Economic Recovery? What Recovery?

[Panaconda]

Economic Recovery? What Recovery? - by Stephen Lendman

There is none, and it's getting worse under a president and his predecessor's policies - engineering and sustaining economic decline, not recovery, Obama's latest announced job creation program as bogus as his April 2009 $787 billion stimulus. At the time, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said, besides bailing out Wall Street, it would create millions of jobs and get credit flowing again.

Wrong and he knew it. Credit contraction persists. Job creation is moribund. The true unemployment rate, by 1980 calculations, is 22%, not the bogus 9.6%, and recovery focused on Wall Street, not small business and job creation. The Treasury was looted. Trillions of dollars went to banks, shadow banks (like hedge funds) and insurers, not industrial America, a shadow of its former self by design. More on that below.

...

Economist Jack Rasmus, a regular guest on the Progressive Radio News Hour, agrees, saying:

"Perhaps the best indicator of the faltering economy is the jobs numbers since January 2010:"

-- 575,000 federal jobs created, all but 1,000 temporary census workers being rapidly laid off;

-- state and local governments have shed 81,000 jobs through May, then more as monthly layoffs are announced;

-- of the 495,000 private sector jobs created, 468,000 were low wage, low benefit part-time ones or temps;

-- at the same time, "hundreds of thousands of full-time permanent jobs have been eliminated;"

-- unemployment duration has risen to unprecedented levels, six workers competing for every job opening;

-- "one in four workers....has experienced some period of unemployment" since late 2007, a shocking indictment of a sick economy;

-- 23 - 25 million unemployed, not the official 15 million figure, bogus like all government data, softened to look better;

-- "And these (numbers) don't account for the tens of millions of inner city youth(s), undocumented, and itinerant workers" the Labor Department never counts, non-people in their calculation;

-- the true number of unemployed likely way exceeds 25 million; and

-- to recover jobs lost since December 2007 "require(s) hiring more than 300,000 workers every month from now until 2017," and the longer the delay, compounded by more job losses ahead, extends that date well into the future.

...

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2010/09/09/18658296.php

[babylonsister]

1. I stopped reading after yet another 'writer' gets his facts wrong.

The stim isn't and wasn't bogus, as much as people keep repeating that, trying to make it so.

Judging Stimulus by Job Data Reveals Success

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/business/economy/17leonhardt.html

[TBF]

5. "Success" if you are pleased with double-digit unemployment -

some of us would actually like to see people get back to work. "Jobless recovery" is an oxymoron.

[babylonsister]

15. Have you considered how many people would be unemployed

w/o the stim? I'm sure the teachers, cops, etc., who kept their jobs are grateful. As usual, your glass is half empty.

[Panaconda]

26. Let's just discuss the facts

By your own admission you said you stopped reading the article pretty much right away. This would, by logical extension, disqualify you from being able to articulate reasonably on the topic.

Now there are some pretty simple and salient facts in the article which dryly and statistically detail what the reality is. You could've looked at that but you seem uninterested in honestly observing these numbers. There are also simple and readily available statistics on how many job losses have occurred in the educational sector and it's getting worse.

Why you seem incurious on this matter is strange. I live where there are many schools of all stripes and without exception teachers are being laid off, budgets cut and class sizes increasede. This can not be denied as it is plain as day for anyone who wishes to examine it.

BTW "a recovery" does not mean less people are losing their jobs.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

47. On the contrary, this is the FASTEST jobs recovery in decades, according to CNN and CNBC

according to CNN and CNBC. I knew where your obscure OP economist was going as soon as I read, "Perhaps the best indicator of the faltering economy is the jobs numbers since January 2010"

Since JANUARY 2010? What about the hole Dubya dug in employment all through 2008, during the Bush recession that began in December 2007 (see http://www.nber.org/cycles/april2010.html ) and ended sometime before strong GDP growth in the fourth quarter of 2009?

Barack Obama and Ben Bernanke reversed the direction of job growth in just one year, compared to the two years it took to reverse the direction of job growth in 2001, after Dubya's FIRST recession. (See the CNN snippet below.)

But Dubya's job destruction is much more severe this time than his first time, affecting 7 percent of all jobs, compared to less than half half that for the 2001 recession.

It's going to take some time to restore all those millions of lost jobs, but Dubya's jobs sinkhole is shrinking now, rather than continuing to grow.

LINK and CHART: Private sector job growth. Washington Monthly September 3, 2010

From http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_09/025514.php :



All told, the economy has added 763,000 private-sector jobs in 2010. For comparison purposes, note that the economy lost nearly 4.7 million private-sector jobs in 2009, and lost 3.8 million in 2008.

With that in mind, here it is, a ... homemade chart, showing monthly job losses/gains in the private sector since the start of the Great Recession. The image makes a distinction -- red columns point to monthly job totals under the Bush administration, while blue columns point to job totals under the Obama administration.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From http://money.cnn.com/2010/09/02/news/economy/jobs_recovery/index.htm :

"Strongest jobs recovery in decades. Seriously

By Chris Isidore, senior writer; September 2, 2010:

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- A jobless recovery? Hardly. By historical standards, the labor market is recovering nicely -- job growth has started earlier than in past recessions. ... The unemployment rate hit a high-water mark of 10.1% in October 2009 and has since fallen to 9.5%. Payrolls began growing in November and, excluding the impact of temporary census jobs, the economy has added jobs every month since January. That's a much quicker peak than previous job market recoveries.

After the 1990-91 recession ended, the economy lost nearly 300,000 additional jobs in the 11 months that followed. And the 2001 recession was followed by a so-called jobless recovery that lasted for nearly two more years. "Sustained, positive job formation began earlier in this recovery than in the prior two recoveries," said Lakshman Achuthan, managing director of Economic Cycle Research Institute.

But today's economy is different. The problem is that the damage done during the Great Recession was so severe, it will take a lot more growth than normal to dig the job market out of its hole. There were 8.4 million jobs lost in 2008 and 2009 -- roughly 7% of all jobs at the start of the recession. That compares to a loss of 3.1% of all jobs during the 2001 recession and the jobless recovery that followed, and only 1.9% of jobs lost during and after the 1990-91 recession. ...

Brusca said given the fact that job losses took place throughout 2008 and 2009, it's still too soon to conclude whether the recovery is going to come up short. He's still hoping growth picks up in the fall as businesses start to gear up for the holiday shopping period. ...

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

flpoljunkie posted this as a reply in a GDP thread on Erin Burnett's (CNBC) Meet The Press smackdown of Rich Lowry's (National Review) lies about "no effect" of the President's stimulus (at http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=431125&mesg_id=431554 ).

Last Sunday, Erin Burnett stunned the MTP roundtable with her proclamation that we are experiencing "the fastest jobs recovery in decades".

[TBF]

29. Anybody who can keep a job in this economy is grateful -

but should that be a measure of how we live? Should we be grateful to be slaves? Thrilled when we are the ones to keep our minimum wage jobs while others are homeless? You set very low expectations.

[Johonny]

27. +1

[eridani]

37. It helped, but would have helped far more without stupid tax cuts that

--stimulate exactly nothing.

[mdmc]

38. those cencus jobs sure did rock the numbers

without them it doesn't look so rosey..

[Champion Jack]

2. Nice try, but, a Fail

[Panaconda]

3. So there is a recovery?

Could you point to some facts on this mysterious recovery?

[Lost4words]

4. according to the above posters everything is Fine

and you must be confused, dont let the flat earth crew get to you.

[saltpoint]

6. This is a hundred vats of horseshit.

Unrec'd.

[blindpig]

7. Really? What's wrong with the numbers?

Are they false? Can you point out where?

The working people of this country are in the shit can and these 'stimulus' monies do little to nothing to alleviate that. Only a massive government jobs program can get us out of this hole. Private enterprise has no obligation to provide jobs, that people might live. It's only purpose is to generate a profit out of the hides of workers. Yet this administration ignores the historic Democratic precedent proven to provide relief to the people, why is that?

k&r

[saltpoint]

8. That a massive government jobs program would be

a good thing is not the same argument that Obama's stimulus package has not been of benefit to many, which the OP pretends, or that its intent was to help bolster key service workers, such as teachers and firefighters.

[blindpig]

17. It is grossly inadequate.

This bullshit, "it helps somebody" is the same sort of lame excuse used to support the wretched health care bill. Sure, it help a few, but was that the point? These actions are heralded as 'historic', but the benefits reaching the people are hard to see without rose colored glasses.

[saltpoint]

18. Is it your argument that full employment is something

that can be light-switched?

Is it also your notion that fiercely progressive legislation is a cakewalk with an 111th Congress comprised of people like John Cornyn, Tom Coburn, Virginia Foxx, Michelle Bachmann, and any number of others?

Are you calling for a comprehensive government-sponsored jobs creations bill, or not?

If you are, I suggest you propose a blueprint for achieving such a bill, which is likely to entail quite a bit more than your posting a grocery list of stats.

Here's this if you do like statistics, as posted elsewhere in this thread:

- - -

David Leonhardt recently wrote in the New York Times: "Perhaps the best-known economic research firms are IHS Global Insight, Macroeconomic Advisers and Moody's Economy.com. They all estimate that the bill has added 1.6 million to 1.8 million jobs so far and that its ultimate impact will be roughly 2.5 million jobs."

- - -

I distrust your assessment.

[blindpig]

21. Yes, WPA, CCC, those are the model.

Blueprint? Not my business. If FDR could do it I see no reason why Obama couldn't, if he wanted to, especially in these days when executive privilege is to the fore.

[saltpoint]

22. Again, I think you'd find wide support on this site

for just such model programs.

I still haven't heard how this materializes in the 111th or 112th Congresses.

We can assess FDR's New Deal with the benefit of hindsight. That is far less the case with a current administration. Things can change in politics, sometimes very quickly. Most of us want things to be better faster, but as voters and adults have to navigate what we have before us. In the absence of legislative initiatives which Krugman, to cite one example, concedes are too limited (he called for a second stimulus, suggesting more firepower and not that the initiative was 'wrong'), isn't the hinge of reform on the make-up of the Congress? What economic initiative that matches the comprehensive jobs model of the New Deal would not originate in the House of Representatives?

[blindpig]

23. What we have before us is a load of crap.

I expect no help from that body of the well-off, they have their own agenda. If control of the White House, Senate and House can't get the job done then what does that say? I don't believe anything like that has been proposed by any Democrat, and if it were it would be ignored and/or derided.

The way to deal with "what we have before us" is to ignore the liars and hustlers of the political class and organize democratically outside of politics as usual. A working class organization led by of and for that class, we will blow them away.

[saltpoint]

31. Which working class organization did you have in mind?

The furthest Left getting the farther toward electability, IMO, was Robert La Follette, and he did not win the presidency.

You could use sheer arithmetic and say Perot did better, but Perot was hardly Left.

I'm guessing you don't want to have to cite Nader and McKinney's vote totals.

[blindpig]

39. Forget the electoral system, for the time being.

Organize, organize, organize. After ya can put millions on the street, shut it all down, then you're ready for the polls.

As for the organization, who knows what will emerge? Unions must be central, the UE is a fine example and it will be necessary for the rank & file of unions like the UAW to regain their leadership and put the scabs out of their houses.

[saltpoint]

40. This ardently pro-Labor Democrat agrees with you

about the vital participation of unions in American political life, although at this hour unions have the least impact in electoral outcomes than they have had for some decades.

Not that that has stopped the GOP from trying to eradicate them altogether, of course.

Community organizing toward progressive goals is a truly good thing, no matter how often Sarah Palin ridicules such efforts in St. Paul and elsewhere, but isn't that what the Green Party, to cite one example, has been doing in the U.S., and to little gain? The constituencies which form electoral majorities when they coalesce were not attracted to Cynthia McKinney or Ralph Nader or Barry Commoner in significant numbers, and that is a charitable assessment. A more accurate one would be that those constituencies, including Labor, ignored those campaigns in overwhelming numbers.

It isn't as if no one is aware of the economic dire straits or the suffering they visit upon the populace. That's not in dispute. Union members play a tough, smart game almost all of the time. They've lapsed in clarity and purpose a bit regarding Nixon vs. McGovern and later, when Ronald Reagan ascended to power, but their higher percentages have remained true to purpose and I completely agree with you that any recommitment of progressive values must (almost by definition) involve a huge and inspired pro-Labor component.

I'd like to see Labor generally align more closely with the Arts community, including film media, to tell the stories of working people in a way that used to be the norm and has now faded a bit. A revival of Studs Terkel's WORKING, for example, would be refreshing and would reach a lot of eyes and ears.

[blindpig]

42. Greens, McKinney, Commoner.......

That's what happens if ya don't have a strong organization before you make your challenge. The Greens I think are useless, their suburban middle class perspective is not something the working class is very interested in and besides they are quite happy with capitalism, just want it to be friendlier to the environment. Good luck on that.

When it comes to the Arts Michael Moore continues to be a Tribune of the working class, we need more like him.

[saltpoint]

43. If I may, it's the middle class being concentric with working

class values where the persuadable populace resides, and where the votes are, too.

If the argument runs that the middle class is shrinking, and threatened, and that corporatists wish to diminish it in size to all but eliminate its influence in elections, a focused organization such as you describe still needs that percentage and demographic -- the sheer numbers and the persuadable minds -- to gain traction.

Commoner and LaDonna Harris DID organize, but only within the limits imposed on them by the percentages of progressives to whom they appealed. This is the curse of arithmetic that Ralph Nader, an otherwise extremely perceptive and intelligent soul, ran up against. 'Critical mass' is under-used in U.S. political history because it has only very rarely occurred. When it has occurred, for instance in the turn of public opinion against the Vietnam War, it happened gradually, like a slowly rising flood stream, and not as a storm-the castle event. When Robert F. Kennedy and Eugene McCarthy spoke to audiences against the war, those audiences (of mostly younger Americans) agreed with their words but went home to families and neighborhoods who still supported Lyndon Johnson. Johnson himself was very slow to change his mind on his military leaders' assessment of the odds for SE Asia.

U.S. politics moves slowly, far slower than they do in France or Germany, for instance, and it's probably not an accident of fate that the Greens are more influensive and present in Europe than they are here.

I'm not arguing against the impulse to make much-desired reform in institutional government but only saying that the change may have to be cultural, rather than political, at least in the early going.

I think film-makers and painters and musicians can be the early angels of needed change.

[blindpig]

44. The kind of organizing I'm talking about takes years.

Not talking about organizing for an electoral campaign but rather organizing the working class to act in it's own interests, of which elections are only a part, almost an afterthought.

Cultural change will follow political and economic change. First we eat, then we talk about it.

[saltpoint]

45. OK. I do follow. I'm in the Arts-first end of the campgrounds

but it sounds like the same campground, definitely.

[opihimoimoi]

9. Another RW Meme attempting to denigrate the President...Thats all these guys do..Flame and Blame

Thats their mission....not for COUNTRY FIRST BUT FOR GOP FIRST

Fuck everything else

[JoseGaspar]

53. Got news for you, Penguin.

Your party loyalty has made you blind... and you are projecting.

Recessions are not just statistics, and neither are recoveries. They are flesh and blood, multiplied by the millions.

This ain't "Microsoft versus Linux".

[MadHound]

10. Nice succinct post, one that nails home the point that our economy is not recovering

And won't be in recovery for a long while, unless this administration alters the course it is on. What is needed is a massive job creation program, not this piddling fifty billion. Instead, we're continuing to see tax cuts and more tax cuts, the least effective form of economic stimulus going.

[Dr.Phool]

16. Fifty billion for planes, trains, and automobiles.

But $700 billion+ for investors, shysters, hedge funds, and banksters. Add to that, you've got to give tax cuts to these same crooks, so that they'll go along with the piddling $50 billion for infrastructure, when trillions are needed.

I think we see what the priorities are.

And as a bonus, we get Austen Goolsbee!

[fasttense]

11. Good summary of what the American economy is suffering right now.

He claims that based on 1980 methods of counting unemployment, the current unemployment rate is 22%.

The 2nd RepubliCON Great Depression, are we there yet? I certainly think we found a Herbert Hoover in President Obama to ensure its continuation.

I suspect in 2016 we may get an FDR to run....maybe.

Here's to surviving this depression

[Dr Morbius]

12. Wnna know what's holding up the recovery?

The corporations which want to run the world are sitting on about $1.6 trillion, and they're not investing right now because they want to ensure Republicans get back into office before they start reinvesting capital.

The stimulus was too small to actually cause a full recovery. Virtually every legitimate economist, left or right, concedes it prevented a real depression. Without doubt, it forestalled the losses of some two million jobs. Technically, the recession ended with a quarter of GDP growth, and we're on the way to our third consecutive quarter of GDP growth. But the money being made is not being reinvested, as is the normal case in a capitalist economy, and accordingly job growth has been stymied.

And for perhaps the last time, the unemployment figure is a trailing indicator. It's going to be one of the last numbers to improve if the economy does indeed really recover.

[jillan]

36. +1000000

[uponit7771]

13. This thread = A big Steaming stankin pile of fail.....

[opihimoimoi]

28. PLUS 998710292837813746651.09

[saltpoint]

14. Slate is great:

- - -

http://www.slate.com/id/2245048/

Excerpt:

David Leonhardt recently wrote in the New York Times: "Perhaps the best-known economic research firms are IHS Global Insight, Macroeconomic Advisers and Moody's Economy.com. They all estimate that the bill has added 1.6 million to 1.8 million jobs so far and that its ultimate impact will be roughly 2.5 million jobs."


- - -

Two point five million jobs.

Try making lunch for 2.5 million people and let me know if you think that's a quite a few or not.

Also I'm pretty sure if you went door to door at DU you'd find quite a number of us in favor of an economic turnaround, not least on sustainable energy initiatives and public transportation generally and high-speed rail corridors especially.

[saltpoint]

19. And that clueless dumbass, Bernie Sanders, thinks

the stimulus helped his state:

http://www.wcax.com/Global/story.asp?S=12965423

[saltpoint]

20. Plus, that demented fool Thom Hartmann thinks the

stimulus is working, too:

- - -

http://www.thomhartmann.com/forum/2010/08/stimulus-working-we-need-more

Excerpt:


The CBO is reporting that the Obama administration's comprehensive stimulus package boosted the GDP by up to 4.5 percent in the second quarter of 2010 and is responsible for putting to 3.3 million people to work. This CBO estimate shows that the stimulus effort may have prevented the sluggish U.S. economy from tanking all together between April and June. Economists surveyed by Reuters expect that revised numbers due out on Friday will show that the economy had sluggish growth of a 1.4 percent pace during that time period, a number that would be depression area negative and massively worse had the Obama administration not passed their stimulus measure last year.

- - -

[Name removed]

25. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[saltpoint]

30. Hey. Howdy.

We were out politickin' today. And we're goin' tomorrow, too.

For DEMOCRATS.

Hope you are thriving, ma'am.

:hi:

[Panaconda]

48. US Poverty Rate Expected to Post a Record Increase

US Poverty Rate Expected to Post a Record Increase
Overall number could reach 15%, demographers say

by Hope Yen

WASHINGTON - The number of people in the United States who are in poverty is on track for a record increase on President Obama's watch, with the ranks of working-age poor approaching 1960s levels that led to the national war on poverty.

Census figures for 2009 - the recession-ravaged first year of the Democrat's presidency - are to be released this week, and demographers expect grim findings.

It's unfortunate timing for Obama and his party just seven weeks before midterm elections in which control of Congress is at stake. The anticipated poverty rate increase - from 13.2 percent to about 15 percent - would be another blow to Democrats struggling to persuade voters to keep them in power.

"The most important antipoverty effort is growing the economy and making sure there are enough jobs out there,'' Obama said Friday at a White House news conference. He stressed his commitment to helping the poor achieve middle-class status and said, "If we can grow the economy faster and create more jobs, then everybody is swept up into that virtuous cycle.''

Interviews with six demographers who closely track poverty trends found wide consensus that 2009 figures are likely to show a significant rate increase to the range of 14.7 percent to 15 percent.

...

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2010/09/12/us_poverty_rate_expected_to_post_a_record_increase/

[saltpoint]

49. I'm pretty sure you know that Barack Obama is not

the cause of poverty in the Unitged States.

My guess is that Hope Yen knows it too.

"Poverty trends" cited have their roots in far more places than the Oval Office during any president's administration.

Come on, Panaconda. Play fair.

[Panaconda]

50. Of course that is the case

People should not be blaming Obama nor placing hopes on Obama. They should also not be simply blaming Bush/Cheney (though they are both war criminals).

The issues of war and poverty (intertwined) are more deeply rooted and systemic than any political office, even the highest in the land.

I'm simply pointing out the fact that there is no jobs recovery of any meaning, sorry "private sector" jobs don't count, and that the fact that various ways of disguising the crisis are being used for political purposes does not change the reality.

[bvar22]

24. Jobless Recovery?....DLC Mission Accomplished!

-- of the 495,000 private sector jobs created, 468,000 were low wage, low benefit part-time ones or temps;

-- at the same time, "hundreds of thousands of full-time permanent jobs have been eliminated;"

The "Centrist" DLC Democrats were correct when they stated that the American Worker can WILL compete with 3rd World Slave Labor.....
(all you have to do is let them get hungry enough!... Hahahahaha.)


Cheap Labor for the NEW Gilded Age ....Here we come!
Times were GOOD in the Old Gilded Age...if you were IN the top 1%.
Lets DO IT AGAIN!
Deregulation, and MORE Free Trade!!!!

[area51]

32. +1 n/t

[Starry Messenger]

33. +2

[unkachuck]

34. "...and recovery focused on Wall Street, not small business and job creation."

....it does seem like only the corporate interest has been served with gusto by the Party....

....we need a much smaller tent; nothing but corporate interest as far as the eye can see....

[Cognitive_Resonance]

35. Bunk. Everyone knew upfront recovery would take years. nt

[girl gone mad]

41. Well, when you throw 13 Trillion at Wall Street..

then basically give the rest of the country the shaft, of course it's going to take years.

[TBF]

54. LOL - yes in Potomac Falls I'm sure you can wait it out.

most are not as fortunate as you.

[maryf]

46. kick

Error: you can only recommend threads which were started in the past 24 hours

[JoseGaspar]

51. A short time ago, it was only Republicans who claimed "recovery"...

... while millions were unemployed. Heck, it was very right-wing Republicans, at that.

You would never see Gerald Ford, as an example, claiming a recovery while there was widespread pain. He would point to phony programs and feel that "pain".

This used to be the previous "third rail" of politics. Jerk-off Republicans talkin' shit about "Happy Days", were proof positive of a certain kind of politico who was unusually, impossibly out of touch. They were an embarrassment.

Not any more.

It's the fastest recovery, ever.
Things are getting better.
Just wait. Stop being impatient.
Why are you so negative.

Happy days are here again...

Meanwhile, Time magazine publishes a major tract declaring home ownership to be the cause of unemployment (it roots people in specific locales and doesn't allow them to move with the minimum wage jobs - which people can't take "because of their mortgage").

This has got to be one of the fastest downward spirals on record. It would make Romans dizzy.

[Safetykitten]

52. The "depression" word will be out there officially after the fall elections.

[TBF]

55. I predict it will be out there before the election -

and how is Obama going to respond to those charges? You can only blame the last administration so long .... Yes, republicans are greedy assholes who march other people's children off to war at the drop of a hat. Yes, they caused the depression. But what have you done, Mr. Obama, to make things better for folks since you took over 2 years ago? We campaigned for you, voted for you, and believed in you. Why are we still mired in depression and war?