***Cross Posted from "Chuck for..."***
I've owed Ron a post for some time, but most get dated too quickly to cross post and lately I've been time limited. This headline got 7100 views on reuter.com, it's not that good...
Just the other day George II quit talking about how good the economy is and said a stimulus is needed. In fact the stimulus needed is "direct and rapid." (Go ahead and make jokes) Maybe a stimulus is needed now that things are going south for those with big bucks in the stock market.
Just as a measure of how some things seem to miss the CiC, lets take a look at some US Bureau of Census figures for a couple segments of the economy, like the second one fifth from the bottom and the bottom of the top 5%, and note, this has nothing to do with extremes. In 1984 in 2006 dollars the second 1/5th earned $32,863 and the bottom of the top 5% earned $126,610. In 2006 in 2006 dollars the number are 37,774 and $174,012 the changes respectively are, $4,911 and $47,402 which means an increase of 14.9% and 37.4%. I suppose you think I ought to give George a break and only use numbers he could reasonably have some responsibility for, like 2001 to 2006? Ok, sure. 2001 2nd 1/5th $37,940 and bottom of top 5% $171,395 so the differences are -$166 and $2617 or -0.5% and 1.5% so at an upper middle class you've stayed close to the game with BushCo, blue collar, you've sucked.
2003-2004 were pretty tough, in the 2nd 1/5th you lost $260 and in the bottom of top 5% you lost $1,190 but in the average of the top 1% of after tax income you went from $572,000 to $620,700 or +8.5%. You're still not talking about George II's pals, the top 0.1%, they did nicely in 2003-4 to the tune of 9.5% while their tax rates fell by 3.4% while the bottom 80% experienced a drop of 0.3%. For perspective, this top 0.1% had more income than the bottom 33% of taxpayers a group 330 times as large. In 1979 the bottom third's income exceeded the top 0.1% by 2.5:1.
Dow Jones average on 12/24/07 was about 13,500 on 1/18/08 about 12,100 or a 10% decrease. That's a chunk of change for those in the top 0.1% of tax payers. 1/14-18/08 was the big drop, 700 points, about half the loss or 5% and nearly 5.5% in those days. Reflect on the wages of the 2nd 1/5th during BushCo, the income of the top 0.1%, and who lost when George II started talking about something other than a good economy. It became something worthy of "direct and rapid" stimulus only the other day. If you work for a living you may have noticed direct and rapid stimulus during his Administration - if you were bent over.
If you'd like to compare the Reagan years, you'd find 1976-81 interesting, for the same groups,
'76 $31,721 and '81 $31,907 or +0.6% and bottom of top 5% $110,250 to $117,419 or +6.5%. (sorry, I don't have 0.1%) Tinkledown economics at its finest.
