AliEnvy
Refugee
My only critique has been not to have blind confidence in any single metric without analysis.
AliEnvy said:
1. Life expectancy at birth
2. Adult literacy rate
3. Combined primary, secondary, and tertiary education gross enrolment rate.
4. Per capita GDP
Hundreds? Makes it easier to understand why the math rank is so low.
nbcrusader said:OK. But what metric constitutes "proper analysis"?
AliEnvy said:STING, every public policy made in some way affects one or more of those four areas either directly or indirectly.
You want to justify your HDI rank as OK...whatevah, you're certainly not alone. Again, we don't agree and I'm going to leave it at that.
yolland said:
Actually, these are the greatest disparities the US has seen since the 1920s, period.
AliEnvy said:
You're not being clear or maybe it's just late. Proper analysis is, in part, comparing relevant information and metrics.
This was uncalled for.Irvine511 said:but this is idiotic, and proves my point.
yolland said:
This was uncalled for.
I will reiterate for the sake of it that Iraq discussions don't belong in this thread; however, when the topic is economic data, economic statistics are a relevant contribution. As are constructive critiques of why said statistics may be inadequate to tell the whole story.
yolland said:I think we can all agree that a low unemployment rate is better than a high one. However, recent decreases in US unemployment have not made me more optimistic for the longterm economic future of the average American--particularly the average working-class and lower-middle-class American. And I'd feel that way largely, though not totally, regardless of which party was in power. Here are a few reasons why:
----- According to the UN's 2005 Development Programme Report, the US ranks 73rd out of 123 countries on income equality (data not available for all 177 members). Among the 40 other "high HDI" countries counted, only 7--Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Mexico, Panama, Singapore and Uruguay--had worse income disparities than the US.
Our inequality is significantly worse now than it was 25 years ago, too. According to Census Bureau data, in 1980 the lowest fifth of wage-earners accounted for 4.2% of total household income; by 2002, only 3.5%. Conversely, the highest fifth accounted for 43.7% of total household income in 1980, but 49.7% in 2002. The disparity is even more pronounced if you look at the wealthiest 5% (20% of total household income), who made 11 times the wages of the lowest fifth in 1980, but 19 times their wages in 2000.
Or, to look at it in terms of inflation-adjusted income change: from the late 1970s to the late 1990s, the income of the poorest fifth declined 6%; the middle fifth's income grew 5%; the top fifth's income grew 33%; and the income of the wealthiest 5% grew 55%.
Actually, these are the greatest disparities the US has seen since the 1920s, period.
----- According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the US ranks near the bottom of the developed world for annual percentage of people moving out of poverty (in other words, upward mobility). Some examples from their 2001 Employment Outlook data:
Denmark 60.4%
UK 58.8%
Netherlands 55.7%
Ireland 54.6%
Spain 49.6%
Belgium 48.2%
France 46.9%
Germany 41.1%
Italy 40.6%
Canada 36.4%
Portugal 37.0%
United States 29.5%
That is less than half our mobility rate in the 1960s.
----- Average real weekly earnings, as measured by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (nominal wage divided by Consumer Price Index), have been declining steadily since the 1970s. They grew by about 2.5% in the '50s; about 1% in the '60s; declined about 1% in both the '70s and '80s; briefly increased about .5% in the '90s; then fell 1% from 2000 to 2005. (They haven't increased thus far in 2006, despite the drop in unemployment.) This decline has been especially severe for less educated workers: a man without a high school diploma earns a third less today than he would have in 1973, for example.
Meanwhile the US poverty rate as of 2004 was 12.7%, an increase of 1.4% from 2000. While this is slightly lower than the peaks of the early '80s and '90s, it is still far too high.
----- The real value of the minimum wage has been declining steadily, too; 1969's minimum wage of $1.30, for example, was equivalent to $9 in 2005 terms. The current federal minimum wage of $5.15 works out to $10,407 a year, just $837 above the poverty line for a single person (they add $3260 for each additional household member). I don't know how anyone is supposed to build a savings account on that kind of money.
----- I'm not sure where STING2 got the $49,000 figure, but according to Census Bureau data for 2004--the last year for which such figures are available--median household income was $44,389 (which would be $38,000-something after taxes). This figure is, however, likely to decrease in real terms if recent trends towards disproportional growth at the lower-paying end of the services sector continue. For example, the (averaged) average income for workers in retail, education, food service, accomodation, and entertainment is only $29,203. An increase in low-paying service sector jobs cannot compensate for the loss of manufacturing sector jobs, which once provided good wages for so many blue-collar workers, over the last quarter century.
----- While I agree with nb that a culture of spending rather than saving is a problem, it is easy to go overboard in estimating the influence of this factor. As bonoman mentioned, comparisons to how many households owned cell phones, PCs, game systems, and portable electronics 30 years ago is not very meaningful, since most of these items were not widely available at the time. Furthermore, their costs have plunged as the cost of manufacturing them (abroad) has declined. In the 1950s, for example, a microwave cost more than 2 years' worth of low-income rent. Now they cost well under one month's low-income rent.
----- Finally, the relatively weak social safety nets present in the US compared to other developed countries need to be taken into account when considering the relationship between income and standard of living. E.g, the 16% of Americans who have no health insurance (per Census data). Or the 82% of lowest-fifth-(by-income) workers who have no pension coverage.
Given these and other factors, I don't personally find the recent decrease in unemployment--or for that matter, the tripling of US GDP since 1960--all that comforting.