A Recovery For The Rest of Us

A Recovery For The Rest of Us - Forbes:

Could this be another flaw of monetary policy. Krugman is always shouting that it doesn't work well at the zero-bound but maybe it doesn't really work very well in an overly unequal economy?

The elite/the rich/Capital capture the majority of the monetary stimulus leaving little for the worker-bee/labor group. The rich don't really need the money so it just creates bubbles as it ricochets around the financial system. The poor are left to scramble for the little that "trickles-down".

Good fiscal policy that puts labor directly to work, puts the money where it can help the majority,.. in labor's pockets. I guess bad fiscal policy, that is, waste programs designed to feed cash to special interests, would also just feed cash to the rich.  

So, i guess as long as the rich hold the power we can expect monetary policy combined with bad, crony-ism fiscal policy. We're screwed.

tnb

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McDonald's Customer Service

The Customer Service Problem at McDonald's Is a Symptom of a Much Bigger Problem | Slog:

More pay may help but poor service is inherent in the corporate system. The corporate slaves just don't feel the attachment to the work place like they could if it was a well-run, locally-owned, mom-and-pop shop. They're paid very little, have little or no benefits, have to work a lot of crappy, short, doesn't-qualify-for-benefits shifts, are subject to a lot of over-bearing policies designed to protect the corporate interests, are subject to dismissal at the whim of another discouraged corp-o-slave, and have very little chance to really move up in the organization. Their work life is only about harvesting money from the locals so it can be shipped off to some never-seen corporate master. Given that, how could anyone really give a damn about the place they work or its customers?


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401s and old workers

A good rant from Gin and Tacos today.

BUT IT'S CHEAPER, RIGHT? | Gin and Tacos:

401's just don't work as a person's only retirement plan. They can be a piece of you retirement stash but most people won't save enough or will dip into it for some emergency cash so they just won't have enough to cover retirement. Also, there have two large hits to most 401s in the last 15 years so people probably are postponing retirement so their 401 can recover but I see many old workers hanging on for "The Insurance".

I'm lucky to be working in an industry that still pays pretty well and has defined pension plans (for now) but there are still many people working way past their prime. The main excuse for non-retirement is that they can't afford insurance while they wait for medicare to kick in. These people have the cash to retire. Many would have an annual income from their pension far in excess of the average worker's working wage but they just can't bring themselves to pay for medical insurance that the company has paid for them all these years.

Medicare for all,... good quality, pay-everything Medicare, would lead to a mass exodus of the 55 and above crowd from our workforce.

tnb

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War with Syria

Wilkerson: Chemical weapon use in Syria ‘could have been an Israeli false flag operation’ | MyFDL:

This could’ve been an Israeli false flag operation, it could’ve been an opposition in Syria, … or it could’ve been an actual use by [Syrian President] Bashar al-Assad. But we certainly don’t know with the evidence we’ve been given. 

again...."we certainly don’t know with the evidence we’ve been given."

We just don't know. We went to war once when we didn't really know. We were told we knew,.. but we didn't. That war cost billion of dollars, millions of lives, and hurt the US reputation around the world. We don't need a Syrian War.

tnb

Update

The evidence points to the rebels not the Government?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/05/us-syria-crisis-un-idUSBRE94409Z20130505

there are strong, concrete suspicions but not yet incontrovertible proof of the use of sarin gas, from the way the victims were treated," Del Ponte said in an interview with Swiss-Italian television. 

"This was use on the part of the opposition, the rebels, not by the government authorities," she added, speaking in Italian.

I doubt we'll see this on CNN or Fox.



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Frozen by Fear

a good post here: Stonekettle Station: ‘Fraidy Cat:

a piece below but you should read the whole thing

They’re afraid of the government. They’re afraid of the president, they’re afraid of congress, they’re afraid of the judges. They’re afraid of socialism. They’re afraid of Nazis and communists. They’re afraid of liberals and progressives and RINOs and feminists and Prius-driving vegetarians. They’re afraid of their neighbors. They’re afraid of the North and afraid of the South and afraid of people from Chicago, and New York and Washington D.C. and California. They’re afraid of gangs and crime and terrorism.  They’re afraid of know-it-all college educated long hairs. They’re afraid of political correctness and affirmative action. They’re afraid of minorities and they’re afraid of immigrants and they’re afraid of uppity blacks and strong-willed women and smart Asians and dirty Latinos and murderous Muslims. They fear their own supposedly loving God and they’re afraid of everybody else’s deity too. They’re afraid of the Rapture and the Anti-Christ and the End Times. They’re afraid of Sharia Law and they’re afraid of the Pope and afraid of the Jews – and yet they’re afraid of atheists too. They’re afraid of immorality and pornography and the internet and cable TV and that Rock&Roll music. They’re afraid of social media, they’re afraid of Twitter and Facebook and the bloggers and the Goddamned lamestream media. They’re afraid the military might just take over and they’re afraid that the military isn’t powerful enough. They’re afraid of death and afraid of taxes. They’re afraid of science, of evolution and climate models and plate tectonics and carbon dating and sex education. They’re afraid of abortion and birth control and the morning after pill, but at the same time they’re also afraid people might be having sex and they’re afraid “those” people might be having a whole bunch of welfare babies that they’re afraid they’ll have to pay for. They’re afraid of North Korea and China and the long defunct Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. They’re afraid that somebody might be coming to take all their guns and they’re afraid of all the crazy people with guns and they’re afraid that the government has too many guns.  They’re afraid of being poor but they’re afraid of the rich too. They’re afraid of the Bilderbergs and the Illuminati and the New World Order. They’re afraid of the the banksters and yet they’re deathly afraid of any laws that might restrict those self same power brokers. They’re afraid of losing their entitlements and they’re afraid the undeserving want entitlements too and more than anything they’re afraid that somebody somewhere might be getting something for nothing on the taxpayer dime, but they’re afraid of making those same “takers” pay for their own healthcare.  They’re afraid of chemicals in their food and genetically engineered crops, but they’re afraid of laws requiring that those same ingredients be fully disclosed by food producers because they’re afraid that might be bad for business. They’re afraid of obesity and heart disease and that our kids are a generation of blubbery little couch potatoes, but they’re afraid of Mayor Bloomberg and Michelle Obama.  They’re afraid of Hollywood violence and yet they’re also afraid that Sesame Street might be making their kids into prancing pacifist pisswillies. They’re afraid we’ll run out of oil or that some America hating dictator somewhere will cut the oil off – and yet at the same time they’re afraid of solar panels and wind towers and electric cars.

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That Damned Liberal Media

REPORT: Partisanship And Diversity On The Sunday Shows In 9 Charts | Research | Media Matters for America:

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Free Markets

from: Class War in America via a taxing matter: Big Business believes in taxpayer subsidies, not "free markets":

"A free market requires that everybody plays nice and follows the rules. Guess what. There’s always someone who will do whatever evil they think is required to make money. Once you realize that, you know there can be no such thing as the free market."

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US-Israel vs Iran

from:  jamiols world

Science vs Belief

A good post at GinAndTacos this morning.

THE DIVIDE | Gin and Tacos:

the older I get the more I believe that the real divide in this country (I won't speak for the whole world, although I have my suspicions) is not between liberals and conservatives, the old and young, black and white, or any of the most common tropes. The divide in modern America is between people who think facts and knowledge are based on evidence and those who think that whatever one believes is true. The media is liberal because I think it is. Climate change and evolution are myths because I don't believe them. Tax cuts grow the economy because I think they do. 

For most Americans, the research stops as soon as they find something that agrees with what they believe.

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Happiest Countries

There sure are a lot of those Commie-Socialized Medicine-Gay-Euro nations on this list.

1. Norway - The World's Happiest And Saddest Countries - Forbes:

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Hullabaloo: We're Broke

A good post from Hullabaloo: today. reprinted below..

Stock market reaches record high in broke, destitute nation

by David Atkins

This country is broke. So, so broke:

NEW YORK--Blue chips continued to climb to new heights, pushing beyond the record levels reached in Tuesday's rally after a better-than-expected reading on the labor market.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 42.47 points, or 0.3%, to 14296.24 in late trading on Wednesday. On Tuesday, the blue chips soared 126 points to punch through a closing level not seen since before the turmoil that ensnared the markets for five and a half years. Dow industrials have climbed for three sessions in a row and five out of the past six.

The Standard & Poor's 500-stock index tacked on 1.67 points, or 0.1%, to 1541.46. But the Nasdaq Composite Index fell 1.77 points, or 0.1%, to 3222.36, pulled down by Apple and Google, which shed 1.3% and 0.9%, respectively.

We have no money at all.



In fact, we have no choice to come together in a bipartisan fashion to slash Medicare, Social Security, climate mitigation and investments in our nation's future. We certainly can't ask our job creators to pay for any of it:


Our lazy citizens just aren't producing enough to stay competitive in a global marketplace, so wages have to come down.



And our poor, bedraggled corporations just aren't making enough profits to justify hiring.



So, so broke. Whatever shall we do?



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Corn

It’s Time to Rethink America’s Corn System: Scientific American:

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Divorce

Bill would forbid parents from getting no-fault divorce (AUDIO):

Because Repulicans are all about personal freedoms.

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Victimhood

a good post from Gin and Tacos this morning...

VICTIMHOOD | Gin and Tacos:

"The amount of delusion necessary to allow someone to sit in front of a 70" TV in a giant house with two luxury cars in the garage and complain about the unfairness of it all is incomprehensible."

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Hagel

The Booman Tribune ~ A Progressive Community: asks "What was Gained by the Hagel Opposition"

Well,.... they put up enough of a fight that they didn't kill their chance for AIPAC campaign donations. Actually, they probably got big checks every time they were seen complaining about Hagel. so,... what did they gain,.....MONEY.

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Land of the Free

We lock up more of our citizens than any country on earth.



(charts from  Incarceration in the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:)

This NPR story blames Nixon and Rockefeller but it looks like it really took off after 1980.




A couple of notes from Wikipedia....

Violent crime was not responsible for the quadrupling of the incarcerated population in the United States from 1980 to 2003. Violent crime rates had been relatively constant or declining over those decades. 

Perhaps the single greatest force behind the growth of the prison population has been the national "war on drugs." The number of incarcerated drug offenders has increased twelve-fold since 1980. In 2000, 22 percent of those in federal and state prisons were convicted on drug charges.

Our drug laws suck. Bankers and corporations can steal, cheat and lie. They can launder drug money but if you smoke a joint you're the criminal.

once again,... Our drug laws suck.


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A couple of maps from  www.salon.com: the_white_souths_last_defeat





The "American" entry on the second map sort-of pisses me off. Unless you're a Native American every American's ancestry is something other than "American". This is  a US Census map why the hell do they include "American" in the list of choices? They should know better. Are they write-ins?

In reality, the "American" on this map really means "Ancestry Unknown,...  but I'm dumb enough to believe that I'm a Real-American". Which actually, makes it easier to see why these maps looks so much alike.

tnb

Risk vs Freedom

From EconoSpeak: Risk = Freedom?:

Ample unemployment insurance makes it easier to work for a startup or switch jobs in general rather than being held down by too strong a need for job security.  A stronger public pension system encourages entrepreneurship: people can hazard their savings by starting a business rather than hoarding everything for old age.  Social guarantees for basic needs make it possible for artists to risk making art their day job.  Professors with tenure (big time risk reduction) can take more controversial positions on public issues.  (I don’t say they always do this, but they do it more than they would if all professors were temps.)  In each case there is a real tradeoff between freedom and security at the individual level, but society can create programs that relax it, so it takes less courage to live freely. 

That’s what I don’t like about the nanny state rhetoric.  Yes, of course the state can go too far and overprotect us from risks we would do better to face ourselves.  But the state we actually live in goes too far in the other direction.  With a stronger safety net we could have less risk and more freedom

And ,... universal health care would translate into less risk and more, not less, freedom for workers. It would encourage entrepreneurship since workers could leave current positions to try their ideas without sacrificing their current employer-provided insurance. It would allow those in the 60-65 age group to retire earlier since many are working now only for the insurance coverage until Medicare kicks in.


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New Monopoly Piece

The best thing I've seen about the quest for a new Monopoly piece.

"From Too Much Coffee Man". link here:

ny_1422.jpg (600×456):


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Drug Laws

Two posts that appeared close together in Indiana news this morning.

Addiction to opiates fuels flood of heroin | The Journal Gazette:

State: Pain med abuse ‘epidemic’

Heroin use is on the rise because prescription opiates like oxycotin are gateway drugs. A couple of quotes from one of the two links above.

"With prescription drugs as a gateway, heroin has been making a resurgence around the country," 

A Study "showed a clear link between the rise in the use of prescription drugs and that of heroin."

Prescription drugs also account for more a higher percentage of patients seeking treatment for drug issues. Twice the rate of heroin.




However at least one network is saying that yes they are seeing more Opiate abuse but its not Heroin that's the problem, It the prescription type.

,.. have not seen more patients needing care because of heroin use. However, the number of patients testing positive for opiates, not necessarily heroin, jumped 25 percent from 2011 to 2012, according to Lutheran spokesman Geoff Thomas.

But,....

Heroin will stay illegal because,... well,..... because it's ....."dangerous", and,..... "illegal", and will ruin your kids lives.

The prescription Opiates, which are a bigger problem at this time, will stay legal. We'll just try to regulate those.

Of course pot will stay illegal because,... well,..... because it's ....."dangerous", and,..... "illegal", and will ruin your kids lives.

In reality, Heroin and pot will stay illegal because they don't have a lobby as powerful as big-pharma.

Our drug laws suck..............

tnb

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