The Beggar's Waltz (REVISITED)

While watching Bill Moyers Journal (click here) the week immediately following my blog about growing wealth disparities in this nation, Bill referenced an OECD press conference that came out on October 21st addressing world wide poverty and wealth inequality. (Full press release here and the US specific data here) It was so weird, like a sad official confirmation of my concerns about inequality... and only a week after I mentioned the same subject! But, what is the OECD? To be honest, I had no clue at that time, but the OECD is the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development, currently consistening of THIRTY countries, regularly giving cumulative data and suggestions about improving the quality of life around the world.

The United States had the 3rd highest inequality level and poverty rate only behind Mexico and Turkey. Some people did not believe my claim that one third of Americans (not in 1928, but in 2008!) make less than $15,000 per year. Thats one out of every three Americans. Musical chairs anyone? That is scary to me. Per the OECD findings, the bottom 10% of Americans earn $5,800/yr... which was 20% lower than the average earning of the bottom 10% in all other OECD nations. Wealth disparities have jumped 20% since the 80's. [Good ole' trickle down Reaganomics] Redistribution of wealth in America by the government is the second lowest of all OECD nations, behind only South Korea. Because our middle class leaders like Joe the Plumber are waaaaaaaaaaay too smart to fall for that liberal government intervention nonsense called "socialism." You can check the "click here" links for more of the (depressing?) news. Go free market capitalism!

The question is... where do we go from here. The current economic crisis has been compared to the stock market collapse of 1929, and there are some similarities and differences. First, lets point out that, at its peak... in the early 30's unemployment reached 25%. So, the severity of today is far lower. The most interesting similarity that I've noticed is that both financial collapses were preceeded by periods of great economic inequality. (I shall not point out which party was in control during both of these periods.) Those periods being... the 1910's and 20's, and our current period from the 1970's until today. The less evenly the wealth is distributed, the more the working class of America is forced to rely on credit. We've all heard of the roaring 20's, but was it "roaring" for everyone or just a select aristocratic upper class? After Herbert Hoover was thrown out of office in 1932, FDR came in and the size of the government ("the New Deal") increased dramatically. [And all the Republicans grimaced!] There was Social Security for all Americans, there were new jobs created as attempted modernization put many Americans to work, & (as I've mentioned many times) the GI Bill. Various government interventions helped CREATE a "middle class" where once we only had a working class and upper class.

The wealth gap decreased from the 1930's all the way through the 1970's. Then in the 70's it began to grow again until we got to where we are now. According to the Department of Labor's (click here) October 2008 summary, America lost a quarter MILLION jobs in October alone. We lost 284,000 jobs in September, and we lost 127,000 jobs in August. According to the Department of Labor, 1.2 million jobs have been lost in the United States in the first 10 months of 2008. There are 300 million Americans. How many are of working age? 200 million people? More than a million jobs have left our nation in the last ten months. Wow!

In the 40's, Europe's post war decimation (and restoration) cost it lots of jobs, a gread deal being manufacturing. Jobs the rest of the (modernizing?) world was not yet in a position to fill. After WWII, America was the worlds largest manufactuer, which helped to boost our economy and grow our fledgling "middle class." I remember having a shirt that just said "Made in the USA." That was the logo, not just something on the sticker inside the shirt. But what about today? Compared to 60 years ago, manufacturing jobs can now leave for all different parts of the world, and with cheaper wages overseas, jobs that were once in Europe, and then in America, and are now gone... I dont foresee coming back.

Hopefully we will seize the green technology movement (if Obama sees this as his new millenium version of "the New Deal"?) and create "green jobs" and become a leader there, or else, I fear we will lose more jobs to places with universal healthcare (because the employer in other nations saves a lot of money when he doesn't have to pay his employees health beneifts) and generally lower wages. With stagnant wages, higher unemployment, and rising costs of living here in the US... this current crisis is largely a product of higher dependency on credit and the inability to afford (i.e. homes)...

...but who is addressing our growing inequality in this nation and the cause of people relying more on credit. Aside from reading print, like US News and World Report, (good mag, by the way) I have not heard ONE commentary from a single mainstream news outlet even MENTION rising income and wealth disparities in our nation and this trend we've experienced over the last 35+ years. Will we once again become a nation with a very large working class, few middle class and a select few upper class aristocrats?

Dont make me speculate on it :*(