"The Great Depression and its aftermath demonstrate that there is only one way back to full recovery: through more widely shared prosperity," writes Reich. " n the 1930s, the American economy was completely restructured. New Deal measures -- Social Security, a 40-hour work week with time-and-a-half overtime, unemployment insurance, the right to form unions and bargain collectively, the minimum wage -- leveled the playing field."

In the decades after World War II, legislation like the G.I. Bill, a vast expansion of public higher education and civil rights and voting rights laws further reduced economic inequality. Much of this was paid for with a 70 percent to 90 percent marginal income tax on the highest incomes. And as America's middle class shared more of the economy's gains, it was able to buy more of the goods and services the economy could provide. The result: rapid growth and more jobs.

By contrast, little has been done since 2008 to widen the circle of prosperity. Health-care reform is an important step forward but it's not nearly enough.

Reich also suggests "extending the earned income tax credit all the way up through the middle class, and paying for it with a tax on carbon. Or exempting the first $20,000 of income from payroll taxes and paying for it with a payroll tax on incomes over $250,000."

Some other points:

Early childhood education should be more widely available, paid for by a small 0.5 percent fee on all financial transactions. Public universities should be free; in return, graduates would then be required to pay back 10 percent of their first 10 years of full-time income.

Another step: workers who lose their jobs and have to settle for positions that pay less could qualify for "earnings insurance" that would pay half the salary difference for two years; such a program would probably prove less expensive than extended unemployment benefits.

"These measures would not enlarge the budget deficit because they would be paid for," he wites. "These measures would not enlarge the budget deficit because they would be paid for."

In the end:

"Policies that generate more widely shared prosperity lead to stronger and more sustainable economic growth -- and that's good for everyone. The rich are better off with a smaller percentage of a fast-growing economy than a larger share of an economy that's barely moving. That's the Labor Day lesson we learned decades ago; until we remember it again, we'll be stuck in the Great Recession."

"In the decades after World War II, legislation like the G.I. Bill, a vast expansion of public higher education and civil rights and voting rights laws further reduced economic inequality. Much of this was paid for with a 70 percent to 90 percent marginal income tax on the highest incomes. And as America's middle class shared more of the economy's gains, it was able to buy more of the goods and services the economy could provide. The result: rapid growth and more jobs."

Reich and Eisenhower, both of them are Socialists in the minds of the right.

Godalmighty. Comparing the economy of 60 years ago to the one today.

Here's a plan, first: if you're going to go back to the 1950's, we'll need first of all to engage in a world war that annihilates all the other factories on planet earth and kills 80 million foreign young men. Then the world has nowhere else to go but here, when it comes to buying stuff.

See, I knew it.
The stagnation in hiring has nothing to do with the uncertainty and yet unknown costs of the 0bama Administration and HCR.
It's because we need more direct redistribution of wealth to compel the rich to hire people and pay those people a higher wage...er, something like that.
Economic recovery and growth through higher taxation, right?
Am I catching on?

Am I catching on?
#5 | Posted by libertarian_gi

Does anyone care?
Anyone?
Anyone?

Well, sure.
You should care.
Winning more Americans to the Left way of thinking should be a high priority for "Progressives".
Especially now-a-days.

never never never never EVER trust anyone this short....EVER..
they are too busy making up for being midgets but without the ability to demand you call them 'little people'..

also anyone who is a prof at berkley....they cant teach there without passing the liberal litmus test...

BUT I do enjoy his tete e tetes with george will when they are on abc together....

never never never never EVER trust anyone this short....EVER..
they are too busy making up for being midgets but without the ability to demand you call them 'little people'..

#8 | Posted by afkabl2 at 2010-09-03 03:47 PM | Reply | Flag:

Drunk_Dwarf

What are the rich going to do when the poor and middle class have no more money to buy their goods and products?

This bears repeating:

The rich spend a much smaller proportion of their incomes than the rest of us. So when they get a disproportionate share of total income, the economy is robbed of the demand it needs to keep growing and creating jobs.

A good start would be this Nov voting for ANYONE with a (R) after their name.

#1 | Posted by Doc_Sarvis at 2010-09-03 09:03 AM | Reply | Flag:

Us Dwarves hafta stick together

A good start would be this Nov voting for ANYONE with a (R) after their name.
#11 | Posted by MSgt

It'll only be a change in labels.

hafta stick together
#12 | Posted by vernon

Vermin, you silly old perv, considering how often you project your fantasies about anal sex and jizz gurgling onto other posters while posting in church with your children in tow as the youngest bounces on the rolls of your fat lap, I believe I may safely say I speak for many on the DR when I request that you please refrain from using the term "stick together" in future.

That's a sticky subject, DOC. Better wear gloves. :-O

You're telling me!

Us Dwarves hafta stick together

#12 | Posted by vernon at

im sure you know im teasing
HOWEVER...randy newman may have gotten it right

"short people have got
short people have got NO reason to live"

#12 | Posted by vernon

I'm curious: How are you able to offer moronic comments on posts you've sworn you don't read?

I mean, I understand the moronic part, Vermin, that's a given. It's the knowledge of content about posts you claim you dn't deign to give any attention I find, well, slightly odd.

no longer have the purchasing power to buy the goods and services they produce as workers

We have become a service economy not producing anything. WTF is the little squirt talking about? We can't afford a quick trip through the drive-thru?

Reich also suggests "extending the earned income tax credit all the way up through the middle class, and paying for it with a tax on carbon. Or exempting the first $20,000 of income from payroll taxes and paying for it with a payroll tax on incomes over $250,000."

Translation; The non-workes and low-lifes will leach off of the producers. That is sure going to inspire me to work hard.

"In the decades after World War II, legislation like the G.I. Bill, a vast expansion of public higher education and civil rights and voting rights laws further reduced economic inequality.

#3 | Posted by danni

dear dan, we had industry here in the US after WWII. We exported finished goods to most of the world. Times have changed. We have very little industry and much of our exports are raw material, not finished goods. We add very little value to all the raw material we export to China.

Economic recovery and growth through higher taxation, right?
Am I catching on?

#5 | Posted by libertarian_gi

You got it but it seems to go over dok's head.

Reich has it right - until we fix wage inequality, we're up shit creek.

But if anyone's looking for Washington to fix it, they're engaging in more wishful thinking than John Hinckley did about Jodie Foster.

The one way to fix this is from the bottom, not the top. Consumers need to begin penalizing corporations that do not accept any responsibility to their communities. If Americans used the clout the Internet gives them, this horseshit would be over in fairly short order. They could be organizing boycotts of corporations who outsource, lay off to create phantom "profits," engage in "speedups" (ordering workers to increase production with no corresponding increase in pay) or limiting hours to levels that render employees ineligible for benefits. It has to be made in corporations' best interest to behave more responsibly before that will happen.

Consumers would have to accept a responsibility to pay more for goods produced onshore, and - with the exception of major purchases like houses and cars - to purchase what they can actually pay for (borrowing for minor purchases only gives power to banks), but Americans do have the power to reclaim their nation, if only they would use it.

I am not repeat not repeat NOT holding my breath.

"[C]onsumers no longer have the purchasing power to buy the goods and services they produce as workers; for some time now, their means haven't kept up with what the growing economy could and should have been able to provide them."

No shit. Thank you Mr. Obvious. Your boss was as much of the cause of this as anyone else.

Here's a plan, first: if you're going to go back to the 1950's, we'll need first of all to engage in a world war that annihilates all the other factories on planet earth and kills 80 million foreign young men. Then the world has nowhere else to go but here, when it comes to buying stuff.

#4 | POSTED BY RIGHTISRIGHT AT 2010-09-03 10:47 AM | REPLY | FLAG

Yep then we have to stop pretending that wars pay for themselves.

Also we need to return to the days when executives appreciated the value employees bring to the company.

A good start would be this Nov voting for ANYONE with a (R) after their name.

Yeah as if their policies of the past 30 years have not decimated our economy.

i agree 100%.

A good start would be this Nov voting for ANYONE with a (R) after their name.

Or a "D". Or has anyone else not noticed their failures in fixing this shit?

This is the way class warfare backfires, in the long run.

But, in order to pay decent wages domestic production must be restored. We can begin with reestablishing integrity in the financial, insurance and real estate industries....by fixing broken laws and stop domestic immigration abuse and offshoring.

"A good start would be this Nov voting for ANYONE with a (R) after their name."

"Or a "D". Or has anyone else not noticed their failures in fixing this shit?"

Or just vote for smart people with some ideas regardless of lettering?

Assuming that there are any, of course.

I'm gonna tell you what I plan on doing. Voting straight D on my ballot. Anna Eshoo is a lock to win anyways. NorCal voters would never put a corrupt rethug in power.

I'm gonna tell you what I plan on doing. Voting straight D on my ballot.

Well,if you're still in Texas,all I can say is "large deal"

Or just vote for smart people with some ideas regardless of lettering?

And there you have it, folks.

There isn't anybody worth a shit with an R next to their name.

You guys are just figuring that out now?

When was the last time anyone here got a raise at work?

Lets take a poll.... How much was the raise? 1 - 3%?

Corporate america has been screwing the workers for the last thirty years....

It's Called Six Sigma And it should be outlawed.

I was first a victim of this type of corporate greed as far back as 1990. After rolling out a multi-million dollar project, Ahead of time and way under budget, I was told that the company was hurting and that there would be no raises that year.

It's been the same BS year after year in every single company I have worked for. From Phone Company Sub Contractors to Biometric Computer system companies. Even IBM pulled the same shit... Laid off 50% of the subs and then increased their stock price... Told us they were hurting and that there would be a 10% pay cut... Then another 5%... Mean time the work load increases and they make a ton of money....

It's the Corporate American Scam.

So lets take a poll.... Who got a raise this year or last?

Who is getting screwed on the medical benefits? Who got their vacation days trimmed by half? How many of you are working through lunch at your desk and not getting paid for it?

I know your out there.....

Blabber are company uses it and it is a bitch. We are short-staffed and we work like dogs while they get richer and richer.

are=my

Also we need to return to the days when executives appreciated the value employees bring to the company.

#25 | Posted by 726

That was back in the day when companies were NOT run by the bean counters. They have destroyed more companies than all the depressions combined. Until business are run by the engineers and inventors again, nothing is going to change.

I agree with snipe,

...but I also think there is more to the picture. The country needs to face reality and create policies which promote wealth creation. Our problems are the consequence of an elite financial, insurance and real estate sector taking control of our Government and selling citizens down the river with Capital flight and labor arbitrage. Add to that debt peonage pretending to be wealth creation and you have a fuller description of the problems we face.

Consider the tee shirt emblazed with "Pray for Obama Psalm 109:8" -- citing a biblical verse widely considered "A Cry for Vengeance" that contains passages declaring "Let his days be few" and "Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow."

Making this anti-Obama tee shirt available in conservative circles creates and sustains jobs…employment for the people selling tee shirts to the anti-Obama entrepreneurs (hopefully shirts made in America), employment for the people employed printing that perverse ‘prayer' onto those tee shirts, employment from the marketing of those shirts and employment for the distributing of those tees to eager buyers.
Anti-Obama-ism also fuels expanding employment in the manufacture and sale of guns.

Last year Americans purchased 14-million guns according to gun industry figures. These purchases – stabilizing employment in gun related endeavors – continues the steady rise in gun sale rates triggered by Obama's November 2008 election that the NRA opposed with shrill warnings about Obama supposedly planning to enact stiff gun control measures.

Those 14-million guns sold last year in America represent more guns than the total combined number of soldiers in the world's three largest armies (China, the US and India) that have five-million-plus soldiers... less than half the number of guns purchased in America last year.

The pattern in privatizing schools, prisons, and military is clear. Lower wages for those that do the actual work and bigger bonuses for the CEOs and stockholders whether they perform or not. Stop privatizing public services. Stop legalized white collar crime.

Another source of funding for public service jobs is plugging corporate tax breaks and revising American jobs crushing Free Trade arrangements hailing from the Clinton presidency. Conservatives bashing Obama on America's record unemployment rate conveniently ignore the reality that policies initiated under President Reagan crippled US jobs by facilitating ‘outsourcing' to foreign countries.

Americans need paychecks not phony platitudes from well-heeled politicians and wealthy corporate leaders lecturing the unemployed about virtues of stoically accepting their descent into poverty.

Excerpted from Linn Washington Jr. @ Counterpunch

...but I also think there is more to the picture. The country needs to face reality and create policies which promote wealth creation. Our problems are the consequence of an elite financial, insurance and real estate sector taking control of our Government and selling citizens down the river with Capital flight and labor arbitrage. Add to that debt peonage pretending to be wealth creation and you have a fuller description of the problems we face.

#39 | Posted by nutcase

There are times we do agree on things and this is one of them.

yes, a restructuring, a complete ideological change.

capitalism has allowed the corporations to redline us and to collude, there is little real competition allowed. that is why noone can afford anything anymore, or so much so that too many live hand to mouth paycheck to paycheck.

sure anyone can have and watch TV, just get out those old rabbit ears.

even if where there is not actual collusion there is an intuitive collusion. it's too easy. the only solution is radical, socialistic, change.

@#39, it's not just those sectors, it's also communications, energy, etc. it's the system, the entire system.

...it's even the protective agencies... it's all corrupt to one degree or another, some massively, completely.

random anarchy, i.e., survival of the fittest is the wrong answer because, first, it is a immoral answer. this seems to be what the TP and GOP are preaching... they, most, just don't know it.

...they just don't know it while, apparently, vehemently, are against it. they got it completely, dangerously, via actual violence, bassackwards.

From the Ford model of paying enough to afford their product to the WalMart model of paying so little their workers can't afford anything but their product.

yav, wealth is created by adding value to a product. Ford took a pile of raw material and made a car. WTF do we produce here in the US now? Over 70% of our economy is the service sector now. We change the sheets in the beds and fry chicken.

Sniper, last I checked we're still number 1 in manufacturing. We're still number 1 in GDP if you break the EU into nations. What's been concerning are the trends. We reverse them or we adapt.

capitalism has allowed the corporations to redline us and to collude, there is little real competition allowed.
#42 | Posted by ichiro at 2010-09-06 03:06 PM

That's largely because the anti-trust laws in this country haven't been enforced since St. Ronnie took office. True competition would fix a lot of these problems. Prices, for example. You can only hike prices so much before a competitor undercuts you. If there are no competitors, however...

Reich and Eisenhower, both of them are Socialists in the minds of the right.

#3 | POSTED BY DANNI

The right's counter to socialism is the "free market capitalism" which is code for being a wage slave AKA "serf". They have their "freedumb" though. Go patriot act.

Sniper, last I checked we're still number 1 in manufacturing. We're still number 1 in GDP if you break the EU into nations. What's been concerning are the trends. We reverse them or we adapt.

#48 | Posted by YAV

We are a 70% SERVICE economy!!!

WTF does gdp have to do with the health of the country? It is all being eaten up by the government!!! THAT is the problem.

A good start would be this Nov voting for ANYONE with a (R) after their name.

Yeah as if their policies of the past 30 years have not decimated our economy.

#26 | Posted by 726 at 2010-09-

YEAAAAAAAAAH BUDDY,....take a look at the gdp and get back to us...
OH NEVER MIND...let me repeat the bullshit mantra for you

its bush's fault....

BL2, was the economy under reagan or nixon that great? What is the repub message - hey we're not those guys we're the other guys? You are only anti. You have no positive features.

havent had a chance to read the stuff from paul ryan..but saying there is no gop plan is incorrect.

I am waiting to see what thier plan is if barry and dems ACTUALLY come out with extending tax cuts....should be interesting.....

most of it though is pretty simplt

spend less
tax less

"Consumers no longer have the purchasing power to buy the goods and services they produce as workers; for some time now, their means haven't kept up with what the growing economy could and should have been able to provide them."

...their means haven't kept up with what the growing economy could and should have been able to provide them ???

Their means have never met what they wanted.

In all honesty, if consumers bought what they needed, and only what they needed, they would have a lot of money in the bank.

Instead, they use credit to buy all that they don't need, i.e. WANT.
With debt, they have no savings.

Economy crashes, no savings, nothing but debt, and it is everyone else's fault and they need a bailout.

There was an article some years ago about a family of 5 (I think) living on an income of 20-25k in Texas. AND, they were saving money month to month.

It had to do with meeting needs and delaying want.

For the economy to survive, people will need to save and meet need over want. This will crash the excess but many saving their money will survive - until they savings are distributed to the less fortunate (those that didn't save).

AND....

#46 Yav> From the Ford model of paying enough to afford their product to the WalMart model of paying so little their workers can't afford anything but their product.

Some people say a man is made outta mud
A poor man's made outta muscle and blood
Muscle and blood and skin and bones
A mind that's a-weak and a back that's strong

You load sixteen tons, what do you get
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store

I am sick of these gov and banker dipshits tinkering with the economy. Mr. Reich - do you know why the richest 1% got so much richer? There are 2 easy things to point to:

1.) Asshat bankers like yourself stealing from the ordinary investors on wall street (thereby making the 1% fabulously wealthy) meanwhile working with companies to offshore US jobs. Mr. Reich - you had a direct hand in both so you should look yourself and the mirror and admit that you are a greedy son of a bitch that wrecked this country.

2.) The % of people that simply accept poverty as a way of life has skyrocketed. This is mainly due to the huge increases in government money to the poor which encourages them to have more children. In the 1950's, you probably aren't going to pop out baby #6 with baby daddy #6 if you are already living in poverty because society would shun you and you would FUCKING STARVE because you can't afford to feed your children. Meanwhile, the productive members of society are decreasing family size. This is not so much a 'trickle up' of wealth, as it is an explosion of poor people due to the birth rates differential. I promise you - if you need Jerry Springer to tell you who your 'baby daddy' is, you are much more likely to be poor your entire life than if you grow up with a mom and dad at home.

Reich lost all credibility with me when he gave his racist rant against 'white construction workers' getting any part of the stimulus spending. This guy is a racist puke and should be run out of government before he causes any more damage. Take your race baiting, poverty inducing experiment back to Israel and let them 'benefit' for awhile, we need a break here in the US.

The war on the middle class is over.

We lost.

#59 | Posted by donnerboy at 2010-09-07 03:05 PM

Pray for a spark that lights a tremendous civil war. This is the only way to defeat the evil republican empire. All liberals must join forces to topple their regime.

#60 Jacka$$> Pray for a spark that lights a tremendous civil war.

You are as daft as the nuts on the right that talk about armed revolution! Maybe you should go to the public library and read about the aftermath of the last civil war and the devastation that resulted.

>This is the only way to defeat the evil republican empire.

In case you didn't know, the occupant of the White House has a D after his name, and so do a whole lot of folks in Congress. You also might want to repeat that old phrase (which is still true): "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." (George Santayana)

AKAT I am aware there would be losses. Potentially in the millions. I am ok with that because their side would endure tremendous losses too. The problem with the last civil war was the country was reunited. I want the end game to be permanent separation.

I want the end game to be permanent separation.

#62 | Posted by jackass

So, you libs get everything east of the mississippi and get the hell out of the west. Don't forget to blow all the bridges when the last lib crosses the river.

The problem with civil war is that the rich still existed.

Notice all the world wars yet there are still the rich - particularily bankers?

It won't end there.