The Great Disappearing Economic Recovery....

This chart was posted on The Hand that Feeds You post "They're Just Not Hiring".   The data was initially published on the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.   The chart starkly displays what we all knew in our heart to be the case...we are in the deep, dark jobless recovery.  Although there have been a few green shoots, the economy is still in the ICU in critical condition.   But what interested me the most about the chart was the emerging pattern that demonstrates the intellectual bankruptcy of trickle-down theory.



Although I was "employed" as a Graduate student during the 2001 recession,  I remember that although it was not a particularly deep recession, the recovery was labeled as "jobless recovery."  Jobs in biotech started to disappear at this time while salaries in my field were definitely losing traction.  It was during this recovery that I recognized that science was NOT recovering.  That the Bush Administration's war against the public sector - more specifically against the NIH (National Institute of Health) was creating a permanent glut of scientists and the salary situation was becoming a race to the bottom.  Biotechnology and pure science were not the only victims.  Computer programmers, engineers, IT professionals - you name the STEM career - were all experiencing a quantum shift.  Public sector funding was disappearing like snow in the sun while outsourcing, as well as insourcing, further decimated salaries and eliminated jobs.

The first jobless recovery...the 2001 recession:

I think that many Americans forgot the misery of those years.  Although not particularly deep - it took well over three years for jobs to come back to pre-recession levels.  Worse still - some careers - like mine - would ever be the same again.  However, contrast that to the 1991-1992 recession. Although deeper - we bounced back to where we were in two short years.  And the truly awful recession of 1981-1982 we also were bouncing back after about two years.   Also note that job growth was the most robust during the first recession of 1981-82, and somewhat less in 1991-1992.  The recovery for the normal working person was tepid at best following the 2001 recession.   In fact - it was nearly 2004 before we got back to where we were before the 2001 recession. If it weren't for the housing bubble there would have been no recovery at all.  Be that as it may - the normal working stiff only had about three years of slow job growth before they were smacked down again by the recession that began in 2007.

The failure of supply-side - trickle-down economics:

This could be a harbinger of things to come if we do not end our love affair with supply-side economics.  The loss of the public sector, the outsourcing of high-paying and skilled private-sector jobs and the inability to raise revenue from corporate entities and wealthy individuals are creating a situation where economic recoveries can not gain much traction before we are thrust into another down cycle. The funneling of money to the top and the separation of the market from the general economy and the economic welfare of individuals is ominous.  This chart shows that striking disconnect and how it has become progressively more divergent with each economic cycle.

But we can't ask a company like GE to pay taxes - they might decide to leave and take the jobs with them!

Grow up America - that's already happening even though according the New York Times GE didn't pay ANY taxes last year and in fact was refunded a stunning sum of $3.2 billion.  Not only did GE not pay taxes on their profits  - but  somehow the struggling American tax payer ended up subsidizing a company that had $14.2 billion in profits to the tune of $3.2 billion. Our fear of "offending" or "scaring away" the wealthy has past the point of being ridiculous - it is approaching madness. It  is also making it impossible to extract needed revenue from their profits to support our society and infrastructure.  This is a dangerous game we are playing and the results are demonstrated in that chart.  The wealthy few have hijacked the system and gamed it to work for them without regard to "collateral damage" a.k.a. the working and middle classes. Supply side economics, trickle down theory  - by whatever name you call it -  it is an intellectually and morally bankrupt scheme.

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