If the previous good times were never really the natural fruit of any American excellence, if all that was just an illusion, then improving things now may be much harder than simply returning to the past's proven formulas. It may require new solutions starting from scratch.
That's an interesting thing to consider, for certain. You may be on to something.
I will say, though, that it seems Reagan began the chain of events that led to today's wealth inequality with his massive tax cuts for the wealthy. At least, that's what I understand, but I'm not an economics expert either.
Religion is for people whose existential fear is greater than their common sense. It's also the favored cover for hypocrites.
Chap, I think that the description of the current situation is mostly accurate. I’m skeptical of the “we used to have the best” claims. It smacks too much of MAGA nostalgia.
I’m an overshoot and collapse guy, and I think we’re too locked in to an extraction-exponential economic increase model. I don’t think looking to the past for solutions is going to work. As the stress of climate change, collapsing ecosystems, and oil depletion builds, I see further division and splintering as we scrabble to fix things with inadequate resources. I’m not sure we will have the resources to fix the problems, let alone agree on how to fix them.
he/him
“I prefer peace. But if trouble must come, let it come in my time so that my children can live in peace.” — Thomas Paine
Chap, I think that the description of the current situation is mostly accurate. I’m skeptical of the “we used to have the best” claims. It smacks too much of MAGA nostalgia.
OK - but the point is that the US used to be pretty damn good in the respects listed in the article, and that is no longer the case. Life for ordinary Americans is now markedly worse than it was in their parents' time - but better than it ever has been for a tiny minority of the ultra-rich.
I’m an overshoot and collapse guy, and I think we’re too locked in to an extraction-exponential economic increase model. I don’t think looking to the past for solutions is going to work. As the stress of climate change, collapsing ecosystems, and oil depletion builds, I see further division and splintering as we scrabble to fix things with inadequate resources. I’m not sure we will have the resources to fix the problems, let alone agree on how to fix them.
I'm fine with that on a macroscopic long-term scale, and not just for the US. But what Saunders rightly points out is that while life is getting worse for most people, it could be a lot better than it is if restraints were placed on the obscene wealth and power of the hyper-rich class that has grown up in recent decades. And ordinary people have the power to do something about that by voting as they recently did in New York.
Maksutov:
That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
Mayan Elephant:
Not only have I denounced the Big Lie, I have denounced the Big lie big lie.
Chap, I think that the description of the current situation is mostly accurate. I’m skeptical of the “we used to have the best” claims. It smacks too much of MAGA nostalgia.
OK - but the point is that the US used to be pretty damn good in the respects listed in the article, and that is no longer the case. Life for ordinary Americans is now markedly worse than it was in their parents' time - but better than it ever has been for a tiny minority of the ultra-rich.
I’m an overshoot and collapse guy, and I think we’re too locked in to an extraction-exponential economic increase model. I don’t think looking to the past for solutions is going to work. As the stress of climate change, collapsing ecosystems, and oil depletion builds, I see further division and splintering as we scrabble to fix things with inadequate resources. I’m not sure we will have the resources to fix the problems, let alone agree on how to fix them.
I'm fine with that on a macroscopic long-term scale, and not just for the US. But what Saunders rightly points out is that while life is getting worse for most people, it could be a lot better than it is if restraints were placed on the obscene wealth and power of the hyper-rich class that has grown up in recent decades. And ordinary people have the power to do something about that by voting as they recently did in New York.
Short term, I agree that steps could be taken to make life better for the 99%. But, economically speaking, voters in much of the country do not vote in favor of their own financial interest, measured objectively. The obscene amounts of wealth of the 1% were created in the US by majorities that voted for tax cuts that gave them relatively small benefits, but gave the 1% enormous benefits. Today, our Republican Party is anti-government, meaning that people will vote against government regulation and spending, even when that regulation and spending economically benefits them. It has voters so convinced that all government benefit programs are "communism" that we can't have the benefits of government health insurance, which would give us better health outcomes for less money.
Voters are nowhere near rational economic actors. If they were, no one who understood the economic effects of huge tariffs and mass deportation would have voted for Trump. We vote more on ideology, which is sometimes dressed up in economic trappings.
he/him
“I prefer peace. But if trouble must come, let it come in my time so that my children can live in peace.” — Thomas Paine
Voters are nowhere near rational economic actors. If they were, no one who understood the economic effects of huge tariffs and mass deportation would have voted for Trump. We vote more on ideology, which is sometimes dressed up in economic trappings.
I completely agree with you. But huge amounts of money are being poured into making sure American voters do NOT vote in their own best interests.
Despite that, few non-Republican politicians seem to be willing to tell the truth in a way that voters can and will grasp.
Speaking as a non-American, it seems to me that Bernie Saunders is one of those. I just wish he wasn't so old, and that there were more like him. Otherwise I fear that the majority of decent Americans will see their own lives and those of their children getting steadily worse, and that they will blame it on poor brown people rather than on those who have grabbed all the money to stuff into their own pockets.
Maksutov:
That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
Mayan Elephant:
Not only have I denounced the Big Lie, I have denounced the Big lie big lie.
Voters are nowhere near rational economic actors. If they were, no one who understood the economic effects of huge tariffs and mass deportation would have voted for Trump. We vote more on ideology, which is sometimes dressed up in economic trappings.
I completely agree with you. But huge amounts of money are being poured into making sure American voters do NOT vote in their own best interests.
Despite that, few non-Republican politicians seem to be willing to tell the truth in a way that voters can and will grasp.
Speaking as a non-American, it seems to me that Bernie Saunders is one of those. I just wish he wasn't so old, and that there were more like him. Otherwise I fear that the majority of decent Americans will see their own lives and those of their children getting steadily worse, and that they will blame it on poor brown people rather than on those who have grabbed all the money to stuff into their own pockets.
Maybe. I look at the huge measles outbreaks here and wonder what it will take to pierce through the tribal insanity that has gripped MAGA. I’ve got no good answers.
he/him
“I prefer peace. But if trouble must come, let it come in my time so that my children can live in peace.” — Thomas Paine
About reining in the ultra-rich: I've been wondering (still as a non-economist) whether we may be hitting a scalability problem in capitalism itself.
It's important to remember that the unlimited right to grab whatever one can is not a natural law. "You earned it, so you get to keep it" cannnot even be fundamental as a moral truth, because the only reason that anyone can ever have more than the bag of flour that they can defend with their shotgun is that the rest of society agrees to support one's right to private property. Taking that support from everyone else for granted, and refusing to accept any reciprocal responsibility to everyone else, is no more morally consistent than saying that I did everything to harvest my grain except for the last step of actually cutting it and so I don't owe my labourers anything.
No, without the people who cut all my wheat for me, I would have no grain to sell, and so I owe them their wages. And in the same way there is a basic debt that the rich owe to everyone else simply for respecting their right to be rich, because without that respect, they'd have nothing. The right to be rich is not a God-given right. Who said it was? It's a right conferred by the rest of humanity, in return for collective benefit.
At least up to a point, conceding the right to be rich does offer everyone else a great benefit. It's the miracle of capitalism, identified by Adam Smith and demonstrated well since, that safeguarding the right to get rich has proven to be a much more effective way to make everyone more prosperous than seemingly enlightened schemes to control economies. This might not be a principle that still holds right up to infinite wealth, though.
The natural world is full of rules that work great within a wide range of circumstances but break down outside that range. Perhaps economics is that way as well. Perhaps allowing a few lucky or talented people to get richer and richer offers the rest of humanity diminishing returns at some point. Perhaps the peak incentive effect is somewhere around 100 million dollars, and billionaires are all counterproductive.
So perhaps there should simply be a wealth cap, where the right to private property simply stops. Maybe it should be part of the definition of ownership, that nobody can ever own anything above a total value of a hundred million dollars, or something like that. "Billionaire" would be an oxymoron.
The prize of getting hold of up to a hundred million dollars ought to be enough to motivate anyone to take risks and work hard. Why do we need more than that? How much more do we get, by allowing billionaires, than we'd have if we didn't? How much less do we have, because we have billionaires, than we'd have if we didn't?
About the MAGA thread in American culture and the challenge of making life in America better: the United States really is different from other nations in one way, namely the degree to which its culture emphasises the importance of individual liberty. All democratic countries recognise rights to individual freedom, but they tend to regard liberty as one value among others, not the only value. Europeans, for example, want some Egalité and Fraternité along with our Liberté, some Einigkeit and Recht along with our Freiheit.
The uniquely American emphasis on Liberty above all may be a long-term weakness because of the way that it fosters stubborn refusal to listen to other people, accept responsibility to others, or even face reality. It may just be too easy to interpret the right to Liberty as the right to cover one's ears and shout "I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" to anything and anyone besides one's own wishes.
It should be noted, since Dump is threatening to shut down the opening of the new US/Canadian bridge in Michigan, that Canada and the US are so economically tied together that when cross-border traffic slows, the damage shows up fast in border towns. Places that relied on Canadian shoppers, tourism, trucking, and shared supply chains are seeing sales fall, businesses close, and investment evaporate. Retail corridors that used to live off weekend visitors are struggling, hotels and restaurants are quieter, and even the malls are sitting half empty. When the cross-border flow weakens, it isn’t just Dump getting even with Canada for perceived slights, it’s small communities on watching their local economies stall out.
Additionally, air routes are being canceled, Vegas is taking a crap, and Canada is developing trade deals to cut the US out.
What’s wrong with America? We had 77 million people decide Russia was more trustworthy than NATO, that browns are too numerous, and the world owed us big time for whatever fever dream they have. What’s wrong with America? It’s the Americans that are wrong with America. A bunch of mushy-brained screw-ups who are shooting themselves in the foot because Fox News tells them what to believe.
Pam Bondi appeared to rely on a prewritten “burn book” of talking points to respond to questions rather than answering them spontaneously. Instead of arresting and convicting pedophiles from the Epstein files, she’s acting like a total sociopath in the hearing. And people like Xanax are ok with that. They have no damned clue why that kind of irresponsible behavior as a representative of an American institution is rotting this country from within.
