Bernie & Hypocrisy

[gipper]

Bernie wrote this in the left wing rag NY Times yesterday...


Democrats need to wake up...
Incredibly, the wealthiest 62 people on this planet own as much wealth as the bottom half of the world’s population — around 3.6 billion people. The top 1 percent now owns more wealth than the whole of the bottom 99 percent. The very, very rich enjoy unimaginable luxury while billions of people endure abject poverty, unemployment, and inadequate health care, education, housing and drinking water.

Could this rejection of the current form of the global economy happen in the United States? You bet it could.
During my campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, I’ve visited 46 states. What I saw and heard on too many occasions were painful realities that the political and media establishment fail even to recognize.

In the last 15 years, nearly 60,000 factories in this country have closed, and more than 4.8 million well paid manufacturing jobs have disappeared. Much of this is related to disastrous trade agreements that encourage corporations to move to low wage countries.

Despite major increases in productivity, the median male worker in America today is making $726 dollars less than he did in 1973, while the median female worker is making $1,154 less than she did in 2007, after adjusting for inflation.

We need to fundamentally reject our “free trade” policies and move to fair trade. Americans should not have to compete against workers in low-wage counties who earn pennies an hour. We must defeat the Trans-Pacific Partnership. We must help poor countries develop sustainable economic models.

Meanwhile, in our country the top one tenth of 1 percent now owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. Fiftyeight percent of all new income is going to the top 1 percent. Wall Street and billionaires, through their “super PACs,” are able to buy elections.

Let’s be clear. The global economy is not working for the majority of people in our country and the world. This is an economic model developed by the economic elite to benefit the economic elite. We need real change.



Yet, Bernie and the D party are about to nominate a candidate that epitomizes everything they claim to disdain. Is this not hypocrisy?

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/o...e-sanders-democrats-need-to-wake-up.html?_r=0

 

[Fenton Lum]

Yes, absolutely it is. Some of us were hoping the republican party would come up with a suitable option to Hilary. We were failed by that party as well.

 

[gipper]

Yes, absolutely it is. Some of us were hoping the republican party would come up with a suitable option to Hilary. We were failed by that party as well.

Agreed.

The ironic thing is Trump talks much like Bernie, when it comes to trade, jobs, and the nation's economy.

 

[Fenton Lum]

Yes, absolutely it is. Some of us were hoping the republican party would come up with a suitable option to Hilary. We were failed by that party as well.

Agreed.

The ironic thing is Trump talks much like Bernie, when it comes to trade, jobs, and the nation's economy.

Nah, not so much.

 

[gipper]

Yes, absolutely it is. Some of us were hoping the republican party would come up with a suitable option to Hilary. We were failed by that party as well.

Agreed.

The ironic thing is Trump talks much like Bernie, when it comes to trade, jobs, and the nation's economy.

Nah, not so much.

Yes he does. They are very similar on these issues, but partisan Ds can't see it.

 

[320 Years of History]

Bernie wrote this in the left wing rag NY Times yesterday...


Democrats need to wake up...
Incredibly, the wealthiest 62 people on this planet own as much wealth as the bottom half of the world’s population — around 3.6 billion people. The top 1 percent now owns more wealth than the whole of the bottom 99 percent. The very, very rich enjoy unimaginable luxury while billions of people endure abject poverty, unemployment, and inadequate health care, education, housing and drinking water.

Could this rejection of the current form of the global economy happen in the United States? You bet it could.
During my campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, I’ve visited 46 states. What I saw and heard on too many occasions were painful realities that the political and media establishment fail even to recognize.

In the last 15 years, nearly 60,000 factories in this country have closed, and more than 4.8 million well paid manufacturing jobs have disappeared. Much of this is related to disastrous trade agreements that encourage corporations to move to low wage countries.

Despite major increases in productivity, the median male worker in America today is making $726 dollars less than he did in 1973, while the median female worker is making $1,154 less than she did in 2007, after adjusting for inflation.

We need to fundamentally reject our “free trade” policies and move to fair trade. Americans should not have to compete against workers in low-wage counties who earn pennies an hour. We must defeat the Trans-Pacific Partnership. We must help poor countries develop sustainable economic models.

Meanwhile, in our country the top one tenth of 1 percent now owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. Fiftyeight percent of all new income is going to the top 1 percent. Wall Street and billionaires, through their “super PACs,” are able to buy elections.

Let’s be clear. The global economy is not working for the majority of people in our country and the world. This is an economic model developed by the economic elite to benefit the economic elite. We need real change.



Yet, Bernie and the D party are about to nominate a candidate that epitomizes everything they claim to disdain. Is this not hypocrisy?

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/o...e-sanders-democrats-need-to-wake-up.html?_r=0

Hmmm....The report from which Sen. Sanders' claim derived is this one: 62 people own same as half world – Oxfam | Press releases | Oxfam GB . It was supplemented with the graphic below.

Maybe I'm missing something, but what that picture says to me is that the wealthy are not getting wealthier. Put another way, the graphic shows that the number of super rich folks is decreasing and is projected to continue doing so.

Looking at Mr. Sanders' specific remarks:

What I saw and heard on too many occasions were painful realities that the political and media establishment fail even to recognize.

Might that be due to his reticence to talk to or seek people who appear to be thriving? If one goes looking for misery, assuming one is reasonably intelligent, and I think Mr. Sanders is, what the heck does one think one is going to find, joy?

In the last 15 years, nearly 60,000 factories in this country have closed, and more than 4.8 million well paid manufacturing jobs have disappeared. Much of this is related to disastrous trade agreements that encourage corporations to move to low wage countries.

Red:
Yes, that's so. It's also the case that record numbers of manufacturing has returned to the U.S., yet what to do we keep hearing from the likes of Mr. Sanders and Donald Trump? That bringing back manufacturing jobs will be the solution. Well, why are so many folks complaining? Why is nobody saying, the jobs are coming back and we are thrilled? Because the manufacturers are returning, but the jobs that left are not.

Those jobs aren't going to return even if/when the factories that left were to return, and there's a reason for it: technology and those former factory workers' lack of skills that are now needed by the manufacturers.

• The American manufacturing resurgence hasn’t helped many of the country’s blue-collar workers who were let go in the past two decades, including many who were pink-slipped during the last recession, in part because the modern factory environment is driven by high-tech equipment, robotics, flexible scheduling, and lean techniques. These factories depend on workers who are adept at programming and overseeing high-tech equipment; able to handle multiple jobs throughout the factory as product demand shifts, rather than a single station on an assembly line; and proficient enough with manufacturing concepts that they can recommend plant improvements, large and small, on their own.
  
  Source: Why Donald Trump Is Wrong About Manufacturing Jobs and China - The New Yorker
  
  
• While employment in the sector may grow somewhat, the nation won't regain its status as a manufacturing center, said David Autor, an MIT economics professor who co-authored the study with Hanson. Many of the jobs lost were in factories that made toys, clothing, furniture and other labor-intensive industries, which were relatively low-skilled. The manufacturing jobs that return will involve more technology and require more education and training, he said. "More stuff will be made here, but it won't be by the same laid-off workers from textile and leather plants," Autor said.
  
  Source: Why it would be tough for Trump to bring jobs back from China

So, yes, it's nice to repeatedly talk about returning manufacturing to the U.S. It's great for the company owners and the nation's GDP that the return of the factories will help move the U.S. closer to being a net exporter rather than importer. Will those shifts put those unskilled workers back to work in "good jobs?" No.


Blue:
It's true that free trade makes it easier for producers to produce wherever they find it most cost effective to do so. Yes, that does make jobs move from one location to another. That is a bad thing for the folks who are unwilling to go where their job went. There is an upside, however. Prices are lowered.

The obvious question to ask is whether the benefit of lower prices is enough, for the majority of the population, to offset the lost wages. Time and time again, it's been shown that the gains from lower prices more than offset the losses. "Americans benefit from cheaper goods made overseas. This is particularly true for poor and middle class Americans, who spend much more of their earnings on imported products," says Robert Lawrence, a professor of international trade and investment at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. "Items manufactured in the United States will likely cost more. You'll see a huge increase in the cost of living for Americans," he said.

I've at length shared multiple sources and commentary on the matter of free trade. Quite simply, overwhelmingly economists disagree with and have proven Trump and Mr. Sanders wrong about the net impact of free trade.

We need to fundamentally reject our “free trade” policies and move to fair trade.

No, we need to increase the skill levels and skill sets of our people so they become eligible to be hired to do the jobs that businesses need done. The U.S. has more unfilled jobs than there are people who lost their jobs due to manufacturers having moved their production offshore. There is plenty of work, plenty of jobs, for people who qualify for them.

• U.S. job openings hit 15-year high

Readers here may want to complain about what qualifications employers demand. That's all well and good, but what people seeking the job need to do is not bitch about it and instead contact the employer and present a coherent case that they can do the job even if they don't have all the stated qualifications on a job notice.

For example, in my firm, for client-facing positions, we don't generally seek freshly minted undergraduate applicants who have less than a 3.7 GPA, but we have hired folks who have 3.2 GPAs and who present well in an interview, and generally speaking, they've proven to be good employees who consistently meet or exceed expectations. That's not to say we intend to alter our baseline GPA threshold, only that we realize it's a guideline not a "written in stone" rule. All employers have similarly flexible hiring guidelines.

 

[Pocahontas]

When you see simple answers to complex issues assume you are being manipulated by political wordsmithing tools. In other words, like Brexit, Trump and Bernie can come up with the magic bad guy but rarely have answers and they don't need answers if it is said often enough. Factually, it is about none of the above but it is about managing fair trade via trade agreements to be competitive. It is about taxing the top as the concept that money that becomes tax free annually is then put back into a company is a nonsense concept. It is about making it harder for American companies to leave than to stay in America.

Every single thing that bonds those around simple ideas are based on not understanding how constricting in the global times we find ourselves in only makes us smaller. We can drive banks, financial institutions, and business from us but there are better mousetraps. Look for real answers and avoid the villain-bait as we are at a crossroad and if we turn ourselves into a dysfunctional island because we don't understand economic realities than we simply have to dig ourselves out of a worse mess, longer. Shrinking our environment when the global environment is expanding is economic suicide. We are going to have to compete or give up. There was a time when we knew that and were actually inspired by it.

 

[Fenton Lum]

Yes, absolutely it is. Some of us were hoping the republican party would come up with a suitable option to Hilary. We were failed by that party as well.

Agreed.

The ironic thing is Trump talks much like Bernie, when it comes to trade, jobs, and the nation's economy.

Nah, not so much.

Yes he does. They are very similar on these issues, but partisan Ds can't see it.

Nope, don't buy it. Trump and Sanders are not advocating the same path.

 

[gipper]

Yes, absolutely it is. Some of us were hoping the republican party would come up with a suitable option to Hilary. We were failed by that party as well.

Agreed.

The ironic thing is Trump talks much like Bernie, when it comes to trade, jobs, and the nation's economy.

Nah, not so much.

Yes he does. They are very similar on these issues, but partisan Ds can't see it.

Nope, don't buy it. Trump and Sanders are not advocating the same path.

I am not claiming they have.

My point is both men have been outspoken about the harm committed by free trade, trade agreements like TPP, destruction of manufacturing jobs, the corny capitalism that enriches Wall Street, etc. They have different solutions, but they have both given voice to these issues.