NOT A RECESSION! IT'S THE FUTURE!
I've been following strings dealing with our economic woes, with interest, and have noted that most of the posters have exhibited frustration, fear, and anger relative to the unemployment situation. I, also, sensed that most posters are expecting that this weak economy will pass. I, fortunately, have never been the victim of a "reduction in forces." ( Was asked to resign a couple of times, but those events were self-inflicted). I do know what it feels like to be "a day late and a dollar short!"
We have all been informed what opinions are like.
If you have not been informed, ask around...Someone will inform you. So here is my opinion on the economy and our future:
Eric Hoffer, author, longshoreman and adviser to John Kennedy wrote some lengthy dissertations relative to economics. One of his strongest assertions (not exactly quoted) was that no successful economy was ever created that did not create "material" products that another tribe, hamlet, city , state or country was not desirous of. Be the object grain, spices, machinery or sea shells, objects preferably manufactured from raw materials taken from same area of origin, optimized the success of the trade relationship. Hoffer emphasized that service industries created little stability because knowledge knows no boundaries.
I drove the turnpikes from Chicago to the East coast, for the first time, in the early-sixties. At night, the polluted skies were aglow from the towering stacks of refineries, steel mills and various other heavy manufacturing industries. This stretch of America was the backbone of our middle class. Today, that same stretch is known as "The Rustbelt." If you have read this far, it isn't necessary for me to explain the sundry forces that decimated our manufacturing base. As off-shoring decimated our middle-class, our tax base was equally decimated. Then, followed the deterioration of our infrastructure. How could our middle class sustain its' standard of living? Easily! Loosen the credit standards! Import CCPS (Cheap Chinese Plastic S**t) as a replacement for items that had once been manufactured here. Capital for internal investment has left our shores years ago.
Some skills can't be off-shored, but there will never be enough jobs available to off-set those which are gone...Forever. This country is undergoing drastic economic change. We are not experiencing a "dip" in our economy. What the future holds, I have no idea. I don't buy that America's ingenuity will return us to the word-prominence we once enjoyed.
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October 30, 2009 10:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
One of the first industries to go was manufacturing of consumer electronics - radios, tape recorders, televisions, etc. Eventually, most of these were manufactured by Japanese companies. As computers and telecommunications equipment became higher-volume products and could be made using similar processes, these also followed consumer electrnics to Japan and to other East Asian countries. Thus, a new and growing category of manufactures, and the highly-automated, high-precision manufacturing technology all migrated to East Asia and was not available to fill the void left by increasing productivity in the manufacture of larger, lower-volume goods like autos. The start of this process was encouraged by government policies to help the Japanese and East Asian economies during the Cold War.
A second set of industries to go were those that caused air and water pollution. I too drove through Chicago and around Gary in '67 and the pollution reduced visibilty to about a quarter mile that day. Unfortunately, we didn't clean up polluting industries; we exported them. Basic materials processing like iron ore smelting migrated overseas. Bad environmental legislation raised the cost of domestic production without adding a comparable pollution tariff on imported goods produced using polluting processes.
The demise of American manufacturing is the direct result of bad US government policies.
October 30, 2009 10:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Merrill:
You have it figured out. One thing that I might disagree with -- Corporate America sold us out. They merely bought our government and the whores in Washington served their master. Always follow the money. Patriotism is for the losers. The suckers arrive at Dover, A.F.B., with regularity! And, they are not adorned in vested suits and wing-tips!
October 30, 2009 11:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
There have been situations where US corporations were pressured by Washington to give concessions to foreign corporations because Washington wanted something from the foreign government.
"The fish rots from the head."
The geopolitical priorities are set in Washington, not Wall Street. It's political and military power first, and economics third.
October 30, 2009 11:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
No, Chuck is right. It is the corporations and they have no sense of loyalty and no care about any nation. So called "American" corporations just game the system to get the US government to help them out, but at the first sign of any quid pro quo (or any expectation of a contribution to the community--whether by taxes or other) they are outta here and off to some tax haven.
October 31, 2009 12:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
It is the Washington politicians and bureaucrats that have no loyalty to the well-being of American citizens and businesses.
Their thinking and loyalties have been driven by three ideologies:
First, the Cold War anti-communism made national security take priority over all other needs.
Second, there was an ideal of spreading US political and economic systems throughout the world. "Trilateralism" might characterize this.
Third, there is the post-Cold War triumphalism summed up by PNAC and other neo-con imperialisms. The War on Terror replaces the Cold War as the highest priority.
With these as the highest priority of our Washington politicos and policy makers, the fleecing of the taxpayers, the mulcting of the corporations, and the abandonment of the poor are seen by Washington as negligible prices to pay for national glory.
October 31, 2009 9:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Merrill:
Politicians, in a majority of cases, are only as powerful as their political funding. I am neither an economist nor a politician, but I "have" been involved with government contracting. Yes, the government does pull strings, but not to further just-democratic causes. Again...Follow the money.
October 31, 2009 12:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
In any case, aren't you begging for a chicken vs egg fight by presenting "priorities" in this way?
Take, for example, the US support provided to Pinochet before and after his forces seized power in Chile. Was this done in the context of a global struggle against Communism (despite the fact Allende was democratically elected)? The answer is yes.
Did the seizure of power have to do with the fact that Allende nationalized industries owned by ITT and Anaconda? The answer is also yes.
For both of these reasons to be the primary cause of the support given to Pinochet would seem to be a source of cognitive dissonance if the objectives of Washington and Wall Street are operating independently of each other.
On the other hand, no confusion need ensue if one were to discover that there was a special agency within the government that was tasked with finding creative ways that Government and Business could work together.
And what if there was more than one agency dedicated to this sort of thing......
October 31, 2009 10:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
Comment recommended. That was my thought, too, Merrill.
October 31, 2009 8:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
I hope you are wrong about the future. But with our manufacturing capacity crippled and corruption firmly established as part of the "capitalist" religion, the multinational top (bottom?) feeders have us in a tough spot.
October 30, 2009 11:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's almost too depressing to think about Chuck. I truly envision future suburban slums, where we all scrap for what we can get to survive, and dream of a better life south of the border.
October 31, 2009 12:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
mig: In reply to your reply...I would be "preaching to the choir! I understand that what I post here may not be acceptable, but I would like to tell you that I really enjoyed your last post. I req'd it, but did not comment. If I was blessed with such writing skills! You generated a joy for me to read!
October 31, 2009 1:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks mate!
October 31, 2009 2:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
erica:
I'm a vet and a grandfather. I was involved with the lunar landing. I believe in "a God." I believe that laissez-faire capitalism has destroyed the finest nation that ever existed...Or ever will exist. Greed is an awesome force that must be kept at bay...We failed to control that force.
October 31, 2009 12:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
I spent a lifetime traveling all over this planet providing hardcore factory automation services and have observed first hand the major changes or migrations of manufacturing. It is unbelieveable the number of huge factories that have become idled in this country and elsewhere. And our government has made it attractive for our corporations to do this. This has been a huge mistake.
Just the same way where the majority of other developed nations have modified their healthcare systems and moved to some form of quasi public centrally managed system to gain efficiency we have gone the opposite way and face a huge cost disadvantage becasue of it. We abandoned manufacturing, handing it off to places where labor was cheaper, without considering that the short term profits couldn't be justfied in relation to the long term losses. Any nation in this for the long haul must continually reinvest in itself to remain in the game. That means continuous remaking of the public infrastructure to support the engine that drives it all. The dumbasses that run everything have no idea that they have to make this reinvestment or they are screwed. They don't want to spend a nickel in support of something that is more than two or three years down the road.
In particular, you can't continuously modify a tax or economic system where you transfer wealth up the economic ladder and simultaneously reduce taxes on those who are the recipients of that transfer. It takes away the possibility of having the public dollar resources required to sustain the overall operation. And then everything goes to hell. And once you get behind, the cost to catch up is huge. That is where we are right now. The lastest estimates I have seen for this say we need to spend something on the order of $2.5T - $3.0T dollars just to catch up. Where this is especially messed up is major corporations and wealthy individuals fight tooth and nail any investment (read taxes) necessary to sustain the very thing from which they are sucking all their profits. Collectively they are some very dumb people.
In the same way this country was ravaged by pollution corporations are doing elsewhere right now and even in some places here this is still happening. The coal mining in appalachia comes to mind in this regard. Corporations just suck the life out of everything. Period. They complain about regulation but in fact we regulate maybe only by half what is necessary in order to assure we can sustain the entire economy in the longer term.
And you can bet your ass this is happening in large part because our congress in particular has been corrupted by 'corporate personhood' and political corruption. Government must in fact be completely isolated from this influence. No two ways about it. This world cannot be sustained with this model. Period.
October 31, 2009 3:10 AM | Reply | Permalink
Part of the problem, I think, is that our leaders no longer come from the working class.
I think President Obama has the best of intentions. However, he is a highly educated man who believes the answers we need will come from the highly educated. Where did he look for solutions for the economy? He went straight to his friends at the Universtity of Chicago. He should have asked a few of his supporters who live in the neighborhoods immediately surrounding that University's campus.
October 31, 2009 5:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
Obama has good intentions. But like so many others of the priviledged class he has no idea of the nuts and bolts of an economy within the broader scope necessary to really know it. You can be well educated but that gives you only half the picture. There is another equally important piece that if unknown prohibits making the right choices. Those kinds of choices were once made by labor in the sense of the contribution which labor made. Labor is no longer a part of the process so the contribution is missing and thus you have poor choices being made. This is unavoidable where crucial elements of the overall knowledge resource are minimized or disregarded. It is conceptually similar to the focus on profits and gaining wealth to the exclusion of other equally important aspects of our overall socio-economic construct. The imbalance creates all manner of problems that cannot be overcome except by restoring that balance.
October 31, 2009 6:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with this assessment. If you have capital and wish to market something we all do not need, like sponges on a stick and you can get the pretend sponge covers and the stick manufactured by Asian Women for thirty cents an hour and get an entire years supply shipped to you for one big time investment, why the hell pay people eight bucks an hour here.
The you look at things like cars. How much of the steel was made here, how much of the pretend steel was made here, .....I have read essays on this and finish more confused than when I started.
BUT WE CANNOT PAY PEOPLE A BUCK AN HOUR.
As a matter of fact we should not be able to hire anyone (except for high school students and stuff) for less than twenty bucks an hour with benefits.
I do not have an answer. But I certainly see a future where a lower, lower class is created; a middle class decimated; richer classes taking an even bigger percentage of this country's income as well as property. People will not own homes but rent them.
I see doom and gloom and I can point to 1981 as the beginning of this new era. And the newer era began in September of last year.
THE END
October 31, 2009 3:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
DD, you set this post at 3:17 AM. Do you not sleep?
We can't pay people a buck an hour? Why not? Wouldn't that leave the other $19 an hour for our rich friends? Then they could take that extra money an invest it in the future for us.
I really think the working class in this country is getting just a little to uppity.
October 31, 2009 5:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
DD doesn't sleep. Nor do I. He posted at 3:17 and I posted at 3:10. He's always late to he party. :)
I do hope your comment is tongue in cheek. Or if not your handle is spot on. Not only Faroff but Waygone round the bend.
October 31, 2009 7:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
Uhhh...plus the time zones are all in Eastern time. I was going to type EST, but I can't even remember if we've gone off Daylight. Jeez.
I heard some pundits (maybe Chris Matthews show) talking about what if the unemployment rate stayed at these levels permanently. The question was: Would that be a bad thing?
Holy sufferin' sailfish! The answers were varied, but some thought it might be supportable. Asshats.
October 31, 2009 9:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
Invasion of the Asshats. Coming soon to a theater near you. NC-17
I wonder who asked if that would be a bad thing? Just so I can remember to change the channel when he or she is yapping.
If Michael Moore could find the bucks he could make a movie every six months. We need George Carlin back.
It'll be a while before we see below 7% or 8% again. And that says nothing about the real number which is more like 20%. Which, of course, is another of those lie thingys. I am so sick of the over the top lies from these scumsuckers.
October 31, 2009 11:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
I am almost sure that it was Tweety Matthews. Now, please don't hold it against him; he gets influenced by any of his favorite guests. It is purely genetic: Chameleon-itis. And he wanted to run for the Senate, but there must have been no takers in the $$$$donor-world; he then remembered he had family obligations to fulfill...I wish I could remember, though, who was on the panel that day.
Yeah; it doesn't look so hot; I am listening online to Dylan Ratigan's program; he wants to foment a goddam revolution. He is PISSED OFF! I think he's getting a few things wrong on Jefferson vs. Hamilton, but I may be wrong. This is his issue, now; pretty good!
October 31, 2009 6:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
The changeover from daylight savings time is tomorrow at 2:00 AM. I'm sure you'll be up to change your clocks promptly.
October 31, 2009 11:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Christ, no! I wait and get up at 3:30 lately. Bugger! Need some of that butterfly drug: Namenda? Garrrrrggllle. Here's the Ratigan; it's pretty fun:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31510813/ns/msnbc_tv-morning_meeting#33549932
October 31, 2009 6:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
In another thread I told of my travels to Brazil... I briefly described what I'd seen economically (Have and Have-Nots... not much in between)...
I likened the airplane to a time machine that was taking me to the future.
October 31, 2009 11:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
Eric Hoffer - one of my favorites too, although I haven't read him in years. One thing that he wrote that stuck with me: word to the effect that "you can always know a civilization will survive if there are hooks for the brooms and mops in the broom closet."
October 31, 2009 6:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
I can't explain why, but no author's words ever rang clearer to me than Eric Hoffer's! I read everything I could find from him when I was in my early twenties and , 40 years later, I think he had this world pretty-well figured out!
October 31, 2009 7:24 PM | Reply | Permalink