A month ago the Center for Economic and Policy Research updated that famous question Ronald Reagan asked in 1980: "Are you better off today than you were four years ago?"
They produced an informative chart that pretty much says "Nope."
The table below updates Reagan's question by comparing the state of the economy in 2000 and 2008. We use 25 indicators of economic well-being and economic performance and find that 23 of the 25 indicators are worse in 2008 than they were in 2000.
Which two? Median family income, up to $61,355 from $61,083, and productivity growth, up to 21.9% from 15.9%.
Hmm. If the benefits of that kind of productivity growth were passed along to the people being productive, you'd think that income number would be up more than a paltry $272 over the eight-year period. Who did get better off as a result, then? Why, CEOs, of course! (4-page pdf, see Table 3.41).
We need change.
Posted by Linkmeister at October 27, 2008 12:38 PM | TrackBack