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Edited on Wed Jan-13-10 04:02 PM by cufford
We've only just begun to see the tip of the iceberg of the ever increasing depression.
These daily reports are meaningless, and for every positive one, there are two more negative ones to counter. It continues to be a net loss, and that's not going to end in our lifetimes.
This has not been some cyclical "down-turn" or "recession" and there can be no "recovery". Buzz words only to keep the masses appeased, despite the facts.
We're seeing the consequences of 3-4 decades of declining wages (since the mid-70's, and accelerated by NAFTA and related so-called "Free Trade" agreements). A critical mass of the best paying, working-class jobs in this country have been eliminated. Industry, gone. Manufacturing, gone. Leading exporter, gone. A complete restructuring of our economic system over the past several decades. It's a completely different game than it's ever been in this country since the industrial revolution. Comparisons to the Great Depression, or any other subsequent economic cycle are mostly meaningless because it's apples and oranges. It's a different kind of economy now. And it's most certainly not a swinging pendulum as people would understandably like to believe - at their own peril.
The economy is collapsing because there are fewer and fewer consumers, thanks to ever declining wages in this country. It has little to do with "Wall Street" shenanigans of the past decade, as they would love for us to believe (while they do nothing about that). Anything to keep distracting us from the real problem of low wages. This is the elephant in the room that nobody in power wants to touch. Because to do so not only goes against the philosophy of big corporations, but it would be admitting that these trade polices were not just flawed, but fatal to our once greatest economy on the planet.
Even full employment (100%) would make little difference in anything, because we're now a nation of minimum wage jobs for the masses. And that's the problem. UNDERemployment, rather than UNemployment. Even many who are working full time are not making even basic ends meet.
Unless wages begin to increase again (they clearly won't) not only will nothing turn around for the better, but we'll simply continue to spiral downward towards full blown depression, or more accurately third-world economy status, run by an Oligarchy, with a small segment of very wealthy individuals/families, and most everyone else living in dystopian poverty. It's just around the corner.
Things are only going to get much worse, slowly but steadily over the coming years and decades. It took 30+ years to get us to this point, and it would take just as long to return to those prosperous days, if the institutions of power even wanted to make that happen. They don't. It's all about cheap labor for big corporations, but that also killed the American marketplace because those employees are also the consumers who purchased the goods and services. Big corporations like the automakers fired their own best customers, and now the chickens are coming home to roost.
Good paying jobs created demand, which creates more jobs. Minimum wage jobs kill demand and fall short of what's needed to even sustain an even-keel in the economy. And it's now progressed far enough that it's a self-perpetuating downward spiral. As more people loose their jobs, more and more people will loose their jobs. It's a domino effect that cannot be stopped at this point. Not without a significant increase in wages for the masses.
Since that's clearly not in our future, it's a mathematical certainty that we're headed towards the bottom, and have a very long ways to get there yet.
Stimulus packages that create a few jobs temporarily is only sweeping the dirt under the rug. It does not change the equation over the long term.
It's wages for the masses that matters. That is the fuel of our economy. People being able to afford to consume goods and services beyond the most basic. That well has been bled dry and it simply isn't coming back in our lifetimes. There is absolutely no reasonable evidence to suggest otherwise.
If we doubled the minimum wage, our economy would take off like a rocket. Money in the pockets of the masses is what fuels the economy.
Big corporations clearly only think short term; that next quarterly report, and with no regard for the long term. This much is clear. Their actions of the past few decades of outsourcing has, ironically, killed the very market they serve. If they started paying their workers much more, including those time-honored benefits, they'd see a growing market of people who could afford to buy their products, and even at higher prices to offset the labor increases. But that's a long term strategy, and as we know, that's not how they work.
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