New York City intensifies assault on the homeless
New York City intensifies assault on the homeless
By Philip Guelpa
30 December 2015
Two years into the administration of New York City’s Democratic mayor, Bill de Blasio, the crisis of housing and homelessness continues to worsen. Reports of the brutal treatment of homeless people on the street and of the appalling conditions of the city’s homeless shelters, as well as the continuing critical shortage of genuinely affordable housing, point to the utter failure of the mayor’s policies.
In sharp contrast to the prosperity of the city’s wealthy elite, who are paying ever-greater prices for luxury residences, the city’s homeless population continues to grow. According to the city’s own statistics, approximately 58,000 people live in homeless shelters, an increase of roughly 8,000 in the two years since de Blasio’s election based on promises to address income inequality. More than one third of the homeless are children. In addition, another 3,000 to 4,000 live “in the rough” (i.e. on the streets, in the subways, in parks, etc.). The US Department of Housing and Urban Development estimate is even higher—75,000 homeless in New York City. These figures represent the highest rates of homelessness since the Great Depression.
The city’s response to growing homelessness has included an intensification of its assault on people living on the street. The new policy is termed “aggressive homeless outreach.” In what amounts to the creation of an intelligence-gathering unit for the police, mayor de Blasio recently announced a new program, the NYC Homeless Outreach and Mobile Engagement Street Action Team, or HOME-STAT, that will conduct daily sweeps in a large portion of Manhattan, between Canal Street and 145th Street, to locate people living on the streets.
At the same time, the mayor and police commissioner Bill Bratton have increased the size of the police unit dealing with the homeless by 100 officers. Bratton has stated that he wants to step up the enforcement of “quality of life” infractions (i.e. the harassment of the homeless), reminiscent of the notorious “Broken Windows” and stop-and-frisk policies. Over the last several months, city police have demolished more than 30 homeless encampments in public spaces such as parks.
Recent news accounts state that the subjects of these assaults report being rousted by police in violent, early morning raids; with all of their belongings, including important documents such as Social Security cards, confiscated and thrown into the trash. One of the victims of such a police attack, Floyd Parks, 61, stated, “Beat cops told us they were operating on orders from downtown that this was an edict from the mayor.” The New York Civil Liberties Union has filed a lawsuit against these actions by the city on behalf of three homeless men.
City Comptroller Scott Stringer recently reported that conditions in the city’s “cluster sites” homeless shelters, privately owned apartments leased by the city to house homeless families, were “appalling” and remain virtually unchanged nine months after a report by the city’s Department of Investigation last March which characterized the shelters as “Dickensian” and called for major changes. The situation at these cluster sites is reportedly even worse than at the city-owned shelters.
Stringer was announcing the results of a new audit, which found that families living in cluster site shelters faced an environment of rats, cockroaches, mold, peeling paint, and broken windows. Other problems included broken faucets and showers, faulty smoke detectors, walls with holes, gas leaks, and blocked fire escapes. The audit found that 87 percent of the apartments that were inspected were unsafe. Furthermore, it concluded that the city has failed in its legal requirement to transition people from shelters to permanent homes, leaving them trapped in these deplorable settings.
The cluster housing program constitutes a substantial giveaway to the city’s slumlords. New York’s Department of Investigations cited one example in which the landlord was paid $95 per night on average, two to three times the market rate for apartments in that neighborhood. Many of these units would otherwise fall under the city’s rent regulations. New York currently has 3,079 units of cluster housing.
Homeless advocates and even some city officials have called for the program to be scaled back. Nevertheless, despite these horrendous conditions, the city recently announced that it is proposing to extend four existing cluster housing contracts for another four and a half years, at a cost of $200 million dollars, with a potential further extension of an additional four years.
In an admission of the failure of his policies, days before the results of the audit were announced, the mayor called for a “top to bottom” review of the Department of Homeless Services following the resignation of its commissioner. De Blasio stated that it would take many years to address the city’s homeless problem.
It is a testament to the utter incapacity of capitalism to meet the most basic human needs that the conditions revealed in the city’s shelters are reminiscent of those under which the working class of New York City lived a hundred or more years ago, as exposed in Jacob Riis’ 1890 How the Other Half Lives.
The growth of homelessness in New York City is merely the most visible symptom of the critical lack of affordable housing and the growing impoverishment of a large portion of the city’s population. Decades of rising rents, stagnant or declining wages, and attacks on social services have resulted in increasingly difficult living conditions for the working class. In New York, a third of the population earns less than $35,000 in annual income, and 47 percent pay more than one-third of their income for rent.
During his two years in office, Mayor de Blasio has proposed a hodge-podge of measures intended to incentivize private developers to increase the availability of affordable housing. This approach continues the decades-long trend, under both Democratic and Republican mayors, away from the construction of city-sponsored housing that took place from the 1930s to the 1960s. Instead, there has been a radical change in approach, predicated on the primacy of the real estate industry’s right to make profits and, as a consequence, to focus on higher end residences. This has created an artificial shortage of affordable housing, resulting in a dramatic increase in rents and real estate prices.
One of the mayor’s recent proposals is based on the rezoning of poor neighborhoods, allowing the construction of more and taller buildings to encourage private development, while requiring the inclusion of a limited number of supposedly affordable housing units. The proposal, dubbed “mandatory inclusionary housing,” has been heavily criticized for using a formula to calculate “affordability” that would cut out a large proportion of current residents. It has been characterized as being little more than city-sponsored gentrification, a boon to the city’s real estate developers.
The proposal is so unpopular that most of the city’s 59 community boards have rejected it, as have four of the five borough presidents. The city’s own comptroller has estimated that the first targeted neighborhood, East New York in Brooklyn, could suffer the displacement of nearly 50,000 current residents because they would no longer be able to afford the rent.
Fundamentally, the city’s approach to the crisis of homelessness and the lack of affordable housing is predicated on advancing the interests of the private real estate industry at the expense of the city’s residents. The scale of the problem may be gauged by the fact that over the past decade 400,000 affordable housing units have been converted to “market rate” apartments.
According to Tom Agnotti, a professor of urban affairs and planning at the City University of New York’s Hunter College, “If [the] government were to build the housing itself with capital funds, it would end up costing government much less than the other schemes which depend on private funding.
The author also recommends:
Behind the struggle for affordable housing in New York City
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Legislative deal means further deepening of New York’s housing crisis
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A New Year’s sense of foreboding over the global economy
THE GLOBAL ECONOMY PAYS THE ULTIMATE PRICE FOR THE LOOTING OF OBAMA - CLINTONS' CRONY BANKSTERS!
"The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs."
"This government-driven, crony-capitalist economy defined by job scarcity and wage stagnation is the reason college graduates are burdened by $1.3 trillion debt, living with parents, can’t afford to marry or buy homes, and working as waitresses and bartenders. Job scarcity and low wages are the reasons we’re becoming a nation of renters rather than homeowners. They are the reasons that 51 percent of workers earn less than $30,000 a year. They are the reasons for the demise of the middle class and the burgeoning welfare rolls, the modern-day equivalent of slavery."
"On the economic front there are two sources of this mounting disquiet: First, the fact that despite the pouring of trillions of dollars into the global financial system by the world’s major central banks, recessionary tendencies are gathering momentum. Second, that, in Rachman’s words, “there is… a widespread fear that, after years of unorthodox monetary policy, another financial or economic crisis might be building."
“As a result, the share of wealth held by the richest 0.1 percent of the population grew from 17 percent in 2007 to 22 percent in 2012, while the wealth of the 400 richest families in the US has doubled since 2008.”
A New Year’s sense of foreboding over the global economy
30 December 2015
Since the eruption of the global financial crisis seven years ago, it has been commonplace for bourgeois commentators to end each year with predictions of better economic times ahead. Not so this time.
Financial Times columnist Gideon Rachman summed up the prevailing mood in a comment this week. “In 2015,” he wrote, “a sense of unease and foreboding seemed to settle on all the world’s major power centres. From Beijing to Washington, Berlin to Brasilia, Moscow to Tokyo—governments, media and citizens were jumpy and embattled.”
On the economic front there are two sources of this mounting disquiet: First, the fact that despite the pouring of trillions of dollars into the global financial system by the world’s major central banks, recessionary tendencies are gathering momentum. Second, that, in Rachman’s words, “there is… a widespread fear that, after years of unorthodox monetary policy, another financial or economic crisis might be building.”
The predominant economic development in 2015 has been the deepening trend towards global recession. At its meeting in October, the International Monetary Fund forecast the lowest rate of global economic growth since the immediate aftermath of the financial crisis and warned that it could further downwardly revise its estimates.
The myth, assiduously promoted for a number of years, that China and the emerging market economies would provide a new foundation for global capitalism was finally buried this year, as China experienced its lowest growth levels since the early 1990s. Rather than provide a new base for expansion, the mounting problems in the Chinese economy, exemplified by the Chinese stock market crash over the summer and the devaluation of the renminbi, are negatively impacting the rest of the world, with major economic and political consequences.
The “left” turn in Latin American politics has come to an end as the boom fuelled by exports to Chinese markets has given way to recession. Brazil, once seen as a source of economic expansion, along with the other members of the BRICS group of countries, has been plunged into recession. Its economy contracted 4.5 percent in the last quarter in the biggest downturn since the 1930s Depression. This contraction has intensified its financial problems. November’s figures for the increase in Brazil’s public debt were the third highest on record.
The effects of slower growth in China are extending to the advanced capitalist economies. Canada, which is highly dependent on exports to China, has, with the announcement that the economy contracted in October, experienced negative or stagnant growth in seven of the first ten months of the year.
Falling iron ore export revenue, the result of the Chinese slowdown, is causing major fiscal problems for the Australian federal government as well as the states. In its latest budget update, the Turnbull government announced that it expected to lose another $7 billion in revenue over the next four years as compared to estimates made just last May, largely as a result of falling ore prices. These are now below $40 per tonne, compared to $180 per tonne four years ago. The once boom state of Western Australia has announced its biggest income fall since the Great Depression due to lost revenue from the mining industry.
For some time the US was touted as a bright spot in the world economy. To the extent that this is still the case, it only underscores the dismal situation everywhere else. US wages remain stagnant, economic growth remains well below levels achieved in all previous post-war recoveries, and industrial output is falling, with warnings that the sector has entered a recession.
The euro zone has yet to recover the levels of output reached before the beginning of the financial crisis, with no signs of any revival of investment.
One of the most prominent indicators of the onset of global recession is the precipitous fall in the prices of all industrial commodities. The Bloomberg Commodity index of 22 raw materials has fallen to its lowest level since the financial crisis.
While the plunge in the price of oil—down from its levels of around $100 per barrel in the middle of last year to just $36—has attracted the most attention, it is only the most prominent expression of a general tendency. Iron prices continue to fall, accompanied by precipitous declines in other metals associated with basic industry.
At the beginning of this year, the price of nickel, which is used in the manufacture of stainless steel, was expected to rise by 22 percent. It has fallen by more than 40 percent, a bigger decline than the collapse suffered by oil. Likewise, the price of zinc, which was predicted to rise by 16 percent, has dropped by 28 percent.
When the oil price began to fall, the view was advanced that this could be beneficial to the world economy by reducing energy costs. But any positive effects have been completely outweighed by the deepening slump. In an indication of future trends, the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries lowered its long-term estimates for global oil demand and said oil prices would not return to the level of $100 per barrel until 2040 at the earliest.
The falling oil price has sent a shock wave through financial markets, hitting high-yield or so-called “junk” bonds as well as mutual funds that have invested in energy-related projects. With money available at ultra-low interest rates and oil fetching more than $100 per barrel, there was money aplenty for speculation. But with oil at below $40, many of these projects are unviable.
Mutual funds that invested in pipelines and other infrastructure projects have also been adversely affected. According to one analyst cited by the Financial Times: “These funds have never gone through the kind of energy price crash that we have had this year.”
The problems could extend more broadly to US banks. Wells Fargo, one of America’s largest banks, has already warned that low oil prices mean exploration companies and oil producers may not be able to repay their loans. It has been estimated by US regulators that there are five times as many oil and gas loans in danger of default than there were a year ago.
When the financial crisis broke in 2008-2009, the air was filled with talk of coordination and cooperation among the major capitalist powers. That has already gone by the board and the past year has seen growing divergences.
There is a rift in the policies of the world’s central banks, with the US Fed starting to lift rates while the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan hold rates near zero and continue to pump money into the financial system.
While a façade of unity is maintained, divisions are deepening, especially as regards China. In March, there was a conflict between the US and Britain when the Cameron government, acting on behalf of British financial interests, defied US opposition and announced it was signing on to the Chinese-backed Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank, opening the way for other European powers to join.
A new conflict has now opened up, with the US reported to be lobbying to prevent the European powers, with Britain and Germany playing a key role, granting China market economy status under the World Trade Organisation (WTO). If China were so designated, it would further open up the world market to its exports. US officials have denounced the move as an attempt by European powers to win the support of Beijing as they seek profitable outlets for euro investments.
Widening rifts were also in evidence with the effective burial of the Doha Round of trade negotiations at the WTO talks in Nairobi earlier this month. This was chiefly at the instigation of the US, which is abandoning the pursuit of multilateral trade deals in favour of exclusive agreements, such as the Trans Pacific Partnership covering Asia and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership covering Europe, in which trade concessions are not extended to all but only to those countries agreeing to Washington’s demands.
The implications for the international working class of the deepening crisis are further austerity coupled with intensifying attacks on jobs, wages and working conditions.
Euro zone economists polled by the Financial Times this week set out the agenda with a call for a renewed push on so-called “structural reforms” of the labour market—the scrapping of remaining regulations governing wages and working conditions—aimed at nothing less than the creation of an impoverished cheap labour force.
Economic developments in 2015 have again underscored the fact that the crisis of 2008 signified a breakdown of the global capitalist system, not a downturn from which there would be a “recovery.” The coming year will bring a stepping up of the assault carried out over the past seven years. It can be met only through a political movement of the working class based on an international socialist program.
Nick Beams
No “peace on Earth” in 2015
THE REALITY of OBAMA-CLINTONOMICS:
"Barack Obama continues to fundamentally transform and tilt our nation to favor one of his favorite groups – Muslims -- at the expense of everyone else.
AS WALL STREET BANKSTERS LOOT WITH IMPUNITY:
"In a suitable symbol of “Christmas in America,” a cafeteria worker in an Idaho middle school was fired last week for “theft” after she gave a hungry child a free meal. “My heart hurts,” she told a local news station. “I truly loved my job, and I can’t say that I wouldn’t do it again."
Nowhere is this more true than in the center of world finance, the United States, where one in five children live in food-insecure households and millions of people will struggle to scrape together enough money for a holiday meal. For all the promotion of philanthropic “charity” by the media, one can scarcely imagine a more un-charitable society than contemporary America, dominated by a Dickensian level of cruelty to the poor.
No “peace on Earth” in 2015
24 December 2015
This holiday season, people all over the world will celebrate Christmas by expressing sentiments of tolerance and brotherhood. They will exchange gifts and cards, and try to smile a little more, in the distant hope that their individual benevolence might somehow extricate the world, at least somewhat, from the mire it is lodged in.
These genuine sentiments are, of course, goaded on by a good deal of official promotion. Anyone visiting a shopping mall or airport in much of the world over the holiday period will hear Christmas carols piped through loudspeakers extolling “peace on Earth, goodwill to men,” and exhorting them to have a “Merry Christmas.”
The holiday season is always a time where hypocrisy is pressed into service by the political establishment, a “Christmas spirit” created from the collision between religion and frantic merchandising. But there have been few holiday seasons so unhappy for so many people, and in which the spirit of tolerance and benevolence supposedly epitomized in the “Christmas spirit” clashes so obviously with reality.
Not since the end of the Second World War seventy years ago has the absence of “peace on Earth” been so stark, or “goodwill to men” so absent. Numerous public figures, from the Pope to the Prince of Jordan to The New York Times opinion page, have declared that the Third World War has already begun.
American warplanes and drones swarm the Middle East and North Africa, bombing, killing and maiming indiscriminately and driving millions from their homes. President Obama, according to press reports, will spend his holiday mulling over plans to further expand bombing in populated areas in Syria, which will radically expand civilian casualties.
Every major combatant in the first two world wars is again on the warpath. Germany and Japan, are feverishly remilitarizing to assert their influence on the European continent and in East Asia, respectively.
The millions of human beings displaced by war and poverty are greeted by states everywhere with barbed wire and guns. At least five million people were forced to flee from their homes this year, with one million seeking refuge in Europe, as a result of the wars in the Middle East stoked up by the Western powers.
These same powers, the self-styled bastions of tolerance and human rights, have responded to the flood of people desperately in need of aid by closing off their external borders and forcing hundreds of thousands to make their way over the Aegean Sea. Over 3,000 people have died this year seeking to cross into Europe by this route, while over 1,000 of these are children.
For an enormous section of mankind, this Christmas will not be “merry.” In fact, it is hard to imagine any Christmas in recent decades that will be so miserable for so many people.
For millions around the world, it will be another year that they are denied by poverty the happiness of being able to afford holiday presents for their friends and loved ones.
Nowhere is this more true than in the center of world finance, the United States, where one in five children live in food-insecure households and millions of people will struggle to scrape together enough money for a holiday meal. For all the promotion of philanthropic “charity” by the media, one can scarcely imagine a more un-charitable society than contemporary America, dominated by a Dickensian level of cruelty to the poor.
In a suitable symbol of “Christmas in America,” a cafeteria worker in an Idaho middle school was fired last week for “theft” after she gave a hungry child a free meal. “My heart hurts,” she told a local news station. “I truly loved my job, and I can’t say that I wouldn’t do it again.”
All over the world, governments and the media are seeking to counter the sentiments of compa
ssion by whipping up nationalism, xenophobia, communal hatred and paranoia. In the US, the leading Republican presidential candidate is an open bigot, declaring that Mexicans are rapists and calling for banning Muslims from entering the country. Donald Trump’s demagogy was expressed in action when a British Muslim family was prevented this month from boarding a plane to Disney World by the State Department, without any explanation.
In Germany, Angela Merkel, the supposed promoter of the “welcoming culture,” declares that “multiculturalism is a sham.” In France, the ruling Socialist Party, seeking to enshrine a permanent state of emergency into the constitution, is bent on obtaining the power to strip dual citizens of their nationality, a measure last used in France during the mass deportation of Jews under the Vichy Regime during the holocaust.
Anyone who has observed the world in 2015 must expect that 2016 will be a year of unprecedented violence and social misery. But the same processes driving the world to the brink of world war are those that must give rise to social struggle by the working class.
Unlike the professional liars and opinion-makers of the financial elite and its political representatives, the working masses of humanity take the ideals of universal peace and brotherhood seriously. They genuinely hope and strive for a better world, and will fight for it. In the coming period, millions will conclude that an independent political struggle by the working class, armed with a socialist perspective of overthrowing capitalism and reorganizing society on an internationalist basis, is the only means to achieve “peace on earth.”
Andre Damon
As the chart shows, the federal government’s welfare system is fostering dependency at an alarming rate. The number of people dependent on three big government programs has grown from less than 80 million to over 95 million in just six years. This as the federal government runs up the national debt with a credit card backed by future earnings of today’s children and by those not yet born.""The national debt stands at $18.8 trillion, $8.2 trillion more than the $10.6 trillion it was when President Barack Obama was elected."
There has been a massive expansion of immigrants coming into America -- one that has accelerated under Barack Obama.
Income inequality grows FOUR TIMES FASTER under Obama than Bush.
http://mexicanoccupation.blogspot.com/2014/12/obamanomics-at-work-depressed-wages-and.html
“By the time of Bill Clinton’s election in 1992, the Democratic Party had completely repudiated its association with the reforms of the New Deal and Great Society periods. Clinton gutted welfare programs to provide an ample supply of cheap labor for the rich (WHICH NOW MEANS OPEN BORDERS AND NO E-VERIFY!), including a growing layer of black capitalists, and passed the 1994 Federal Crime Bill, with its notorious “three strikes” provision that has helped create the largest prison population in the world.”
AMNESTY: THE HOAX TO KEEP WAGES DEPRESSED AND PASS ALONG THE COST OF MEXICO'S WELFARE STATE IN OUR OPEN BORDERS AND CRIME TIDAL WAVE TO WHAT IS LEFT OF THE AMERICAN MIDDLE CLASS!
By One Measure, 95.5 Million Are Dependent on the Federal Government
Patrick Tyrrell /
December 18, 2015
/ 31 comments
Dept. of Housing and Urban Development apartments in New York City. (Photo: Richard B. Levine/Newscom)
Commentary By
Patrick Tyrrell
Patrick Tyrrell is a research coordinator in The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis.
How many people are dependent on the federal government? That’s a hard nut to crack. Counting people who rely on the government to sustain their lifestyles is more complicated than simply counting up the number of dependency program enrollees. If you did that, people on the rolls of more than one program at a time would be over counted.
Relying on survey data is also problematic; the U.S. Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey notoriously undercounts program enrollees.
However, it is possible to track the growth of government dependents over time. This can be done by tracking the number of people in the same programs year over year. To get the trend for overall government dependents, several programs that have minimum overlap in recipients can be added together and tracked.
The chart shows the number of OASDI (old age, survivor and disability insurance) recipients, plus the number of Pell Grant recipients, plus the number of earned income tax credit recipients from 1975 to 2013 (the last year complete data is available).
These programs target widely different populations: the earned income tax credit aids working families; Pell Grants, college age dependents; and OASDI, for the most part senior citizens. So there is likely to be little overlap. In 2013, 95.46 million people were enrolled in these three programs—30.16 percent of the U.S. population.
This obviously is only a rough calculation, but any double counting of people who, for example, are on OASDI and also have Pell grants should be more than balanced by people who are dependent on other programs like food stamps or subsidized housing, but are not on one of the counted programs.
In fact, Robert Rector and Rachel Sheffield of The Heritage Foundation have concluded that when counting all of the over 80 means-tested welfare programs that provide cash, food, housing, medical care, and targeted services to poor and low-income Americans, the number of government dependents tops 100 million individuals—nearly one in three Americans.
As the chart shows, the federal government’s welfare system is fostering dependency at an alarming rate. The number of people dependent on three big government programs has grown from less than 80 million to over 95 million in just six years. This as the federal government runs up the national debt with a credit card backed by future earnings of today’s children and by those not yet born.
The national debt stands at $18.8 trillion, $8.2 trillion more than the $10.6 trillion it was when President Barack Obama was elected. That’s not investing in the future, that’s kicking an $18.8 trillion can down the road to the next generation’s doors.
The next time a politician promises one more “free” government benefit, the “Me Generation” should remember that they are living on borrowed time and borrowed money
Income inequality grows FOUR TIMES FASTER under Obama than Bush.
http://mexicanoccupation.blogspot.com/2014/12/obamanomics-at-work-depressed-wages-and.html
Middle Eastern groups have been pushing for years for this change: George Bush opposed the designation. Barack Obama is pushing it as part of his plans to radically transform America-as he promised to do in 2008.
His legacy will last forever. Americans will be paying the price.
"According to Senator Jeff Sessions, 91 percent of recent Middle Eastern refugees are on food stamps and 73 percent receive free health care. The lifetime costs to American taxpayers for 85,000 refugees will be 55 billion dollars."
"There has been a massive expansion of immigrants coming into America -- one that has accelerated under Barack Obama."
"Barack Obama continues to fundamentally transform and tilt our nation to favor one of his favorite groups – Muslims -- at the expense of everyone else."
"Taking even a sympathetic approach to Obama’s handling of foreign policy, one might not be too wide of the mark in suggesting that what he had in mind re a fundamental transformation was bringing America low, i.e. that contrary to Krauthammer’s more generous assessment of Obama’s actions as “disengaged” or “delusional,” he is doing exactly what he set out to do -- destroy America."
December 20, 2015
Obama -- Disengaged, Delusional, or Diabolical?
By Ken Eliasberg
President Obama’s reactions to recent terrorist attacks have been the source of some consternation among many who have been following these attacks. While it is becoming increasingly more difficult to disregard the terrorist nature of these events, Obama has certainly given it the old college try, doing his best to change the subject to gun control or alleged climate difficulties. In a recent TV discussion of Obama’s effort to change the subject in this manner, Charles Krauthammer suggested that Obama was either disengaged or delusional. But in fact, "diabolical" may be the better term. But Obama may have foreseen just such happenings when he informed us that it was his desire to “fundamentally transform” America. No one thought at the time that he might have in mind the weakening of America to the point of our being so vulnerable as to possibly being taken over by an Islamic caliphate that his neglect had made possible.
As recent events have made clear, there is no question that they are buried deep in the soil of the Obama administration. One very stark example is the Muslim Brotherhood, mother of all Islamic terrorist organizations; it is banned in Egypt, its birthplace, but welcome in the White House.
Taking even a sympathetic approach to Obama’s handling of foreign policy, one might not be too wide of the mark in suggesting that what he had in mind re a fundamental transformation was bringing America low, i.e. that contrary to Krauthammer’s more generous assessment of Obama’s actions as “disengaged” or “delusional,” he is doing exactly what he set out to do -- destroy America.
Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/12/obama__disengaged_delusional_or_diabolical.html#ixzz3uttXneRT
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The Causes of Income Inequality
By Catherine Sellers
Income inequality has risen during the last several decades to heights last seen in the 1920s. Most of the income growth has gone to a small fraction of the population, the ultra-rich elites, while real wages for the bottom 90 percent has been stagnant since the 1980s. The U.S. now ranks at, or near, the top of developed countries for income inequality. Job creation has lagged far behind population growth. Automation has erased some jobs, but corrupt, inept government leadership is responsible for the deplorable job- deficit-low wage situation.
Trade agreements are one cause of job and wage reduction. Over the last twenty years, we’ve amassed $10 trillion in trade deficits and exported 12 million manufacturing jobs, forcing workers to move into lower-wage service jobs. Government brags about the free trade agreements, CAFTA, NAFTA, KORUS, and TPP. But the “free” applies only to the foreign trading partners, which manipulate their currencies, pay sweatshop workers low wages, manufacture under environmentally-toxic conditions, and restrict U.S. imports. We hand over our technology, good-paying jobs, product labeling, and safety guarantees -- all to enrich multinational corporations and foreign industry. Industrial research and development have been decimated as companies move overseas or outsource jobs, leaving the nation a future of little technological innovation. The U.S. is left with hollowed-out industries and service jobs.
The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs. A well-known example is that of Disney IT workers who were forced to train their cheaper immigrant replacements. It is no coincidence that the rise in immigration has occurred simultaneously with the rise of the welfare state. People unemployed, or in low-wage and part-time jobs, rely on government subsidies. The result is larger national debt, more corporate wealth, and declining wages.
ObamaCare influences, and will influence to greater degrees, the lowering of incomes for Americans as healthcare costs rise. Higher premiums and deductions for health insurance are being shifted to employees, reducing benefits and wages. Medical care costs already have risen much faster than wages, leaving many struggling to pay for necessities. Ever-higher deductions mean that people can’t afford to use the insurance they are forced to buy because they can’t even pay the deductions.
Another contributor to job deficiency and wage stagnation is the increased regulation and taxation of small businesses instituted by Obama’s executive orders, EPA overreach, and ObamaCare. Small businesses traditionally have created two-thirds of new jobs annually. The bright spot in the economy, small businesses have created 78.7 percent of new jobs since the recession. Today, faced with these government anti-business policies, small businesses are closing their doors at a faster rate than new businesses are opening. The small businesses that remain open often don’t expand because of Obamacare and government regulations.
Income inequality is greatly impacted by the Federal Reserve’s policies of money-printing and zero interest rates, which have led to the funding of the financial and corporate markets while ignoring the needs of smaller businesses. The money supply and cheap lending has gone to the government, large corporations, and Wall Street, leaving the rest of the economy to sputter along with little capital and fewer jobs. The Fed’s policies of crony capitalism favor big business and big banks over that of smaller entities and are responsible for the increasing number of big business deals such as Walgreen's purchase of Rite Aid.
DEATH OF THE AMERICAN MIDDLE-CLASS
This government-driven, crony-capitalist economy defined by job scarcity and wage stagnation is the reason college graduates are burdened by $1.3 trillion debt, living with parents, can’t afford to marry or buy homes, and working as waitresses and bartenders. Job scarcity and low wages are the reasons we’re becoming a nation of renters rather than homeowners. They are the reasons that 51 percent of workers earn less than $30,000 a year. They are the reasons for the demise of the middle class and the burgeoning welfare rolls, the modern-day equivalent of slavery.
Income inequality and its devastating consequences are seldom mentioned on the nightly news. The media and bogus government statistics paint rosy pictures about economic recovery, and government masks the bad economy with welfare so that we don’t see Great Depression bread lines. But the only recovery has been in the Federal Reserve’s inflated stock market, not in the main street economy, where 94 million working-age adults are unemployed and 47 million are on some welfare program. The “Made in America” displays weekly touted by ABC news are the few exceptions, rather than the rule, in an American economy of boarded-up stores and factories.
The political implications of income inequality are most evident in the increasing rise and entrenchment of career politicians, supported by big donor funding and media favoritism. The integrity of the electoral process is endangered as election propaganda, funded by big money and hyped by corporate media bias, become more prominent in spreading lies, distortions, and innuendos to the voting public. Unrestricted campaign funding has given the moneyed elites first access to elected officials. At the same time, private-sector unions, small businesses, and citizens find their influence dwindling or irrelevant. This crony capitalism, resembling dictatorships and communist oligarchies, seriously threatens our democracy because money, power, and media control are consolidated in the hands of a few at the top. Voter apathy prevails, as voters feel increasingly powerless to change the course of events.
The United States, a once great economic powerhouse and the largest creditor nation, has become the largest debtor nation, and is fast becoming a banana republic. Past and present elected authorities and public officials have stripped bare our industries, put the nation under a mountain of debt, and turned the U.S. into a welfare depository. Government leaders have intentionally failed to protect our borders, jobs, and freedoms. These public “servants” and the wealthy elites have garnered riches for themselves, and purposely impoverished citizens and future generations. The greatest threats to our economy and national security are not foreign countries or terrorists; they are the enemies inside, corrupt government leaders and the money masters they serve.
Income inequality has risen during the last several decades to heights last seen in the 1920s. Most of the income growth has gone to a small fraction of the population, the ultra-rich elites, while real wages for the bottom 90 percent has been stagnant since the 1980s. The U.S. now ranks at, or near, the top of developed countries for income inequality. Job creation has lagged far behind population growth. Automation has erased some jobs, but corrupt, inept government leadership is responsible for the deplorable job- deficit-low wage situation.
Trade agreements are one cause of job and wage reduction. Over the last twenty years, we’ve amassed $10 trillion in trade deficits and exported 12 million manufacturing jobs, forcing workers to move into lower-wage service jobs. Government brags about the free trade agreements, CAFTA, NAFTA, KORUS, and TPP. But the “free” applies only to the foreign trading partners, which manipulate their currencies, pay sweatshop workers low wages, manufacture under environmentally-toxic conditions, and restrict U.S. imports. We hand over our technology, good-paying jobs, product labeling, and safety guarantees -- all to enrich multinational corporations and foreign industry. Industrial research and development have been decimated as companies move overseas or outsource jobs, leaving the nation a future of little technological innovation. The U.S. is left with hollowed-out industries and service jobs.
The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs. A well-known example is that of Disney IT workers who were forced to train their cheaper immigrant replacements. It is no coincidence that the rise in immigration has occurred simultaneously with the rise of the welfare state. People unemployed, or in low-wage and part-time jobs, rely on government subsidies. The result is larger national debt, more corporate wealth, and declining wages.
ObamaCare influences, and will influence to greater degrees, the lowering of incomes for Americans as healthcare costs rise. Higher premiums and deductions for health insurance are being shifted to employees, reducing benefits and wages. Medical care costs already have risen much faster than wages, leaving many struggling to pay for necessities. Ever-higher deductions mean that people can’t afford to use the insurance they are forced to buy because they can’t even pay the deductions.
Another contributor to job deficiency and wage stagnation is the increased regulation and taxation of small businesses instituted by Obama’s executive orders, EPA overreach, and ObamaCare. Small businesses traditionally have created two-thirds of new jobs annually. The bright spot in the economy, small businesses have created 78.7 percent of new jobs since the recession. Today, faced with these government anti-business policies, small businesses are closing their doors at a faster rate than new businesses are opening. The small businesses that remain open often don’t expand because of Obamacare and government regulations.
Income inequality is greatly impacted by the Federal Reserve’s policies of money-printing and zero interest rates, which have led to the funding of the financial and corporate markets while ignoring the needs of smaller businesses. The money supply and cheap lending has gone to the government, large corporations, and Wall Street, leaving the rest of the economy to sputter along with little capital and fewer jobs. The Fed’s policies of crony capitalism favor big business and big banks over that of smaller entities and are responsible for the increasing number of big business deals such as Walgreen's purchase of Rite Aid.
This government-driven, crony-capitalist economy defined by job scarcity and wage stagnation is the reason college graduates are burdened by $1.3 trillion debt, living with parents, can’t afford to marry or buy homes, and working as waitresses and bartenders. Job scarcity and low wages are the reasons we’re becoming a nation of renters rather than homeowners. They are the reasons that 51 percent of workers earn less than $30,000 a year. They are the reasons for the demise of the middle class and the burgeoning welfare rolls, the modern-day equivalent of slavery.
Income inequality and its devastating consequences are seldom mentioned on the nightly news. The media and bogus government statistics paint rosy pictures about economic recovery, and government masks the bad economy with welfare so that we don’t see Great Depression bread lines. But the only recovery has been in the Federal Reserve’s inflated stock market, not in the main street economy, where 94 million working-age adults are unemployed and 47 million are on some welfare program. The “Made in America” displays weekly touted by ABC news are the few exceptions, rather than the rule, in an American economy of boarded-up stores and factories.
The political implications of income inequality are most evident in the increasing rise and entrenchment of career politicians, supported by big donor funding and media favoritism. The integrity of the electoral process is endangered as election propaganda, funded by big money and hyped by corporate media bias, become more prominent in spreading lies, distortions, and innuendos to the voting public. Unrestricted campaign funding has given the moneyed elites first access to elected officials. At the same time, private-sector unions, small businesses, and citizens find their influence dwindling or irrelevant. This crony capitalism, resembling dictatorships and communist oligarchies, seriously threatens our democracy because money, power, and media control are consolidated in the hands of a few at the top. Voter apathy prevails, as voters feel increasingly powerless to change the course of events.
The United States, a once great economic powerhouse and the largest creditor nation, has become the largest debtor nation, and is fast becoming a banana republic. Past and present elected authorities and public officials have stripped bare our industries, put the nation under a mountain of debt, and turned the U.S. into a welfare depository. Government leaders have intentionally failed to protect our borders, jobs, and freedoms. These public