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Recovery for Wall Street and Wealthy, Austerity for Workers and Poor
The plain fact is that corporate profits are the only area of the US economy to recover since 2009. Any other claim is a lie
The so-called economic "recovery" since mid-2009 was chiefly hype, a veneer of good news to disguise and minimise the awful underlying economic realities. The few (large corporations and the rich) who bear much of the responsibility for the crisis made sure that the government they finance used massive amounts of public money to support a recovery for them. The mass of the population was excluded from the government-financed recovery for the few. We now have the summary official statistics to expose this grotesque injustice.
In economics, as in other fields, pictures and graphs are sometimes worth more than a thousand words. So it is with a summary graph prepared recently by a group of economists at Northeastern University in Boston. Their short report (pdf) exposes the basic lie in claims by politicians, media spokespersons, business leaders and others that the US economy has been in an economic "recovery" since early 2009.
What did recover in the US, partly or wholly, were only corporate profits (especially those of banks) and the stock markets. The report's chart 14 shows three vertical bars indicating the size of profit and stock recoveries from the second quarter of 2009 through the first quarter of 2011.
Chart 14, from The 'Jobless and Wageless' Recovery from the Great Recession of 2007-2009 (pdf). Source: Center for Labor Market Studies, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts; May 2011
What did not recover by the first quarter of 2011 – and has not recovered to this day – is shown by the five remaining bars in the chart. Those tiny bars show what happened to payrolls and to employment. From the depths of the crisis in early 2009 until now, there has been absolutely no recovery whatsoever in wages or jobs for US workers.
The crisis of the capitalist system in the US that began in 2007 plunged millions into acute economic pain and suffering. The "recovery" that began in early 2009 benefited only the minority that was most responsible for the crisis: banks, large corporations and the rich who own the bulk of stocks. That so-called recovery never "trickled down" to the US majority: working people dependent on jobs and wages.
The countless claims of "recovery" as if it were a general economic event spread across the entire US economy were, and are, lies. They hide the tragic truth of ongoing economic crisis for the many.
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Show AllAnd it will be ever thus as long as corporations control all branches of the U.S. government, as well as state and local governments, through the insanely corrupt campaign funding and lobbying system we have allowed to evolve here.
Corporations are inherently anti-democratic and anti-humane, required by law only to maximize profits for their shareholders, NOT to care for people, animals, or the environment.
As long as the sociopathic and parasitic economic/political system called corporate capitalism is allowed to exist, with its control of politicians and justices (i.e. the Citizens United and Wal-Mart decisions), there is no hope of a sustainable, democratic/equitable future.
Politicians no longer represent us nor listen to us.
It is up to us to use non-violent civil disobedience to stop the Corporate Murder Machine: general strikes, boycotts, walk-outs, flashmobs, sit-down strikes, divestment, infiltration of shareholder meetings, graffiti, sit-ins, mock ad campaigns, product sticker campaigns, hacking web sites, and other tactics.
All over this beautiful planet corporations are killing people and other species for profit. It's time to oppose them and disrupt their murderous business as usual.
The plain fact is that corporate profits are the only area of the US economy to recover since 2009. Any other claim is a lie
It is not surprising, since virtually all of the bailout money went to wallstreet and not mainstreet. Nor is it surprising that they lie--they always lie.
The only thing that surprises me nowadays is how calm the American people are while their children are being sold out and their futures are being ravaged. I thought Americans were made of sterner stuff, but we are sheep being led to slaughter by the Judas-goat known as Obama.
"The only thing that surprises me nowadays is how calm the American people are [...]"--downtownwalker
perhaps more like stumbling about in a confused state of dibelief than calm?
You think people will hold still for this forever? They never have.
Unfortunately, most Americans have been drugged with antidepressants in tap water, poisoned into early-onset Alzheimer's Disease by "food-like substances", emotionally and physically battered by ten years of war, doped by propaganda disguised as news talk on all media, hypnotized by soaring prices, and paralyzed by hopelessness in what has become essentially an end-game with only one possible winner: the ultra-rich.
It is my hope that the ultra-rich enjoy living on a decimated, poisonous, toxic, carcinogenic mud-ball. I hope their flotillas sink, their space program fizzles, and their blood boils (or freezes, as the case may be). I hope that all the millionaires become the slaves of the billionaires. I hope that Trump has to shine Buffett's shoes.
I hope they enjoy every blood-stained moment of their self-inflicted Karma. I hope they rot in their hermetically sealed life-modules. Pure Darwinism. Pure "survival of the fattest". Pure, sweet PAYBACK!
They already appear pretty miserable to me.
Meanwhile, maybe a few of us with active brains and true grit, a few of us who don't want to live forever, will meet up and make trouble. At this point, I doubt that there will be many of us. I see this ending badly.
But it's been such a hard, painful, long road for my family and I. Maybe I'm more than a bit jaded. I sincerely hope I'm wrong about this.
I just can't see an organized revolution. I can't even get my band back together!
jjw1138
I think your comments are incisively well said. However I must disagree when you state that most Americans are "emotionally and physically battered by ten years of war". Unfortunately I believe that it is quite the opposite as most Americans are not even dimly aware that the United States military is bombing the hell out of the Afghans and the Pakistanis and that Made in USA canisters had been killing protesters in Egypt. The problem is that the major media in this country are not, for the most part, unlike during the Vietnam conflict, presenting those images to an uninformed American public. And one suspects that even if they knew what is going on they would not care all that much given the fact that those bombs are not being dropped on this country but rather on innocent people who live thousands of miles away from the United States.
One suspects that most Americans probably take comfort in that old adage:
Out of sight, out of mind
That's been said about every issue from slavery, women's rights, civil rights, the Vietnam war, etc.. Eventually the citizens of this nation step up.
It's not that most are stupid, most are overworked and overwhelmed. By necessity they get their news from what is now today a single voiced monstrosity. But when you consider that today's families have to have two incomes to barely survive, it's easier to understand how they don't have the time to seek multiple sources and digest things that have been made complicated for the explicit purpose of excluding or exploiting them.
"What did recover in the US, partly or wholly, were only corporate profits (especially those of banks) and the stock markets.... The countless claims of "recovery" as if it were a general economic event spread across the entire US economy were, and are, lies. They hide the tragic truth of ongoing economic crisis for the many."
_______________
Wolff is correct to point out that Amerika's corporate mass-media selects, prioritizes, and spins economic news and information that's "fit to broadcast".
The other day, I wrote about the "business report" teaser at the top of the hour on the local AM "newsradio" station that breathlessly announces the state of the Amerikan stock and bond markets.
It struck me that these mundane informational blurbs are more than just alerts to businesspersons and the "investor class". It's as if the "markets" are now considered latter-day canaries in the coal mine of the US economy.
So over the past several days, we learn that the markets have been faltering and declining because investors are worried and anxious about the Debt Crisis. The suspense is killing them!
It's a foregone conclusion that regardless of the ruinious and catastrophic consequences to ordinary unprivileged Amerikan citizens that will result from the virtually certain "eleventh-hour settlement" or "resolution" of the crisis, the markets will soar when it takes effect.
I guarantee that a palpable note of relief, satisfaction, and even triumph will sound in the voice of the newsradio business reporter when he reports that "the Dow is 'roaring back' and has gained X hundred points this morning as investors react to last night's resolution of the debt crisis...".
The "markets" are sound and resonant! The canary is chirping again! Never you mind what your betters are up to in the black, mysterious caverns of the mine itself. Don't worry about the ominous thuds, crunches, and distant explosions rising from its foundations, or the trembles, vibrations, and cracks underfoot.
As far as the power elite is concerned, Amerikans need only keep their eyes and ears on that canary.
It used to be the damsel lashed to the tracks by the swarthy man in black. But the audience knew the hero on the blonde horse was en route.
Now it's the ebb and flow of the market that's calculated to anesthetize us, mind, body and soul. And, hey, just WHERE are the good guys to the rescue?
It's not even entertaining. We've been robbed!
(On more levels than we have so far been able to comprehend.)
The "trickle down" meme was a deliberate deception, meant to cover for what was really a "suck up" economy.
Representative government is purposely light years behind today's technology. Like using a hamster wheel to power a train. Its all about keeping the oligarchy's boot on our necks.
Direct democracy
Wolff is a collegue of Michael Hudson. He has his own website that catelogs his essays and videos, which like Hudson's is well worth the time to explore, http://www.rdwolff.com/
Unlike so many, he is unafraid to call a lie a lie. But his truth will never be published by the US Propaganda System, which has totally supported the lie.
When the Corp. media talk about "the recovery" they mean the one that counts or the one that helps the rich and their Corps. The rest of us don't count so a recovery analysis doesn't even consider us anymore.
Richard Wolff presents a very astute analysis of the problem. Unfortunately he has no such clear suggestion for any answer to the problems he has identified. To suggest that corporate and wealthy tax rates need to be raised to former levels of the 40's and 50's and 60's (as he did on Democracy Now on 07/28/11) is meaningless without explaining how any consensus for accomplishing such a tactic could be achieved. To suggest that the society "rethink capitalism" (as he also did on Democracy Now on 07/28/11) makes about as much sense as those opposing the Vietnam war singing "Give Peace a Chance" or some drugged out hippie chanting "All You Need Is Love".
It took the extremist capitalists 57 years of determined and disciplined subversion of FDR's New Deal and the American political process (along with investments totaling in the multiple tens of millions of dollars) before they elected the first in a series of amiable-dunce-clones to reside in the White House. There exists no hard evidence of any such determination or resources (financial or mass followings) capable of countering such an ongoing and continual effort on the part of the elitist totalitarians in our midst.
Defining the problem as a "war" and the solution as either a new "war" (revolution) or reverting to a system which has already proven itself to be a failure (a new constitutional convention) is repeating the folly of the past. Revolutions never accomplishes anything except laying the foundation for the next revolution. Doing the same thing all over again (a new constitutional convention) and expecting any different results is a definition of insanity. Those truths are the rock and hard place between which both we in the US and the rest of the world's peoples find ourselves.
Waldo B.
Perhaps you had watched a different Democracy Now! than the one that my wife and I had just seen because the one that we had watched [which was recorded on 07-28-11] had Wolff saying very clearly that before any change can come about in the United States there must first be a debate about this inefficient and less than egalitarian system that rules over this country and that system, of course, is capitalism. Until and unless that debate is ever allowed to take place then no change of any meaningful consequence will ever occur in this country.
You have proven my point without intending to do so. Talk and debate is what Boehner, Reed, and Obama and their cohorts are doing. Talk and debate for most of the mass of people who compose the culture and citizenry of the U.S. in all socio-economic strata consists of whatever the popular media (including increasingly the Internet) tell them it is.
Wolff has cogently observed that capitalism has proven itself totally ineffective and inefficient as a system of economics. What neither he nor most of the common dreamers dare say or even think is that democracy has similarly proven itself incompetent as a workable system of governance.
The recognition of the failure of democracy as a system of governance as well as capitalism as a system of economic organization are the keys that unlock the prisons enslaving the thoughts of both the left and the right. Such "blasphemies of thought" are beyond the capacity of most of the citizenry of the U.S. and hence the present situation worsens.
Waldo B.
Perhaps you had read my comments too swiftly. You state that our political leaders are conducting talks and debate in this country. That is true but they are certainly not addressing what I had mentioned and that is any criticism of what may be the fundamental problem in this country and that is capitalism and how it effects the poor and working class in this country. The last thing that the Republicans and the Democrats will ever do is to criticize the system which enabled them to rise to power.
This then leads into your second fallacy in which you bizarrely claim that Professor Wolff has never "dare sa[id] or even [thought] ... that democracy has similarly proven itself incompetent as a working system of governance." Your criticism of Wolff simply does not make any logical sense given the fact that he has taught and examined Marxian thought for over forty years in the United States. I suggest that you may wish to view this outstanding video [called Capitalism Hits the Fan] of Wolff presenting a lecture in a classroom in Mass. as it clearly demonstrates that he, contrary to what you believe, does indeed offer an alternative to the present inefficient form of government that is so endemic here in the United States.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7382297202053077236
I have seen Richard Wolff's lecture at U Mass Amherst (the link you gave) as well as subsequent versions of the same talk given at The New School and Brown University (personally I preferred the Brown talk for its greater length and later date). The idea of replacing the two party system with multiple parties still assumes that they will function in a democratic system of governance.
As a final reminder, let me restate my concluding statement (which was the real point of my response to you--not any attack on the person of Richard Wolff):
"The recognition of the failure of democracy as a system of governance as well as capitalism as a system of economic organization are the keys that unlock the prisons enslaving the thoughts of both the left and the right. Such "blasphemies of thought" are beyond the capacity of most of the citizenry of the U.S. and hence the present situation worsens."
Over and out--
Constitution Convention and write a new constitution, or break up the country into several republics!
Intuition tells me that the latter is inevitable. They need not be geographic separate republics, or even if they are geographic, they need not be contiguous.
The internet has made almost infinite possibilities feasible.
If that were to come to pass in this day and age. I think those doing the rewriting would end up being those that now control our government. I prefer to stick with the one we have. I am guessing those of you calling for a new constitution would be happy with one that looks like that "god awful" health care bill.
Corporations don't vote. Banks don't vote. Stocks don't vote. Hedge funds don't vote. Oil corporations don't vote. Yet as this article points out the only things that Obama has done since being elected is represent the interests of non voters.
Presidents are elected to represent the people who voted for them. Obama said not a word when Rahm called Obama's voters and supporters fucking retards. WTF!!!
How can anyone even vote for the lesser of two evils who brings them zero, zilch and nada and does not one thing for those that they are contractually bound to support by law?
How can we the people be so ignorant to do nothing when the alternative to getting zero is to vote in a republican who actually attacks the health safety and welfare of the people by killing unions, taking away the social safety net and negating the freedom and independence of our mothers and sisters, daughters and wives.
We all have learned in school about our city on the hill democracy and yet it is without any doubt what so ever that our president represents not one thing in three years as turtle in chief that will benefit or raise the people from their declining prosperity. How can this be? How can we not follow Thomas Jefferson and his version of the declaration of independence? How can we do nothing when our system of representative democracy has so failed us.
Do Americans not see this? Do they not care? Are they so stupid they they do not understand that on this path we and our families will surely suffer? Where is our pride and honor as a people? How can we look daily into the eyes of our wives, children, parents and fellow Americans and do nothing as Obama and his corporate buddies pack us full of shit?
What ever happened to no taxation without representation?
Yes, and isn't it interesting that a large segment of elected officials who are financed by these corporate criminals are now busy seeing to it that as many as real people who can vote in opposition to their agenda are in actuality disenfranchised?
On a subject a bit closer to home...Why is it that one is constantly prompted by the wonderful new Common Dreams software to "Log On" in order to comment and then, when one does so, we reach a page that tells us:
You are not authorized to access this page.
What a waste of time! Is there a programmer in the house?
yes, strange. this works for me. i arrive at the home page, ignore the promp to log-in and select an article to read. when i've finished reading i see "you must be logged in to comment" and flip back to home page and voila! "welcome back hummingbird!" appears at the top. or you can just perform the flip acrobatics before reading.
Every site has it's quirks. You learn to live with them. I am sure as CD grows it will exorcise some of it's demons.
Many Americans, by design or accident, have been dumbed down to the point that they shouldn't be allowed to handle sharp objects.
Just as bad, many have been molded into being as ferocious as a new-born kitty. You'll see many of these types making comments on blogs and news sites. If you reply to their comment with a straight-forward answer, they'll reply in a hysterical manner, accusing you of 'flaming' them and being a mean, hateful bully when your only sin was that you went straight to your point and didn't dance around the subject and sugar-coat for mass consumption.
At one time, someone who was known as a 'straight-talker' was considered a valuable friend, as they would tell you the truth and not fill your head full of hot air and BS.
Not anymore, now some consider the straight-talkers as some kind of deranged nut, who should be locked away in some loony bin.
Between this and the untold number of lies still protecting the FALSE FLAG/INSIDE JOB of 9/11, this country's future is getting extremely grim.
P.S. Wasn't the day that the Navy SEALS murdered some Pakistani patsy about the same time the NORTH AMERICAN TERRORIST ORGANIZATION, AKA NATO, bombed and killed Gaddafi's grandkids?
Great distraction.
Washington is too corrupt to change. It's deceptions, loyalties, entanglements, and lies become conflated and when accelerated by change become unintelligable and unmanageable. Nothing good will come from Washington. Hope lies elsewhere. The foundations for the New America are now being laid by decentralized independent and diverse efforts at the local level. We must suffer the collapse of the old before giving birth to the new. In my opinion, the collapse and rebirth events are much closer that people understand. Try to steady and ready yourselves as much as possible.
Where is karl marx when you need him? Lost in translation. These tea baggers are determined to create a depression and Obama is helping them.
I wonder how many credit card defaults will start next month as interest rates rise? And old folks and disabled people starve to death without SS payments? I may have to kill and eat my dog?
Welcome to banana republic America.
You might as well kill and eat your dog, you won't be able to afford to feed him.
The essential crisis within capitalism today is stagnation within the economy. This has resulted from the successes the capitalist class has had over the last thirty years in the class struggle. Working class real wages have not risen at all over this time period, resulting in consumers being forced to borrow to purchase the goods it produces. The debt crisis - not only the national one, but at all levels of society has resulted in a capitalist crisis where accumulated capital can no longer be reinvested in productive growth. The capitalists are forced to move their capital into the financial sector which just fuels a deeper crisis of stagnation. In short, capitalism as an economic system has arrived at a stage in its development (as Marx warned would happen), where it can no longer operate and overcome its contradictions. Any effort made to overcome this crisis just pushes it into a new deeper crisis. Capitalism has outlived its usefulness and can not move forward. It must be replaced by socialism. The capitalists know that we've reached this point. The working class, is starting, finally, to also realize this.
The chart says it all. Cut social security and medicare and watch all but the first three plummet below the line.
"The only thing that surprises me nowadays is how calm the American people are".....
Don't underestimate the population "kontrol" through anti-depressant prescriptions, which are now considerable. Their effect: a sort of lobotomization which delivers pliable, "calm" citizens to the ruling corporatocracy and its servant-politicians.
@ ED
And it will be ever thus as long as corporations control all branches of the U.S. government, as well as state and local governments, through the insanely corrupt campaign funding and lobbying system we have allowed to evolve here.
i agree! i so tire of reading political forums filled with suggestions for congress members such as "place limits on corporate campaign funds!" or "enact term limits!" or simply believing that obama should don his super-cape and single handedly clear off hardened layers of corruption which has been accumulating from long before white man "discovered" the new world. the last sentence from the bit i cited reminds me of "people get the government we deserve." those few of us who try our damnedest to adhere to the underlying principles for a successful democratic-republic, made the wisest decisions possible in managing our personal finances may feel justified in saying, "NOT MY FAULT!" the fact remains all of us, "the good, the bad and the ugly" get a share in the repercussions from mass insanity!
@ Waldo Binney
Jul 29 2011 - 8:13pm
Richard Wolff presents a very astute analysis of the problem. Unfortunately he has no such clear suggestion for any answer to the problems he has identified.,
you made some excellent points in your posts, but we cannot expect any one person to provide the solutions. we common-dreamers learn to understand the nature of the beast from a variety of well-informed people. i learned a lot from wolff's democracy now! guest shot, but when one grabs a delicious bit of food for thought to share on a political db, how disappointing to see that few bother to nibble at the bait. "economics! to hard for us--leave it to the experts! school's out forever!" most seem more comfortable exchanging the prepackaged talking points and platitudes from the republicratic ouroboros. i think the frustrated, frightened man/woman in the streets feels too intellectually intimidated to do his own thinking. i don't know, how but step one is just what wolff does, share what you know and watch the knowledge grow. the more informed people kicking ideas back and forth toward problem solving the better chance of finding answers that serve the common good.
@ Erroll
Perhaps you had watched a different Democracy Now! than the one that my wife and I had just seen because the one that we had watched [which was recorded on 07-28-11] had Wolff saying very clearly that before any change can come about in the United States there must first be a debate about this inefficient and less than egalitarian system that rules over this country and that system, of course, is capitalism. Until and unless that debate is ever allowed to take place then no change of any meaningful consequence will ever occur in this country..,
yeah, somehow too many of the hoi-polloi humbly accept our place as groundlings booing and hissing our heroes and villains as if we have no comprable stake in the economy, the ecology or the moral collapse...,
@ Nietzsche
Jul 29 2011 - 9:21pm
Intuition tells me that the latter is inevitable. They need not be geographic separate republics, or even if they are geographic, they need not be contiguous.
The internet has made almost infinite possibilities feasible. ..,
my intuition's been telling me the same. not only from the farcical and divisive right vs, left politics, but climate change may force communities to work together, help one another at the local grassroots level. floods, fires and droughts all bring unique problems to be addressed and neither the wizards of wall street nor our self-branded "leaders" have the all-encompassing power, wisdom or will to tinkle down the answers. one positive may be that today's kids won't be so tempted to put unabashed "faith" in the government. i hadn't thought of cyber-communities, but that's a good way to bring more into the discussion who suspect that taking "personal responsibility" means more than stepping into the voting booth ever couple of years to throw darts in the dark. how do we find such places?..,
@ Greg Bacon
Jul 30 2011 - 3:49am
You'll see many of these types making comments on blogs and news sites. If you reply to their comment with a straight-forward answer, they'll reply in a hysterical manner, accusing you of 'flaming' them and being a mean, hateful bully when your only sin was that you went straight to your point and didn't dance around the subject and sugar-coat for mass consumption...,
AMEN! frustrating as hell, huh? i guess all we "grown-ups" can do is to try to keep a level head in the midst of chaos, hope the idea of informed discussions catches on one by one and every once in a while "give 'em hell, harry!" guess they need a shot of endorphins or they wouldn't ask for it. their clueless insults miss the mark but tell what insecurities fester beneath the anger and false bravado. be firm but gentle with these who suffer from damaged self-image.
I keep wondering:"Where are the charts and graphs?" Statistics presented in easy to understand pictures ARE worth a thousand words and then some. I've got to get a printer then go looking. The when/who/why of our $14T national debt, unspun in a chart, will never be seen on the MSM. Neither will the priceless little graph displayed in this article. I'm sorry trees but I'll need hard copies.
I say screw the market. This isn't a market. It has become a gambling den of corrupt capitalism at its worse. It has permeated every thing in our lives. Everything revolves around it. Enough. The hell with it. Back to basics of enjoying life, playing and making every moment a precious moment of living. To hell with the market, the rat race, and the money grubbing.
It's organized crime simply put.
Hard to enjoy life, when one doesn't have a home, health care or job. But the Dow gained on the anouncement!