Our economy stinks

originally posted by: manuelram16

originally posted by: pexx421

originally posted by: manuelram16
a reply to: dfnj2015

Yes the economy was great with Odumbo and stinks with Trump....
can you please tell Trump to keep the economy stinking ??

This isn’t about trump or Obama. The us economy has been declining for the majority for the last 30 years. It’s continuing that trajectory.

Correct, it's a stupid post to try and tell the sheeple that Orange man bad....

You know this line is getting old and sounds totally childish.

And why is he so orange again?

originally posted by: Edumakated

originally posted by: pexx421

originally posted by: SeaWorthy
a reply to: Edumakated

Economy is booming for the professional and entrepreneur classes. If you have skills, you are doing well. Economy is definitely stagnant for the low skilled. Not really sure what can be done about that in the short term.

We also know that artificially inflating minimum wage won't fix the issue

No but it will push out small business so the big corps and get bigger.

Minimum wage has been artificially pushed down for decades through outsourcing, immigrants, and offshoring. Bumping it up to lower than it would have been had it increased with productivity and inflation? That’s not “artificially inflating” more like a partial correction.

Wages are just where supply and demand intersect. You can't change wages without causing other issues...

I agree that outsourcing, immigrants, offshoring, etc have helped to suppress wages. I'd also argue feminism is a HUGE contributor as well by bringing a ton of women into the workforce. All of these things affect the supply side of the curve thus putting pressure on wages.

In what world? Where do kings of capital not manipulate the system to push wages as low as possible? It’s the whole primary target of neoliberalism. Pushing economies down to be the cheap labor suppliers for the consumer nations. It’s what we did to Eastern Europe, South America, Africa, China, etc. and now it’s results are coming to roost on the average American worker. All of pay scales are a random joke. They’re not based off of actual ability or productivity. Let’s take, for instance, the change since 08. All the economy was in recession so we can’t afford raises! They said. Prior to that in the medical industry we regularly got our 5% per year. Since then we’re lucky to get 3. Most years it’s 2. For about 5 years it was 0. At the same time our hospitals are making banner profits, each year better than any year before. What bs.

Because business lies. They promised more jobs and investment in our own industries with better wages in exchange for trillions in tax breaks. Well we’re still deindustrializing. 95% of it spent on financial shenanigans. But you go right on thinking that the oligarchs will let little things like “supply” and “demand” effect their profits. They create artificial scarcity, they price fix, and they create demand. If the military is topped off on weapons and supplies, they’ll create a war so they can sell more munitions. They probably see global warming and environmental catastrophes as a good plus for future profits too.

a reply to: MRinder

Lol.. well adding population density didn't skew the results... what a load of crap.

Why would it? Clearly places with higher density are the ones paying better and have higher incomes better schools and so forth.

originally posted by: Edumakated

originally posted by: SeaWorthy

originally posted by: Edumakated

originally posted by: Gargoyle91
a reply to: dfnj2015

At $100,000 living in Los Angeles I'm still pay check to pay check - Rent and taxes are killing me here in LA it costs me over $2000 a month just to go to work between gas, taxes and insurance So I agree .

Move.... $100k anywhere else is a good living.

Yeah move to a state where the cost if housing is low but your income will drop to 27000.

Not necessarily...

Chicago ain't cheap, but it is way cheaper than California. There are plenty of jobs and high incomes in cheaper states like TX, NC, TN, GA, etc....

The Cost of Living Index measures regional differences in the cost of consumer goods and services, excluding taxes and non-consumer expenditures, for professional and managerial households in the top income quintile. It is based on more than 90,000 prices covering 60 different items for which prices are collected quarterly by chambers of commerce, economic development organizations, and university applied economic centers in each participating urban area. Small differences should not be interpreted as showing a measurable difference.

coli.org...

a reply to: SeaWorthy

Why do some of the least populous states have better schools than California? Just because there are more people there doesn't mean anything when it comes to quality of education.

originally posted by: pexx421

originally posted by: SeaWorthy

originally posted by: Edumakated

originally posted by: Gargoyle91
a reply to: dfnj2015

At $100,000 living in Los Angeles I'm still pay check to pay check - Rent and taxes are killing me here in LA it costs me over $2000 a month just to go to work between gas, taxes and insurance So I agree .

Move.... $100k anywhere else is a good living.

Yeah move to a state where the cost if housing is low but your income will drop to 27000.

Let’s be fair. Yes, I’m many states low cost of living is tied to low wages, or high cost is tied to high wages, but that’s hardly the whole picture. There are plenty states where pay is high and costs of living are normal or low. It was so when I lived in Phoenix, and when I originally moved to Atlanta some 20 years ago the pay was higher and housing and such were lower. And there’s also places where the cost of living is high, and the pay is dismally low. Like New Orleans.

Also some places are beautiful or near wonderful places and some just plain stink...and yes i have seen all of the states.

originally posted by: underpass61
a reply to: projectvxn

Thanks for the backup, project. I think my reply went over his 'lil head.

On topic, I don't care what your numbers say I'm seeing more work now than I have in a decade. Good, profitable work. My backlog is currently 3-4 weeks and will stay that way at least through the end of the year. Projections for 2020 are strong too, sorry to burst your bubble.

Do you know what an anecdote is?

Maybe you could post some spreadsheets too.

originally posted by: Edumakated

originally posted by: pexx421

originally posted by: SeaWorthy
a reply to: Edumakated

Economy is booming for the professional and entrepreneur classes. If you have skills, you are doing well. Economy is definitely stagnant for the low skilled. Not really sure what can be done about that in the short term.

We also know that artificially inflating minimum wage won't fix the issue

No but it will push out small business so the big corps and get bigger.

Minimum wage has been artificially pushed down for decades through outsourcing, immigrants, and offshoring. Bumping it up to lower than it would have been had it increased with productivity and inflation? That’s not “artificially inflating” more like a partial correction.

Wages are just where supply and demand intersect. You can't change wages without causing other issues...

I agree that outsourcing, immigrants, offshoring, etc have helped to suppress wages. I'd also argue feminism is a HUGE contributor as well by bringing a ton of women into the workforce. All of these things affect the supply side of the curve thus putting pressure on wages.

True let's go with barefoot and pregnant!

I think a lot of the problem beside the loss of manufacturing to low paying countries is lazyiness and greed.

We could but a pair of American made shoes at one of many shoe stores but then knock offs came along for half the price at Costco and Walmart and we jumped.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: SeaWorthy

Why is high population density a plus?

The number of people in an area seems to be an arbitrary of measure of its quality for living.

Well like I said, everything goes up with population. I live in a low population area, we have no jobs and the ones we do have are low pay. Homes are made shoddy because we have no real skilled work force and it takes them a year to do what a more populated contracter does in a month.
Just my own experience example, I didn't research why they chose to include population.

originally posted by: chris_stibrany
a reply to: MRinder
RE their metrics:
How is a higher population density a good thing? People suck. -.- If they got rid of that 'handicap' for some states the map would look wayyyy different. Someone should edit it

Most People like cities and people, just not ATS people in general it seems.
Certain to find a better restaurant in a populated place. Our restaurants have only frozen microwaved food

originally posted by: LSU2018

originally posted by: KnoxMSP

originally posted by: underpass61
a reply to: dfnj2015

I like the economy, I think it's great!

It is for a select few. Mostly boomers though, as they had it much easier than genx or millenials.

Wage gap is higher than ever, home purchases are a higher portion of our income than ever before, and food, water, and electricity is a higher percentage of our income than my parents or their parents had at my age.

Wage gap? What a farce. If a man and woman have the same exact job and credentials, they get paid the exact same unless they're in a DNC committee.

Home purchases are higher because people don't go in search of a small 3 bed 2 bath house like they used to. They want bigger and bigger, and bigger.

I thought they meant gap between income and expense?

But

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Since we have started tracking the gender pay gap, the difference between the earnings of women and men has shrunk. But significant disparity in how men and women are paid still remains.
The uncontrolled gender pay gap, which takes the ratio of median earnings of all women to all men, decreased by $0.05 since 2015.
However, women still make only $0.79 for every dollar men make in 2019.

www.payscale.com...

a reply to: SeaWorthy

The reason you find that gap is due to women like myself who put our careers on hold in order to be mothers. We step out of the full-time workforce and thus stop advancing up the ladder, so our male contemporaries who don't do that end up making more at higher paid positions. So if you go back after a few years, they've advanced because more of us have dropped out. That creates the so-called gap.

Measure a woman and a man in the same position, and they make the same money.

originally posted by: SeaWorthy


I thought they meant gap between income and expense?

Actually meant more like;

In the 1950s, a typical CEO made 20 times the salary of his or her average worker. Last year, CEO pay at an S&P 500 Index firm soared to an average of 361 times more than the average rank-and-file worker, or pay of $13,940,000 a year, according to an AFL-CIO's Executive Paywatch news release today. May 22, 2018

But that goes hand in hand. The average american has less purchasing power with their wages, compared to almost anytime in history, and COL is higher than ever.

We live in the Corporatocracy of America now. Big business makes the rules, and tells you the numbers, and if you don't like it, there's the door, we will find someone to fill your shoes, or ship your job to (insert even lower avg wage country here).

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: SeaWorthy

Why do some of the least populous states have better schools than California? Just because there are more people there doesn't mean anything when it comes to quality of education.

Thank you for the link. Looks like it might be about class size.

originally posted by: Gargoyle91
a reply to: dfnj2015

At $100,000 living in Los Angeles I'm still pay check to pay check - Rent and taxes are killing me here in LA it costs me over $2000 a month just to go to work between gas, taxes and insurance So I agree .

And you're probably walking over strangers' piss and crap and used needles. I don't know how people who make good money such as yourself would want to live there. At 100k a year, you would live lavishly in most states.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: SeaWorthy

The reason you find that gap is due to women like myself who put our careers on hold in order to be mothers. We step out of the full-time workforce and thus stop advancing up the ladder, so our male contemporaries who don't do that end up making more at higher paid positions. So if you go back after a few years, they've advanced because more of us have dropped out. That creates the so-called gap.

Measure a woman and a man in the same position, and they make the same money.

I see that, but the gap does exist. Personally I do miss the days when someone stayed home with the kids and made a house a home for the whole Family.

Another key factor is that women tend to spend more time out of the workforce, which hurts their career. In 2018, we studied this issue and found that when a worker leaves the workforce, they incur a wage “penalty” upon their return.

Workers who took a break for 12 months or longer experienced an average wage penalty of 7.3 percent relative to a similar worker who did not take a break. Women take more breaks and longer breaks than men, primarily for taking care of children and aging family members, and bear the brunt of this “time-off” penalty.

www.payscale.com...

originally posted by: butcherguy
a reply to: KnoxMSP

Mostly boomers though, as they had it much easier than genx or millenials.

I remember the economy in the 1970's.
I think some genXers and millenials need to experience some of those 'easy times'.

I was born in 1979, I've listened to my parents tell stories about living with next to nothing for most of the 70's. Things got better in the 80's and my dad ended up being very successful, but they struggled bad in the 70's.

originally posted by: LSU2018

originally posted by: Gargoyle91
a reply to: dfnj2015

At $100,000 living in Los Angeles I'm still pay check to pay check - Rent and taxes are killing me here in LA it costs me over $2000 a month just to go to work between gas, taxes and insurance So I agree .

And you're probably walking over strangers' piss and crap and used needles. I don't know how people who make good money such as yourself would want to live there. At 100k a year, you would live lavishly in most states.

Again, you don't know what they do for the 100,000 is it available elsewhere? leaving a job of 100k does not promise a new job of 100k unless it is a transferable occupation. It also does cost a lot to make long distance moves.

For hundreds of years the economy of the world and particularly the US was built on exploration and exploitation. Move into new territories, fight the locals, steal their stuff, put the profits into the bank accounts of the wealthy.

But unless we decide that Central Asia is worth invading, or figure out a way to easily live in one of our many delightful oceans, we've kind of run out of frontiers. Space! you say. Well, that might work if it wasn't so expensive to get there and set up shop. As it is, only extremely wealthy nations and individuals can do it. Not like the push westward in the cowboy days when anybody with a couple of mules and a wagon could start a new life in Californy.

What we're seeing now is how we're dealing with reaching a dead end. Fighting for the same scraps over and over among ourselves. So long, "American Dream" (which was mostly marketing anyway).

We're stuck until somebody invents something to change the paradigm. Our economy is still based on technology that is 100-150 years old -- our electrical grid, our gas-burning horseless carriages, our little powered flying contraptions. We need something different, or we're heading toward stagnation. But who can predict what genius device will appear? Nostradamus? Criswell? The Magic 8-Ball?

a reply to: SeaWorthy

Maybe, but it reinforces the idea that more population isn't always better.