CoalSpeaker recently mentioned that I should keep calming his nerves. To that I replied that I'd do my best but that some things made *my* nerves uncalm (*not really a word). Then, what do I see today but the above article in the NYT. Let's examine a bit of it:
Another 2.6 million people slipped into poverty in the United States last year, the Census Bureau reported Tuesday, and the number of Americans living below the official poverty line, 46.2 million people, was the highest number in the 52 years the bureau has been publishing figures on it.
To anyone watching the decay in value of the USD and the export of American jobs, this is not a surprise at all. Actually, what is a surprise to me is that it took us quite a bit longer to get here than I expected. Of course, if our leaders in government had been paying attention as closely as people like me, they might have tried to avoid such a result. Instead they were effectively paid to turn a blind eye to corporations putting profits above the welfare of American citizens they allegedly service. Now, even they are suffering since their customers (us) have no money to spend on their products.
I mean, seriously, you don't pay the salaries of American citizens and you're surprised when they have no money to buy your stuff? Seems like our leaders in government aren't the only people who haven't been paying attention. Imagine if Apple paid Americans some of their huge pile of cash to make iPods instead of Chinese laborers?
And in new signs of distress among the middle class, median household incomes fell last year to levels last seen in 1997.
There's still a middle class?
“This is truly a lost decade,” Mr. Katz said. “We think of America as a place where every generation is doing better, but we’re looking at a period when the median family is in worse shape than it was in the late 1990s.”
Notice he used the word DECADE. So no blaming Obama for this shit. This is Bush and the Republican's fault and even Clinton's fault, to a certain degree, since anyone looking forward could have seen this coming. When my dad got laid off from a major broadcaster's R&D department back in 1992, that should have been a sign of decline (no Research and Development means less innovation which means less new stuff to sell which means less jobs for people making and selling).
The bureau’s findings were worse than many economists expected, and brought into sharp relief the toll the past decade — including the painful declines of the financial crisis and recession —had taken on Americans at the middle and lower parts of the income ladder. It is also fresh evidence that the disappointing economic recovery has done nothing for the country’s poorest citizens.
This "recovery" hasn't done much for anyone, even for the rich, as the article goes onto explain a bit further down:
Median household income for the bottom tenth of the income spectrum fell by 12 percent from a peak in 1999, while the top 90th percentile dropped by just 1.5 percent.
So, even rich folks are getting hurt by this--even if only a little.
Overall, median household income adjusted for inflation declined by 2.3 percent in 2010 from the previous year, to $49,445. That was 7 percent less than the peak of $53,252 in 1999.
So, even in 1999, the tail end of the Clinton Era, things were not great for most American families. I mean, I remember when I was a kid hearing from my parents that teachers generally didn't get paid much--$30k or so. That was in the 1980s. So, if a two income household is making $7k less than twice that in 1999, that's some pretty crappy income right there. Of course, eleven years later in 2010, households made just under $50k and that's worse than it looks, compared to the 1999 and 1980s number once you think about inflation.
So, sorry CoalSpeaker, while creepy/bizarre sounds and solar flares aren't bad things to be concerned about, my nerves don't like news like this. Especially since it's been a while since I've seen a paycheck. :\
