Most Read Realitybase Posts in August
Thursday, September 1, 2011 at 10:34AM 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 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.
Pitchforks before Parties A third party candidate to challenge Obama is doomed unless it is supported by a broad and powerful ideological movement. Using such a movement to influence the Democratic Party would be more effective and more enduring than a third party.
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.
Our Plutocrats Versus Their Plutocrats Jeffrey Sachs writes that Republicans are for Big Oil and, since Bill Clinton and Robert Rubin, Democrats are for Big Banks. Neither party looks after the interests of middle class and poor Americans.
The American Dream died in February 1973 With graphs from multiple sources showing stagnation of inflation-adjusted middle class incomes since the 1970s after strong and steady post-WWII growth
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.
How would your family cope with 20% pay cuts? What if your customers got 20% pay cuts? Booz is showing its clients how to reduce the wages of their US employees by 15-20%. This is a general 21st Century trend and is causing a broad downward macroeconomic spiral that only major federal government policy changes could reverse.
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 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.
