Saturday, May 5, 2012

Corporate Raiders like Mitt Romney Lowered Median Household Incomes

... and they caused high unemployment...not Barack Obama.

“There’s class warfare all right. But it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war...and we’re winning.” - Warren Buffett, 2006

(Las Vegas, Nevada, 2012) The "99ers" might be down and out, but they're not forgotten. The New York Times reports that "the widely quoted unemployment rate of 8.1 percent reflects only the red portion in the chart below, the 12.5 million people who did not work in April of 2012, but actively searched for work. A broader unemployment rate, which includes the U-6 figures and includes all the people in this chart, stands at 14.5%".

But I don't believe those numbers either. I believe it's much, much worse. It could be as high as 20% if you counted all the "99ers".

Now add to that "14.5%" at least another 8 million more Americans who've been out of work for at least 99 weeks or longer. To date they have exhausted all their unemployment benefits without ever finding work again.

But they are no longer being counted, either in the media's reported U-3 unemployment rate or in the Bureau of Labor Statistics' reported U-6 rate -- as either "marginally attached" or "discouraged workers". These people are known as the "99ers", those that one time may have received the maximum amount of 99 weeks in unemployment benefits in the higher rated unemployed states.

To date at least eight million Americans have been swept under the statistical rug. A portion took an early Social Security retirement with reduced benefits at age 62, and a portion applied for disability benefits.

The Bureau of Labor statistics has (or, so I've heard) only recently began keeping track of these people (the 99ers), but they report much less than there actually are. The BLS also claims that according to their CPS household survey, these people "gave up searching for work".

As a matter of fact, the BLS just reported (May 2012) that "the number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) was little changed at 5.1 million in April. These individuals made up 41.3 percent of the unemployed. Over the year, the number of long-term unemployed has fallen by 759,000."

Did you understand that last sentence? We didn't "fall", we were no longer counted! And the number of people who are no longer being counted are dropped from their count every month. The media and the BLS co-mingles these people into the "discouraged workers" category, and says they're no longer looking for work.

From the Bureau of Labor Statistics: "The 'mean' duration estimate is somewhat biased because the greatest number of weeks of unemployment that could be recorded in the CPS was capped at 2 years through 2010. In the aftermath of the particularly severe recent recession, 9 percent of the unemployed were jobless for 99 weeks or longer in 2010."

I've been unemployed since October 2008 when the mass layoffs were occurring and ran out of unemployment benefits in June of 2010. I've been out of work 31/2 years, so I know I'm not counted. People like me now rely on a free room from a gracious person and use food stamps to survive.

My number (8 million) is fully explained in my post with links to my sources: 8 Million Unemployed Not Counted by Labor Dept

Mitt Romney Lowered Median Incomes & Caused Unemployment

Mitt Romney has been citing an interesting economic statistic lately about the economy under Barack Obama: He says, “Well let’s look at what happened. What you’re not going to hear is, that during his term median income in America has dropped by $3,000.”

In the fourth quarter of 2008 the median household income was about $55,380 "per household" (or $27,690 each in a two-income household). As of the last quarter of 2011 the median household income was $52,377 (or $26,188 each in a two-income household). (a decline of $3,002 per household or $1,501 per person in a two-income household).

But if we added in those 8 million people I mentioned who no longer have any income at all, and who rely solely on food stamps and another's generosity, we can see why the median household income has dropped since right after the Great Recession (brought on by the banks and Republican economic policies).

But Mitt Romney isn't really too concerned about our "household incomes". As a matter-of-fact, he could give a damn. He made $200 million laying off people and/or cutting their wages and benefits -- and taking their pensions through skuzzy bankruptcy deals.

Mitt Romney and his merry band of corporate raiders* had personally lowered households incomes, but President Obama never has. The "successful investments" that Romney &Co. likes to brag about (i.e. Staples) just created a whole slew of low-paying jobs, and not enough to live on.

Yet, if Mitt Romney were ever elected, you can bet ($10,000) that he and the Republicans will make "average median household incomes" even lower than what they are today >>> and here's but just one reason why.

* An "investor" who buys a large number of shares in a corporation whose assets appear to be undervalued. The large share purchase would give the corporate raider significant voting rights, which could then be used to push changes in the company’s leadership and management. This would increase share value and thus generate a massive return for the corporate raider.

My related posts on Mitt Romney:

My related posts on Jobs, Wages and Unemployment:

Posted by Bud Meyers at 10:36 AM
Bud Meyers lives in Las Vegas: Twitter * Facebook * YouTube * Subscribe to Blog * Personal website * Google Plus * * *

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