Arm yourself with the facts. Go viral with these charts.
Corporate cash-on-hand has risen to its highest increased levels since 1952, from 2007-Present at the same time long-term unemployment has done the same and the CURVE IS ALMOST IDENTICAL.
Is this contributing to long-term unemployment? Krugman thinks so.* The charts seem to indicate it does:
http://online.wsj.com/...
The truth about the US Deficit below:
The true cause of our deficits is reported by The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Facts, not opinions. Go viral with the facts. Charts teach.
The events and policies that have pushed deficits to these high levels in the near term, however, were largely outside the new Administration’s control. If not for the tax cuts enacted during the presidency of George W. Bush that Congress did not pay for, the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that were initiated during that period, and the effects of the worst economic slump since the Great Depression (including the cost of steps necessary to combat it), we would not be facing these huge deficits in the near term.
While President Obama inherited a dismal fiscal legacy, that does not diminish his responsibility to propose policies to address our fiscal imbalance and put the weight of his office behind them. Although policymakers should not tighten fiscal policy in the near term while the economy remains fragile, they and the nation at large must come to grips with the nation’s long-term deficit problem. But we should not mistake the causes of our predicament.
http://www.cbpp.org/...
Why not pound this fact home over and over and over again.
The very people that are calling the unemployed "funemployed" are enjoying the very same tax cuts that sunk us into deficit spending and who beat the war drums that also played/play a major role in creating/increasing our deficits.
The Bush tax cuts and war spending caused the deficit and corporate cash-on-hand prolongs long-term unemployment.
More charts:
http://www.cbpp.org/...
Executive Summary
The Bush Administration has stood in favor of tax cuts through thick and thin. In the midst of a booming economy and large projected budget surpluses, President Bush’s top economic policy initiative — both as a candidate in 2000 and upon taking office — was to cut taxes. When the economy slowed, the Bush Administration’s response also was dominated by tax cuts. Now, in the face of yawning deficits and its own pledge to reduce them, the Administration has again put forward large, permanent tax cuts as part of its most recent budget.
http://www.cbpp.org/...
Emphasis, mine.
And that Trickle Down Theory, Bogus! During the Bush administration, the country had the weakest economic expansion since WWII
For six of the seven indicators, the average annual growth rate between 2001 and 2007 was below the average growth rate for the comparable periods of other post-World War II economic expansions.
Notably, this expansion was among the weakest since World War II with respect to both overall economic growth and growth in fixed non-residential investment. These two indicators should have captured any positive “growth effects” of the tax cuts.
The labor market also was weaker during the 2001-2007 expansion. Both employment growth and wage and salary growth were weaker during this expansion as a whole than in any prior expansion since the end of World War II.
The 2001-2007 expansion outperformed the average post-World War II expansion in only one area: corporate profits, which grew much more rapidly than average.
http://www.cbpp.org/...
We can see from the charts and reporting by The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities how we got into this deficit mess.
And we can see by the first two charts why long-term unemployment will be with us for a long time unless something is done to inspire corporations to use some of their record cash-on-hand to hire the long-term unemployed they laid off in droves beginning in the late nineties.
These corporations are using their record cash-on-hand to pay shareholders larger dividends. For empirical evidence of this you can read this diary:
http://www.dailykos.com/...
And this article:
U.S. Firms Build Up Record Cash Piles
http://online.wsj.com/...
This chart demonstrates that tax cuts increase deficits. This is an important chart:
IMO, this chart demonstrates that tax cuts increase the deficit because we know who implemented the tax cuts: Reagan and Bush II
http://zfacts.com/...
*The charts above explain what Paul Krugman alludes to when he says:
In the face of this grim picture, you might have expected policy makers to realize that they haven’t yet done enough to promote recovery. But no: over the last few months there has been a stunning resurgence of hard-money and balanced-budget orthodoxy.....
So I don’t think this is really about Greece, or indeed about any realistic appreciation of the tradeoffs between deficits and jobs. It is, instead, the victory of an orthodoxy that has little to do with rational analysis, whose main tenet is that imposing suffering on other people is how you show leadership in tough times.
And who will pay the price for this triumph of orthodoxy? The answer is, tens of millions of unemployed workers, many of whom will go jobless for years, and some of whom will never work again.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Print out this diary, and show up at the Deficit Hawk Town Hall rallies being sponsored by Peter G. Peterson (who hopes to dismantle Social Security and all other social safety nets).
You can read about Peterson's sponsored Town Hall Meetings here:
http://www.dailykos.com/...
But please be aware, there is a huge effort to dismantle our social safety nets and those of the other developed countries as well.
FIGHT BACK WITH THE FACTS - CHARTS TEACH
The press for a debt-reduction commission, promoted by scare-mongers such as the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, is really an attack on social insurance masquerading as principled concern for the public fisc. It wasn't entitlements that caused the crash--it was financial high rollers who pushed for deregulation and then exploited it, such as Peterson and his friends.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
At the center of Mr. Peterson’s plan lies “I.O.U.S.A.,” which will be screened for the news media in Washington on Monday and opens in 400 theaters next month. Directed by Patrick Creadon, who shot “Wordplay,” about crossword-puzzle enthusiasts, “I.O.U.S.A.” hopes to give as much cachet to long-term fiscal policy as “An Inconvenient Truth” gave to environmentalism.
Mr. Peterson’s foundation is planning an active Internet strategy, tapping bloggers and social networks to reach young voters, who typically pay little heed to far-off fiscal obligations. In early 2009, as the new president takes office, the foundation will try to draw attention with programming on public television, and possibly television advertisements and infomercials.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
And where did Mr. Peterson get so much money?
Well, he is a founder of Blackstone, which then launched Blackrock, for one
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
And has very close ties to the Fed and Treasury:
Tim Geithner has given BlackRock three no-bid contracts to manage the Fed’s portfolio of troubled securities, according to a NY Times piece yesterday (April 27). BlackRock has close connections to Blackstone (where it was once the asset management division) and to the NY Fed.
This is a good read, if you want to know the powers we have to push back against:
http://www.economicpopulist.org/...
And just how incestuous is the role of rich, powerful, and well-connected Peter G. Peterson and his ilk:
Report: BP Hires Blackstone Group, Goldman Sachs To Defend Itself Against Takeover Attempts
http://www.businessinsider.com/...
It's just mind boggling. I could go on and on about the inter-connectedness of Peter G Peterson; however, we just need to stay focused on who and why we need to push back with the FACTS, not opinions.
Corporations fire us, make record profits, and then fund the dismantling of social safety nets to reduce the very same deficit their policies created and from which they are now profiting.
FIGHT BACK, CARRY THESE CHARTS WITH YOU TO THEIR TOWN HALL MEETINGS, GO VIRAL WITH EMAILS, GET THE FACTS OUT THERE.
And this is where our tax dollars go. It's not entitlements causing the deficits:
http://www.warresisters.org/...
11% General Government. How much smaller can government get?