The biggest question in America these days is how to revive the economy.
The biggest question among activists now occupying Wall Street and dozens of other cities is how to strike back against the nation's almost unprecedented concentration of income, wealth, and political power in the top 1 percent.
The two questions are related. With so much income and wealth concentrated at the top, the vast middle class no longer has the purchasing power to buy what the economy is capable of producing. (People could pretend otherwise as long as they could treat their homes as ATMs, but those days are now gone.) The result is prolonged stagnation and high unemployment as far as the eye can see.
Until we reverse the trend toward inequality, the economy can't be revived.
But the biggest question in our nation's capital right now has nothing to do with any of this. It's whether Congress's so-called "Supercommittee" -- six Democrats and six Republicans charged with coming up with $1.2 trillion in budget savings -- will reach agreement in time for the Congressional Budget Office to score its proposal, which must then be approved by Congress before Christmas recess in order to avoid an automatic $1.5 trillion in budget savings requiring major across-the-board cuts starting in 2013.
Have your eyes already glazed over?
Diffident Democrats on the Supercommittee have already signaled a willingness to cut Medicare, Social Security, and much else that Americans depend on. The deal is being held up by Regressive Republicans who won't raise taxes on the rich -- not even a tiny bit.
President Obama, meanwhile, is out on the stump trying to sell his "jobs bill" - which would, by the White House's own estimate, create fewer than 2 million jobs. Yet 14 million people are out of work, and another 10 million are working part-time who'd rather have full-time jobs.
Republicans have already voted down his jobs bill anyway.
The disconnect between Washington and the rest of the nation hasn't been this wide since the late 1960s.
The two worlds are on a collision course: Americans who are losing their jobs or their pay and can't pay their bills are growing increasingly desperate. Washington insiders, deficit hawks, regressive Republicans, diffident Democrats, well-coiffed lobbyists, and the lobbyists' wealthy patrons on Wall Street and in corporate suites haven't a clue or couldn't care less.
I can't tell you when the collision will occur but I'd guess 2012.
Look elsewhere around the world and you see a similar collision unfolding. The details differ but the larger forces are similar. You see it in Spain, Greece, and Italy, whose citizens are being squeezed by bankers insisting on austerity. You see it in Chile and Israel, whose young people are in revolt. In the Middle East, whose "Arab spring" is becoming a complex Arab fall and winter. Even in China, whose young and hourly workers are demanding more - and whose surge toward inequality in recent years has been as breathtaking as is its surge toward modern capitalism.
Will 2012 go down in history like other years that shook the foundations of the world's political economy -- 1968 and 1989?
I spent part of yesterday in Oakland, California. The Occupier movement is still in its infancy in the United States, but it cannot be stopped. Here, as elsewhere, people are outraged at what feels like a rigged game -- an economy that won't respond, a democracy that won't listen, and a financial sector that holds all the cards.
Here, as elsewhere, the people are rising.
Robert Reich is the author of Aftershock: The Next Economy and America's Future, now in bookstores. This post originally appeared at RobertReich.org.
Follow Robert Reich on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RBReich
The two questions are related. With so much income and wealth concentrated at the top, the vast middle class no longer has the purchasing power to buy what the economy is capable of producing. (People could pretend otherwise as long as they could treat their homes as ATMs, but those days are now gone.) The result is prolonged stagnation and high unemployment as far as the eye can see.
Until we reverse the trend toward inequality, the economy can't be revived.
But the biggest question in our nation's capital right now has nothing to do with any of this. It's whether Congress's so-called "Supercommittee" -- six Democrats and six Republicans charged with coming up with $1.2 trillion in budget savings -- will reach agreement in time for the Congressional Budget Office to score its proposal, which must then be approved by Congress before Christmas recess in order to avoid an automatic $1.5 trillion in budget savings requiring major across-the-board cuts starting in 2013.
Have your eyes already glazed over?
Diffident Democrats on the Supercommittee have already signaled a willingness to cut Medicare, Social Security, and much else that Americans depend on. The deal is being held up by Regressive Republicans who won't raise taxes on the rich -- not even a tiny bit.
President Obama, meanwhile, is out on the stump trying to sell his "jobs bill" - which would, by the White House's own estimate, create fewer than 2 million jobs. Yet 14 million people are out of work, and another 10 million are working part-time who'd rather have full-time jobs.
Republicans have already voted down his jobs bill anyway.
The disconnect between Washington and the rest of the nation hasn't been this wide since the late 1960s.
The two worlds are on a collision course: Americans who are losing their jobs or their pay and can't pay their bills are growing increasingly desperate. Washington insiders, deficit hawks, regressive Republicans, diffident Democrats, well-coiffed lobbyists, and the lobbyists' wealthy patrons on Wall Street and in corporate suites haven't a clue or couldn't care less.
I can't tell you when the collision will occur but I'd guess 2012.
Look elsewhere around the world and you see a similar collision unfolding. The details differ but the larger forces are similar. You see it in Spain, Greece, and Italy, whose citizens are being squeezed by bankers insisting on austerity. You see it in Chile and Israel, whose young people are in revolt. In the Middle East, whose "Arab spring" is becoming a complex Arab fall and winter. Even in China, whose young and hourly workers are demanding more - and whose surge toward inequality in recent years has been as breathtaking as is its surge toward modern capitalism.
Will 2012 go down in history like other years that shook the foundations of the world's political economy -- 1968 and 1989?
I spent part of yesterday in Oakland, California. The Occupier movement is still in its infancy in the United States, but it cannot be stopped. Here, as elsewhere, people are outraged at what feels like a rigged game -- an economy that won't respond, a democracy that won't listen, and a financial sector that holds all the cards.
Here, as elsewhere, the people are rising.
Robert Reich is the author of Aftershock: The Next Economy and America's Future, now in bookstores. This post originally appeared at RobertReich.org.
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Where Has All the Income Gone?
Middle American incomes rise substantia
BY THE MINNEAPOLI
I am Ifshin.
I agree with all your points, BUT you say nothing about causes and solutions.
The "experts" were expounding the move to the "service/ knowledge/ intelligen
US companies manufactur
It is time for the "experts" (economist
- Bring back and create new advanced manufactur
- Create parity in import tariffs, now that China has advanced industrial
I agree that 75% of the world population should not live and exist on usd 2 to 5 per day, but neither can the ex-Industr
The once again positive "multiplyi
It is time for the academics and experts to see the naked truth of where the "Emperor's Jobs" are!
http://www
Truth be told, if some (maybe many) of the super- and mega-rich individual
Mega-rich Job creators? My foot ! Job destroyers would be more accurate descriptio
Yet, all that money really goes from hard-worki
The poverty-le
So even welfare for the poor goes to corporatio
These expenditur
And that's what's at the core of our economic mess.....a demand crisis = consumers don't have the money to spend to boost or sustain our economy. And, the government has been trying to fill that demand void left by consumers over the past couple years.
The problem is that the government can't sustain that for very long.....t
Things continue to get worse because we won't recognize our demand crisis.
I knew one guy who got $200 a month in food assistance
$18,000/yr in medicaid? So is this a family of old, sickly people? But you mention free school lunch, so is this an extended family, with young kids going to school and gramdma and grandpa a part of the family?
No one qualifies for EVERY type of assistance
The guy you "knew" didn't tell you the whole story. Section 8 pays $900 per month for a family of three.
work money. Pretty good I say. That is how it works here in Hawaii.
Hint: you are not the exception to the rule.
There're loads of credible facts and figures summarizin
First, we need federal election campaign finance reform. We the people will pay for our elections, Not the1%ers.
Second, Term limits for Congress members. Elect members who want to serve the people.
Mirador Del Monasterio
http://www
People have to have a stake in the system, or they can turn to extremism, such as communism, nazism, or whatever. Just as FDR saved America from extremism, we need such leadership again today.
in maerica you are FREE to work as much or as little as you want. nothing is easy. if you need more money get another job, start a business or invent something. if you have NO SKILLS, after a FREE secondary education, expect minimum wage. i don't raise my pay cuz you think its too low..... PROVE you are worth more....
There're 10-20 million Americans from all segments of society unemployed and underemplo
What I fear is that the law enforcemen
At the beginnings of these hole diggings (exportati
Political power is the most important tool in the developmen
We mainly have two political parties , but with a for-profit media it takes money to get elected or reelected . And with the money siding with the Republican
Something should have been said about the economy when GWB announced in 2001 "we are in a recession" . Or when Congress handed the Wall Street banking President all of our money . But we remained silent until now when the pain becomes unbearable .
Those who have eyes and ears and exercise critical thinking know President Obama is a corporatis