The Rich Are Still Stealing the Economy From Us

They're not going to give it back, either. Not without one hell of a fight.



Steve M:

This is a longstanding right-wing project -- to make sure Americans never get angry at the country's real parasites, the financiers who contribute nothing of value, while demanding every cent they can get their grubby hands on. Right-wingers have been very successful in this project -- they have most of Heartland America convinced that the real parasitic "elites" are college professors and Prius drivers and unionized teachers and other folks who work for the damn gummint.

Meanwhile, Hamptons developer Joe Farrell has a theory about why the good times are back in his neck of the woods:

But most of all, he credits the Federal Reserve for the economic stimulus, which he said has helped the wealthy most of all. "The stock market's flying through the roof and who's that helping, the middle class? No, I mean that's the reality," he said. "Out here, life goes on."

To a large extent, that's Obama's fault -- and yet he would have gone for a second stimulus, and he's called for more investment in public works projects, and, of course, none of this is allowable because Republicans won't hear of it. The only stimulus we can have is the one that helps the most privileged.

And yes, maybe Glibertarian Glenn has a point about public officials getting too comfy because they get perks the rest of us don't. But he stops there. To me, that means they identify more with their billionaire contributors than with the rest of us. To Glibertarian Glenn, identifying with the rich is a good thing -- but if you're in government, you'd better make sure the rich get all the privileges, and not dare to take any for yourself, because government is evil, while rich people in the private sector are sacrosanct.

Digby:

EPI put out a fascinating paper yesterday about wage stagnation. (Yes, it really was fascinating!) The upshot is that we're still a very rich country. The problem is that the wealth isn't being broadly distributed:

SNIP 

There are lots of problems caused by how profit-biased the recovery has been. For one, income accruing to capital-owners is less likely to recycle quickly back through the economy and generate demand (as evidence, see the huge amount of idle cash balances on corporate balance sheets in recent years). If a larger share of income growth had translated into wage-growth, this would have sparked more self-generating demand and improved the recovery. From a political economy perspective, the rapid recovery of corporate profits has also likely led to less urgency from a potential ally in asking for more macroeconomic stimulus (corporate business, which, remember, strongly supported the Recovery Act).

And, most directly, these higher profits just mean that all else equal, there’s less to go to paychecks. And as yesterday’s paper shows, that’s a sadly familiar outcome.

That is not to say there aren't solutions to this. The problem is that those solutions must come from our completely dysfunctional political system:

SNIP

That's not much to hang on to. Our political system is so corrupted by money and obstructed by a rump fanatical minority that it's hard to see how we get out of it before this economic problem turns into a very big social and yes, economic problem. It's very hard to see where one ends and the other starts.

Still, it's good to know the money is still there. The greedheads who are hoarding it all should probably think hard about just how much they really need to keep for themselves. These things tend not to end well if they don't.