In 2013, realization of the growing inequality and narrowing opportunity that is America almost crowded out the Kardashians, Honey Boo-Boo and Duck Dynasty from the national "conversation."
Eminences sought to explain. Among them was Larry Summers, who wrote that stagnation might be the "new normal." That takes some brass, as his former boss Bill Clinton would say, considering that Summers and his mentor, Bob Rubin, did so much to create this mess.
Tyler Cowen, the libertarian economist It Guy of the moment, writes in his book Average is Over and in a Time magazine essay that the middle class is pretty much toast. A radical hollowing out will leave some at the top and most in the bottom (which doesn't mean they can't be happy).
With some worthy exceptions (Brad DeLong, Paul Krugman, et al), our thinkers tell us we are powerless against the forces that have been reshaping America.
This is nonsense.
Raise taxes on the richest Americans, back to around 70 percent, and close loopholes. Impose taxes on carbon and Wall Street transactions. Begin a robust antitrust regimen that not only stops job-killing, anti-competitive mergers but breaks up such highly concentrated industries as banking, airlines, fossil fuels, broadcasting, etc.
Change the tax code so that it penalizes destructive economic behavior (e.g. tax-free mergers, stratospheric executive compensation and gambling in the derivatives markets). Enact a 21st century Glass Steagall that applies to the shadow banking system as well.
Outlaw the influence-peddling in D.C. (i.e. "lobbying"). Pass a constitutional amendment if necessary to roll back Citizens United, a first step to getting corporate and oligarch money out of politics.
Make it easier to unionize through card check. Make union-busting corporations think twice by moving laws and regulations protecting unions and workers more into the balance where they once stood.
Create an American version of Chinese mercantilism. Time for us to stop being the world punching bag thanks to bad trade deals. For most of the history of the republic, tariffs were an essential part of policy. Republicans wanted higher duties, Democrats lower. But the idea of no tariffs is a relatively new conceit, one that has helped destroy the blue-collar middle class. Time to reverse course. Let the WTO argue about it for decades.
We need to get out of the empire business, especially playing into China's hands by escalating the chances of war in Asia (and one we might lose). The recent budget "compromise" kept intact defense spending that we can't afford and arguably encourages programs that will fail on the battlefield.
"Military Keynesianism" would be better spent on, say, building and operating high-speed trains and other nation-building at home.
Embark on heavy spending for infrastructure (and I don't mean "roads and bridges"), research and education that will more than repay the investment. We need Moon Shots in clean energy, high-speed trains and most of all addressing climate change. We need to renew our space program, too.
So for all those who read my work and say, "I feel so depressed," take heart. None of this is irreversible. It is not an Act of God. Most of it is a result of 1) The 40-year project by Big Business to take control of policy, ably chronicled by Hedrick Smith in his book, Who Stole the American Dream, and 2) Unsustainable living arrangements.
Oops. There's a 3)...bad political choices. Majorities of the middle class spending the past 33 years voting against their self interest. What's the Matter With Kansas and all the states of the New Confederacy. As "Soleri" can explain more eloquently that I, we are in a death spiral where middle-class anxiety feeds into bad political choices — seasoned, of course, by racial hatred and the culture wars.
As this Pew tracking poll shows, those identifying themselves as "conservative" consistently beats those who say they are "liberals." When this translates to elections and the media, the results are the ongoing consolidation of the oligarchs' power. And national suicide.
Yes, Americans as a whole are dumber, less engaged in the public square. But a consolidated, cowardly, venal and peddle-to-the-duhs-and-ignos media matters, too. The combination of muckrakers and an engaged citizenry led to most of the progressive advances of American history. So did the willingness of workers to shed blood.
Now, we got gadgets to keep us distracted. We got the national freak show and people tweeting stupid things. So there's no American equivalent of the protests in Kiev to demand that Congress address the national crisis of unemployment or myriad other crises.
Or to push for adequate stimulus to make up for the massive hole in demand caused by the swindle-caused Great Recession. Government spending, adjusted for inflation, is far below where it stood at this point in the aftermath of previous modern recessions.
The elites are doing fine. Better than ever. Corporate profits and cash on hand is at a record; so is the stock market. The ratio of CEO compensation to an average worker was 273-to-1 in 2012, vs. around 24-to-1 in 1965. Real median hourly wage growth is lower than in 2000.
Indeed, austerity and reaction rule the day. The tea party House feels emboldened to cut food stamps and unemployment assistance. The "Party of Lincoln" has proved that it will happily, self-righteously, destroy the country to make that (Black) Man in the White House a failure.
Mr. Obama is struggling with the ACA, even though most people don't realize that it was originally cooked up by the uber-conservative Heritage Foundation and implemented at the state level by the Republican Party's most recent presidential candidate.
ACA is "market based." Much of the foul-ups are a result of private contractors — the holy private sector — and the rest because of antiquated federal systems, inadequate spending and hatred of gub'ment workers that keeps away talent. Your tax cuts at work.
Moronistan deserves no better. An astonishing Gallup Poll recently showed that a 72 percent of respondents said "big government" is a bigger threat to the nation's future than big business or big (sic) labor.
I fear this result is not because of NSA spying.
So even though all of our challenges can be addressed and many fixed outright, nothing will be done as long as so many people are bamboozled. So long as these people enjoy cleaner air and water, safe food, infrastructure, schools, Social Security, Medicare, cheap stuff from Asia traveling on sea lanes made safe by the U.S. Navy, etc. etc. Taking all this for granted while they inveigh against "big government."
Things may have to get much worse before they get better.
Happy holidays.
Nothing -- nothing -- will change until people start raising holy hell and, yes, are willing to shed their own blood in the name of calling out the dog & pony show that has become American life. Leaders of both political parties act like spokespersons for the corporatocracy, dangling just enough "economic recovery" to keep the masses quiet. Progressives, desperate for signs of caring by anyone in power, fall all over themselves to praise a religious leader's photo ops, not bothering to discern PR from policy. Wingnuts hang onto what little they still possess like a two-year-old clutching the last cookie from the jar. Their worship of the likes of a backwoods reality TV star speaks volumes of the rampant distrust Americans hold toward each other. In the meantime, the number of people who can't afford to contribute to the economy via discretionary spending grows. I wonder how big it has to be before critical mass occurs.
Posted by: Diane D'Angelo | December 23, 2013 at 02:48 PM
Let me recount a story as told by Samuel Gompers. Gompers was hiding in a stairwell from Pinkerton 'detectives' who had once again attacked a union line with truncheons and guns. As he watched what was happening to his men he resolved to turn the tables on the oligarchs.
Years before he had been approached by organized crime who had stated that they would get the oligarchs off labors' back in return for a piece of the action. They explained to Gompers that they knew how to handle these guys (the oligarchs) and the leaders of the labor movement did not.
Gompers declined the offer at that time, but resolved to himself years later while in the stairwell, that he would take them up on their offer -- which he did.
And that, friends and neighbors, is how organized crime got a foothold in organized labor.
Posted by: headless lucy | December 23, 2013 at 03:33 PM
In addition to more protectionism (yes, I said the dreaded P word), the race-to-the-bottom war between the states vis a vis generous tax incentives need to be halted. It is blowing a hole in state budgets. Intel, whose former CEO Craig Barrett likes to wring his hands over Arizona's stingy education spending, got a sales factor tax break that was worth $100 million.
Posted by: Donna Gratehouse | December 23, 2013 at 03:39 PM
PR over policy is dead on, Diane. Just look at all the swooning over Chris Christie. He's following the Arpaio playbook to the letter. You can be a total dick to the "undesirables" so long as you tug at heartstrings every so often and come across as an Everyman.
Posted by: Donna Gratehouse | December 23, 2013 at 05:17 PM
That bit about Gompers was interesting, headless lucy. I did a quick Google but nothing obvious came up (except about the early organizers' resistance to the syndicate) - would love to read more on that.
It peaked my interest as well because I (hanging my head in shame) had a very very negative view of unions from my childhood on up to about the mid-80's.
In my defense... I grew up in New Jersey and the paternal side of my family were Sicilian. I overheard a lot of braggadocio - some of it surely embellished - that didn't sit well with me. "The Sopranos" may be fiction, but it'll give you the idea.
It is ironic that unions grew to derive their power from the underground oligarchy.
I evolved into deciding that unionization is a necessary evil to counteract the oligarchic pressures in a Capitalist paradigm. But that's just a bad system adding complexity to try to fine tune itself.
Goodbye Capitalism... goodbye the need for unions (which have to hew to the imperatives of capitalism in order to remain engaged - which was the Achilles' Heel of Communist states in a Capitalist world economy.)
Posted by: Petro | December 23, 2013 at 05:44 PM
Petro -- The story is from a biography that I read about Gompers. It was part of a college paper (NAU)that I wrote on the labor movement in the U.S. That was in 1973 and I have tried to find that source again, but have not been able to. Wish I'd saved the paper.
It's an actual anecdote from the book. I'll try to find it again.
Posted by: headless lucy | December 23, 2013 at 10:02 PM
Where we stand: They're led once again by Washington state, which will continue to have the highest state minimum wage in the nation, at $9.32 per hour.
Posted by: cal Lash | December 23, 2013 at 10:38 PM
How is it that a failed 30-year experiment to unleash America's animal spirits and thereby bring about heaven on Earth continues to fail but the faith in the experiment itself only grows? Yes, the rich are richer, which is nice. But what about the rest of us? Do we matter, or were we only meant to be the chorus in an epic adventure involving our betters? Social mobility is at an all-time low. Income inequality is at levels not seen since 1929. And this is how it is meant to be. Because Zeus loves those who help themselves. Or something spiritual like that.
Horatio Alger stories bewitch us because the pornography of material excess dovetails with the political methodology enabling it. We got Powerball dreams to go along with our Big Mac appetites. Maybe you're supposed to float an IPO on the basis of an idea dreamed up after too many Bud Lites? Why not? What's evil is liberals taxing your Powerball winnings so low-lifes can continue to live the good life on food stamps.
The American right doesn't do policy anymore because that would suggest there's actually something government can do in lieu of just cutting taxes to zero and ushering in the Randian End Times. The social compact is revealed by a see-through fig leaf: bend over, grab your knees, and wait for an infusion of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus was born in a manger with granite countertops and a 12-man hot tub. He came to Earth so we wouldn't be damned for eternity by long DMV lines and affirmative action. He was a non-union carpenter who turned fishes into the Gadarene Swine who worked at Goldman Sachs. You don't have to believe any of this. But if you do, your life will be much richer for it. Or you can move to a FEMA camp in socialist Europe.
Posted by: soleri | December 24, 2013 at 11:51 AM
For some reason, when I talk to college educated, conservative, economic-theory types, they get really agitated when I insist that their supply side nonsense is, in reality, just a zero sum game.
Posted by: headless lucy | December 24, 2013 at 12:53 PM
another great day on the Mountain.
I saw John Galts name on a Park Bathroom wall this morning?
Soleri:"The social compact is revealed by a see-through fig leaf: bend over, grab your knees, and wait for an infusion of the Holy Spirit."
Or as Elmer Gantry would say, I rammed the fear of god into her behind the altar.
Posted by: cal Lash | December 24, 2013 at 01:19 PM
Actually, soleri, that is exactly it. It is also an embarrassingly accurate description of how I spent my greedhead years. Me and my fellow dreamers were rummaging for that golden ring anywhere.
Hell, one of our fantasies was... oh, never mind. I've soiled myself enough already for now.
Posted by: Petro | December 24, 2013 at 05:41 PM
I keep thinking that the price of fuel is so cheap that things that are made in China are shipped half way around the world, marked up by 50% and still sold for less than we can manufacture here. I think that may have something to do with protectionism and maybe even organized crime – I’m not sure.
cal,
I myself was out on a mountain today too. It was so clear that I thought I saw you out on your patio chair somewhere in the Sonoran desert with your phantom dog. It was a beautiful day.
Posted by: Suzanne | December 25, 2013 at 07:33 PM
When all boats rise, they're still the same boats, and you had better not have them tied to tightly to the pier.
Posted by: headless lucy | December 26, 2013 at 07:53 AM
It's a question of percentages, hence it's a zero sum game, which is why you have to keep an eye on the percentages.
To make a simple comparison, the economy is like a game of checkers, not like boats rising in a high tide. Even if, for instance, the checkerboard gets bigger, there are still the same amount of checkers. Therefore, whoever has the most checkers is taking checkers from the other player, and may well win.
Starting another checkers game is what the right calls "redistribution" -- and is, in Wingnutopia, an invalid thing.
Posted by: headless lucy | December 26, 2013 at 08:00 AM
Suzanne I hope I didnt shock you with my winter sun bathing, nude, in the great Sonoran desert, whats left of it.
Posted by: cal Lash | December 26, 2013 at 08:50 AM
No amount of change in entrenched economic policy can turn this juggernaut or overcome the limits to growth. Only the abandonment of growth -- that is, the overthrow of Western-style Capitalism, which is clearly not going to happen -- could give us any chance for survival. Technology has postponed the day of reckoning, but there's abundant evidence we have tipped beyond the tipping points toward the cliff at the end of the line. Melting ice caps and methane plumes, melting Fukushima coriums and radiation plumes, fires, floods, drought, superstorms, dying marine life, and more -- all signal an ELE, that is an abrupt end of the human experiment, if not all life on earth. Enjoy what we can while it lasts, but be kind to those in need.
Posted by: Gaylord | December 26, 2013 at 11:17 AM
Well said Gaylord!!
Posted by: cal Lash | December 26, 2013 at 12:42 PM
cal,
that was you out sunbathing neked in the desert??
there's a joke in there somewheres, but dang if I can think of it.
Posted by: AzReb | December 26, 2013 at 03:44 PM
Gaylord -- "...that is, the overthrow of Western-style Capitalism, which is clearly not going to happen...."
Do you have any documentation for that statement, or is it just your personal opinion? Revolutions often have predictable causes but unforeseeable sparks and paths.
For example, it is also clear that the world banking system will implode upon itself in the foreseeable future, but whether it will be bailed out again is not so certain.
Since control of capital is what makes capitalism capitalism, it's repeated self destruction and artificial re-inflation through political fiat after self-destruction, is in no way or form "...clearly not going to {not happen}."
Posted by: headless lucy | December 26, 2013 at 04:56 PM
That was me Reb.
Sun bathing neked while reading my copy of Adbuster. No joke.
Posted by: cal Lash | December 26, 2013 at 07:15 PM
Moronistan Report: "Opening soon: Kentucky's first ninja star throwing range"
That just made my day.
In lieu of Rogue's heathenish "Happy Holidays", a belated Merry Christmas!
If the world turns more into a system of 'winner-takes-all' capitalism then one would think that redistribution schemes will become more important to keep society stable (as they have been historically). Somehow most cultists (e.g. Singularity) at the altar of innovation think more redistribution won't be that necessary and the average boat will be floating happily along. In a roundabout way they may be right because of those new gizmos like drones and total surveillance that come just in time to keep the lid on the unhappy masses. IMO innovation won't enable us to solve all our problems (it's already game over for climate change) and let us become immortal man-machine creatures. Instead it will turn on itself and if we're lucky we get back to a middle of the 20th century lifestyle.
Meanwhile:
http://earlywarn.blogspot.de/2010/05/singularity-climate-change-peak-oil.html
Posted by: AWinter | December 26, 2013 at 08:07 PM
I'm sunbathing and all is lost. I read it in a book somewhere.
Posted by: headless lucy | December 27, 2013 at 08:08 AM
Boy! You sure hit the nail on the head this time, headless!
Well said!
Posted by: dorky dorkman | December 27, 2013 at 08:09 AM
Its Robert Redfords last movie.
Posted by: cal Lash | December 27, 2013 at 08:28 AM
Where we stand:water:http://www.usatoday.com/story/weather/2013/12/26/california-drought-water-shortage-wildfires/4192275/
Posted by: cal Lash | December 27, 2013 at 11:45 AM
"Majorities of the middle class spending the past 33 years voting against their self interest."
Everyone single one of you who votes Democrat or Republican is voting against your self-interest. The two-party system and their sycophants and talking windbags have polarized this country into stagnation. Every decision that is made is not because it's the right thing to do, but because it's the right thing to do politically (either to their advantage, their opponent's disadvantage, or some combination thereof). That is the sole motivator, and if we are to ever wrest control of our country back we need to completely dismantle the two-party system, remove all the roadblocks to legitimate third-party success and educate the public on the ramifications of all decisions.
Posted by: Boo-urns | January 08, 2014 at 12:18 PM