MSN Money: "By all indications, this is a economic recovery only if you're rich."

[Better Believe It]

It's a recovery only if you're rich
The economy is looking up. But the latest numbers show ever more clearly why, if you're on the lower rungs, things haven't improved. Conditions are now changing, though.
By Anthony Mirhaydari, MSN Money
March 2, 2011

Where you sit in the socioeconomic strata largely determines how you view the economy and how much you've benefited from the recovery so far. If you are well-educated and relatively well-to-do, and you have a sizable portfolio of financial assets, chances are you're feeling pretty good right now. You're probably working. You've enjoyed the stock market's doubling from its bear-market low. And you've probably even managed to convince your boss to give you a raise.

If you are less fortunate, with fewer assets and no college degree, and you are more reliant on that day-to-day paycheck, things have hardly improved at all. And now, with the costs of fuel and food on the rise, things have taken a turn for the worse.

It's worth remembering that rising inequality was largely responsible for getting us into this mess in the first place. Over the last 10 years, in the wake of the dot-com blowup, Americans used cheap credit and rising home equity to mask the fact that in inflation-adjusted terms, their wages weren't growing. There were social consequences, too: People were forced to work longer and harder, and embrace the two-income earner lifestyle to keep up.

After the Great Recession, there was hope that these problems would fade. But they haven't. Now, our two-speed recovery could be sowing the seeds of the next crisis. But instead of financial turmoil, the next iteration will likely play out in the political sphere, as it has in places like Greece, Egypt and even Wisconsin as new pressures are placed on the working class.


Labor's share of the economic pie has dropped to its lowest levels since records started after World War II. This is a global trend that is affecting all of the advanced economies. But it's hitting the United States particularly hard.

Please red the full article at:

http://money.msn.com/how-to-invest/its-a-recovery-only-if-youre-rich-mirhaydari.aspx

[Canuckistanian]

1. The "jobless recovery" is a sham and illusion

Until real employment picks up, America is still in a Depression, the worst since Hoover.

[RainDog]

2. the problem is not just for those without a college degree

the attempt to cut costs by cutting funding for libraries, for instance, has put many people with masters degrees out of work over the last few years.

someone I know is working two part time jobs with a masters degree - and those contain no benefits.

others I know left the field and have taken lower-paying jobs b/c they have benefits - one person I know is working as an administrative asst. in a uni. division - with a masters degree - after having worked in various academic libraries around the world as a librarian.

someone else I know has applied for various jobs for which she is overqualified merely to obtain a job with health benefits and has not been able to get so much as an interview. (I've experienced that too, in fact.)

these are people with current skills - with advanced degrees - so, it's really misleading to claim this recovery is only a problem for those who are not college educated. these are people who have been willing to relocate in order to take a job, too.

[RandomKoolzip]

3. I work as a reference librarian outside of Chicago...

The library district I now work for took over the building I work in from another district. That previous district was paying its FTE employees pretty well.

When the new district took over, they fired the old staff and hired new PART-TIME employees, including me, at hourly wages that were dramatically lower than what the previous staff was making.

I had just left a job as a cook at a restaurant; I actualy took a pay cut to work in librarianship because it's somethimg I've really wanted to do for a long time (cooking wasn't my career choice). But it just goes to show that even a Master's is no guarantee of a job with a living wage.

Tax the fucking rich.

[RainDog]

4. jobs posted for librarians

on the site for the national asso. for librarians nearly always specify that someone has to have obtained a masters degree in LS/IS from an accredited institution.

so, are you talking about a job as a library asst. or as a librarian? The two aren't the same.

if you're saying they fired the librarians and hired people w/o training... that's interesting.

[RandomKoolzip]

6. Yep. Are you a librarian too?

I'm not sure abou everyone on the staff, but in the adult service department, yes, they hired non-MLIS employees to replace the MLS-holding FTE employees they'd fired. I'm working toward my MLIS right now and they hired me in the knowledge that I was untrained (though I'd been working as an assistant librarian at the college I was going to for undergrad). Even so, My title is "Librarian." There's a woman on my staff whose title is "Specialist;" that title is usually designated for library employees without MLISs; I really lucked out - it must have been a good resume, or, if you notice, when positions ask for people with MLISs, they usually qualify it with "MLIS or equivalent experience..." and I had a few years' experience at an academic library under my belt.

I'm lucky and extremely grateful to have a job, but a bit queasy that it had to come at the expense of someone with a Master's and many more years of experience. It's unfair to them.

Of course the trend now in public libraries is to fire all paid workers and replace them with volunteers. Apparently there's a big push for that in the UK right now as well. I hope that doesn't happen here - public libraries still perform a necessary societal function, even if they're in a flux state between "information repositories" and "community centers." Plus, untrained and unpaid volunteers cannot handle cataloging (all those metadata languages!), acquisitions, database licensing negotiation, understanding the principles behind AACR2, yadda yada yada....sorry, I'm tired, it's been a long day and I'm probably babbling....

[RainDog]

8. yes.

in addition, I was a Phi Beta Kappa undergraduate, won awards for my research (one from the entire arts and science division at a major university), was nominated for a Rhodes Scholarship, worked as a librarian for 3 years, have extensive experiencing (with great reviews and awards) for supervising others, learned two other languages, learned html, css, xhml, worked on some major projects as a student (archival work), attended the top-ranked MLIS school in the nation for scholarly research... and

fuck it.

just fuck it all to hell.

[snappyturtle]

5. You're so right! I know a number of people who have degrees

and can't get work in their fields and have taken low wage jobs, much lower. Several left their college education off their resumes after months of being in the rolls of the unemployed....then they got work! It's third world like when people are scrambling for the bottom of the barrel.

[Newest Reality]

7. +1

Thanks for pointing that out.