Monday, March 4, 2013

UPWARD MOBILITY in AMERICA: Obama and Wall Street's Assault on Middle America


UPWARD MOBILITY? NOT FOR LEGALS IN OBAMA’S AMERICA WHERE THE JOBS GO TO ILLEGALS, AND THE LOOTING OF HIS WALL STREET PAYMASTERS CONTINUES UNABATED. 

OBAMA’S AMERICA: HIS BANKSTER LOOTERS GET THE JOBS IN HIS ADMINISTRATION, AND THEIR LOOTING SOARS… WHILE HIS LA RAZA PARTY BASE of ILLEGALS GET THE JOBS AND GRINGO-PAID DREAM ACTS of WELFARE.

THE REST OF US GET… OPEN AND UNDEFENDED BORDERS WITH NARCOMEX, AND THE TAX BILLS FOR WALL STREET’S CRIMES, AND THE LA RAZA WELFARE STATE and MEX CRIME TIDAL WAVE IN AMERICA!

DURING OBAMA’S FIRST TERM, 2/3s OF ALL JOBS WENT TO IMMIGRANTS, BOTH LEGAL AND ILLEGAL. HE SABOTAGED E-VERIFY TO HELP EASE MORE ILLEGALS INTO OUR JOBS DURING A PERIOD OF JOBS CRISIS. WORKPLACE ENFORCEMENT OF LAWS PROHIBITING THE EMPLOYMENT OF ILLEGALS PLUMMETED 70%, AND IS EXPECTED TO BE NON-EXISTENT DURING OBAMA’S SECOND TERM AS HE PURSUES AN AGENDA OF AMNESTY VIA NON-ENFORCEMENT.
 

Monday, Mar. 04, 2013

 

Upward Mobility not in Obama's America

By Fareed Zakaria

America has long been seen--by its citizens and the world--as the place where anyone can make it. And yet studies from the past two decades all point to a different reality. Economic mobility in the U.S. is low compared with what it was in times past and with current levels in many European countries and Canada. It is particularly sticky at the two ends of the economic ladder. Rich people rarely become poor in a generation--and the poorest seldom get rich. Despite the rags-to-riches myth, such stories are the exception. A comprehensive study by the Pew Economic Mobility Project documents that in the U.S. today, few poor people become even upper middle class.
That's why President Obama's proposal to expand early-childhood education is vitally important: the idea is to provide high-quality pre-K for 4-year-olds from families whose incomes are at or below 200% of the poverty line--that is at or below $47,000 for a family of four. Children born into poor or dysfunctional families must have pathways up, especially if they have the talent to succeed. And the more we learn about neuroscience, the clearer it becomes that the human brain develops much sooner than we had believed. Early stimulation and education can be highly effective.

Some of the criticism of Obama's program has come from the usual ideological opponents, though this is a program squarely aimed at creating greater equality of opportunity, not outcome. Other critics share his goals but worry about the government's track record in the area. Specifically, they point to Head Start, the long-standing program that provides early education to disadvantaged children. The Department of Health and Human Services released a study of Head Start in 2010, updated in 2012, that concludes that the program's positive effects begin to fade within a few years. This has led many to call it a failure and urge the government not to throw good money after bad.

But critics are jumping to conclusions about a very complicated subject without really understanding the study--or the limitations of social-science research. In a June 2012 paper, three scholars from the University of Chicago and University of California, Davis, painstakingly explained why it is premature to reject Head Start. They note that many factors may have intervened to erode the early gains in scores, including sharp rises in single-parent families, non-English-speaking households and severe health problems like childhood obesity and diabetes. They also noted that early education in public schools has been getting better, a trend that might explain why Head Start kids lose their advantage over non--Head Start kids. Most important, some studies show that though their test scores level out, children who have been through early education do better in their professional lives.

Look at the data from the rest of the world. A 2012 report from the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) concludes that early-childhood education "improves children's cognitive abilities, helps to create a foundation for lifelong learning, makes learning outcomes more equitable, reduces poverty and improves social mobility from generation to generation."

This conclusion is based on data from 34 rich countries, many of which outperform the U.S. in educational achievement and--now--economic mobility. In many of these countries, 90% of 3-year-olds get early-childhood education. The OECD average for 4-year-olds is 81%. In the U.S., it is only 69%, and those children tend to be from middle- and upper-middle-class families.

European countries provide universal (or almost universal) general education and day-care programs that focus on whole-child learning, unlike American ones, which are often more limited and target only the poor. The U.S.--the government and private sector combined--also spends much less on early-childhood education as a percentage of GDP, ranking 24th of the 34 countries surveyed by the OECD, and has a higher-than-average student-to-teacher ratio. Additionally, America's poor children suffer more than Europe's from malnutrition, which has an effect on the ability to learn.

American government, working locally for the most part, set the pace for education in the past 150 years. By the second half of the 19th century, mass elementary education was the norm across the nation. It would take other industrializing countries three to four decades to catch up, write scholars Claudia Goldin and Lawrence Katz in their book The Race Between Education and Technology. "Human capital became supreme in the 20th century and America led the way."

That lead is now gone. Head Start should be reformed to ensure its effectiveness. But Obama's proposals will help the U.S. start to catch up in the great human-capital struggle that will define the new century even more dramatically than it did the last.

TO READ MORE BY FAREED ZAKARIA, GO TO time.com/zakaria

The original version of this article said the paper by scholars from the University of Chicago and University of California, Davis was published in September 2011. While released as a working paper in 2011, the version referenced in the column was presented in June 2012

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DO YOU THINK OBAMA'S BANKSTERS HAVE SUFFERED ANY?
“Records show that four out of Obama's top five contributors are employees of financial industry giants - Goldman Sachs ($571,330), UBS AG ($364,806), JPMorgan Chase ($362,207) and Citigroup ($358,054).”

BOOK:

Obamanomics: How Barack Obama Is Bankrupting You and Enriching His Wall Street Friends, Corporate Lobbyists, and Union Bosses


 
BY TIMOTHY P CARNEY 

Editorial Reviews

Obama Is Making You Poorer—But Who’s Getting Rich?

Goldman Sachs, GE, Pfizer, the United Auto Workers—the same “special interests” Barack Obama was supposed to chase from the temple—are profiting handsomely from Obama’s Big Government policies that crush taxpayers, small businesses, and consumers. In Obamanomics, investigative reporter Timothy P. Carney digs up the dirt the mainstream media ignores and the White House wishes you wouldn’t see. Rather than Hope and Change, Obama is delivering corporate socialism to America, all while claiming he’s battling corporate America. It’s corporate welfare and regulatory robbery—it’s Obamanomics.

Congressman Ron Paul says, “Every libertarian and free-market conservative needs to read Obamanomics.” And Johan Goldberg, columnist and bestselling author says, “Obamanomics is conservative muckraking at its best and an indispensable field guide to the Obama years.”

If you’ve wondered what’s happening to America, as the federal government swallows up the financial sector, the auto industry, and healthcare, and enacts deficit exploding “stimulus packages,” this book makes it all clear—it’s a big scam. Ultimately, Obamanomics boils down to this: every time government gets bigger, somebody’s getting rich, and those somebodies are friends of Barack. This book names the names—and it will make your blood boil.

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Obama Is Making You Poorer—But Who’s Getting Rich?

Goldman Sachs, GE, Pfizer, the United Auto Workers—the same “special interests” Barack Obama was supposed to chase from the temple—are profiting handsomely from Obama’s Big Government policies that crush taxpayers, small businesses, and consumers.

Investigative reporter Timothy P. Carney digs up the dirt the mainstream media ignores and the White House wishes you wouldn’t see. Rather than Hope and Change, Obama is delivering corporate socialism to America, all while claiming he’s battling corporate America. It’s corporate welfare and regulatory robbery—it’s Obamanomics. In this explosive book, Carney reveals:

* The Great Health Care Scam—Obama’s backroom deals with drug companies spell corporate profits and more government control – YES, OBAMA DID LIE ILLEGALS WERE NOT INCLUDED IN OBAMCARE. HE AND PELOSI RIGGED IT SO IT WOULD.
* The Global Warming Hoax—Obama has bought off industries with a pork-filled bill that will drain your wallet for Al Gore’s agenda
* Obama and Wall Street—“Change” means more bailouts and a heavy Goldman Sachs presence in the West Wing (including Rahm Emanuel)
* Stimulating K Street—The largest spending bill in history gave pork to the well-connected and created a feeding frenzy for lobbyists
* How the GOP needs to change its tune—drastically—to battle Obamanomics

If you’ve wondered what’s happening to our country, as the federal government swallows up the financial sector, the auto industry, and healthcare, and enacts deficit exploding “stimulus packages” that create make-work government jobs, this book makes it all clear—it’s a big scam. Ultimately, Obamanomics boils down to this: every time government gets bigger, somebody’s getting rich, and those somebodies are friends of Barack. This book names the names—and it will make your blood boil.

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This report is another example of the obscene concentration of wealth in America that has raised inequality to a level not seen in more than a century. Wages for workers in the United States are at their lowest level since the 1950s.


IN LA RAZA-CONTROLLED MEXIFORNIA THERE IS A PUSH TO HAND ILLEGALS UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE. THIS STATE ALREADY PAYS OUT $22 BILLION PER YEAR IN SOCIAL SERVICES TO ILLEGALS WITH COUNTIES PAYING OUT EVEN MORE ON TOP OF THAT NUMBER!

IN CA THE LA RAZA PARTY PASSED A LAW MAKING IT ILLEGAL FOR EMPLOYERS TO USE E-VERIFY. LA RAZA JERRY BROWN QUICKLY SIGNED IT.

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OBAMA’S BANKSTER PARASITE CLASS IS DOING WELL! DESPITE THE DEVASTATION THIS VERY CLASS HAS PERPETRATED ON AMEICANS!

An immense and unbridgeable chasm exists between the conditions of life for masses of people—suffering from the greatest economic and social crisis since the 1930s—and a ruling class whose wealth is almost entirely divorced from productive activity in the real economy.



wsws.org
Published by the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI)
The financial aristocracy and the growth of working class struggle

4 March 2013

Last year, nine executives at four major private equity companies received a combined total of $1 billion in pay and dividends in what was likely the largest payout in the companies’ histories.
This extraordinary fact was reported in an article in the weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal. The article noted that dividend payouts alone amounted to more than $100 million each for Stephen Schwarzman, CEO of Blackstone Group LP; Henry Kravis and George Roberts, the co-founders of KKR; and Leon Black of Apollo Global Management LLC. All of these men were already billionaires, with Schwarzman worth $5.2 billion, followed by Kravis at $4 billion, Roberts at $3.7 billion, and Black at $3.5 billion.
The average payout for each of the nine executives was about 2,000 times the median household income in the United States.
This report is another example of the obscene concentration of wealth in America that has raised inequality to a level not seen in more than a century. Wages for workers in the United States are at their lowest level since the 1950s.
Meanwhile, massive cuts are being implemented at every level of government, justified by the claim that “there is no money” for health care, education or other basic social needs.
The same day that the Journal reported the income of the Wall Street private equity executives, the federal government began the implementation of $1.2 trillion in “sequester” budget cuts, and Michigan Governor Rick Snyder announced that he would appoint an emergency financial manager with dictatorial powers to impose cuts in Detroit.
The Obama administration has indicated that the brutal cuts under the “sequester” will not be reversed. The across-the-board cuts in social spending are the outcome of calculated maneuvers by the Democrats and Republicans to impose extremely unpopular measures that both parties support. Among the many consequences, those receiving long-term unemployment benefits will see their weekly income fall 11 percent to $260. The weekly take of each of the Wall Street executives cited by the Journal was more than 7,000 times this amount.
These figures point to the overwhelmingly dominant factor of American life: social inequality. Repeated surveys have shown that the great mass of the people significantly underestimate the scale of the wealth concentrated in the hands of the financial elite. It is little talked about in the media, and for most people the sums of wealth controlled by this layer are simply incomprehensible.
An immense and unbridgeable chasm exists between the conditions of life for masses of people—suffering from the greatest economic and social crisis since the 1930s—and a ruling class whose wealth is almost entirely divorced from productive activity in the real economy.
In terms of the political response, the contrast to the 1930s is instructive. In introducing the Revenue Act of 1935, which increased tax rates on high incomes and estates, President Franklin D. Roosevelt stated, “Great accumulations of wealth cannot be justified on the basis of personal and family security.”
Such a conception—advanced by Roosevelt as part of the effort to save capitalism from the threat of social revolution—belongs to another age. It is completely outside of the boundaries of contemporary bourgeois politics. Now the watchword is for ever greater attacks to make the working class pay for the crisis of the capitalist system.
The American ruling class bears all the hallmarks of an aristocracy, with all that implies for social and political stability. When the existence of the ruling class and the economic system upon which it is based become inimical to any progressive development—when instead they become the driving force for an immense historical retrogression—society is on the verge of revolution. This was true in France before 1789 and Russia before 1917, and it is true in the United States today.
For 30 years, the American ruling class has built up its wealth through a process of financialization, in which the productive forces of the economy were steadily undermined. This process led to the Wall Street collapse of 2008, which has become the occasion for an even more frenzied orgy of speculation.
Definite policies have been pursued, first under Bush and then vastly expanded under Obama, to ensure that this process continues. The financial elite is addicted to an unending stream of virtually free money pumped into the markets by the US Federal Reserve. After a quick fix of bailouts in the wake of the 2008 crash, the American central bank is mainlining a steady supply of dollars by means of asset purchases on the order of $85 billion a month.

This is what is behind the massive rise in stock prices upon which the wealth of the private equity executives is based, and it is the reason why the Dow Jones Industrial Average is within a few percentage points of setting a new record, even as economic growth stalls and begins to go in reverse.
The malignant character of social relations infects every political institution. The entire organism stinks of corruption. Both political parties, the Democrats and Republicans, function as direct instruments for the enrichment of the ruling class.
Nothing can be changed through this political system. Social struggle is required. The working class must fight back, countering the dictates of the ruling elite through collective action. Social conflict is, indeed, inevitable. It has already begun to emerge in explosive forms in countries around the world, and the first signs of the coming eruption can be seen in the United States itself.
Andre Damon and Joseph Kishore

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WHY THE JOBS GO TO ILLEGALS:

“At the hearing, Dr. Rakesh Kochar, Associate Director for Research at the Pew Hispanic Center, testified that in the year following the official end of the recession (June 2009), foreign-born workers gained 656,000 jobs while native-born workers lost an additional 1.2 million jobs.”                                                      

“What employers really want in many cases by hiring immigrants is to hold down wage costs, experts say.” 

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UNDER OBAMA, TWO-THIRDS OF JOBS GO TO HIS PARTY BASE OF ILLEGALS!


"We have a situation where the job market — the bottom fell out, yet we kept legal immigration relatively high without even a national debate," he said. "As a consequence, a lot of the job growth has been going to immigrants."

Mr. Obama did take action this year to grant many illegal immigrants up to 30 years of age a tentative legal status that prevents them from being deported and authorizes them to work in the United States.

Some Republicans in Congress have criticized Mr. Obama's policy, saying it violates his powers and will mean more competition for scarce jobs.

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 “The inspections have determined that hundreds of companies throughout the U.S. have significant numbers of illegal immigrants on their payroll yet none have been punished, according to a Houston newspaper that obtained internal ICE records through the Freedom of Information Act. At least 430 audit cases listed as “closed” by the agency had high percentages of workers with “questionable” documents yet they faced no consequences.”

THE ENTIRE REASON THE BORDERS ARE LEFT OPEN IS TO CUT WAGES!

“We could cut unemployment in half simply by reclaiming the jobs taken by illegal workers,” said Representative Lamar Smith of Texas, co-chairman of the Reclaim American Jobs Caucus. “President Obama is on the wrong side of the American people on immigration. The president should support policies that help citizens and legal immigrants find the jobs they need and deserve rather than fail to enforce immigration laws.”
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 “The principal beneficiaries of our current immigration policy are affluent Americans who hire immigrants at substandard wages for low-end work. Harvard economist George Borjas estimates that American workers lose $190 billion annually in depressed wages caused by the constant flooding of the labor market at the low-wage end.” Christian Science Monitor
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
Why the new jobs go to immigrants

By David R. Francis

Wall Street cheered and stock prices rose when the US Labor Department announced last Friday that employers had expanded their payrolls by 262,000 positions in February. But it wasn't entirely good news. The statisticians also indicated that the share of the adult population holding jobs had slipped slightly from January to 62.3 percent. That's now two full percentage points below the level in the brief recession that began in March 2001

ILLEGALS NOW CONTROL THE CA STATE LEGISLATURE WHERE ALL AGENDAS ARE FOR LA RAZA SUPREMACY!

NOW ILLEGALS WILL BE GETTING UNEMPLOYMENT FOR THE JOBS THEY STOLE FROM LEGALS!

Undocumented immigrants could get jobless benefits

By Jim SandersThe Sacramento Bee

By Jim Sanders Last modified: 2012-12-12T19:20:24Z Dec. 12, 2012 - 12:00 am | Page 4A

Legislation introduced Tuesday would give about 400,000 undocumented immigrants in California the same rights as citizens to unemployment benefits and various other government services.

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WHO IN THE OBAMA ADMIN IS NOT CONNECTED TO HIS CRIMINAL BANKSTER DONORS, OR A LA RAZA SUPREMACIST PARTY MEMBER? 


OBAMA HAS TWO AGENDAS. SERVICING BANKSTER DONORS, AND PUSHING OUR BORDERS OPEN FOR MORE ILLEGALS. HE KNOW WE WON’T BE PUNKED BY HIS PERFORMANCES THE SECOND TIME AROUND!

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