David F. Ruccio — I ran out of words to describe how bad the recovery numbers are

Workers’ wages have been stagnant for the past decade across the 36 countries that make up the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. But the problem has been particularly acute in the United States, where the “low-income rate” is high (only surpassed by two countries, Greece and Spain) and “income inequality” even worse (following only Israel).

The causes are clear: workers suffer when many of the new jobs they’re forced to have the freedom to take are on the low end of the wage scale, unemployed and at-risk workers are getting very little support from the government, and employed workers are impeded by a weak collective-bargaining system.

That’s exactly what we’ve seen in the United State ever since the crisis broke out—which has continued during the entire recovery.…

"It's the distribution, stupid."

Occasional Links & Commentary
I ran out of words to describe how bad the recovery numbers are
David F. Ruccio | Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame

David F. Ruccio — Inequality and immiseration

"Immiseration" has a nice quality to it and is less emotionally loaded than "exploitation," which is now associated with "Marxism" in the pejorative sense in capitalist countries like the US.

It’s clear that, for decades now, American workers have been falling further and further behind. And there’s simply no justification for this sorry state of affairs—nothing that can rationalize or excuse the growing gap between the majority of people who work for a living and the tiny group at the top.

But that doesn’t stop mainstream economists from trying...

Are mainstream economists capitalist shills or are they just clueless about reality? Or maybe both.

American workers are getting relatively less of what they produce, which means more is available to distribute to those at the top of the distribution of income.

That’s what mainstream economists can’t or won’t understand: that workers may be worse off even as their wages and incomes rise. That problem flies in the face of every attempt to celebrate the existing order by claiming “just deserts.”

There’s nothing just about the relative immiseration and growing inequality faced by American workers. And nothing that can’t be changed by imagining and creating a radically different set of economic institutions.

Economists operate in terms of the institutional status quo and those stepping out of line are marginalized a "heterodox," or "Marxist." The economics department at Notre Dame, where David Ruccio taught for many years, was recently reorganized to diminish if not entirely excluded heterodox teaching. This is also an institutional problem and it is closely connected with the larger institutional issues in which contemporary capitalism is embedded and imposed on workers (labor) and the environment (land).

The economics profession needs to be address these issues to remain credible.

 

Occasional Links & Commentary
Inequality and immiseration
David F. Ruccio | Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame

Sandwichman — Dean Baker is Clueless On Productivity Growth

There are two HUGE problem with Dean's story. First, aggregate productivity growth is a "statistical flimflam," according to Harry Magdoff, who pioneered productivity measurement in the 1930s....

Fred Block and Gene Burns took up the critique of productivity statistics six years later in "Productivity as a Social Problem: The Uses and Misuses of Social Indicators." Their analysis specifically addressed the second problem with Dean's story, his contention that productivity growth is totally benign...

Leaving aside the benefits and risks of technological advances themselves, Block and Burns chronicled how the concept of productivity growth -- and its faux measurement -- has been used as a political weapon against workers, unions and collective bargaining....

In short, flimflam productivity measures were used by the enemies of workers to justify enacting a set of policies that ensured that workers wouldn't share in the gains of technological advance.

Econopseak
Dean Baker is Clueless On Productivity Growth
Sandwichman

David Wicker — Nearly Half of Job Switchers Earn Less in Their New Roles

When workers move from one job to another, economists generally assume it was an optimal choice. However, nearly half of all workers switching employers directly from one job to another experience earnings losses. It would seem that a vast number of workers are making choices that are difficult to justify, at least from an earnings perspective.

FRBSL — On the Economy
Nearly Half of Job Switchers Earn Less in Their New Roles

David Wiczer, Economist

Mike Whitney — 40 Years of Economic Policy in One Chart

Counterpunch
40 Years of Economic Policy in One Chart
Mike Whitney