AMERICAblog: Poor get poorer, just in time for recession
constantcomment
· 1 year ago
let's see: six. billion with the possiblity of nine billion peeps coming up soon. a chinese middle class as large as the population of the US. wealth being redistributed and concentrated worldwide. a foolish war with no real payback. yup, the poor will get poorer.
Nigel Elliott
· 1 year ago
Chris, you forgot about the "stimulus cheque" that's in the mail. The poor will spend that money on Chinese products at Wal-Mart and that will boost the economy just enough in one quarter, so Bush can claim that the economy expanded. Presto: no recession!
Nigel Elliott
· 1 year ago
Marc Ambinder: A provocative headline, I know, perhaps needlessly so, but it remains one of those hidden secrets in Washington that a Democratic Justice Department is going to be very interested in figuring out whether there's a case to be made that senior Bush Administration officials were guilty of war crimes. http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/20...
SINGING_TROLL
· 1 year ago
Normally I wouldn't post anything from the WSJ but certain occasions and assholes among us make it easier.. The last sentence here is the most important. That's your girl there HILLBOT DRONES!!! -- Trove of Videos Vexes Wal-Mart Producer Peddles Clips To Lawyers and Unions; Mrs. Clinton on Stage By GARY MCWILLIAMS April 9, 2008; Page A1
LENEXA, Kan. -- For nearly 30 years, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. employed a video-production company here to capture footage of its top executives, sometimes in unguarded moments. Two years ago, the retailing giant stopped using the tiny company.
At first, the decision threw Flagler Productions Inc. into a panic. Now it's Wal-Mart that's squirming.
In recent months, Flagler has opened its trove of some 15,000 Wal-Mart tapes to the outside world, with an eye toward selling clips. The material is proving irresistible to everyone from business historians and documentary filmmakers to plaintiffs lawyers and union organizers. Since the '70s, Wal-Mart employed a Kansas video-production company to capture its corporate meetings and culture. But since that relationship has ended, things have changed. Paul Lin reports.
Among the revealing moments: A former executive vice president and board member challenges store managers in 2004 to continue his work opposing unionization. Male managers in drag lead thousands of co-workers in the company's corporate cheer. In another meeting, managers mock foolish or dangerous use of a product sold in its stores. In 1991, founder Sam Walton describes Hillary Clinton, then a Wal-Mart director, as "one of us." Normally I wouldn't post anything from the WSJ but certain occasions and assholes among us make it easier.. The last sentence here is the most important. That's your girl there HILLBOT DRONES! -- Trove of Videos Vexes Wal-Mart Producer Peddles Clips To Lawyers and Unions; Mrs. Clinton on Stage By GARY MCWILLIAMS April 9, 2008; Page A1
LENEXA, Kan. -- For nearly 30 years, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. employed a video-production company here to capture footage of its top executives, sometimes in unguarded moments. Two years ago, the retailing giant stopped using the tiny company.
At first, the decision threw Flagler Productions Inc. into a panic. Now it's Wal-Mart that's squirming.
In recent months, Flagler has opened its trove of some 15,000 Wal-Mart tapes to the outside world, with an eye toward selling clips. The material is proving irresistible to everyone from business historians and documentary filmmakers to plaintiffs lawyers and union organizers. Since the '70s, Wal-Mart employed a Kansas video-production company to capture its corporate meetings and culture. But since that relationship has ended, things have changed. Paul Lin reports.
Among the revealing moments: A former executive vice president and board member challenges store managers in 2004 to continue his work opposing unionization. Male managers in drag lead thousands of co-workers in the company's corporate cheer. In another meeting, managers mock foolish or dangerous use of a product sold in its stores. In 1991, founder Sam Walton describes Hillary Clinton, then a Wal-Mart director, as "one of us." http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120770260120100...
I hear Paraguay is the new Mecca for these creeps.
Bush_Bites
· 1 year ago
Busboy Families that teach their children well and stay together grow rich together. Single parent families are up the creek without a paddle. That's the real message from the data.
----
So the middle class is stagnant because of single parent families?
I tend to doubt it.
Besides, most poor white trash families have tons of kids playing on the beat up Chevy in the front yard.
I don't really expect to see them on a cruise any time soon.
Bush_Bites
· 1 year ago
constantcomment
US. wealth being redistributed and concentrated worldwide.
----
Yeah, that's a big one.
Globalization tends to spread the weath pretty thinly.
Bush_Bites
· 1 year ago
By the way, Bus Boy.
I'm trying to fix you up with the Dog Lady who trolls here during the day.
She acts like she's not interested, but I think she's just being coy.
Sage24
· 1 year ago
Latest Rasmussen Poll:
Obama about 10 points lead against Clinton Obama has slight lead over McCain McCain has lead over Clinton.
More and more, Obama is proving that he can beat McCain, and Clinton has not done very well against McCain. Obama has won more states, more delegates, leads in the popular vote, does better than Clinton against McCain, and has run a very good campaign.
Time for Hillary to face reality, pack her tent, and go back where she came from. This woman is in denial.
She is spoiling Obama's chances to win this November. Maybe she knows it, and does not care.
im gonna scream THAT IS JUST SHAMEFUL....and 37 th in healthcare....despickable,really!
nicho
· 1 year ago
Rich get richer. Poor get poorer. Middle class disappears. All part of the plan. This is what the fascists have been after since old Prescott turned traitor in 1934 and spawned a family of traitors.
The most pathetic people are the worker idiots who support this fascist gang.
Andrew
· 1 year ago
If the purpose of a blog is to inform others in cyber space and the public at large about various issues, Americablog has certainly taken the lead in bringing this financial train wreck called the American economy to the forefront of those who have ears to hear and eyes to see. But other than venting ones spleen over what we know to be some of the worse financial decisions ever made by an administration, ask yourself, what have you done as an individual to change the direction we're moving in? Have you written to your Congressmen or Senators? Have you blocked a highway as truckers did yesterday all over the country in protest of diesel prices over $4 a gallon? Are you still paying through the nose in going to a movie or out to eat rather than cooking at home? Did you make yet another purchase of something that you really didn't need? Yes it's a great thing having a voice on various issues, but what have we the people done to take our government back? The only thing this aadministration understands is money, power and greed. Take it away from them and the game is over. Here's a thought. How about all the bloggers in the US get together and ask their readers to make a one day scrifice. A one day national strike so as to send a clear message to our elected officials that we're mad as hell, and we're not going to take it anymore. No more bailouts using tax payer funds for brokerage firm bailouts. Repayment of all executive bonuses from the year 2007. A 90 day freeze on both state and federal fuel taxes at the pump for starters and last but not least, doing away with the Federal Reserve which has been nothing more than a growing cancer since 1913. That might get their attention as well as the MSM.
Andrew
· 1 year ago
Mirth......"My footprint is very small and the $ I save goes to those who are trying to make a difference with a louder voice than mine". It's a start and if everyone did the same, we might just be able to send the right message to D.C. There are many thing the individual can do to make a difference, but no doubt a national day of protest would hit them between the eyes. either they act more responsibly with our tax dollars and spending, or the revolution begins.
shanobama
· 1 year ago
We have been reduced to holding fund raisers on American Idol.
Great idea, but only a drop in the bucket because of the mismanagement of government funds for Katrina, environmental degradation, unwholesome food, jobs outsourced......on and on. Record food stamp applications in Ohio this quarter. Food banks running out of supplies.
The misery is starting to trickle up slowly. The strength of this nation is the middle class.
Corporate poverty
· 1 year ago
This problem is larger than just who is going to be the next President. Both Obama and Clinton's universal healthcare plan includes FORCING PEOPLE TO BUY HEALTH INSURANCE. We already have a major problem with revenue raiding pre-profit to the tune of millions of millions of dollars going into the pockets of the top executives of health insurance corporations--heck, every major corporation, really.
Now, the "progressive" candidates want to make sure every American contributes to the fifth house/14th BMW multi-millionaire club.
While corporations strip health insurance benefits, pensions, jobs, and pay, AND in the case of the insurance industry, payouts on claims, claiming that such expenses can't be afforded anymore, the revenue which later becomes profit is stripped for the for the benefit of the very few.
Regulation, obviously, is the only answer. Corporations should be FORCED to return revenue to their employees below the top paid 10%. There must be salary/perq caps installed, so that the taxable profit reflects the revenue collected.
Health insurance corporations should then be made to operate as non-profits, WITH, most importantly, the regulations severely limiting the amount of revenue doled out to the top 10% paid employees, as PROFIT, as we all know, is calculated AFTER salary/perq expense funds are removed.
As long as corporations are allowed to behave in this completely socially irresponsible manner, and as long as government is in the pockets of these corporations, the American citizen doesn't stand a chance.
There is one example of a corporation which has self-regulated so that the top paid employee makes only a certain percentage more than the lowest paid employee, and that corporation has been fantastically successful. Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream is a shining example and THE model for overall corporate regulation.
A) Corporations who do not have a taxable address in the non-property/territory (Puerta Rico, Bahamas, etc.) United States should not be allowed to do business in the United States, thus eliminating the hiding of revenue in these places.
B) Corporations/businesses should have to pay a tax on business trips (airline tickets, hotels, etc.) to curb the use of fossil fuels in jet flights, utilizing electronic meeting devices instead.
C) Corporations who do business in the United States should be forced to pay the equivalent of the minimum wage to every foreign manufacturing employee, and any product sold in the United States must have come from a company that pays the equivalent of the minimum wage.
That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.
Frank Ruscica
· 1 year ago
The diagnosis is not at issue: moral hazard risks abound.
The cure, then, will maximize the likelihood that gratuitous moral hazard is too impolitic.
Historically, a job largely for the fourth estate (e.g., Jacob Riis, H.L. Mencken).
How, then, to make it maximally profitable for the fourth estate of today to muckrake?
Imho, the key insights:
1) The introduction of particular online markets, starting with a new kind of market for the ad spaces on blogs, will provide people with new and improved ways to develop, showcase and profit from expertise.
2) Owning popular markets of the aforesaid kinds is an ideal way to increase profits for an American media conglomerate that owns a broadcast TV network.
3) The less benefit individual speculators can derive from moral hazard, the more they will utilize said markets.
Given the above, the sooner media conglomerates start introducing/popularizing the aforesaid markets, the sooner a lot of top-quality entertainment programming will, in part:
1) increase awareness of (proposed) public policies that (would) put taxpayers on the receiving end of gratuitous moral hazard (e.g., increase awareness via a next-gen Jed Bartlet channeling Jon Stewart and Vietnam-era Walter Cronkite) 2) showcase elected representatives who protect taxpayers from gratuitous moral hazard
Thoughts?
Best,
constantcomment
· 1 year ago
Actually, this is all pretty simple.Human population numbers are out of control. The carrying capacity of the planet for the human niche, that is in some semblence of balance with a healthy biodiversity, is somewhere between 2-4 times greater than healthy. And it ain't getting better anytime soon. The ride is not going to be pretty, as you can't fool mother nature.
jr
· 1 year ago
top 1 percent cheerleader Neil Cavuto says it's a "liberal media myth" that people are struggling
scottinsf
· 1 year ago
Sage24 Today 07:34 PM --------------------------------- Ya really think so?
;-)
scottinsf
· 1 year ago
Nigel Elliott Today 07:05 PM Chris, you forgot about the "stimulus cheque" that's in the mail. The poor will spend that money on Chinese products at Wal-Mart and that will boost the economy just enough in one quarter, so Bush can claim that the economy expanded. Presto: no recession! --------------------------------------------------- Actually Nigel, I think we're beyond that. The $600 checks will mostly be going to the banks. Mommy and Daddy owe a lot on their credit cards and the bill collectors are getting nastier by the week I hear.
scottinsf
· 1 year ago
Andrew Today 08:07 PM --------------------------- Good post and great points!
The biggest thing I've done the past three years is to quit driving completely (seriously). I don't use taxis either, except on a couple of very short runs I've made where there was a safety/emergency issue involved. Now if I could just quit driving people insane.
Anybody want to buy a dusty but flawless '03 Jetta TDI with low miles? It's ridiculous that thing is still taking up space in my garage.
mirth
· 1 year ago
Niiiigel, one thread down. Come play.
mirth
· 1 year ago
Andrew,
You make a point that needs to be made again and again: We are not powerless!
No, I do not write Congresspersons because that tactic is pointless, a waste of effort. And I have not blocked a highway, altho I salute the truckers for their actions. But I have paid off and cut up credit cards; I do not buy unnecessary items and I research a company's labor practices or their products' origins before I make purchases - Wal-Mart isn't the only company we should be boycotting; I've discovered that 1/2 of usual household products such as dish liquid and laundry detergent works as well as the recommended amounts; until airlines become respectful of their passangers I wouldn't fly on an airplane if they paid me; my tv collects dust, which is preferable to turning it on. My footprint is very small and the $ I save goes to those who are trying to make a difference with a louder voice than mine.
There are so many ways we can force change, but it takes resolve and determination and self-denial. The best part is that giving as much as you take is a much more pleasant way to live.
mirth
· 1 year ago
Andrew, I don't think we citizens, collectively, are capable of a revolution, but we can make individual statements and that's what I am doing. Eventually, doing without won't be an option. For now it is my personal revolution.
mirth
· 1 year ago
Good for you, ScottSF.
I live in the country quite a ways from town, so I still rank driving as a necessity, at least it is in Winter, but my usual long summer roadtrips on blue highways are on hold. I miss them, but they are not necessary.
Busboy
· 1 year ago
Families that teach their children well and stay together grow rich together. Single parent families are up the creek without a paddle. That's the real message from the data.
All Comments
http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/20...
The last sentence here is the most important.
That's your girl there HILLBOT DRONES!!!
--
Trove of Videos Vexes Wal-Mart
Producer Peddles Clips To Lawyers and Unions;
Mrs. Clinton on Stage
By GARY MCWILLIAMS
April 9, 2008; Page A1
LENEXA, Kan. -- For nearly 30 years, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. employed a video-production company here to capture footage of its top executives, sometimes in unguarded moments. Two years ago, the retailing giant stopped using the tiny company.
At first, the decision threw Flagler Productions Inc. into a panic. Now it's Wal-Mart that's squirming.
In recent months, Flagler has opened its trove of some 15,000 Wal-Mart tapes to the outside world, with an eye toward selling clips. The material is proving irresistible to everyone from business historians and documentary filmmakers to plaintiffs lawyers and union organizers.
Since the '70s, Wal-Mart employed a Kansas video-production company to capture its corporate meetings and culture. But since that relationship has ended, things have changed. Paul Lin reports.
Among the revealing moments: A former executive vice president and board member challenges store managers in 2004 to continue his work opposing unionization. Male managers in drag lead thousands of co-workers in the company's corporate cheer. In another meeting, managers mock foolish or dangerous use of a product sold in its stores. In 1991, founder Sam Walton describes Hillary Clinton, then a Wal-Mart director, as "one of us."
Normally I wouldn't post anything from the WSJ but certain occasions and assholes among us make it easier..
The last sentence here is the most important.
That's your girl there HILLBOT DRONES!
--
Trove of Videos Vexes Wal-Mart
Producer Peddles Clips To Lawyers and Unions;
Mrs. Clinton on Stage
By GARY MCWILLIAMS
April 9, 2008; Page A1
LENEXA, Kan. -- For nearly 30 years, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. employed a video-production company here to capture footage of its top executives, sometimes in unguarded moments. Two years ago, the retailing giant stopped using the tiny company.
At first, the decision threw Flagler Productions Inc. into a panic. Now it's Wal-Mart that's squirming.
In recent months, Flagler has opened its trove of some 15,000 Wal-Mart tapes to the outside world, with an eye toward selling clips. The material is proving irresistible to everyone from business historians and documentary filmmakers to plaintiffs lawyers and union organizers.
Since the '70s, Wal-Mart employed a Kansas video-production company to capture its corporate meetings and culture. But since that relationship has ended, things have changed. Paul Lin reports.
Among the revealing moments: A former executive vice president and board member challenges store managers in 2004 to continue his work opposing unionization. Male managers in drag lead thousands of co-workers in the company's corporate cheer. In another meeting, managers mock foolish or dangerous use of a product sold in its stores. In 1991, founder Sam Walton describes Hillary Clinton, then a Wal-Mart director, as "one of us."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120770260120100...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120770260120100...
Oh well....
Families that teach their children well and stay together grow rich together. Single parent families are up the creek without a paddle. That's the real message from the data.
----
So the middle class is stagnant because of single parent families?
I tend to doubt it.
Besides, most poor white trash families have tons of kids playing on the beat up Chevy in the front yard.
I don't really expect to see them on a cruise any time soon.
US. wealth being redistributed and concentrated worldwide.
----
Yeah, that's a big one.
Globalization tends to spread the weath pretty thinly.
I'm trying to fix you up with the Dog Lady who trolls here during the day.
She acts like she's not interested, but I think she's just being coy.
Obama about 10 points lead against Clinton
Obama has slight lead over McCain
McCain has lead over Clinton.
More and more, Obama is proving that he can beat McCain, and Clinton has not done very well against McCain.
Obama has won more states, more delegates, leads in the popular vote,
does better than Clinton against McCain, and has run a very good campaign.
Time for Hillary to face reality, pack her tent, and go back where she came from. This woman is in denial.
She is spoiling Obama's chances to win this November. Maybe she knows it, and does not care.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/...
THAT IS JUST SHAMEFUL....and 37 th in healthcare....despickable,really!
The most pathetic people are the worker idiots who support this fascist gang.
Have you written to your Congressmen or Senators? Have you blocked a highway as truckers did yesterday all over the country in protest of diesel prices over $4 a gallon? Are you still paying through the nose in going to a movie or out to eat rather than cooking at home? Did you make yet another purchase of something that you really didn't need?
Yes it's a great thing having a voice on various issues, but what have we the people done to take our government back? The only thing this aadministration understands is money, power and greed. Take it away from them and the game is over.
Here's a thought. How about all the bloggers in the US get together and ask their readers to make a one day scrifice. A one day national strike so as to send a clear message to our elected officials that we're mad as hell, and we're not going to take it anymore. No more bailouts using tax payer funds for brokerage firm bailouts. Repayment of all executive bonuses from the year 2007. A 90 day freeze on both state and federal fuel taxes at the pump for starters and last but not least, doing away with the Federal Reserve which has been nothing more than a growing cancer since 1913. That might get their attention as well as the MSM.
Great idea, but only a drop in the bucket because of the mismanagement of government funds for Katrina, environmental degradation, unwholesome food, jobs outsourced......on and on. Record food stamp applications in Ohio this quarter. Food banks running out of supplies.
The misery is starting to trickle up slowly. The strength of this nation is the middle class.
Now, the "progressive" candidates want to make sure every American contributes to the fifth house/14th BMW multi-millionaire club.
While corporations strip health insurance benefits, pensions, jobs, and pay, AND in the case of the insurance industry, payouts on claims, claiming that such expenses can't be afforded anymore, the revenue which later becomes profit is stripped for the for the benefit of the very few.
Regulation, obviously, is the only answer. Corporations should be FORCED to return revenue to their employees below the top paid 10%. There must be salary/perq caps installed, so that the taxable profit reflects the revenue collected.
Health insurance corporations should then be made to operate as non-profits, WITH, most importantly, the regulations severely limiting the amount of revenue doled out to the top 10% paid employees, as PROFIT, as we all know, is calculated AFTER salary/perq expense funds are removed.
As long as corporations are allowed to behave in this completely socially irresponsible manner, and as long as government is in the pockets of these corporations, the American citizen doesn't stand a chance.
There is one example of a corporation which has self-regulated so that the top paid employee makes only a certain percentage more than the lowest paid employee, and that corporation has been fantastically successful. Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream is a shining example and THE model for overall corporate regulation.
A) Corporations who do not have a taxable address in the non-property/territory (Puerta Rico, Bahamas, etc.) United States should not be allowed to do business in the United States, thus eliminating the hiding of revenue in these places.
B) Corporations/businesses should have to pay a tax on business trips (airline tickets, hotels, etc.) to curb the use of fossil fuels in jet flights, utilizing electronic meeting devices instead.
C) Corporations who do business in the United States should be forced to pay the equivalent of the minimum wage to every foreign manufacturing employee, and any product sold in the United States must have come from a company that pays the equivalent of the minimum wage.
That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.
The cure, then, will maximize the likelihood that gratuitous moral hazard is too impolitic.
Historically, a job largely for the fourth estate (e.g., Jacob Riis, H.L. Mencken).
How, then, to make it maximally profitable for the fourth estate of today to muckrake?
Imho, the key insights:
1) The introduction of particular online markets, starting with a new kind of market for the ad spaces on blogs, will provide people with new and improved ways to develop, showcase and profit from expertise.
2) Owning popular markets of the aforesaid kinds is an ideal way to increase profits for an American media conglomerate that owns a broadcast TV network.
3) The less benefit individual speculators can derive from moral hazard, the more they will utilize said markets.
Details are online at http://www.loveatmadisonandwall.com.
Given the above, the sooner media conglomerates start introducing/popularizing the aforesaid markets, the sooner a lot of top-quality entertainment programming will, in part:
1) increase awareness of (proposed) public policies that (would) put taxpayers on the receiving end of gratuitous moral hazard (e.g., increase awareness via a next-gen Jed Bartlet channeling Jon Stewart and Vietnam-era Walter Cronkite)
2) showcase elected representatives who protect taxpayers from gratuitous moral hazard
Thoughts?
Best,
---------------------------------
Ya really think so?
;-)
Chris, you forgot about the "stimulus cheque" that's in the mail. The poor will spend that money on Chinese products at Wal-Mart and that will boost the economy just enough in one quarter, so Bush can claim that the economy expanded. Presto: no recession!
---------------------------------------------------
Actually Nigel, I think we're beyond that. The $600 checks will mostly be going to the banks. Mommy and Daddy owe a lot on their credit cards and the bill collectors are getting nastier by the week I hear.
---------------------------
Good post and great points!
The biggest thing I've done the past three years is to quit driving completely (seriously). I don't use taxis either, except on a couple of very short runs I've made where there was a safety/emergency issue involved. Now if I could just quit driving people insane.
Anybody want to buy a dusty but flawless '03 Jetta TDI with low miles? It's ridiculous that thing is still taking up space in my garage.
You make a point that needs to be made again and again: We are not powerless!
No, I do not write Congresspersons because that tactic is pointless, a waste of effort. And I have not blocked a highway, altho I salute the truckers for their actions. But I have paid off and cut up credit cards; I do not buy unnecessary items and I research a company's labor practices or their products' origins before I make purchases - Wal-Mart isn't the only company we should be boycotting; I've discovered that 1/2 of usual household products such as dish liquid and laundry detergent works as well as the recommended amounts; until airlines become respectful of their passangers I wouldn't fly on an airplane if they paid me; my tv collects dust, which is preferable to turning it on. My footprint is very small and the $ I save goes to those who are trying to make a difference with a louder voice than mine.
There are so many ways we can force change, but it takes resolve and determination and self-denial. The best part is that giving as much as you take is a much more pleasant way to live.
I live in the country quite a ways from town, so I still rank driving as a necessity, at least it is in Winter, but my usual long summer roadtrips on blue highways are on hold. I miss them, but they are not necessary.