Had Enough Yet?

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2006/08/29/had-enough-yet/

Had Enough Yet?

Recent economic news has not been good. Lots of info from U.S. Census Bureau figures out today—which show the U.S. poverty rate declined by one-tenth of a percentage point, a statistically insignificant change, according to Census officials, and higher than it was in 2000. But just in the past few days, we hear the following.

* The median hourly wage for America’s workers has declined 2 percent since 2003, after factoring in inflation—while productivity has steadily risen, according to yesterday’s The New York Times. Wages and salaries now make up the lowest share of the nation’s gross domestic product since the government began recording the data in 1947. But the top 1 percent of earners—including many corporate CEOs—received 11.2 percent of all wage income, up from 8.7 percent a decade earlier and less than 6 percent three decades ago, according to Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty, economists who analyzed the tax data.
* The number of Americans without health insurance rose to a record in 2005—from 45.3 million in 2004 to 46.6 million in 2005, according to Census Bureau figures released today. This rate is higher than all but two years (1997 and 1998) since the data series began in 1987. Nearly 46 million are without health insurance—as medical costs increased three times as fast as wages, according to forecasts for a Census Bureau report today. The total has climbed every year since President George W. Bush took office—and that’s according to the corporate media mouthpiece, Bloomberg.com.
* The Census Bureau also reports the percentage of uninsured children rose from 10.8 percent in 2004 to 11.2 percent in 2005. This reverses a trend that started in 1998 of declining uninsured rates for children.
* Meanwhile, employer-provided health coverage dropped from 61.5 percent of workers in 1989 to 58.9 percent in 2000, sliding to 55.9 percent in 2004, according to the nonprofit Economic Policy Institute (EPI). “Less well known is the fact that those who still receive employer-provided coverage are now paying a larger share of those insurance costs,” economist Lawrence Mishel, EPI president, said in EPI’s biennial report, State of Working America, which will be released in full on Labor Day.
* Inequality in the United States is on the rise, whether measured in terms of wages, family incomes or wealth, and is much higher than that of other advanced countries, according to EPI. The richest 1 percent of wealth holders had 125 times the wealth of the typical household in 1962. By 2004, they had 190 times as much or $14.8 million in wealth for the upper 1 percent compared with just $82,000 for the household in the middle fifth of wealth.
* Census data show the median wealth of the average African American household ($11,800) is one-tenth that of white households.
* The net worth of U.S. households is deteriorating, as Americans cope with rising debt, flattening real estate values and stagnant wages, according to EPI. The accumulation of stocks, bonds, bank savings or other assets aside from equity in their homes has eluded many Americans. In fact, about 30 percent of households have a net worth of less than $10,000.
* The housing market—houses are the most significant form of wealth for most of America’s workers—is tanking. Housing inventory now stands at 7.3 months, the highest since 1993. New home sales are down 21.6 percent. According to economists quoted in The Observer, this downturn in the U.S. housing market

will force businesses to slash 73,000 jobs a month in the new year and could be more damaging to the world economy than the dotcom crash….

But wait. The news isn’t all bad. This year is an election year. We can take action.

As Firedoglake put it recently, “Had Enough Yet?”



by Tula Connell