Disturbing News on the Economy

[kerrygoddess]

Disturbing News on the Economy

For those caught in the middle and lower income brackets, the economic news looks bleak, very bleak. This is not actually news to those affected, but is something we are not hearing enough from the MSM, let alone the liberal blogosphere, who are for the most part trumpeting Cindy Sheehan, bring the troops home and Plamegate. Not to discount the importance of these issues, however, other issues that affect average Americans are falling by the wayside, as we struggle to get by daily with raising prices at the stores and pumps, and falling wages.

Thomas Oliphant writes in the Boston Globe today, “For more than a year, hard-pressed Americans have been trying to signal the political establishment that something is upside-down wrong in an economy that is producing soaring costs and flat incomes.” No one is listening.

Given the blinders associated with his fervent ideology, President Bush’s deaf ear is expected and unremarkable.

“It’s progressive politicians who should be paying more attention.” But, this issue has been overshadowed by the myriad of other issues being pushed by the progressive grassroots. The very sector that liberal and progressive grassroots need to reach out to, are being left by the wayside. To many of these people, their pocketbook is the number one concern, yet no one is listening.

MORE & LINKS - http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=300

[demnan]

1. My Mom and brothers live on a fixed income

and they are getting almost to the point now where they can't afford food. I have to help them and I think I'm going to start budgeting money regularly to buy them food. Of course if my lazy brothers would go out and get a job, my mother could sell her house and she'd have plenty of money. But that's another story.

[kerrygoddess]

4. Things aren't good and

no one is talking about it. It sucks.

[barb162]

32. yeah and if anything, the MSM is telling everyone how good

things are (except for gas). There's not much depth on this issue in the trade journals either

[kerrygoddess]

34. That's the kicker...

The MSM is still parroting the economy is good. They are starting to atleast give us some voice on the war, I hope they start with the truth on the economy soon too.

And yes, trade journals are mum. What is up with that? La la la la la - everything is rosey my ass.

[roguevalley]

14. I'm on a retirement fixed income. I guess I better get readt to get

screwed. Imagine, it only took 5.5 years to get this way.

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

2. Bad news in California...a glimpse of things to come:

Want a Wal-Mart job? Join the crowd
11,000 apply for 400 openings at retailer's new Oakland store

Pia Sarkar, Chronicle Staff Writer

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/08/17/MNGDPE91AH1.DTL

For all the criticism that Wal-Mart receives for its low wages and minimal health benefits, the retail giant says more than 11,000 people in the Bay Area are clamoring to get a job at its new Oakland store. The country's largest employer plans to welcome customers into its 148, 000-square-foot store on Edgewater Drive next Wednesday, and it says it already has filled 350 of its 400 openings.

Wal-Mart has accepted more than 11,000 applications from Bay Area job seekers, marking the largest volume of interest it has received at any of its Northern California stores, said Wal-Mart spokeswoman Cynthia Lin. "I needed a job ASAP, and they had their doors open," said Virginia Ford, 19, of Oakland, who had applied for 25 jobs in three months before she landed one as a cashier at Wal-Mart in Oakland on Tuesday.

Stephen Levy, an economist for the Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy, said the pent-up demand for work reflects the Bay Area's slow recovery from the dot-com crash. "There's still a lot of people who were put out of work in the last four years who still don't have a job," Levy said. The unemployment rate in Alameda and Contra Costa counties climbed to 5.1 percent in June, up from 4.6 percent the month before but still below the state's unemployment rate of 5.4 percent, according to the latest statistics from the California Employment Development Department.

But some economists say those numbers do not tell the full story about the job market. To be counted as unemployed, a person must have sought a job within the past four weeks and must be completely out of work. Wanting a job but not looking for one takes a person out of the labor force and out of the unemployment-rate calculation. The Bay Area also has lost hundreds of jobs to outsourcing and offshoring, compounded by all the jobs that never came back after the local economy collapsed.

[kerrygoddess]

6. They are trying to put more WalMarts in LA too. N/T

[Burried News]

3. Oil is and maybe has been the gold standard for quite a while

In a sense oil hasn't gone up - the dollar has gone down and all other goods and services will gradually come into alignment. It is one reason why I favor nationalization of the oil companies. When the Cartel has sole control of oil pricing they also control the dollar.

In my opinion the Iraq war wasn't so much to obtain oil as it was to control oil. Our failure to accomplish the mission is now becoming manifest. The guys in the know are trading currencies and using hedge funds which are unregulated. I believe the Social Security move was to bolster stock values and immunize them against dollar devaluation.

Someone should push Ozymandius on this issue when he posts. He understands this stuff better than anyone else I have come across.

[kerrygoddess]

5. Not!

Oil has gone up. Goods and services are just starting to eek up, but wages are frozen. It's a problem, if prices continue to soar and wages stay frozen people are screwed. That's what Thomas Oliphant is saying.

[theHandpuppet]

7. Yep, and just wait until winter arrives

Some estimates put the estimated increase in such systems as gas and fuel oil at something like 48%!

How the hell will folks on fixed incomes and our working poor be able to afford to heat their homes?

[Burried News]

10. So as long as I don't do alot of driving and I can because I am

retired (and don't have a daily commute) I can just sit back and relax? I would be pleased if this were so. I don't think it is.

The difference in our views, practically speaking is how long does it take for a dollar to get to its' new equilibrium point.

Unimpeeded (i.e. no government action) my guess would be perhaps three to five years. Don't forget that it isn't just the economy in the US that comes into realignment. The dollar is also a world currency and that lengthens the time to get to a new value. So we are talking world wide inventories, worldwide perceptions and worldwide pressures to reset wages and salaries.

[kerrygoddess]

13. That's all fine and dandy

but meanwhile people are hurting and no one is talking about it. The rhetoric that you are speaking also does not translate to the pocketbook of those struggling.

Point is we need to talk about it in terms that people can understand and do something about it -- not in 3 to 5 years!

[Burried News]

17. The doing something about it is getting out of Iraq

Punishing those who took us there, taxing the shit out of the profits the oil companies just made and cutting government expenditures.
The quick fixes are there I think you just want to advance a DLC agenda.

What I am talking about is not rhetoric. It is accurate diagnosis and treatment.

Now you tell me what you are going to do about it in the next three years while you wait for Bush to self destruct.

[kerrygoddess]

21. Excuse me?

Look, I'm a SMALL BUSINESS OWNER - I'm talking a real SMALL BUSINESS, a HOME BUSINESS. My clientele are SMALL RETAILERS. My vendors are SMALL BUSINESSES.

Obviously you are clueless about what is going on in the real world here. Small Business is the backbone of the American economy.

If I was advancing the DLC agenda, then I should be a corporate business owner, eh?

No one is waiting for Bush to self destruct, I am simply suggesting that WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT THIS TOO!

THE WAR IS NOT THE ONLY ISSUE! I write about all the issues daily on my blog... Cindy Sheehan, the war, Plamegate all of them. The environment, the economy too. ALL THE ISSUES MATTER. WAKE UP!

[Burried News]

24. The war is the issue that leaves no funding for anything else.

Please answer the question - what do you plan to do about it? Until you do the rhetoric remark is increasingly looking like a crock calling a kettle black.

Capitalization of programs is a requirement for programs to be a success, capitalization of comments is considered rude.

[kerrygoddess]

27. W isn't going to end this war... today, tomorrow or the next day...

Sad but true. I'm doing my part like everyone else in standing up against this war.

But, you know we've got poor kids signing up to go, because they have no other options. We need to give them options and we can if people start talking about the economy, as well as the war.

Thomas Oliphant is a brilliant columnist, he pegged it, progressives need to talk about this. I echoed that.

before you continue to jump down my throat, get that I have been talking about the war and all the issues for sometime.

Your talk of caplitalization and waiting sounds like DLC agenda to me. I'm here talking from the perspective of one of those struggling in the economy. You're retired, huh? Must be nice. Some of us are still trying to make a living, raise our kids and put food on the table. Our day to day needs take precedent. That's commonsense.

Get off your high horse. People are struggling in this country and the war is only PART of the problem.

[Burried News]

29. The last word is yours.

After my first post all you had to say was something like:

BN I started this thread to...
Your post will take us in another direction.
Could you discuss this from the point of the impact on the poor and disadvantaged. Thanks

Secondly - you presume alot about my circumstances and actually communicate a resentment of the elderly.

1. My retirement was not voluntary. I worked at a medical facility where
700 of 6000 employees were eliminated. I worked in direct patient care for 28 years. Most of our patients were indigent. You do not make much money providing patient care unless you work considerably longer than a forty hour week. I know how patient care is compromised by funding issues, despite what Arnold Schwartzneger might think.

2. I taught for 8 years in NYC in schools where approximately 30% of the students were considered inner city poor. I know how many of these children don't stand a chance because of abuse, poverty and dismal circumstances.

I am awake. You need to suspend judgment or at least inquire what your correspondents circumstances are.

I find your screen name to be well chosen from two perspectives. Comments about the DLC were made because until recently Bob Kerry seemed to be content to take us to Republican light.

Please note it is still not clear what you expect from this thread or what you propose to improve the circumstances of average people.

[kerrygoddess]

30. Hmmm

You know, Buried News it should have been obvious why I started the post. It's right there in black and white that I am concerned about middle/low income folks and am one of them. I don't know if you read the entire piece on my blog, but it's pretty clear.

I'm glad you are awake. Other's are not. Someone needs to start discussing this. Again I reiterate, Thomas Oliphant says that in his column, I echoed that in my blog post.

I know by what I am speaking of, in terms of how the middle/low income people are struggling. I'm an only parent with a teenager in public school in L.A. I've been on welfare.

You need to suspend your judgement and not assume that by my username I am a DLC supporter. I am a John Kerry supporter, a Democratic party supporter, a Kennedy Democrat originally from MA.

Bob Kerrey, what does he have to do with any of this?

Lastly, I would just like to see some discussion started on this and hope that by our discussing it, some in Congress take notice and start to discuss it too. Thankfully, one blog of one elected official in Congress will posting about my blog piece. It's good to know some are paying attention, isn't it.

[Cosmocat]

11. You got it right ...

SS MOST definitely was about pouring money into the stockmarket ...

[Burried News]

12. Welcome to DU. I am fairly new myself.

[stillcool]

8. don't you think...

the end of oil is the catalyst for what we are seeing and every available legal and illegal dollar the gov gets its hands on is being used to secure their claim to the flow?

[kerrygoddess]

22. Most definately

But we need to look at how this affects the little people and we the progressives need to speak up about it, too. Don't you think? Or should we just ignore it in leiu of other issues?

[stillcool]

40. of late my thinking...

is that aside from local government we have no voice, and that our federal government is global in scope and adhering to their own agenda which trumps anything our lowly nation needs. The solution would seem to be to surrender our way of life, and embrace our neighbors and adjust to what will surely be a new world order. The decisions congress has made in the last year alone like bankruptcy, healthcare, decreasing funding to those in need...the entire aparatus is hell-bent on destruction.

[Al-CIAda]

9. Just yesterday a woman of about 60 knocked on my door to sell

cookies. She was going door to door selling baked goods to pay for her medications (bad foot). A woman that could be my mother, an ordinary white seamingly regular productive member of society for all her life was selling friggin cookies to pay for her cast-wrapped foot.

Just yesterday...it kinda shocked me.

[Alva Goldbook]

15. A Creeping Depression.

Does anyone feel a creeping depression coming? the last recession (from the first Bush) came after a job in housing and oil prices. What are we seeing? and we're not exactly in the best of economic times as it is. A recession in the middle of this and a lot of people will be going over the edge.

[kerrygoddess]

16. Creeping quickly I feel!

Welcome to DU!

[tanyev]

25. Soon we'll be standing around fires in trash cans and singing.

Once I built a railroad, I made it run, made it race against time.
Once I built a railroad; now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once I built a tower, up to the sun, brick, and rivet, and lime;
Once I built a tower, now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?

Once in khaki suits, gee we looked swell,
Full of that Yankee Doodly Dum,
Half a million boots went slogging through Hell,
And I was the kid with the drum!

Say, don't you remember, they called me Al; it was Al all the time.
Why don't you remember, I'm your pal? Buddy, can you spare a dime?

[Vinca]

18. Hmmm. Just yesterday I was at the farmer's market and noticed

all the stands of people selling baked goods, ethnic foods, etc. and thought: I can do that. If worse comes to worse I'll be knocking on your door with a whoopie pie.

[barb162]

33. that's really sad. She probably should not have been walking

[Eloriel]

41. Exactly. Someone hook her up to the internet, to ebay!! or something

n/t

It's absolutely chilling.

[Dover]

19. Is the U.S. going through a form of 'corporate restructuring' ?

It seems the goal of the Bushies and the small percentage of wealthy is to profit from our demise, and then rebuild under new ownership.

[barb162]

42. My opinion on it is that they

just go to their new markets and middle class in China, India, etc. There's a lot more of them there than here. They shipped American jobs there and that's where the money and big economies and development will be. They already know that the US middle and lower classes will only be able to afford dollar stores at best.

[1932]

20. Everything is going according to plan for Bush.

Distract people with war, meanwhile, make the poor poorer and the ultrarich even wealthier.

I don't understand why the left couldn't put the pieces together and frame Iraq in terms of the sort of American imperialism that is about serving the corporatocracy at home and abroad more than it is about anything else.

Read books like Confession of and Economic Hit Man and God's Politics. They have the right frame.

[barb162]

36. Framing

"I don't understand why the left couldn't put the pieces together"

A lot of people just don't put stuff together even when you tell them. They tune out, etc. Every so often I try talking to my brother about this and I get nowhere (he votes GOP) and he's being hurt economically. I think the public is getting dumber and dumber. You gotta say things like gay marriage, moral values,two words or less. When Kerry talked jobs, Bush responded that his administration was creating jobs and many any people bought the lie.

[kerrygoddess]

38. True

The MSM mimicked what Bush was saying while Kerry was telling us the truth. So now here we are...

[OhioBlue]

23. My Grandma is on a fixed income

she is also on a budget for home heating fuel - she lives in a rural area, no natural gas lines, so she has a propane tank which the dealers come out and fill when you call to let them know you are low. People go on a monthly budget so they don't have to shell out hundreds of dollars to get it filled in the winter all at once. They sent her a $1000 "adjustment bill" last week. $1000 friggin' dollars!!!!! Not many people I know can just come up with $1000. My mom is trying to talk her into moving in with her.

[wli]

26. AFAICT we're already in a major depression

And it's getting worse, a lot worse. And Peak Oil is coming on its heels.

This is going to make the Great Depression look like a cocaine-buzzed junk bond salesman of the 80's having a 20 dollar bill fall out of his pocket.

[kerrygoddess]

28. Good points...

Thanks!

I'm glad to see some here are talking about this.

[tsuki]

31. I listened. A year ago, the family decided to cut back, get out of

debt and hunker down. The Depression is going to look like a cake walk.

[ColonelTom]

35. Meanwhile, in the Middle East...

... the economy is looking great:

http://www.cnn.com/2005/BUSINESS/08/21/gulf.911.ap/index.html

[kerrygoddess]

37. Well ain't that something!

WTF?

"But in the oil-rich Arab countries of the Gulf, September 11 is increasingly being seen as the event that kicked off a galloping economic boom -- and prodded investors to pull their money out of a United States perceived as hostile to Arabs, and instead invest it at home.

Since late 2001, economies in the six Gulf Cooperation Council countries have soared, with stock markets up a collective 400 percent. During the same period, investments from those countries into the U.S. slowed to a trickle."

[Clark2008]

39. The cost of gas soars = the cost of EVERYTHING soars.

That simple.

And most employers are barely giving raises, if they're not on a raise freeze, entirely. Also, there's no money in the budget to give cost-of-living increases to those who have a fixed income.

I'm moving in with my fiance, so my money woes will be relieved, somewhat, but, if it weren't for that, my son and I would be toughing it out on my meager income (my ex is a deadbeat and only sends money before he'd get in trouble for non-payment of child support).