Prosperity? Hardly.

[LuckyTheDog]

I’ll concede that on some technical points, there is some “good news” to point to in the economy. But no honest observer would call what we have now prosperity. This isn’t the 90s, when you could just feel it in the air – when employers fought over workers, when people raised themselves up and the future looked bright.

In fact, to some extent, the “good news” we have seen lately merely highlights how out-of-date our traditional measures of economic strength or weakness have become.

The “official” unemployment rate seems strikingly good – on paper. But who can deny that we have far too many citizens who cannot find decent jobs or, in many cases, any jobs at all? We see it everywhere we look. In many cases, people are under-employed or have dropped out of the labor market altogether. That allows us to take them out of the “unemployed” statistics, but that bit of statistical slight of hand doesn’t help them feed their families.

The GOP cites “good data” on housing. But, out there in the real world, houses languish on the market and/or get marked down all over the Midwest.

Corporate profits “seem good.” But many of the countries big employers –the ones that pay the high wages the middle class depends on – are laying people off. Companies that hire low-wage workers are the ones hiring. Unfortunately, a lot of that hiring is taking place in India and China.

Bankruptcies, both corporate and personal, are an epidemic. More than 40 million Americans don’t have health insurance.

Then there is the federal budget. As in the 80s, the supply-side magic failed to emerge. And we have proved once again that a government that slashes taxes but not spending goes into the red very fast and very far.

We have an odd situation here. We have a rising tide that is not lifting all boats. Too many are stuck behind cofferdams that block their access to the rising waters of economic opportunity.

So, all you right-wing partisans can crow all you want about how good the economy is “on points.” But until ordinary people get to share in it, the statistics ring hollow. A technically “good economy” and prosperity – a condition in which people can live their dreams because the brass ring is within their grasp – are very, very different things.

[Buns_of_Fire]

1. We have a "rising tide" that is lifting those who could afford boats

while the rest of us are securely tied to concrete blocks.

Excellent post, BTW... :thumbsup: