September 2008

More People fired, the rest working themselves to the bone

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Check out this analysis. Productivity soars while unemployment claims jump. AP on the numbers:

The Labor Department reported that new applications for unemployment insurance rose to a seasonally adjusted 444,000, up 15,000 from the previous week. Economists had expected claims to drop to 420,000.
The increase indicates that the slowing economy is taking its toll on the job market. Many economists consider claims above 400,000 to be a sign of a weak economy. Initial claims stood at 320,000 in the same week last year.

Similarly from the BLS stats Productivity jumped to 4.3% annually.

This means that more Americans were fired yet the ones remaining worked their asses off, even more than they already are.

Give me your White, scared and wealthy

Tonight the Republicans nominated their candidate for President.  We heard them all speak.  They pulled no punches, that is for sure.  Yet it isn't what they said that intrigued me, it's what they didn't say!

 

The Republican Convention in one second.

One could summarize the whole three days with these lines:

 

  1. John McCain served in Vietnam, got shot down, and became a POW
  2. Terrorists could still strike us, watch out!
  3. The Democrats will raise all your taxes, and you will lose your livelihoods.
  4. Energy independence will come at the tip of a an oil rig drill.
  5. Cutting spending on social programs equals freedom.
  6. Liberals love to kill babies.
  7. Oh...and John McCain was a POW.

So many concerns yet no real answers

RNC - Trade Through the Spin Cycle

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con artistOne of the Republican leadership's best tricks is to claim a bad policy is somehow good.    They say a lie with a complete straight face.    Not a blink, not even a nervous tick.    Nope.    No acknowledgment on how the United States is plain losing on bad trade deals.

Make no mistake, Republicans want more corporate written, NAFTA based, glorified outsourcing agreements.   Nary a statistic will be mentioned.  One is presented with the lie.  Bad is now good and upside down is right side up.

 

From the GOP platform:

GOP VP - Palin on Economics & Trade

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Boy o boy. Oh howdy. Is it tough to find accurate information on Governor Sarah Palin, the GOP VP nominee.

Frankly when all one can find about the candidate for Vice President of the United States are thousands and thousands of posts about babies and daughters and daughters with babies and babies with daughters of babies....millions of nasty bits...gathering to bytes, cloggin' up those Internet tubes......well, the world is clearly sexist as hell.

I'm sorry that's the bottom line. You've got a candidate for the 2nd highest public office in the United States and the blogs read like Jerry Springer.

For all you other people out there, all 2 of you, interested in finding out actual policy positions I managed to dig out a few references:

First, Project Vote Smart I'd say is the most credible.

To the left but has a few economic positions:

Goolsbee - Obama's Economic Adviser - It's All in Your Head

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Guess what folks, there is a new economy!    I'll bet you didn't know that just as much as stock evaluations and profit didn't matter in the dot con era.

 

It's All in Your Head

At the helm of the Obama plan is the Chicago School of Economics, heavily promoting behavioral economics..

Aha, if we all just made the right choices, none of this bad shit would be happening right?  A new article, Obama's Geek Economist, in the MIT Technology Review, gives some foreboding hints at what we could expect in economic policy for an Obama administration.  We're being told (sold), we need a new economist for the new economy.

As I recall our economy is a very old story and it's called labor arbitrage.

Obama subscribes to a distinctive set of economic theories developed at the university [of Chicago], and to a corresponding set of policy prescription

Seniors Going Broke - New Bankruptcy Study

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While we are inundated with TV commercials promoting some illusion of early retirement and traveling in a six figure, gas guzzling RV for months at a time with the grand kids...reality is something completely different.

A new report(pdf) shows the opposite is happening. Americans are filing bankruptcy in droves and the most affected are older people.

Titled Generations of Struggle this study is by the Consumer Bankruptcy Project, sponsored by the AARP. Elizabeth Warren is one of the authors.

 

 

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