Most Read Realitybase Posts in September

I posted only twice in September—lazy and uninspired. So, eight of the top ten most read posts in September were oldies but goodies.

The Citigroup Plutonomy Memos With key quotations from documents that are being disappeared. This post is now the #1 response to a Google search for "plutonomy memo."

The history of US per-capita petroleum consumption will surprise you.  A graph and other data show US per-capita consumption of petroleum is down substantially from the 1970s, has been very stable since 1983 because of CAFE standards, and has fluctuated only slightly with retail price changes.

The American Dream died in February 1973 This post, which makes the top 10 almost every month, has graphs from multiple sources showing stagnation of inflation-adjusted middle class incomes since the 1970s after strong and steady post-WWII growth

The Dysfunction and Corruption of Our Healthcare System, Its Damage to the National Economy and other Basic Healthcare Matters (Guest Post) Describing a system that is destroying American business global competitiveness, that violates fundamental insurance risk principles, and that has inherent conflicts of interest preventing quality national health care delivery and cost efficiency, and proposing a solution.

The Recession Is Coming! The Recession Is Coming! December 2007 post with charts showing America's middle class had already been in recession for 7 years and asking if we really care about them.

After 1975 did incomes grow faster for American families or French families? The top 1% of American families did better than the top 1% of French families, but for the bottom 99% the opposite was true.

US job creation has been declining since April 2000 and is now in freefall. Discussion around a dramatic graph showing our employment-to-population ratio strongly increasing until 2000 followed by a devastating loss in 10 years of all the gains made in the previous 20 years.

The American Middle Class Got Frog-Boiled. Since the 1970s, the middle class gradually lost economic power to the super-rich and also so much political power that it is doubtful it can recapture its share of the American Dream.

We don't have a Social Security problem; we have an unemployment problem. But for chronic unemployment, there would be no Social Security problem.  We should not raise the SS retirement age because that would increase youth unemployment. The current COLA formula is already unfair to seniors and the proposed change would make it more so.

Is the New York Times editorial board adapting to reality, or is this cognitive dissonance? Three years ago the NYT editorial board acknowledged that globalization is one of the reasons "Americans are working harder and not getting ahead," but it continues to urge readers to "embrace" globalization.