Robert Reich: The Economic Recovery Has Stalled, Back Toward A Double Dip Recession.

[Better Believe It]

Back Toward Double Dip
by Robert Reich
June 3, 2011

The May jobs report is a disaster — the weakest reading since September. Non-farm payrolls grew only 54,000 last month, according to the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. Private employment rose only 83,000 — the smallest growth since last June. Government payrolls dropped 29,000.

Together with plummeting housing prices, falling wages for non-supervisory workers, a paltry 1.8 percent growth in the first quarter, and a precipitous drop in consumer confidence, the picture should be clear to anyone able to see clearly.

The recovery has stalled.

Several steps need to be taken right away. Exempt the first $20,000 of income from payroll taxes for two years. Lend money to cash-starved state and local governments. Initiate a new WPA for the long-term unemployed. Amend bankruptcy laws to allow homeowners to include their prime residencies in personal bankruptcy (giving them more bargaining leverage with their lenders to renegotiate mortgage loans).

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/06/03-3

[RC]

1. Gee, I wonder if the lack of Living Wage jobs has anything to do with this?

Ya think?

[NickB79]

2. He has a lot of good ideas for turning this economy around

Which means none of them will go anywhere, and instead the GOP will give the super-rich more tax cuts.

[ixion]

3. There never was a 'recovery'. There was an economy on life support...

and now the life support has run out, and we're back to dying on the vine.

[Octafish]

4. Remember all the talk about the New FDR's Green New Deal?

Nostalgia.

[Donnachaidh]

5. wait -- they'll drag that dead horse out 6 months before the election

And we'll get more promises of it happening - after the election, naturally.... :shrug:

[Octafish]

6. Rah! Rah! Rah!

And the one guy who actually brought up the poor and jobless in the last primary campaign is facing charges of corruption and conspiracy, as we speak.

[RC]

9. So that is the real reason they are making an example of Edwards.

[Donnachaidh]

12. Can't have pundits dragging out comparisons about who was really working for the poor

last time around, now can we?

[Donnachaidh]

11. yup -- you noticed THAT little irony too, eh?

I fully expect the speechifying about working for the poor to get white hot, running up to the election. Of course, it will go as cool as ice once the inner pundits run numbers and figure that the baloney is deep enough to secure the deal.

[Brickbat]

8. There's no stopping or outsourcing those jobs!

[xchrom]

7. Recommend

[moondust]

10. Autokick for RR.

:kick: