• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

Republicans in disarray!

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

An almost top 10,000 blog!

“woke” is the new caravan.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Consistently wrong since 2002

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Mobile Menu

  • Winnable House Races
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • Balloon Juice 2023 Pet Calendar (coming soon)
  • COVID-19 Coronavirus
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • War in Ukraine
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • 2021-22 Fundraising!
You are here: Home / Economics / Fuck The Middle-Class / Strapping young bucks not looking for work

Strapping young bucks not looking for work

by DougJ|  February 16, 201111:39 am| 63 Comments

This post is in: Fuck The Middle-Class, Fuck The Poor

FacebookTweetEmail

Remember that if fiscal austerity helps keep the unemployment high, it will just be “structural unemployment” resulting from the laziness and ineptitude of the American working class (via):

It really makes you despair: we’ve been over and over the evidence, and there’s not a hint in the data that a mismatch between occupations and jobs can explain any important fraction of the jobless rate.

Sometimes I think there may not be enough strapping young bucks to account for all the ingrates soaking up gubmint unemployment benefits, that there could be some meth-addicted white trash on the job too, maybe some former union workers too.

The U.S.-based CEO of one of the world’s largest hedge funds told me that his firm’s investment committee often discusses the question of who wins and who loses in today’s economy. In a recent internal debate, he said, one of his senior colleagues had argued that the hollowing-out of the American middle class didn’t really matter.

How about a big Charlie Rose round-table about how the American middle-class doesn’t deserve jobs or health care because they’re all a bunch of fat lazy fucks who couldn’t cut it in China?

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « Megan McArdle is Always Wrong: Academic Bias, Quick Hit Version
Next Post: That Used To Be an Outrage »

Reader Interactions

63Comments

  1. 1.

    Southern Beale

    February 16, 2011 at 11:42 am

    Can we please just once and for all acknowledge the Republicans’ fiscal hypocrisy as we talk about this stuff? Please?

  2. 2.

    different church-lady

    February 16, 2011 at 11:44 am

    one of his senior colleagues had argued that the hollowing-out of the American middle class didn’t really matter.

    So it’s true: these assholes actually have no idea where their money comes from.

  3. 3.

    Dave

    February 16, 2011 at 11:44 am

    That’s the frightening thing – our Galtian Overlords really think the middle-class is irrelevant. They see Brazil in the 1980s and think “Hey, that’s not so bad.”

  4. 4.

    A Farmer

    February 16, 2011 at 11:48 am

    Why doesn’t the GOP adopt “Fuck the middle class, fuck the poor” as the complete party platform in 2012? Oh that’s right, they have to bash gays, talk about how the government has to ease up on oppressed rich, fat white guys, and bloviate about a strong military to compensate for their lack of manhood.

  5. 5.

    Comrade Javamanphil

    February 16, 2011 at 11:53 am

    Pitchforks and tar. It’s the only thing they will understand.

  6. 6.

    Kristine

    February 16, 2011 at 11:53 am

    They really have no clue how the economy works, do they? No clue as to who buys most of the stuff.

    Yanno, I never hear anyone question the GOs’ patriotism. Their dismantling of the middle class is apparently a non-issue to the chattering classes. Good to know.

  7. 7.

    Bulworth

    February 16, 2011 at 11:54 am

    Maybe we can start saying that the deficit and debt are really bad but not really because our deficits and debt are “structural”. Some in the political class seem to like this term. After all, once the term “structural” is affixed to an issue, that means it isn’t a problem or at least not one we have to talk about because we can’t do anything about it.

    Also, too, since high unemployment is helping drive our deficits, then we can say our deficits are “structural”.

  8. 8.

    Seanly

    February 16, 2011 at 11:54 am

    As someone who was recently fired and is now scrambling to find a new job, I’d like to tell all those hedge fund managers they can fuck themselves with a rusty 10′ spike.

  9. 9.

    RalfW

    February 16, 2011 at 11:58 am

    Hedge funds are the stage IV cancer of a capitalist society. The tumor grows out of control, sucking up all the nutrients and life force and, shortly, killing the host.

  10. 10.

    aimai

    February 16, 2011 at 11:59 am

    I’d like to point out the unpleasant fact that two wars are, in fact, a jobs program. I’m eager to declare victory and get us out of Iraq and Afghanistan but at this point the military itself is a huge employer of last resort. If we saw all those soldiers come back and get dumped on the non existent job market we’d really see some unemployment stats–and maybe some Bonus Marchers and some well prepared rioters.

    aimai

  11. 11.

    Michael

    February 16, 2011 at 12:04 pm

    Fred Barnes’ leg can be cured like any fine ham. Smoke, salt, spices, and it’ll be good to go.

    Oh, and I’m sure that the libertarian rape gangs will love to chase Megan McArdle down.

  12. 12.

    BGinCHI

    February 16, 2011 at 12:05 pm

    Bush deficit: wars off the books.

    Obama deficit: wars on the books.

    Moral hysteria happens in which administration?

    Can the fucking media do anything right??

  13. 13.

    "Fair and Balanced" Dave

    February 16, 2011 at 12:09 pm

    The U.S.-based CEO of one of the world’s largest hedge funds told me that his firm’s investment committee often discusses the question of who wins and who loses in today’s economy. In a recent internal debate, he said, one of his senior colleagues had argued that the hollowing-out of the American middle class didn’t really matter.

    People like this are the reason the French invented the guillotine.

  14. 14.

    Fuck U III: The Duck Fucks Back

    February 16, 2011 at 12:13 pm

    aimai: Yes, but Greg Mankiw told me that military goods represent an economic dead-end, as no one has ever used a HIMARS system to build a better mousetrap and Bradleys make for lousy carpool vehicles.

  15. 15.

    Napoleon

    February 16, 2011 at 12:13 pm

    Kudos DougJ, that “hollowing out” quote should be hauled out by everyone on the left every chance we get. IMO it is absolutely at the heart of much of what we now see in politics in the US, including abandoning investment in our infrastructure.

  16. 16.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    February 16, 2011 at 12:16 pm

    That’s what always gets me about most of the Republican voters: They think that the secret codewords coming from the Republican leadership – which includes people like Rush – implies blacks, foreigners, and out-of-wedlock mothers. What they fail to realize is that the codewords are about them as well.

  17. 17.

    gene108

    February 16, 2011 at 12:17 pm

    We should all become hedge fund managers…set up our own hedge funds, find stuff to invest in and start building up our capital…

    Who needs doctors, teachers, taxi drivers, cooks, policemen, plumbers, etc.?

  18. 18.

    catclub

    February 16, 2011 at 12:18 pm

    @BGinCHI: No, that was really an own goal by Obama. He should have continued to keep the wars off the books until the GOP complained loudly that the wars SHOULD be on the books. (I think that would be the fifth of never.) It would make his defiticts look that much better.

    Better yet, ask the congress for a vote on whether the wars should be on the books or not.

  19. 19.

    GregB

    February 16, 2011 at 12:18 pm

    The best quote from the Southern Beale piece:

    “You just can’t keep letting one political party hit the reset button as soon as they come into power, while still holding the Democrats to account for shit that happened 40 years ago.”

  20. 20.

    Nicole

    February 16, 2011 at 12:19 pm

    And for the crappy low-paying jobs that are out there, Missouri GOP says, let’s bring back child labor:

  21. 21.

    Kryptik

    February 16, 2011 at 12:19 pm

    You know what’s bitterly amusing? The fact that we have wingnuts demanding a gold standard all the while defending the industries that literally make money off of money and nothing else.

  22. 22.

    frosty

    February 16, 2011 at 12:20 pm

    @Comrade Javamanphil:

    Pitchforks and tar. It’s the only thing they will understand.

    Oh, I don’t know. Guillotines worked pretty well for the French.

    ETA: I see Dave at #13 has been thinking along the same lines.

  23. 23.

    Midnight Marauder

    February 16, 2011 at 12:23 pm

    How about a big Charlie Rose round-table about how the American middle-class doesn’t deserve jobs or health care because they’re all a bunch of fat lazy fucks who couldn’t cut it in China?

    Posted in: Fuck The Middle-Class, Fuck The Poor

    So awesome it almost hurts.

  24. 24.

    cleek

    February 16, 2011 at 12:27 pm

    @Michael:
    err…

  25. 25.

    Mnemosyne

    February 16, 2011 at 12:27 pm

    @Nicole:

    To be fair, it’s the same legislature that’s trying to overturn the anti-puppy mill law that the voters just passed. Since they already hate puppies and children, I’m fully expecting a law to ban rainbows next.

  26. 26.

    A Commenter at Balloon Juice (formerlyThe Grand Panjandrum)

    February 16, 2011 at 12:33 pm

    Ahhhhh … Florida! Gov. Rick Scott just turned down $2.4 Billion in stimulus money for high speed rail. Which will result in what?

    The move likely means those dollars would be headed to California and other states investing in high-speed rail.

    I guess the solution to Florida’s traffic congestion issues is to build highways with special lanes for people driving 35 mph with the left turn signal on.

  27. 27.

    kay

    February 16, 2011 at 12:33 pm

    @Nicole:

    That’s an amazing piece of work.
    We had a lively thread here not two weeks ago where libertarians were assuring us no one would ever, ever dare bring back child labor, so we were wrong to even bring it up. That they were speaking only as a matter of constitutionality.
    Not only does she want to bring it back, she wants to make sure it’s deregulated entirely.

  28. 28.

    Nicole

    February 16, 2011 at 12:34 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Damn right. Lazy-ass rainbows living the high life off all of the sunshine’s and rain’s hard work. They’d have banned them years ago if not for left-wing guitar-playing hippie frogs and their musical propaganda.

  29. 29.

    Kryptik

    February 16, 2011 at 12:34 pm

    @A Commenter at Balloon Juice (formerlyThe Grand Panjandrum):

    What? Hell no.

    The Rick Scott solution is to ensure enough of the population is too sick or too dead to congest the highways.

  30. 30.

    Nicole

    February 16, 2011 at 12:36 pm

    @kay: I thought about that thread when I saw that article (hat tip to humorists Lester & Charlie, who posted it on their FB page).

    It’s a sad world where, despite repeated examples, Laffer Curve is taken as truth and Race to the Bottom is not.

  31. 31.

    ET

    February 16, 2011 at 12:43 pm

    @different church-lady: Amen. Talk about being divorced from reality.

  32. 32.

    kay

    February 16, 2011 at 12:44 pm

    @Nicole:

    Remember that? We don’t need federal protections because we’re really, really nice people.
    Conservatives in statehouses are busy showing us the disaster that was “state’s rights” every single day since the midterms.

  33. 33.

    A Farmer

    February 16, 2011 at 12:44 pm

    I really don’t think many Republican voters really bargained for the shit storm the GOP is going to deliver to us. One of my parents’ friends is a pretty strong Republican who happens to work in the local school office. She’s now really concerned about the governor’s war on the school union. I hate to feel some schadenfreude, but I kind of do. I think the GOP’s going to find out their “mandate” was to deliver tax cuts and not cut spending, along with giving everybody a pony. Pretty soon, people are going to be screaming for tax increases on rich folks to keep all those government programs.

  34. 34.

    WereBear

    February 16, 2011 at 12:49 pm

    I believe they will be clueless to the very end. Industries who sell food know they will always be in some sort of demand; industries who, say, help people retire on investments… haw haw! They might have to turn to steel cage matches to attract clients if your typical middle class person is turning to dumpster diving.

    (Good to be back… kitten, laptop keyboard… I should have been drinking whiskey instead.)

  35. 35.

    Mnemosyne

    February 16, 2011 at 12:54 pm

    @A Commenter at Balloon Juice (formerlyThe Grand Panjandrum):

    Oooh. The Mouse is going to be VERY unhappy with Gov. Scott. This could be interesting.

  36. 36.

    kay

    February 16, 2011 at 12:55 pm

    @A Farmer:

    The Tea Party loses an Ohio sheriff.

    “Maybe I have missed it, but what amount of tax payer [sic] dollars will be saved by going after our middle class working people here. Where was Shannon Jones and the tea party members when out new Governor made a personal choice that cost all of us over 6 million dollars? I supported and worked hard to help get Governor Kasich elected.

    He begins with “I am not a pro-union person”, but other than that, it’s a great rant.

    He feels “attacked” as a public employee.

  37. 37.

    ruemara

    February 16, 2011 at 1:00 pm

    I’m finding it hard not to support beheadings after reading that atlantic article. Thanks a bleeding lot.

  38. 38.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    February 16, 2011 at 1:01 pm

    one of his senior colleagues had argued that the hollowing-out of the American middle class didn’t really matter

    He is quite right. They don’t matter, and won’t matter up until they learn how to build IEDs and car bombs and start using them to kill the rich come what may. Then they will matter.

    Land of the free and home of the brave, motherfuckers.

  39. 39.

    Mark S.

    February 16, 2011 at 1:02 pm

    A few paragraphs down from the guy who isn’t worried about the middle-class:

    Speaking at the same conference, Thomas Wilson, CEO of Allstate, also lamented this global reality: “I can get [workers] anywhere in the world. It is a problem for America, but it is not necessarily a problem for American business … American businesses will adapt.”

    It doesn’t sound like he’s really lamenting it. After all, American businesses will adapt, and that’s the only important thing.

  40. 40.

    A Farmer

    February 16, 2011 at 1:02 pm

    @kay:
    What’s really crazy is that it’s the Warren County sheriff. Warren County is the Orange County of Ohio, rich, crazy Tea Party nutjobs, who only know people like themselves. If they lose support there, the GOP is true and rightly fucked.

  41. 41.

    gene108

    February 16, 2011 at 1:03 pm

    @Nicole:

    I do think there is a certain group of conservatives, who look at the dirt poor illiterates, who are mired in poverty, with no hope of getting out or having their children get out of poverty, in Third World countries and lament the fact we could have that here, if only we did what they wanted.

    I mean the U.S. sort of had it going on post-Civil War with tenant farmers and sharecroppers, but all that started going by the wayside in the last 50 years or so.

  42. 42.

    Yutsano

    February 16, 2011 at 1:04 pm

    @kay: You do, of course, have my permission to giggle mightily. Especially since I find that as delicious as the firefighter’s union marching with state employees in Wisconsin. It feels like small steps, but we might just start reversing Reaganism here.

  43. 43.

    bobbo

    February 16, 2011 at 1:10 pm

    one of his senior colleagues had argued that the hollowing-out of the American middle class didn’t really matter to him.

    Fixed

  44. 44.

    El Cid

    February 16, 2011 at 1:10 pm

    In North Carolina as the mills (especially textile) were shutting down because of a variety of factors — automation, different products desired, early off-shoring, expense of updating — I remember not just pragmatic or neutral-sounding economic arguments about the inevitability of this trend.

    I heard an awful lot of utterly callous and snobbish derision of those stupid-ass backwards rednecks who should have known better for trying to keep these ancient shitty jobs anyway.

    You didn’t hear this from the kinds of people who had a relative working in one of the mills, or who were their neighbors, especially in the old and sadly decaying mill villages.

    You heard this from professional and upper middle class types and their kids. Especially those who just lived around a mill area and worked elsewhere in a nearby city.

    At the time it didn’t strike me as so cruel.

    Now, it’s actually the same things that most analysts say, just without the vehemence, and with tossed-off phrases about “a social safety net” and “retraining” and the like.

    I once read a book about how to get Africa to develop as more modern economies so as to improve national stability and a better quality of life for the people.

    It deployed crude Marxism in one of the openly cruelest arguments I’ve ever heard. (Most of the time the astoundingly callous and harmful programs upon poor 3rd world nations which actually were implemented at the behest of US and Western advisers and ‘economic experts’ via the IMF’s and World Bank’s supply-side anti-gubmit genius.)

    You see, in Marx’s historical view, you have stages which must be passed through. The next stage cannot happen until a society passes through the prior.

    The stage before capitalism (the system which can relieve the Africans of scarcity and separation from the modern world economy and a wider middle class) is feudalism, with an exploited class of peasants.

    (“Peasants” are in reality throughout the world farmers who own or are informally recognized by their community as controlling small areas of land, and produce crops for both their own subsistence but also to sell for money income, along with other trades. Typically women are in charge and are the primary producers of cash income.)

    They can only ascend if they become workers as an industrial proletariat.

    Hey, you know what? If you can get peasants to get jobs as workers, then you got capitalism, a workforce for an industrial economy.

    Solution? Force these small-holding farmers off their lands. Appropriate the properties, for example. Apply taxes which make it uneconomical for them to continue. Remove any food or agricultural supply aid and subsidies.

    And so on and so forth. And this was from a scholar and “development” specialist with a “Marxist” view.

    The difference between that approach and the IMF / WB’s “Structural Adjustment Programs” for Africa and the “Austerity Programs” for Latin America and this guy’s is that he was much cruder and more direct in his economic warfare, whereas the sophisticates in the US-dominated IMF/WB allow more indirect effects to smash the lower classes.

  45. 45.

    John Arbuthnot Fisher

    February 16, 2011 at 1:12 pm

    Have to post and run, without reading comments no less, but there’s an important point on which I was hoping to receive the feedback of the BJ community…

    I (~25, degree in economics and political science from a fancy private school) often discuss politics and economics with my father (~60, degree in art education from a small public school), and though he’s usually coming to me for advice, I value his opinion as being far from the intellectual and cultural confines of my education.

    One of the more compelling points that he’s made frequently over the years is to ask why “big business,” or really anyone with exposure to the consumption economy, so disfavors programs that enable and empower the working class. He rightfully points out that the likelihood of these individuals taking their welfare dollars, foodstamps, etc. and plowing them back into Wal-Marts, Targets, Lowe’s, Old Navy, etc. is very high, because they need food, clothes, home staples, etc. As such, the major owners and managers of these entities would benefit significantly from increases in these programs, yet they are marginalized and discredited constantly.

    All of this is true, and readily apparent to someone who themselves would admit that they are no economic genius! So why is it that our favorite Masters of the Universe have such disdain for these programs and their recipients? Perhaps they know all of this, yet are still more interested in condemning strapping young bucks than making money? Just amazing to me – here I think these people just love jerking off on fucking gigantic piles of money, but the only thing that gets them off even more than that is making some poor minority single mother suffer. In the view of the community, is that actually true?

  46. 46.

    Herbal Infusion Bagger

    February 16, 2011 at 1:16 pm

    ” In a recent internal debate, he said, one of his senior colleagues had argued that the hollowing-out of the American middle class didn’t really matter.”

    I’ve realized that this is a pernicious effect of globalization. I believed in the whole Ricardian comparative advantage thing. But free trade and movement of capital has meant the wealthy elite in this country no longer have a compelling economic interest in the growth and prosperity of this country. It used to be that investment in infrastructure and education, R&D, and a working/middle class getting enough of the pie to stimulate demand, as it’s good for the economy in general, would have the support from the Wall St. elite.

    Now, why should a bankster give a crap whether the schools are laying off teachers in California or Missouri or Minnesota? Their kids go to private school, and if economic growth is f**ked in the U.S., well, then the smart money will go overseas. A recession also will make it easier to get the household staff, nannies, cleaners etc.

    We’ve turned into a country run by a self-anointed aristocracy.

  47. 47.

    Sloegin

    February 16, 2011 at 1:19 pm

    The only reason I miss the global march of Communism (I reject Uncle Joe’s frozen broccoli treats, yadda yadda) is that it kept some of these wealthy right-wing MF’ers in line;

    Better to give in to the proles a little so they don’t line you up in front of a wall when the revolution comes…

  48. 48.

    A Farmer

    February 16, 2011 at 1:21 pm

    @John Arbuthnot Fisher : I’ll go with the fact that sociopathy is a psychological disorder.

  49. 49.

    Shinobi

    February 16, 2011 at 1:24 pm

    It bothers me that the middle class is just sitting here taking it. I know several working class individuals who will argue in favor of big business, because they believe that someday that will be then.

    I was thinking about that over the weekend while I mended some torn jeans and watched TV (I can’t afford to buy new jeans anymore.) There were millionaires everywhere on TV, everyone was rich and fabulous and wonderful, except on A&E.

    I then realized why in part the middle class buys in to the idea that they can be millionaires too someday. It is because the don’t realize just how many of us there are who all hope to someday be millionaires. There are just so many people struggling to make it. Most of my friends in my generation haven’t even been able to buy their own couch at this point.

  50. 50.

    ruemara

    February 16, 2011 at 1:30 pm

    @John Arbuthnot Fisher:

    tru dat. If your dad could fake vapid and stupid, we could get him on Charlie Rose. Then he could toss of the mask and freak Bobo out.

  51. 51.

    AAA Bonds

    February 16, 2011 at 1:32 pm

    Hey guys, just saw a GIGANTIC RED BREAKING NEWS UPDATE on the top of FoxNews.com.

    There’s no need to panic yet but apparently, “NEW JERSEY GOV. CHRIS CHRISTIE SPEAKS AT AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE”. My thoughts and prayers are with everyone in this time of unexpected crisis.

    I know you will all want to contact your loved ones and make sure they are all right, especially your smaller loved ones who may have been eaten or become trapped in Gov. Christie’s greasy folds.

  52. 52.

    artem1s

    February 16, 2011 at 1:36 pm

    @kay:

    It’s sad to say that the Democratic party is finally making some inroads in places like Warren. But unfortunately the state party has no idea what to do with them. it is far too entrenched in old guard politics to take advantage of the disenfranchised youth vote. they don’t know how to get the old union workers (thinly veiled tea partiers) to grasp the fact that all of the GOP dog whistles are aimed at them. not the brown people, teh gays, femenazis, and other traditional untermenschen.

  53. 53.

    AAA Bonds

    February 16, 2011 at 1:38 pm

    Seriously, Chris Christie is a disgusting waddling blob of a man. What a monstrous deformation of humanity he is, a howling freak show who could stand in, sans makeup, for some sort of movie mutant who wriggles out from under double-wides to eat small children.

  54. 54.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    February 16, 2011 at 1:38 pm

    @John Arbuthnot Fisher:

    The old paraphrase of Milton (Paradise Lost, lines 258-63) “Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven” is a gross oversimplification but at least it has the advantage of being both consise and poetic. Use it as you see fit.

  55. 55.

    kay

    February 16, 2011 at 1:38 pm

    @Yutsano:

    You do, of course, have my permission to giggle mightily.

    The county prosecutor here, who is a Tea Partier only out of pure political ambition, told me “I’m tired of the anger”.

    Really? Just now, you noticed?

    I should laugh, but I didn’t. I don’t know how to respond to that.

  56. 56.

    kay

    February 16, 2011 at 1:41 pm

    @A Farmer:

    If they lose support there, the GOP is true and rightly fucked.

    How did he think this was going to end? He thought he’d be spared budget cuts and the loss of arbitration rights, why, again? It was okay as long as they were going after teachers and not cops?

  57. 57.

    gene108

    February 16, 2011 at 2:09 pm

    People like this are the reason the French invented the guillotine.

    I actually had time to read the whole article and I agree with the comment about the American middle-class. If 3 people in India and China are uplifted because of globalization and one American is hurt, in the grand scheme of things that’s a net gain.

    People in America, especially in considering where America was with the post-World War II economy, really fail to grasp how much wealth has been concentrated in a few nations. Right now we’re seeing a couple of centuries of capital flows that went from India, China, etc. to Europe and the U.S. correct itself.

    In the end globalization will move everyone to first world nation wealth, rather than people’s fears of a race to the bottom. South Korea or Singapore didn’t get to the point they rival First World living standards by pushing their people to the brink of poverty, so wealth gets concentrated in a few hands.

    What bothers me with these billionaire financial types is they seem to think they can eat their hedge funds, fix their clogged toilets with their financial derivatives, and that basically they somehow don’t rely on the rest of us for anything.

    They all need a good dose of what happened to King Midas, when everything he touched turned to gold because they need to realize man can’t survive on finding good arbitrage spreads alone.

  58. 58.

    kindness

    February 16, 2011 at 2:18 pm

    It’s odd but I’ve long felt American business’ could save a whole bunch more by lopping off the big boys at the top of the income chain and replacing them with cheaper help than going after the production (lower ranks) folks.

    That’s the socialist in me talkin’ though. Send them to Galt without the company money.

  59. 59.

    Mark S.

    February 16, 2011 at 2:21 pm

    @kay:

    “I’m tired of the anger”

    I’m sure all that anger will die down after the GOP delivers all the bullshit they promised. If they can’t, well, there’s always more anger.

  60. 60.

    Cain

    February 16, 2011 at 2:58 pm

    @Shinobi:

    I then realized why in part the middle class buys in to the idea that they can be millionaires too someday. It is because the don’t realize just how many of us there are who all hope to someday be millionaires. There are just so many people struggling to make it. Most of my friends in my generation haven’t even been able to buy their own couch at this point.

    Because it is the new American dream. It isn’t about making a better life for yourself, it is to be rich and not pay taxes.

    cain

  61. 61.

    Dr. Morpheus

    February 16, 2011 at 3:19 pm

    In the end globalization will move everyone to first world nation wealth, rather than people’s fears of a race to the bottom.

    Riiiight! The world doesn’t have the resources to enable everyone on the planet to live a first world lifestyle.

    And nobody is investing in the type of efficient technology needed to allow that to happen.

    What we’re going to see is cancerous wealth concentration followed by a collapse. What emerges from that won’t be pretty.

  62. 62.

    Suffern ACE

    February 16, 2011 at 3:57 pm

    The American worker isn’t any more or less lazy than other workers, but it is rude to not pander and let him know that. And pander we must. Something as mundane as working forms the backbone of our industrious people.

    Middle class consumers are the backbone of society and doing what everybody does when they have a little money (buy stuff) was part of the heroic plan that defeated communism. Never have so many heros bought so much and spent so hard and asked so little of their fellow countrymen, taking on the tremendous risks of shopping.

    Except for saving of course. Nothing says backbone of the republic like the thrifty people in front of me here today. Whatever you guys are doing, unless of course it involves sleeping with each other our having to learn English as an adult, is the bedbone of our great nation.

    Now vote for me.

  63. 63.

    gene108

    February 16, 2011 at 4:36 pm

    @Dr. Morpheus: South Korea and Singapore a perfect examples of how trade won’t improve the living standards of its people. Those guys are totally screwed, with a few wealthy people just pissing on everyone else.

    The world doesn’t have the resources to enable everyone on the planet to live a first world lifestyle.

    Well, it’ll be interesting to see how resources get allocated as consumption increases around the world. I have a more optimistic view of how we will manage things going forward. I think humanity learns from its past.

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

Fundraising 2023-24

Wis*Dems Supreme Court + SD-8

Recent Comments

  • Kelly on Walter’s Fund – Calendars – Pet Postcards (Open Thread) (Mar 26, 2023 @ 4:59pm)
  • Ohio Mom on What Happens Next? What Does the Future Hold? (Mar 26, 2023 @ 4:58pm)
  • StringOnAStick on Walter’s Fund – Calendars – Pet Postcards (Open Thread) (Mar 26, 2023 @ 4:57pm)
  • Ohio Mom on What Happens Next? What Does the Future Hold? (Mar 26, 2023 @ 4:54pm)
  • sab on Walter’s Fund – Calendars – Pet Postcards (Open Thread) (Mar 26, 2023 @ 4:52pm)

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
We All Need A Little Kindness
Classified Documents: A Primer
State & Local Elections Discussion

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Mailing List Signup
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)

Twitter / Spoutible

Balloon Juice (Spoutible)
WaterGirl (Spoutible)
TaMara (Spoutible)
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
TaMara
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
ActualCitizensUnited

Join the Fight!

Join the Fight Signup Form
All Join the Fight Posts

Balloon Juice Events

5/14  The Apocalypse
5/20  Home Away from Home
5/29  We’re Back, Baby
7/21  Merging!

Balloon Juice for Ukraine

Donate

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2023 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!