Economics Made Easy

Duncan Black at Eschaton has a talent for boiling down [allegedly] complex economic issues and then explaining them in terms 99%-ers can understand:

The real problem isn't lack of productivity growth, it's that workers haven't gotten any of the gains. We should all be quite a bit richer than we are.

More Signs of Improvement

The long, slow recovery continues apace.

Real Moms Don't Work

Now the the Romney camp (and the Republican Party as a whole) have themselves all worked up into a dither because some Democrat disrespected Ann Romney by saying she NEVERWORKEDADAYINHERLIFE!!!, it's worth remembering that there was a time the shoe was on the other foot. That was the time when Republicans complained, openly and derisively, about all those welfare moms sitting at home raising their kids -- and NOTWORKING!! -- on the taxpayers' largess.

Eye-Opening Chart of the Day

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Obama Disproving Republican Canard

The stock market is performing remarkably well under our Kenyan-born, half-breed Muslin, Socialist president.

Most Revealing Graph of the Day

Worst Statistic You'll Read All Day

The Federal Deep Poverty Rate ($11,157 annual income for a family of four) is 6.7%.

That's 20,900,000 people.

More Economic Good News for Pres. Obama

We're still in a hole, obviously, but at least we stopped digging in early 2009, and these days things are looking rosier all the time for the current occupant of the White House.

Red Smile

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That red line completing a smile is the key to Obama's re-election.

Turning the Corner [?]

When you combine good economic news with the ongoing Republican civil war, you have to figure things are beginning to look up for the president.

The U.S. job market strengthened at the start of the year as employers added an unexpectedly large number of new jobs and the unemployment rate in January dropped for the fifth straight month.
[...]
With the step-up in private-sector jobs, the nation’s unemployment rate dropped to 8.3% last month from 8.5% in December.

The jobless rate has fallen every month since August, when the rate was 9.1%.

Basic Question

With the national median income sitting at about $26,000 per year, how many of the 99% do you suppose are actually capable of saving any money? I don't mean saving for something like a new [or used] car or a bigger TV or a modest vacation, I mean for big things like retirement or their kid's college education.

We're Doomed, Because We're Doing it Wrong

The people in charge -- and their megaphones in the media -- really have no idea how to fix our problems. Meanwhile, the Dirty Fucking Hippies are right about everything. Always. Also.

Things Are Tough All Over

You think we've got problems?

The unemployment rate in Spain is 22.9%.

How the Payroll Tax Cut Expiration Looks When Your Payroll Clerk Emails You About It.

You'll be hearing a lot more about the payroll tax cut expiration/extension fight over the next few weeks. Yes, the do-nothing Congress is taking up that debate again and, without congressional action, the tax cut expires on February 29th. Here's the way the implications of the expiration were reported to us by our payroll clerk.

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And I'll be damned if that doesn't look like a 2% tax increase.

Juvenile Janitors

When doughy pile of smug white excrement Newt Gingrich argues that 11-and-12-year-old kids would do well to take over janitorial duties at their middle schools, he's not saying that little Joey Smith from suburban John Glenn Elementary School in Pleasant Valley, Indiana, ought to start swabbing lavatory floors, no, what Newt means is little Malik Jefferson at PS 162 in the Bronx should get used to the feel of a mop in his hands in preparation for the only job he'll ever be qualified for.

Newt Gingrich: His racism has sincere economic underpinnings.

On the Recovery

Each line on this graph charts the unemployment problem in the nation's various post-war recessions. The red line marks the current, prolonged Great Recession, which began in December of 2007. You can clearly see that the bottom of the unemployment trough came at month 24 (December 2009, 10 months into the Obama presidency), at which point it began a long, slow and still incomplete recovery.

Rich Get Richer

Who cares about wealth disparity?

Exposing the Lie about Right-Wing Economics

Here is yet another remarkable map (derived from a trove of statistics) illustrating how conservative/Republican/right-wing socio-economic policies are nothing if not disastrous for the citizens compelled to live under them.

In this case, we learn that life expectancy has declined in nearly 25% of all counties in the United States. The map itself clearly illustrates a stark reality of our Red State/Blue State divide: life expectancy is on the way down in the South, Appalachia, and small pockets of the West. Those would be the Red States. Take a look at Oklahoma, for God's sake! In general, these are locations the lowest median personal income, highest teen pregnancy rates, greatest dependency on government assistance programs, highest dropout rates, highest religious affiliation and greatest number of gun owners.

Conversely, life expectancy is going up along the coastal regions and in the Northeast, Pacific Northwest and much of the upper Midwest. In fact, you can even find pockets of increasing life expectancy in the reddest of states...in the towns that grew up around major universities (e.g. Tuscon, AZ; Austin, TX; and Omaha, NE). These are the parts of the country with the highest median personal income, lowest teen pregnancy rates, least dependency on government assistance programs, lowest dropout rates, lowest religious affiliation and fewest number of gun owners.

Statisticians will often say correlation does not imply causation, but just compare the two maps below...

"Who Gives a Care?"

Feeling strangely unmoved by the news that Washington has "solved" the debt ceiling crisis.

Teabaggers at the Wheel

The teabaggers in Congress have officially grabbed the wheel. They're not so cool as James Dean. Looks like we're going over.