SCREWED: The Undeclared War Against The Middleclass...

[Joanne98]

The Author is on Air America right now. Sounds like a good book. He just mentioned "wage inflation" which I just ranted about the other day.

Book Description
http://www.amazon.com/Screwed-Undeclared-Against-Middle-Currents/dp/1576754146

The American middle class is on its deathbed. People who put in a solid day's work can no longer afford to buy a house, send their kids to college, or even get sick. If you’re not a CEO, you’re probably screwed.

As Air America Radio Host Thom Hartmann shows, this death is no accident. Like the Founding Fathers, patriots such as Roosevelt, Truman, and Eisenhower knew that economic opportunity and democracy go hand-in-hand. They believed in maximizing the public good and they worked tirelessly to build the strongest middle class the world has ever seen. But now, under the guise of “freeing the market,” conservative and corporate forces are waging a covert war against the middle class, dismantling policies like Social Security, Medicare, the minimum wage, and fair labor laws — the very safeguards that foster economic opportunity and citizen engagement. The result is an economic system designed to line the pockets of the super-rich, the impending extinction of the middle class, and a very real, very dangerous threat to democracy itself.

By exposing the systematic efforts to destroy the middle class, Screwed empowers readers to stand up, speak out, and reclaim their democratic birthrights.

http://www.amazon.com/Screwed-Undeclared-Against-Middle-Currents/dp/1576754146

[Jcrowley]

1. It's really getting rough out there

Employers shift health insurance costs onto workers
Not only are fewer employees receiving health insurance through their employers, but those who still receive employer-provided coverage are now paying a larger share of those insurance costs. Get the facts at a glance in the Snapshot for August 16, 2006.

Work, poverty, and single-mother families
This month marks the 10th anniversary of the welfare reform legislation signed in August 1996. Those touting the program's success often cite the sharp decline in the poverty rates of single-mother families over the course of the latter 1990s. But what economic factors are really at the heart of these improvements, and have they carried over into today's economy? Get the facts in the Snapshot for August 9, 2006.

U.S. government does relatively little to lessen child poverty rates
U.S. policies have been relatively ineffective in reducing child poverty, with the highest child poverty rate of 16 other industrialized nations. Read more in the Snapshot for July 19, 2006.

Weaker job market re-opens racial income gap
The post-2000 labor market has reversed significant progress in the income gap between African-American and white workers, and in the current labor market the gap is likely to widen further. This week's Snapshot previews data to be presented as part of the forthcoming The State of Working America, 2006/07. Read more in the Snapshot for July 5, 2006.

CEO pay-to-minimum wage ratio soars
Today's average CEO earns more before lunch in one day than the average minimum wage worker earns all year, with a compensation ratio of 821:1. CEO pay continues to climb, while the federal minimum wage has remained unchanged since 1997. Read more in the Snapshot for June 27, 2006.

See this report, lengthy but well worth it. Another DUer passed it on:
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/previews.html

[Joanne98]

2. I know. Tom just made a really good point. It's isn't just about money

It's about power too. When people feel economically secure they start to demand things.

[JHB]

18. kick

[orpupilofnature57]

3. The bourgeoisies ,by sucking up to the rich and looking down on the poor

they have assaulted middle class values from within.

[Joanne98]

4. "Indentured" college students. Good description.

[Joanne98]

5. WOW! this is a really good show. Everybody should listen (link)

http://www.airamerica.com/listen/

[Joanne98]

6. We need to take over the Democratic Party.......

I agree.

[Union Thug]

7. ah yes, the wage inflation chestnut again. The idea that

effectively implies, the less you make, the richer you are!

[Joanne98]

8. Totally phoney theory. Doesn't apply to the rich!

[Bozita]

9. Hartmann is recording chapters - available at KPOJ's website

http://www.620kpoj.com/main.html

[Joanne98]

10. Take back the Democrat Party from the DLC! YES!

[stevedeshazer]

11. Wanna listen to a free chapter, in Thom's own voice? Link here:

Just scroll down to the first item, (Screwed Sneak Peek) and listen, download, or podcast.

http://www.620kpoj.com/cc-common/podcast.html

[Joanne98]

12. They drive down wages with immigration. Just what I've been saying.

There's a reason why Reagan and Bush keep letting people in.

[Bozita]

13. book is 35% off at Powells - $14.92

from an email from Thom:

Screwed: The Undeclared War Against the Middle Class and What We Can Do About It

by Thom Hartmann

Read Free Excerpts from Thom's new book Screwed at: http://www.thomhartmann.com/screwed

From Powells.com - Screwed is available for a limited time at the "special 35% off" online price of $14.92 http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?isbn=1576754146=1 <http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?isbn=1576754146&preview=1> This offer expires on September 10, so order your copy today and save.

From Amazon.com - http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1576754146/ref=nosim/thomhartmann

Listen to a Sneak peak of Thom's book Screwed with guest appearances by Dwight Eisenhower, Rudolf Hess and Franklin Roosevelt. At http://www.620kpoj.com/main.html

Upcoming Speaking.... http://www.thomhartmann.com/tour-up.shtml

[Joanne98]

14. A great idea for a freeper family member Xmas gift...

http://www.impeachbushgame.com/

[Danascot]

15. Krugman's latest column

"... right-wing commentators would like you to believe that the economy’s winners are a large group, like college graduates or people with agreeable personalities. But the winners’ circle is actually very small. Even households at the 95th percentile — that is, households richer than 19 out of 20 Americans — have seen their real income rise less than 1 percent a year since the late 1970’s. But the income of the richest 1 percent has roughly doubled, and the income of the top 0.01 percent — people with incomes of more than $5 million in 2004 — has risen by a factor of 5."


http://wealthyfrenchman.blogspot.com/2006/09/whining-over-discontent.html

[JHB]

16. America: What Went Wrong? (and other stories)

I originally posted this elsewhere, but for resource value it's worth repeating here:
--------------------------------------------------------

One of the things I find that comes up when talking with people about the economy, globalization, etc., is many peoples' belief that it was all rather inevitable, so complaining about it is like complaining about the tide: you can do it, but it's pointless.

I don't have to wonder why they think that -- the "liberal" media has repeated the theme for nearly thirty years now -- but sometimes I wonder how it is that I became "inoculated" against this. Why am I so sure things didn't have to play out this way and that deliberate political decisions were at least as important as "the invisible hand" in bringing about what Paul Krugman called "The Great Unraveling".

Well, part of it was what I'd been reading. I can't exactly give my full reading list for the last 20 years, but I can recommend a few books that will help when it comes to fixing the "What's the Matter with Kansas?" and "Talking to an Elephant" problems.

Reporters James B. Steele and Donald L. Barlett wrote a series of articles, some for The Philadelphia Enquirer, some for Time, on how the changing economy was playing out for ordinary people. The first, published in book form in 1992, is a little dated, but that actually works in its favor now, since it's entirely pre-Clinton. The later series/books followed up on the same or similar themes, and collectively they serve as quite an information source and teaching tool when you try to explain to people just how far this "squeeze the middle" and "starve the beast" effort goes back.

Pick'em up at your library, or at a bookstore, and get

America: What Went Wrong?
by James B Steele, Donald L. Barlett

Paperback: 252 pages
Publisher: Andrews McMeel Publishing (January 1, 1992)
ISBN: 0836270010
"Worried that you are falling behind, not living as well as you once did?..."

AMERICA: WHO REALLY PAYS THE TAXES?
by Donald L. Barlett

Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster; Remaindered Marked edition (March 23, 1994)
ISBN: 0671871579

America: Who Stole The Dream?
by Donald L. Barlett, James B. Steele

Paperback: 276 pages
Publisher: Andrews McMeel Publishing (June 1, 1996)
ISBN: 0836213149
"Let's suppose, for a moment, there was a country where the people in charge charted a course that eliminated millions of good paying jobs..."

The Great American Tax Dodge: How Spiraling Fraud and Avoidance Are Killing Fairness, Destroying the Income Tax, and Costing You
by Donald L. Barlett, James B. Steele

Paperback: 302 pages
Publisher: University of California Press; 1st Califo edition (September 2, 2002)
ISBN: 0520236106
"A woman forms a company to conduct "research" for the benefit of her minor children and writes a monthly "rent" check to her husband to..."

Critical Condition : How Health Care in America Became Big Business--and Bad Medicine
by Donald L. Barlett, James B. Steele

Hardcover: 288 pages
Publisher: Doubleday (October 5, 2004)
ISBN: 0385504543

JHB
:patriot:

[JHB]

17. Speaking of online excerpts...

Chapter 1 of "America: What Went Wrong" can be found here:
http://www.politicalindex.com/wrong1.htm

The chapter title is "Dismantling the Middle Class"
Keep in mind these words were written fifteen years ago:


Here is a summary of what seems likely to come, barring a sweeping reversal in federal policy:


Workers will continue to be forced to move from jobs that once might have paid $8 to $20 an hour into jobs that will pay less. Some will be consigned to part-time employment. Some will lose all or part of fringe benefits they have long taken for granted.

Women and blacks will continue to move into the work force, but they will receive substandard wages, substandard pensions and substandard fringe benefits. For the first time, they will be joined by a new minority whiteminoritywhite males in both manufacturing and service jobs.

Workers will be compelled to forgo wage increases to shoulder a growing percentage of the cost of their own health-care insurance. Some will find their coverage sharply limited. Some will lose their health-care coverage entirely.

The elimination of jobs that once paid middle-class wages will continue uninterrupted, due in part to an ongoing wave of corporate restructurings and bankruptcies, the continuing disappearance of some industries and the transfer of others to foreign countries.

More than a half-million men and women, including many with growing families, will be dumped into this sinking job market as the Defense Department begins to deal with budget cuts by prematurely discharging military personnel-most of whom had planned on a twenty-to-thirty-year career in the armed forces.

Local, state and federal taxes will continue to consume a disproportionate share of the incomes of ordinary workers. At the same time, the proportion of the incomes of wealthy Americans that goes untaxed win continue to grow.

Massive debt loads incurred by corporations and the federal government will require ever growing sums of money for interest payments, meaning less money for new plants and equipment, less money to create jobs, less money to rebuild a collapsing infrastructure-highways, bridges, water and sewer lines.

Men and women, banking on pensions they believe the federal government has insured, will discover at retirement that their pensions are not guaranteed. Some will receive only a fraction of the promised benefits. Some will receive nothing.

For the first time since the Great Depression, a growing number of workers will receive no pension at all. At the other extreme, about 20 percent of the work force will receive hefty pensions-in many cases they will collect more in retirement than they earned while at work.

None of this, it should be underscored, is related to a recession. Because these conditions are structural, built into the economy by the rule book's authors, they will be largely unaffected by any upturn in business.

Did they miss any? I think there were two that were partly off, but the reality wasn't particularly better.
More at the link.



JHB

[Bozita]

19. prescient

PATCO was Fort Sumpter.