Once upon a time, the U.S. economy produced a seemingly unending supply of good paying jobs that enabled American workers to buy homes, raise families and live the American Dream. But now all of that has changed. Over the past several decades, there have been some fundamental shifts in our economy that have steadily eroded the value of the American worker. Thanks to incredible advances in robotics, computers and other fields of technology, many economic activities that once required a tremendous amount of manpower now require very little. Nothing is going to reverse those technological advances, so the jobs that have been lost as a result are now gone forever. But there are millions of other good jobs that we have lost that we could have done something about. Over the past couple of decades, millions upon millions of American jobs have been shipped overseas. Thanks to a whole host of “free trade” agreements that our politicians promised would be very good for our economy, U.S. workers have now been merged into a global labor pool with hundreds of millions of workers on the other side of the globe that live in countries where it is legal to pay slave labor wages. In such a situation, it is only natural for big corporations to shift production from high wage areas to low wage areas. Unemployment in America has skyrocketed and so have corporate profits. Today, corporate profits as a percentage of U.S. GDP are at an all-time high, but wages as a percentage of U.S. GDP are near an all-time low. The lack of decent jobs in the United States is one of the primary reasons why we are in an economic crisis that never seems to end, and things are not going to turn around any time soon. We truly are witnessing the slow, tortuous death of the American worker, and politicians from both political parties are just standing aside and letting it happen. (Read More...)
Jobs
The Inflation Rate Is A Lie Too
Can we believe any of the economic numbers that the government is feeding us these days? Most of the focus recently has been on the bizarre jobs report that the government released last Friday, but the truth is that the inflation rate is a lie too. In fact, the way that the government calculates inflation has changed more than 20 times since 1978. The government is constantly looking for ways that it can make inflation appear to be even lower. According to John Williams of shadowstats.com, if inflation was measured the same way that it was back in 1990, the inflation rate would be about 5 percent right now. If inflation was measured the same way that it was back in 1980, the inflation rate would be about 9 percent right now. But instead, we are expected to believe that the inflation rate is hovering around 2 percent. Well, anyone that goes to the supermarket or fills up their vehicle with gasoline knows that prices are going up a lot faster than that. Just about everything that we buy on a regular basis is steadily becoming more expensive, and so most Americans are not buying it when government officials tell us that there is barely any inflation right now. (Read More...)
10 Shocking Quotes About What QE3 Is Going To Do To America
Ready or not, QE3 is here, and the long-term effects of this reckless money printing by the Federal Reserve are going to be absolutely nightmarish. The Federal Reserve is hoping that buying $40 billion worth of mortgage-backed securities per month will spur more lending and more economic activity. But that didn’t happen with either QE1 or QE2. Both times the banks just sat on most of the extra money. As I pointed out the other day, U.S. banks are already sitting on $1.6 trillion in excess reserves. So will pumping them up with more cash suddenly make them decide to start lending? Of course not. In addition, QE3 is not likely to produce many additional jobs. As I showed in a previous article, the employment level did not jump up as a result of either QE1 or QE2. So why will this time be different? But what did happen under both QE1 and QE2 is that a lot of the money ended up pumping up the financial markets. So once again we should see stock prices go up (at least in the short-term) and commodities such as gold, silver, food and oil should also rise. But that also means that average American families will be paying more for the basic necessities that they buy on a regular basis. The most dangerous aspect of QE3, however, is what it is going to do to the U.S. dollar. Most of the rest of the world uses the U.S. dollar to conduct international trade, and by choosing to recklessly print money Ben Bernanke is severely damaging international confidence in our currency. If at some point the rest of the world rejects the dollar and no longer wants to use it as a reserve currency we are going to be facing a crisis unlike anything we have ever seen before. The real debate about QE3 should not be about whether or not it will help the economy a little bit in the short-term. Rather, everyone should be talking about the long-term implications and about how QE3 is going to accelerate the destruction of the dollar. (Read More...)
Only 24.6 Percent Of All Jobs In The United States Are Good Jobs
Do you want to know why it seems like good jobs are very rare in the United States today? It is because good jobs are very rare in the United States today. According to a paper that was just released by the Center for Economic and Policy Research, only 24.6 percent of all American jobs qualified as “good jobs” in 2010. Over the past several decades, there has been increasing pressure on corporations to reduce expenses and increase corporate profits. One of the biggest expenses that any corporation faces is labor. Large corporations all over the globe are in an endless race to gain a competitive advantage by pushing labor costs as low as possible. Sometimes this is done by using technology. Computers, automation, robotics and other forms of technology have eliminated millions of jobs in the United States and those jobs are never coming back. Millions of other jobs have been eliminated by offshoring. In our globalized economy, American workers have been merged into one giant labor pool with everyone else. That makes it very tempting for big corporations to move jobs from areas where workers are very expensive (such as the United States) to areas of the world where it is legal to pay slave labor wages. When big corporations do this, corporate profits go up, but the number of good jobs in the United States goes down. As a result, there is increased competition for the jobs that remain in the United States and this drives down wages. Meanwhile, the cost of living just keeps going up. So millions of American families have fallen into poverty in recent years, and millions of others have gone deep into debt in an attempt to survive. This dynamic is absolutely shredding the middle class in the United States. (Read More...)
12 Signs That The Next Recession In The United States Has Already Begun
Is the U.S. economy in a recession right now? Has the next recession in the United States already begun? Unfortunately, there are a lot of economic numbers that are pointing in that direction. U.S. retail sales have fallen for three months in a row, U.S. manufacturing activity is contracting and there are numerous indications that the labor market is getting weaker. Of course there are some economists that will argue that we never even left the last recession. For example, the percentage of working age Americans with jobs fell from above 63 percent in 2007 to under 59 percent during the last recession. Since the end of the last recession, that number has not gotten back above 59 percent. In fact, it has been below 59 percent for 34 months in a row. In addition, we have continued to see poverty and government dependence steadily rise during this “economic recovery”. Since Barack Obama became president, the number of Americans living in poverty has risen by 6 million and the number of Americans on food stamps has risen by 14 million. So it would be really hard to argue with anyone that wants to say that the last recession never really ended. However, the latest economic numbers indicate that things are about to get even worse for the U.S. economy, and that is not good news at all. (Read More...)
The Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves: 10 Ways That Obama Is Killing Jobs In America
Have you ever heard the old saying “the beatings will continue until morale improves”? According to Wikipedia, that phrase is often “used sarcastically to indicate the counterproductive nature of such punishment or excessive control over subordinates such as staff in the workplace or children living at home.” Well, apparently Barack Obama believes that the more punishment that he inflicts on the U.S. economy the more we will like him. What other explanation is there for his insane economic policies? The truth is that Barack Obama is killing jobs in America. His regulations are absolutely crippling our businesses, he has been heavily promoting new job killing “free trade” agreements, Obamacare has the potential to be the most job killing law of all time, and he is running up debt that will crush job creation in this country for ages to come. Obama will likely go down as the most anti-business president in U.S. history. He has presided over the worst “recovery” from a recession in post-World War II history, and under his leadership a whole host of economic statistics have steadily gotten worse. The percentage of working age Americans that have jobs has not bounced back since the end of the last recession, and now the next major economic crisis is rapidly approaching. (Read More...)
Are They Insane? 58 Percent Of Americans Believe Economic Conditions In The United States Will Be Good A Year From Now
There is nothing wrong with being optimistic, but there is something wrong with having blind faith that things are going to get better when all of the evidence is screaming at you that things are going to get worse. According to a brand new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll, 71 percent of all Americans consider economic conditions in the United States to be poor right now, but an astounding 58 percent of them believe that economic conditions in the United States will be good a year from now. So what can account for this? Are they insane? Are they hopelessly optimistic? Do they not want to believe the facts that are staring them right in the face? Well, a lot of it probably has to do with the upcoming election. Most Republicans are convinced that things will be “better” somehow if Romney wins in November. Most Democrats are convinced that things will “continue to improve” if Obama wins in November. But the truth is that the economy has been declining steadily in recent years no matter which party has been in power. Today, the American Dream is out of reach for huge numbers of formerly middle class families. Millions of jobs continue to leave the United States, poverty is absolutely exploding and our nation is absolutely drowning in debt. Sadly, nothing is being done to reverse the long-term economic trends that are destroying us. So, a year from now things are not going to be any better. In fact, many analysts are absolutely convinced that things are going to be a whole lot worse by then. (Read More...)
35 Shocking Statistics That Prove That Things Have Gotten Worse In America
Most Americans know that things used to be much better in the United States, but they don’t have the facts and the figures to back that belief up. Well, after reading the shocking statistics in this article nobody should be left with any doubt that things have gotten worse in America. There are less jobs, incomes are down, home values have plummeted, poverty is up, consumer debt is way up, dependence of the government has skyrocketed and government debt is totally out of control. Sadly, it hasn’t really mattered which political party has had control over the White House. Things have gotten worse under Obama, they got worse under Bush, and they got worse under Clinton. We are in the midst of a horrific long-term economic decline and the American people desperately need to wake up. (Read More...)