately following these twin peaks—in 1929 and 2008. This is no mere coincidence. When most of the gains from economic growth go to a small sliver of Americans at the top, the rest don't have enough purchasing power to buy what the economy is capable of producing. America's median wage, adjusted for inflation, has barely budged for decades. Between 2000 and 2007 it actually dropped. Under these circumstances the only way the middle class can boost its purchasing power is to borrow, as it did with gusto. As housing prices rose, Americans turned their homes into ATMs. But such borrowing has its limits. When the debt bubble finally burst, vast numbers of people couldn't pay their bills, and banks couldn't collect.

[...]

A second parallel links 1929 with 2008: when earnings accumulate at the top, people at the top invest their wealth in whatever assets seem most likely to attract other big investors. This causes the prices of certain assets—commodities, stocks, dot-coms or real estate—to become wildly inflated. Such speculative bubbles eventually burst, leaving behind mountains of near-worthless collateral.

The crash of 2008 didn't turn into another Great Depression because the government learned the importance of flooding the market with cash, thereby temporarily rescuing some stranded consumers and most big bankers. But the financial rescue didn't change the economy's underlying structure. Median wages are continuing their downward slide, and those at the top continue to rake in the lion's share of income. That's why the middle class still doesn't have the purchasing power it needs to reboot the economy, and why the so-called recovery will be so tepid—maybe even leading to a double dip. It's also why America will be vulnerable to even larger speculative booms and deeper busts in the years to come.

BHO's socialist export & trade liberalization drive

There goes comrade Barack again, trying to destroy capitalism and turn America socialist.

Can't you all see he hates our way of life?!

UPDATE (07.09.2010): Robert Reich said that if all countries follow America's lead it could cause a return to Smoot-Hawley, trade wars, and protectionism. And who has enough money to buy our stuff anyway, especially if American consumers aren't buying theirs?

Expanding Exports To Stimulate The Economy
By Scott Horsley
July 7, 2010 | All Things Considered, NPR

URL: http://www.npr.org/128365800

Economist: Slower growth & more frequent recessions

It's all doom & gloom. This economist is saying there is no policy that will help us grow the economy faster; and we're destined for more frequent recessions.

Economist: More Frequent Recessions In Next Decade

Host Guy Raz talks to economist Lakshman Achuthan, managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute, about worrying new economic data. Housing sales fell 30 percent in May to the lowest level on record, and markets are faltering on fears of a renewed recession.

July 3, 2010 | All Things Considered, NPR

GUY RAZ, host: Now if all that sounded grim, there's more. Science are pointing to a long period of slow growth and recurring recessions. That's the somber conclusion of economist Lakshman Achuthan and most of his economic predictions have been correct.

Achuthan is the managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute and he joins me from New York. Welcome.

Mr. LAKSHMAN ACHUTHAN (Managing Director, Economic Cycle Research Institute): Thank you.

RAZ: This week, you released a report saying that the global industrial downturn is now just underway. I thought the worst days were supposed to be behind us. But you're saying it's just underway.

Mr. ACHUTHAN: Well, yes. I mean, what goes up must come down. We did have a nice acceleration out of the depths of the recession last year. But now, along with the U.S. economy, the global economy in terms of growth rates is turning back down. And we're doing it in a fairly synchronized manner. Pretty much every country around the world is going to see its growth rates start to throttle back.

RAZ: Is this the much feared double-dip recession?

Mr. ACHUTHAN: Well, not exactly. What's happening now is some downshifting after a year of positive growth. Now, it would be a huge problem if we not only downshifted, but we actually slipped into reverse, meaning like a brand new recession next year when the jobs market, for example, here has only just begun to recover.

But when we look at our leading indicators that we maintain to monitor what's going on with the business cycle, this slow down is basically a done deal no matter what anyone says or tries to do about it.

RAZ: What do you mean it's a done deal?

Mr. ACHUTHAN: Well, it's essentially not something that any type of policy action or luck is going to reverse. Once you see the drivers of the economy that these leading indicators are measuring, once they collectively begin to ease economic activity itself, jobs growth, industrial production, sales and so on, all ease in its wake. And so when we see profits growth or money growth or inventory issues or confidence start to collectively throttle back, then actual production, actual jobs growth, actual sales and income also throttle back.

So right here at the middle of 2010, it may be pretty much as good as it gets in terms - not only of U.S. growth, but also global growth.

RAZ: So if the global industrial downturn is now underway once again and we're going to enter a, let's say, a six to eight-month period of a slowdown, you're not ruling out the possibility of a double-dip recession?

Mr. ACHUTHAN: No. You know, double-dip is kind of a pseudo-technical word. You know, we have had a real recovery in a technical sense. We've had a year of growth. So it would probably be a new recession if there was a new recession on the horizon. But it's not yet baked in the cake. The risks have certainly risen.

And the bigger concern, beyond what may happen in 2011, which is maybe like 50-50 chance of a new recession, the bigger concern is that in the coming decade, we are almost sure to see more frequent recessions than we've been used to at any time since the early 1980s. And that brings with it a huge host of problems.

RAZ: Explain why.

Mr. ACHUTHAN: Well, the business cycle is more volatile, more like booms and busts, combined with lower altitude, weaker and weaker trend growth. Ever since the 1970s, the pace of economic expansion in the U.S. has been stair-stepping down, getting weaker and weaker. And the last expansion was the weakest expansion since World War II on every single count of how strong an expansion can be.

So if you have low altitude and high turbulence, you end up crashing more frequently. And the problem with that, okay, it sounds bad, but the literal problems are that every time there's a recession, the unemployment rate goes back up. So we have unemployment, it's down from the peak last October at 10.1 percent to now nine and a half percent. But nine and a half percent is really high.

RAZ: Mm-hmm.

Mr. ACHUTHAN: And if we have a new recession anywhere near - with unemployment anywhere near these levels, it goes to new highs again and you have chronically high unemployment. The other problem is the markets can never really take off. You're always scared of a new recession.

RAZ: Lakshman, a lot of really smart economists in this country say we need another economic stimulus to sustain the recovery. Do you agree?

Mr. ACHUTHAN: It would be too late. See, the leading indicators are already turning down. So let's say, today, we debate a new stimulus package to sustain the upturn that we've enjoyed for the last year. In a best case scenario in a few months, they may agree on something.

And I think I'm being optimistic. And then it might take another quarter or two for whatever they agreed on to actually hopefully impact the economy. And really that's being highly optimistic.

The business cycle doesn't wait for any of that. By that time, we're talking about 2011 and I don't know where our leading indicators are going. It's quite possible that by then, they've already foretold of the new recession. This has been the problem with policy that it's essentially reactive; it's not in front of the business cycle.

RAZ: So, I mean, the bottom line here is that we should be bracing ourselves for a long period of economic malaise.

Mr. ACHUTHAN: Yeah, near-term what is virtually guaranteed is the slowdown that's baked in the cake. Growth will not improve from here. It will start to ease back off. There is a rising risk of a new recession just beyond the horizon, perhaps in 2011. And that's your near-term forecast.

Separately, when we look at the backdrop of the business cycle for the coming decade, it virtually dictates more frequent recessions than most people can remember. The last time we had frequent recessions in this country was from the late '60s until the early '80s. And, you know, you can kind of recall back what it felt like. We survived it, but there were a lot of ups and downs. And it was a little difficult to (unintelligible).

RAZ: That's quite sobering news from Lakshman Achuthan. He's the managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute. He joined me from New York. Lakshman, thanks so much.

Mr. ACHUTHAN: Thank you.

Fat America: More to love?

What, they don't have fast food in Colorado or something? This map of adult obesity is like something out of Red Dawn: the entire nation is crimson, red, or purple, and there sits blue Colorado, a lone outpost in the middle. "Pack up the car, honey, we're headed for Colorado where they're still free!..."

The South and Oklahoma are particularly fat. I wonder why that is? And why Oklahoma too? Is that like fatness by association? Actually, this social epidemic is scarier than a viral epidemic, as research has shown that obesity can spread and infect others across non-physical social networks via vectors like e-mail, phones, and computers.




The map of childhood obesity is also heavily weighted toward the South (har-har). Fat kids are nothing to laugh at though. I mean, they used to be, back when there was like 1 or 2 fat kids in the whole class, but now 1 out of every 5 or 6 American kids is obese. Pretty soon the fatty majority will be making fun of the healthy-weight kids: "Hey, bean pole, are your parents too poor to afford the Super Size Menu or what?" and "Did you make yourself throw up after lunch again, Lohan?" or "You have to do extra situps in gym class for all of us, lightweight!" Oh wait, I forgot: American kids don't have gym class anymore....

At the bottom of the report, you can click on your state a more in-depth look at its fatness: "F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America's Future 2010."

Below are two states of interest. So is Ohio 1.5% skinnier than Kentucky or just 1.5% less fat? Semantics, I guess.

New Report: Kentucky Ranks Seventh Most Obese State in the Nation

June 29, 2010 Trust for America's Health

Kentucky was named the seventh most obese state in the country, according to the seventh annual F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America's Future 2010 report from the Trust for America's Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). The state's adult obesity rate is 30.5 percent, and, in Kentucky men are more obese than women at 31.4 percent. Now more than two-thirds of states (38) have adult obesity rates above 25 percent.


New Report: Ohio Ranks 13th Most Obese State in the Nation
June 29, 2010 Trust for America's Health

Ohio was named the 13th most obese state in the country, according to the seventh annual F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America's Future 2010 report from the Trust for America's Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). The state's adult obesity rate is 29 percent, and, in Ohio men are more obese than women at 30.2 percent. Now more than two-thirds of states (38) have adult obesity rates above 25 percent.

Polls: Americans schizo & confused about economic plight

We all know who the real enemy is: that Muslim African Marxist in the White House. If we could just impeach or un-elect him, all our problems would go away. Why can't people who don't tea party see that???

Collapse of the Standard of Living in the USA

Studies Reveal Declining Living Standards and Increasing Anger

By Hiram Lee

April 24, 2010 | Global Research

A series of recent studies conducted by the Pew Research Center shed new light on the scope of the economic crisis in the US and the level of hostility the majority of the American population holds for the US government.

Released in March, before the passage of the Obama administration's health care legislation, a survey entitled "Health Care Reform—Can't Live With It, or Without It" indicates that 92 percent of Americans give the national economy a negative rating. No fewer than 70 percent of the respondents report having suffered job-related and financial problems in the past year, an increase from 59 percent the year before. Fifty-four percent report someone in their home has been without a job and looking for work in the past year, up from 39 percent in 2009.

The poll saw an aggravation of conditions in every area of economic life studied the year before. Increasing numbers of people are reporting difficulty receiving or affording medical care (26 percent) or paying their rent or mortgage payments (24 percent). More Americans faced problems with collections and credit agencies (21 percent), or had mortgages, loans or credit card applications denied (19 percent).

As could be expected, the poorest Americans are suffering the most. Some 44 percent of those making $30,000 per year or less report difficulty obtaining medical care, compared to 11 percent of those making $75,000 per year or more. A similar gap can be found in the category of rents and mortgages, with 37 percent of those making $30,000 or less reporting difficulty making rent or mortgage payments, compared to 11 percent of those making $75,000 or more. However, the percentage of those facing difficulties paying rent has increased dramatically for both groups since 2009.

[Obviously the problem is that too many people make $30,000 or less. They need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and start drinking the trickle of economic goodies flowing down to them! - J]

Large numbers of workers polled in the study say they have little confidence in job security and prospects for the future, with almost half (49 percent) saying it is "very or somewhat likely" they will suffer "job-related financial stress" in the next year. Twenty-five percent of workers say they expect to be forced to take a pay cut this year, while 24 percent expect to be laid off.

The Pew survey found that 85 percent of Americans reported difficulty finding jobs in their communities. This and other statistics revealing the increasingly dismal employment opportunities facing millions of Americans are provided context in another study released this month by the Pew Economic Policy Group.

"A Year or More: The High Cost of Long-Term Unemployment" reports that no fewer than 44 percent of unemployed Americans met or exceeded the standard measure of long-term unemployment (six months or more) in March 2010. This marks the highest rate for long-term unemployment levels since World War II.

In addition to this, the Pew study reports that "23 percent of the nearly 15 million Americans who are unemployed have been jobless for a year or more." This translates to 3.4 million people, "roughly equivalent," the study points out, "to the population of the state of Connecticut."

These alarming numbers should be considered along with findings in another recent Pew research study entitled "The People and Their Government," released April 18. This report finds that "by almost every conceivable measure Americans are less positive and more critical of government these days."

Only 22 percent of Americans say their government can be trusted, according to the new survey. The report puts this among the lowest measures of trust in the government in half a century.

The study also shows across-the-board declines in approval ratings for numerous federal agencies, including the Department of Education, the Food and Drug Administration, the Social Security Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Forty-three percent say the government has a negative effect on their daily life, up from 31 percent in 1997.

[Right on! It's all that education, food and drug safety, social security, environmental protection, and disease control and prevention that is keeping the average worker down. Get rid of all those things and -- zoom! -- watch the U.S. economy take off! Sounds like sound policy to me. - J]

While approval ratings for the government are remarkably low, with 65 percent saying the federal government and congress have a negative impact "on the way things are going in the country," the approval ratings for other major institutions are as low or lower. Sixty-nine percent of those surveyed say banks and other financial institutions have a negative impact on the way things are going in the country, while 64 percent say "large corporations" have a negative impact. Some 57 percent say the national news media has a negative impact, while 49 percent say labor unions have such an impact.

The report states that "more than six-in-ten (62%) say it is a major problem that government policies unfairly benefit some groups while nearly as many (56%) say that government does not do enough to help average Americans."

[Exactly! The federal government is doing both too much and too little to help the Little Guy. Start helping us out and get off our backs, Big Guvmint! - J]

Taken as a whole, the Pew studies from March and April offer additional insight into the growing social misery under conditions of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, and the outrage it is generating.

Wide layers of the population, who have seen trillions of dollars funneled from the public treasury into the coffers of Wall Street executives while their own living standards have been assaulted, their jobs slashed, their children's schools closed, and vital social programs such as Medicare cut by billions of dollars, have no faith in the US government to secure their most basic social needs.

The corporate-controlled news media, along with the major institutions overseeing the nation's educational needs and basic food and medical resources, are considered corrupt and untrustworthy, contributing to the suffering of millions.

President Barack Obama, continuing to pose as a populist man of the people when he finds it necessary or beneficial, stands exposed as the chief representative of the interests of the American ruling elite and the standard bearer in the assault on the working class.

[No, that's a lib'rul media bias and myth. See, Obama is a socialist who wants to destroy the ruling economic elite and America in the process. - J]

The restructuring of society taking place, in the direct interests of the corporate-financial elite and at the expense of the working population, is not occurring unnoticed. The American and international working class will inevitably find itself drawn into struggle against the present, untenable form of social organization.

WSJ: 9 years to clear foreclosed housing inventory

Here I was worried that I'd miss the nadir of the housing market. Nah, I think I can wait a little longer to buy.

Number of the Week: 103 Months to Clear Housing Inventory

By Mark Whitehouse

April 24, 2010 | WSJ Blogs

URL: http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2010/04/24/number-of-the-week-103-months-to-clear-housing-inventory/

U.S. lokul ejukashun meetz reseshun

Listen up, all you conservative cavemen (and cavegals) who want to go back to the Laura Ingalls Wilder days of the Little Red Schoolhouse (minus that little b**tch Nellie, I presume): Your beloved model of locally funded and run primary schools has sunken into a fiscal crisis so deep even Michael Landon's angel can't pull it out. That dern economic cycle that you stake your life on means that kids unfortunate enough to be kids today get a worse education.

Aint the free market grand?

Come on, we're smarter than this. Public education should be centrally controlled and financed. Kids -- the future of our nation's economic productivity, and the guarantors of your beloved Social Security and Medicare, you Boomers -- should not be at the mercy of the business cycle.

Meanwhile, the Marxist, failed, redistributive stimulus bill that has brought affluent white seniors to the point of, well, actually leaving their homes, has been responsible for saving more than 342,000 school jobs, about 5.5 percent of all the positions in the nation's 15,000 school systems. "That's just socialism!" I can hear Glenn Beck sobbing from his mansion. I hope he and Nellie will share a desk in hell.


Districts Warn of Deeper Teacher Cuts
By Tamar Lewin and Sam Dillon
April 20, 2010 | New York Times

URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/21/education/21teachers.html

US consumers return to free-spending, low-saving ways despite unemployment, low wages

The important question is: How can we blame Obama, or, deny him any credit for U.S. consumers' irrational exuberance?

Ka-ching! Shoppers keep registers humming

By Jeannine Aversa
March 29, 2010 | Associated Press

URL: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gNiyJ905Ho0Ur96V2TQhsBX19lGwD9EOH0J00