"WalMart: A Progressive Success Story", by Jason Furman, chief economic advisor to President Obama

[Scuba]

http://www.bluecheddar.net/?p=36408

Furman wrote a 16-page 2005 paper entitled “Wal-mart: A progressive success story” when he was a visiting scholar at New York University’s Wagner Graduate School of Public Service. That’s something Michigan’s Mackinac Center liked LOVED. You may remember Mackinac from their support of Right-To-Work in Michigan, or their ALEC involvement, or their supporting role in readying and unleashing Wisconsin Act 10 upon our state. (If not, here’s their entry on SourceWatch).

Back in the day, Alternet printed a nice takedown of Furman by Lynn Stuart Parramore which includes this exremely off-putting quote from Furman on lefty “Kum-Bay-Ya”:

“The collateral damage from these efforts to get Wal-Mart to raise its wages and benefits is way too enormous and damaging to working people and the economy more broadly for me to sit by idly and sing ‘Kum-Ba-Ya’ in the interests of progressive harmony.”

...

I can see why Furman got a conservative stamp of approvall before he was appointed Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors (CEA) in June of this year.

Furman spoke last night at the UW-Madison, and was scheduled to take questions from the audience. Can't wait to learn what was asked, and what answers were given.

We simply cannot afford another corporatist in the White House.

[LuvNewcastle]

1. Are any of them not corporatists?

When they have a meeting, it's probably like an upper-class teabagger rally. Rotten to the core.

[zeemike]

2. We are in the times of "freedom is slavery"

And WalMart is a progressive company.
Orwell it thrashing around in his grave.

[ChiciB1]

3. As Each Day Goes By...

I wonder when this country will wake up, or when the people of this country FINALLY realize how much they're getting screwed!!

I stopped posting at DU for quite some time because I couldn't handle reading these type of stories. Was driving me crazy because so many inside stories about POTUS and/or his Cabinet seemed not to be working for "we the people!"

Not to mention so many other Democrats who seem to be riding on the same bus. The one that most of us are getting thrown under.

So, posting here & there now, but anxiety levels do keep me wondering what this country has turned into.

Nuff said...

[LuvNewcastle]

14. I can see why you took a break. I might have to do the same.

It's just so depressing, but it's revolting and holds you spellbound at the same time. I just can't seem to look away and I think about it all way too much. I'm going to start cutting back on my DU time. It's a great place to learn, but I need to accomplish more and be more positive, for my own health.

[ChiciB1]

41. Yes, Good To Be Up To Date On Info...

but it does bring you down. I've been a member since 2004 & have taken breaks before because of this. Then of course it seems once logged in you read threads and find yourself posting again. Another thing I've found is that when you do get info and try to pass it along to doubtful people, they accuse you of getting "internet information" and question your opinion. Even when you give them real links! Round and round you go.

Still I advise taking breaks when it really gets to you. Which could be an everyday occurrence after a while!

[CanonRay]

4. Obama needs some new economic advisors

Calling Robert Reich, Paul Krugman....

[Scuba]

5. What do those guys know? Just because they've been right every time?

[fadedrose]

32. What'sis you say?

[dotymed]

8. Obama was groomed

and sponsored by a female (name slips me) member of the 1%.

He has the advisers that he is supposed to have.
Man, she groomed him well. She knew what America was looking for...Change from the corporate governance that controls and usually
impoverishes those not on the inside.
I was fooled completely by the 1st candidate Obama. I held my nose (for the last time) for the 2nd candidate Obama.

If Americans are afraid to vote for a proven Progressive because he/she may be a "spoiler" and prevent a corporate democrat
the title of POTUS then they are not Democrats (IMO) or Progressives.

I will vote for a proven Progressive whether they be (I) or whatever.
The two main political parties in America are more corporate than not.

[LuvNewcastle]

15. Her name is Penny Pritzker.

[L0oniX]

20. ...like Jill Stein and Margaret Flowers?

[eridani]

47. Let me know when either gets interested in talking to actual voters instead of just to

--the small minority of us who are active policy junkies.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

6. I don't think you all read Furman's article...

From the conclusion:

Wal-Mart should, however, lead to a serious re-examination of the ways we provide
health insurance. Our current system provides more of an incentive to pay low-income families
in cash rather than health benefits and vice versa for more highly paid workers. Our system also
gives companies and health insurers an incentive to undertake distasteful “cherry picking” to
lower their health costs by, for example, discouraging older and potentially more costly
employees from working or being insured. Piecemeal expansions of the health system – like the
Children’s Health Insurance Program – may on net lead to much more insurance, but also lead
some employers to drop health insurance coverage for some workers. Alternative approaches,
like mandating employers or individuals to purchase health insurance or a single-payer health
system, would avoid many of these problems but create problems of their own.

Wal-Mart claims to care about all its stakeholders, including the workers it calls
“associates.” But it has done relatively little to push for public policies that would benefit these
workers and has done a lot – like promoting repeal of the estate tax – that is inimical to the
interests of these worker. It recently endorsed a higher minimum wage (a step that would cost it
very little since relatively few of its workers are paid at or near the minimum wage), but it could
do a lot more both to reduce its opposition to progressive issues and to actively promote these
issues. Costco, for example, promotes the welfare of its employees not just with its wages and
benefits but also with its advocacy of a higher minimum wage and a better health insurance
system.

Finally, most fundamentally, the “Wal-Mart economy” is not about an economy in which
corporations are squeezing workers. It’s about an economy in which the return to skills is
rapidly growing, and technological change, among other forces, is leading to increased
inequality. The most fundamental solution to these challenges is to invest in the education and
training necessary to ensure that all Americans have the skills to be successful in a
technologically sophisticated, global economy.

The paper argues that the low prices at Wal-Mart provide an economic benefit to families who are struggling to get by (true enough), and while it's not a ringing endorsement of progressive politics, it's not "Mein Kempf" either. Wal-Mart sucks not because of its low wages (wages in retail suck in general) but because it exploits its workers (i.e., working off the clock), squeezes out other local businesses, and lobbies Congress to prevent any changes that would benefit its employees.

[ProSense]

11. It's attack by sound bite. n/t

[Romulox]

12. Good luck with this argument: "Wal-Mart sucks not because of its low wages"

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

21. Low wages suck...

Most retailers pay low wages, as do fast food restaurants. People act like Wal-mart and McDonalds invented the practice.

[Romulox]

43. Wal Mart is the largest private employer in America. And one with close ties to a Presidential

hopeful.

Not just one among many.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

44. And? (nt)

[Vashta Nerada]

16. Walmart sucks because of its low wages.

I can't believe I just read "Wal-Mart sucks not because of its low wages".

[progressoid]

18. Holy Shit. The conclusion is awful.

Finally, most fundamentally, the “Wal-Mart economy” is not about an economy in which
corporations are squeezing workers.

Whaaat? Walmart is the leader in squeezing it's workers.

And...oh never mind.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

22. Seriously....read the whole article

Furman's point in that regard is that our economy should be focused on created more high-wage, high-skill jobs. He's not denying that Wal-Mart and other retailers pay crap wages. The point is that we need a manufacturing economy where people can do better than working at Wal-Mart.

[Fumesucker]

26. Retail is still needed even in a manufacturing economy

Automation is driving humans out of manufacturing, there just aren't as many jobs for each product as there used to be and that number is steadily dropping.

Evidently in some people's view retail workers do not deserve to make a living wage.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

30. Actually....

There's now some evidence that manufacturing jobs are coming back to the U.S. ("re-shoring" is the new buzzword). And when you have an economy that is heavy on higher-wage jobs, that increases the pressure on lower-wage employers to keep up. When we have an economy based on doing each others' nails and delivering pizza, there's no pressure to increase wages.

Hey, we had retail stores back in the 1950's when more than a third of workers were in unions. Now that the number is down to 12% (and -- Jesus Christ -- only 7.6% of private sector workers), we're drowning in low-wage jobs. My thesis is that a lack of better paying jobs is lowering the bar for everybody.

[Fumesucker]

31. Manufacturing may be coming back but a lot of the jobs aren't

I have a neighbor who works as a maintenance mechanic at a local production facility, a union member he makes over $80K and we are in a relatively low wage area by national standards.

He loathes his job because the pressure is relentless and he's forced to work a lot of mandatory overtime because it's cheaper for the company to work the existing mechanics sixty to eighty hours a week than to hire more mechanics.

I could do his job with sufficient training but he and I agree there really aren't that many people with the mindset needed to do effective component level troubleshooting/repair on the type of equipment he works on. Other than maintenance the plant is largely empty, there is a fairly substantial office crew doing office type stuff but not very many actual production workers due to the large amount of automation.

He's pretty busted up too, missing half of one finger and has metal plates and screws here and there from various industrial accidents, largely due to working on equipment that is kept running 24/7 because turning it off costs tens of thousands of dollars per hour in lost production.

What my neighbor tells me is that they go through recent tech school graduates in wholesale quantities because so many of them have the book learning but lack the mechanical aptitude to be truly effective at the job, he's about the opposite has the aptitude but the book learning part comes harder for him but he's also old school and grew up in a family that had a mechanical/construction type business.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

35. The jobs are coming back...

That's exactly what "manufacturing is coming back" means.

What we're seeing is that there's a "fake" skills gap in manufacturing brought on by employers (non-union, of course) who want skilled employees to work for $15 an hour when they should be making twice that. The situation discourages workers (especially younger ones) from pursuing those skills, and it's leading to a "actual" skills gap where there aren't enough workers to go around even when wages are higher.

[Fumesucker]

36. The kids that in my day would have been out building hot rods are now in front of the X Box

Fixing things isn't what it used to be, I was the family TV tech from the time I was about 15 or so, would take the tubes out and carry them to Walgreens and put them on the tube checker about every three or four months when the B/W TV would go on the fritz.

These days people just buy a new TV, no user serviceable parts inside even if you could purchase them.

Disposable, unrepairable products have made for a society where those troubleshooting skills are much more rare than they used to be.

[Egnever]

39. Tv's still have serviceable parts

I dont know what you're on about. Sounds like one of those good ole days posts.

[Fumesucker]

40. Of course it was

Everything has positive features and negative features.

Disposable products that are for most practical purposes not repairable means that technology advances more quickly.

On the other hand those type of products lead to a general public who has less understanding of the technology they use and a smaller percentage of the population who have the skills necessary to advance the technology in practical ways.

Another disadvantage of disposable products is waste, as the old joke goes, a paid for computer is obsolete.

A friend of mine works for an electronics recycling business, the amount of sheer waste to be seen at a place like that is eye opening.

[jeff47]

27. And low-skill jobs will be done by.............

Or does the need for those jobs just disappear in Furman's world? We all going to become nurses and software developers, and we just won't need anyone to do retail jobs?

[progressoid]

28. IRONY alert.

Walmart's business practices kill US manufacturing jobs.

http://economyincrisis.org/content/not-made-in-america-top-10-ways-walmart-destroys-us-manufacturing-jobs

http://www.uky.edu/CommInfoStudies/IRJCI/reports/reportswalmart.htm

http://www.rippdemup.com/2013/01/reality-check-at-50-years-old-walmart-hurts-u-s-manufacturing-jobs/

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2012/08/10/how-everyday-low-prices-are-costing-americans-their-jobs/

[dreamnightwind]

45. Doesn't sound like he's talking about manufacturing jobs

"the skills to be successful in a technologically sophisticated, global economy."

We're all supposed to be in IT, writing the software and running the servers that are the enablers of global corporations having their wealthy executive headquarters in the U.S. corporate offices, and their manufacturing wherever they can find the most desperate and least regulated workforce. If not IT or executives, MBA's, marketing, truck drivers, dock workers, or retail workers. That's the global corporate model we're living under.

Perhaps a few manufacturing jobs are returning, but I don't see any reference to prioritizing that, at least not in the conclusion to his paper that you posted. I admittedly have not read the whole article.

[winter is coming]

7. I see the campaign to redefine "progressive" is underway. n/t

[L0oniX]

19. Good luck to the enemies of progressives. History is a good thing....

and many progressive ideals of old are the same today.

[marmar]

9. We are DEEP in the rabbit hole.

k/r

[ProSense]

10. NLRB to Prosecute Wal-Mart For Violating Workers’ Rights (updated)

NLRB to Prosecute Wal-Mart For Violating Workers’ Rights (updated)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024053560

It interesting that a 2005 paper is being dragged out as evidence of anything.

Jason Furman to Chair the CEA?

Well, well—I see from the Twitterverse that Council of Economic Adviser Chairman Alan Krueger is going back to Princeton, to be replaced Jason Furman. That’s a great choice—Jason will make an excellent CEA chair.

Even though economic policy isn’t going anywhere fast these days given Congressional gridlock, the CEA chair is an important post. S/he is the public face of the administration when important data are released—think jobs day—and, at least in my limited experience, the CEA chair spends a fair bit of quality time with the POTUS, interpreting the economy and explaining the impacts of administration policy.

The CEA chair also can be highly influential in moving policy, as Alan was on the minimum wage and UI extensions, Christy Romer on the Recovery Act, and Glenn Hubbard on the Bush tax cuts.

I’ve worked closely with Jason, and there are few economists I can think of who both get macro (which is to say, see it the way I do) and have such a deep, granular knowledge of federal economic and fiscal policy, in no small part because he’s played a role in shaping those policies since the Clinton years. This is a guy who can hold forth on the history of the tiers of the unemployment insurance system as well as the exemptions in the corporate tax code, including the Senators who snuck them in there.

Roughly speaking, I’d describe the values of Furmanomics thusly:

–Progressive taxation that raises ample revenue;
–Boosting efficiencies and squeezing out inefficiencies in the tax code and the health care system;
–Solidly Keynesian in recession (he was ally in those arguments back in the day);
–Crafting policies with a clear eye to implementation constraints (something you only develop from pretty long experience in the gov’t sector);
–Strong supporter of the safety net (see here, e.g., re the little-known Furman effect).

- more -

http://jaredbernsteinblog.com/jason-furman/

Jason Furman
Recent Reports
http://www.cbpp.org/experts/index.cfm?fa=view&id=145

[hatrack]

23. And I'm sure the settlement they craft will really change Wal-Mart's ways

Why, it might hit seven figures!

Ooh.

[librechik]

13. stories like this should wake people up to the extent we are buried

in this invisible fascism shit. As if the blatant violent fascism weren't enough:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4046454


Yeah, little bitty Taos, NM. EPICENTER of the 60s hippie wars --apparently still going on. (Hippies lost, BTW. Imagine. Peace losing out to weapons and rage. OF COURSE!)

[L0oniX]

17. The only way to undo this corrupt system is from the bottom up.

Forget 3rd party for now. You need to get progressives in local, state and federal office first. Both parties are corporate corrupt. We need living wage jobs. We need to tax the rich more and remove corporate subsidies. We need to scale down the MIC. We need to shore up SS and Medicare. We need to stop fooling ourselves with ACA and refuse to settle for anything but single payer/Medicare for all. We need a strong EPA, We need "fair" trade with enforced labor standards ...and much much more.

[fadedrose]

24. Don't depress me Scuba

Don't I already have enough bad news . . . and you're piling on more...

(Bwa'baaabewa, and so on)

I've been dying to do that Bwa stuff in a post and thank you for the opportunity at last.

[PowerToThePeople]

25. Progressively worse

[Octafish]

29. Wall Street wuvs Walmart

It's a story that can only get better:

Hillary Clinton and Wal-Mart: A Love Story

America just has to get used to austerity and $7.25/hour.

[joeybee12]

33. Up is down, right is left...

Conservatives are progressives...but some of us aren't fooled...thank God.

[AZ Progressive]

34. The Faux Democrats replaced the Real Democrats so....

Democrats would believe that the Faux Democrats are on their side, when they are not. Faux Democrats are placeholders so that Real Democrats don't get elected and come out and fight back against the Corporate Machine.

[Scuba]

37. Bingo.

[liberal_at_heart]

38. Obama should be listening to the people, not corporatists.

[Rex]

42. Yeah if you believe in Voodoo economics and all the crap

that got us in this hole in the first place!

I hate corporate 'yes' suits, they make America suck with their snake oil saleman pitch.

[Egalitarian Thug]

46. What? You don't like the Goldman-Sachs administration?

You're obviously a Communist-Racist bastard that hates America.

[brentspeak]

48. Obama Nominates America’s Biggest Walmart Cheerleader as His Chief Economic Adviser

Nominated...and eventually [link:appointed.

http://www.alternet.org/economy/jason-furman-obama-and-walmart

Obama Nominates America’s Biggest Walmart Cheerleader as His Chief Economic Adviser
AlterNet / By Lynn Stuart Parramore

June 11, 2013 |

On June 10, 2013, President Obama announced his intention to nominate Jason Furman to become the next chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. This is a big-time, highly influential post. So what kind of economist is Furman?

One who thinks Walmart is the best thing since sliced bread.

For Furman, Walmart is nothing short of a miracle for America’s poor and working-class folks. For him, progressives should be cheering the firm: he even wrote a 16-page paper titled, " Wal-Mart: A Progressive Success Story," which was posted on the Center for American Progress website. Here’s a sample of Furmanomics:

“By acting in the interests of its shareholders, Wal-Mart has innovated and expanded competition, resulting in huge benefits for the American middle class and even proportionately larger benefits for moderate-income Americans.”

For the man who will have President Obama’s ear on vital matters like jobs, the evidence of whether Walmart’s wages and benefits are substandard is “murky.” And he doesn’t much care for those who question Walmart’s approach: In the 2006 dialogue with Ehrenreich on Slate, he upbraided activists who had pushed the firm to increase wages and offer better benefits:

"The collateral damage from these efforts to get Wal-Mart to raise its wages and benefits is way too enormous and damaging to working people and the economy more broadly for me to sit by idly and sing 'Kum-Ba-Ya' in the interests of progressive harmony.”