AlterNet: In a Perfect Storm of Economic Stagflation, the Yachting Set Says: "Let Them Eat Pizza"

[marmar]

In a Perfect Storm of Economic Stagflation, the Yachting Set Says: "Let Them Eat Pizza"

By Joshua Holland, AlterNet. Posted July 31, 2008.

Officially, "stagflation" is a thing of the past, but a deeper look reveals a different, very current reality for most Americans.



Stagflation in America? Well, unless you're among the wealthiest, you're soaking in it and have been for quite a while.

But you're not likely to hear much about that story. Officially, the U.S. hasn't experienced stagflation -- a long period of rising prices amid sluggish economic growth -- since the 1970s. The word conjures up images of gas lines snaking around corners, a weary Jimmy Carter looking droopy and forlorn in the Oval Office and the general sense of "malaise" that sunny old Ronald Reagan exploited so adroitly to give rise to the New Conservative movement.

But looking beyond the official numbers -- the data on growth and inflation that most economic reporters bandy about --reveals a deeper truth about the American economy. The reality is that those who aren't at the very top or the very bottom of America's economic food chain have been mired in a long period of painful stagflation. Bit it's a reality that's obscured by the ways in which we measure our nation's economic health.

So while anyone who draws a paycheck knows that prices are rising fast and salaries haven't kept up for a long time, the S-word is never mentioned in our economic discourse. There are two reasons for that. First, a number of government benefits like Social Security payments are indexed to inflation, and since the dawn of the Reagan era, a series of changes were made to the way the government measures it, largely as a back-door way of keeping the growth of entitlements in check without pissing off veterans' groups or the AARP.

Second, while our overall growth has outpaced inflation, America's income has also become much more highly concentrated at the top -- the paychecks of 9 out of 10 Americans have actually declined over the past three decades. It's been Bill Gates and his set who have done extremely well during that time.

As a result of both of these shifts, there's now a significant gap between the economy in which most Americans live and work and the one discussed in the business pages and on the cable news blab-fests. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/workplace/92910/in_a_perfect_storm_of_economic_stagflation%2C_the_yachting_set_says%3A_%22let_them_eat_pizza%22/

[brentspeak]

1. An excellent article

It also points out how complicit Bill Clinton was in allowing official economic data to be manipulated the way it has.