WP: Average Wage-Earners Fall Behind

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A37628-2004Dec30?language=printer

<snip>

This new era requires that workers shoulder more responsibility and risk on the way to financial security, economists say. It also demands that they be nimble in an increasingly fluid job market. Those who don't obtain some combination of specialized skills, higher education and professional status that can be constantly adapted will be in danger of sliding down the economic ladder to low-paying service jobs, usually without benefits.

Meanwhile, those who secure the middle-class jobs of the 21st century will have to make $17 an hour stretch further than ever as they pay more for health care or risk doing without insurance, and assume much or all of the burden for their retirement.

In the lively debate about the future of U.S. jobs, many economists and scholars acknowledge that the changes wrought by technology and global economic forces will be painful at first. But they say the new structure ultimately will create many kinds of jobs as yet unimagined, in fields such as education, health care and science.

"You have to take the leap of faith that the economy will evolve and there will be this innovation economy that comes," said John C. McCarthy, a Forrester Research analyst who authored a report on U.S. jobs going overseas.

Yet many observers also say that the present economic restructuring may be more rocky than similar transitions in the past, and that society should take additional measures to ease the struggles of those caught in the middle, especially the three-quarters of Americans who lack a college degree.

[Rose Siding]

1. If this is true, how can this be true?...

Social Security Underestimates Future Life Spans, Critics Say
...
"Life expectancy will make a very big difference in the fiscal viability of Social Security, but the agency's projections of longevity appear too conservative," said Prof. Samuel H. Preston of the University of Pennsylvania, one of the nation's leading demographers.

http://nytimes.com/2004/12/31/politics/31benefit.html?hp&ex=1104469200&en=3fc58ddd8f4df984&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Won't life-extending medical advances (which will be inaccessible to the growing pool of un/under insured) be neutralized by a lifetime of shouldering "more responsibility and risk"?

[TahitiNut]

5. Increased life expectancy has TWO effects on Social Security.

It depends on how the average life expectancy is increased. If there are fewer causes of death/disability of younger people (suicide, accident, cancer, heart attack, etc.), then the workforce is benefitted and the Social Scurity revenues are increased ... and more immediately. War is one of the causes of death and disability at younger ages.

Let's always remember that when we're talking about "averages" that it's far easier to increase the life expectancy of one young person by 20-30 years than it is to do the same for an older person. All those years go into the numerator.

[VegasWolf]

2. It seems like bushco takes a lot of "leaps of faith." I, for one, am not

willing to follow chimp off the cliff.

[DBoon]

3. in the long run there will be all kinds of wonderful jobs

but as the economist Keynes said, "In the long run we will all be dead."

[The Judged]

4. "Average Wage-Earners" are an extreme minority in the USA ...

IMO They exist statistically as a result of averaging the extremely high pay of the wealthy across the far lower earnings of the upper middle class <not so many as believed>, middle class <almost none left>, lower middle class <majority of Americans>, and underclass <millions and millions of those still>.

Just today figures were publicized on a radio news show indicating the average weekly wage for a worker on Wall Street is over $5,000.00, yet every worker from Wall Street that was interviewed was very surprised to learn this and stated that their own wages were much, much lower than the reported averages.

Therefore, a majority of ACTUAL wage-earners in this country are not falling behind, but VERY FAR behind and DEEPLY into debt. IMO

[TahitiNut]

7. That's why the Gini Index is so significant.

It shows this increasing disparity.

[mhr]

21. OK - Gini Index - I'll Bite - Please Explain - Thanks!

Found This Link

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0908770.html

"Countries are ranked according to the Gini index (or coefficient), a measure of income inequality within a country. A country's Gini rating is between 0 and 100, with 0 indicating perfect equality and 100 indicating absolute inequality. (The U.S. rates 40.8 on the Gini index—the poorest 20% of its population receive 5.2% of income; the richest 20% receive 46.4%.)"

[TahitiNut]

24. Here's an older (1993) article that's good ...

http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/Gini_supplement.html
There's a decent Wikipedia article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient
(It's called "Gini Index," "Gini Ratio," and "Gini Coefficient" depending on the rigorousness of the source. I suppose "ratio" is the most meaningful in general.)

In short, a higher Gini Index indicates that the poor get poorer and rich get richer. Japan, Sweden, Canada, etc. have Gini Indices around 0.25-0.30; Mexico is around 0.50. A "banana republic" is characterized by a small wealthy (ownership) class and a large poor (working) class - essentially the wealthy living off the labor of the poor. A "banana republic" has a Gini Index of about 0.45-0.60.

I've taken the data compiled by our Census Bureau and graphed it. I shows a deteriorating economic equity in the US, clearly the result (at least partly) of Reagan-Bush "welfare for the wealthy" enronomics. Lest anyone doubt that "lower is better" please note that White Families have a lower Gini Index (more equitable distribution of income) than Black Families or Hispanic Familes.

I think it's clear that today's Gini Index in the US is around 0.45 - and climbing.

[InvisibleBallots]

6. there will be violence in the next 5 years

They think Americans are going to sit by peacefully and accept their living standards dropping to the level of Chinese peasants under a communist dictatorship.

They are wrong.

Americans are heavily armed. Rich people will not be able to walk down the streets, and they will be too afraid to come out of their gated communities.

Bring it on.

[Harry S Truman]

16. Bravo!

This direction is the only thing that will work, sadly, to affect change in an America cloaked in darkness by media manipulation.
Bring on the New Revolution.

[CatholicEdHead]

22. At some point there will be

Maybe not in a 5 year span, but no more than a 10 year span.

AM radio and Faux News can only pull the wool over the eyes for so long. Real life will blow the perceptions away.

[reprobate]

25. It will happen before Lil Boots leaves office.

More and more the internet is superceeding the MSM and people are starting to get the real skinny in their news mix.

By 2008 enough poeple will KNOW the truth. And their lives will be reflective of the truth. The gov't will be seen as the enforcer and the corporations seen as the real cause. Their communities will not only be gated, they will be patrolled by armored humvies with machine gun mounts. But that's not the only thing to worry about.

We face economic disaster, but adding to it the perfect storm of global climate change and peak-oil. Climate change I'm afraid will not be the century or two time frame as some predict, but a decade-two at the most. less if the atlantic conveyor is not linear, but switches off at a threshold point as some clam. Peak oil also will not be a century in coming, but a decade as many now agree. The combination will add to a disaster that few can contemplate.

The answer to personal survival I think will be to live on high ground with a home that is energy self sustaining. And arm yourself. There will be wolf packs of marauders trying to feed themselves off your planning.

Welcome to the NEW United States of America.

[wellst0nev0ter]

8. Lucky Duckies All

[daleo]

9. Bush to a rich crowd in F911

"You are the haves and the have-mores. Some people call you the elites, I call you my base."

[mulethree]

11. Bush to the rest of us

Biotech

[reprobate]

23. Bush to the rest of us----Soylent Green!

[mulethree]

10. Hmm so we'll all be teachers, medical workers, bankers

or provide services to them?

So we what? import students and patients? Obviously we need to to get some overseas cash to pay for imported food, goods, offshored labor and guest workers.

Maybe instead of inventing terrorists to explain our feelings of insecurity, we could address the real problem presented here which is an actual draining of all sorts of security.

The perfect subject to bring up if you want a party to end really early. This crap has been bugging me for 5 or 6 years. Hard to get anyone to talk about it without breaking into some variation of 'the Lord is my shepard ..."

[NashVegas]

15. Bankers and Many Med Workers Will Be Outsourced

Except for nurses, that is. Gotta have someone to change the bed pans. Only they'll be working longer hours with less pay. If that's imaginable.

Remember all those infomercials about training schools to be truck drivers and air-conditioner repairers - those will go by the wayside, too, as the hourly wage shrinks and shrinks in comparison to cost of living.

As for those lower and middle class folks who bought into the idea of upward mobility, well .. sorry. You can't just go to college anymore, get your degree and imagine you'll be set.

You'll have to go back, and back, and back, and learn to view everyone around you as competition. Better start watching Survivor and all the similarly-themed reality TV shows if you want to learn how to get along in the Brave New World.

There will be one way left of achieving the so-called American Dream - being your own boss - be a winner on the stock market. In order to thrive, you will have to be an accomplice to those who are hellbent on crushing the soul of the human race.

And the so-called "Creative Class," the generation that's being told they will be able to support themselves and thrive and be soooo valued by using their creativity and brain-power in their careers? There is no bigger lie I can imagine right about now.

In yesterday's NYT, there was a story about how many widget-building major corporations are now outsourcing their product designs. The article interviewed and quoted a good handful of management executives and not even one engineer. The "creative class" will end up much like the family dog in Stephen King's novel Tommyknockers. if they're stupid enough to buy into the hype.

[leesa]

17. They INSOURCE nurses and it has helped to keep wages down.Nurses are

brought in from all over because of the shortage.

[Blower]

12. Things DO NOT look good for 2005 economy, read THIS--

“Baby New Year 2005” Set to Deliver Knockout Punch
-Recent data confirm weak dollar, inflation problems trouncing employment and profits
By Dan Spillane, The Liberty Whistle

(SEATTLE) 12/31/04 – While there has been quite a bit of speculation concerning the effect of the weak dollar on US corporate profits and employment, specific evidence has now emerged—and the result isn’t what many expect. Indeed, US stock markets have rallied significantly through the fourth quarter--in the face of a dollar that has fallen since October.

Since the dollar has fallen, there has been little sign of a noticeable pickup in hiring. What’s going on? The best answer comes from US companies—and is outlined in a “Special Question” in a recent Federal Reserve report. (1) That question asked the effect of a falling dollar on business. According to the report, over half of the respondents said higher input prices would have “some” or “substantial” negative effect on business. Moreover, the net effect of a lower dollar leaned towards negative, not towards positive, as many stock enthusiasts believe. Keep in mind, many input prices have been run up to historically high levels, due in part to an extended period of low US interest rates.

As well, a case in point--on December 30th, Alcoa Inc., a Dow Component, got an earnings estimate cut of over ten percent for the current quarter, based on “high energy, resin, and caustic soda prices as well as the significantly weaker U.S. dollar.” Yet Alcoa is likely only the first of many disappointments in store—a number of other Dow companies have supply contract and hedging arrangements, which expire with the New Year. How are companies responding to increased costs? Well, according to the December 30th Chicago ISM report, input prices were still at lofty levels--even while the employment sub-index contracted.

So clearly, a notion that inflation is running jobs out of the US is supported by not only multiple business surveys, but by the direct example of Alcoa. Moreover, the problem of inflation is suddenly multiplied with the New Year, as companies other than Alcoa are suddenly subject to higher prices as hedging run out. But trouble doesn’t stop there. Many companies, including the likes of General Motors and Caterpillar, rely on finance profits, which in turn are precipitously balanced on low interest rates and low inflation. These companies are so dependent on finance, in fact, Baby New Year is poised to deliver a “one, two” knockout punch to corporate giants, wearing only the “newborn gloves of economic reality.”

The 2005 baby stops crying abruptly, however…to a lullaby of sharply higher interest rates. Without that, he is sure to grow quickly into a terrible delinquent.

(1) Philedelphia Federal Reserve Bank, 12/2004

website

www.libertywhistle.us

[DeepModem Mom]

13. kick

[cyberpj]

14. Meanwhile...Bush Signs Order to Raise Fed Workers' Pay

Bush Signs Order to Raise Fed Workers' Pay


Dec 31, 12:04 AM (ET)


CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) - President Bush spelled out in greater detail Thursday the pay raise that takes effect Jan. 1 for federal workers, members of Congress, judges - even Vice President Dick Cheney.

Congress passed the pay raises earlier this year, but Bush was required to sign an executive order detailing the pay hikes before the end of the year. He did so Thursday.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20041231/D87ADRL04.html

[renaissanceguy]

20. Absolutely sickening.

Why should THEY determine when and how much a raise they get? It's the VOTERS that "hired" them. Could you imagine going to your boss, saying "I think I'll make $50k more this year."

Sick bastards.

http://www.cafepress.com/liberalissues.15475094
http://www.cafepress.com/liberalissues.15032164

[InvisibleBallots]

18. No money? Try extreme shopping!

Coming soon to a city near you. You were warned.

[AllegroRondo]

19. "Average" wage means little, its the Median wage we should look at

The top 1% increased their incomes by astronomical amounts, which pulled the average wage up. But did little for the rest of us.

The Median wage is what we should be looking at, and that has actually fallen for the last 3 years.