Political Punch
Power, pop, and probings from ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper
RECENT POSTS
- Surgeon General Nominee Was World News Tonight’s Person of the Week in 1995
- The Doctor Is (Finally) In: Obama To Nominate Regina Benjamin as Surgeon General
- President Obama Refocuses on Health Care/Stimulus
- Bob Woodruff Returns to Iraq
- President Obama Orders National Security Team to Review 2001 Afghanistan Massacre
- Will It Get Ugly? Both Sides Prepared for Start of Sotomayor Hearings Monday
- Obama in Africa
- Out of Africa
- Kenyan President should be “squirming”, says country’s political analyst
- An Emotional President Obama Tours Former Slave Port with Family
MONTHLY ARCHIVES
« Previous | Main | Next »
Frank: "We Are On Track to Lose Nearly One Million Jobs This Year"
July 16, 2008 8:00 PM
House Financial Services Committee chairman, Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., made a interesting point today during a committee hearing with Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke.
Frank said "if the numbers of unemployment in the second half are no better than those for the first half, we are on track to lose nearly 1 million jobs this year. That’s losing 1 million jobs. 1 million fewer people in the official employment roles than at the beginning of the year. It s not only a case of jobs being lost. There is also continued erosion in the real earnings per hour of working people."
Frank said that on his committee it's been debated, though now it's conceded, that "even in those periods when we were generating wealth, and this continues to be a wealthy country with a great capacity to generate wealth through our free markets -- the distribution was badly skewed. No one expects equality, equality is not a good thing, you can’t have an economy that works if everything’s equal. But too much inequality also has negative consequences."
There is, he said, "continued erosion in the real earnings per hour of working people."
Frank kept highlighting one section of this week's Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System's Monetary Policy Report to the Congress.
On page 21, the report says that "Broad measures of hourly labor compensation have not kept pace with the rapid increases in both overall consumer prices and labor productivity, despite a labor market that, until recently, had been generally tight. The employment cost index (ECI) for private industry workers, which measures both wages and the cost to employers of providing benefits, rose 3 1/4 percent in nominal terms between March 2007 and March 2008 (the latest available data), the same gain as was recorded over the preceding 12 months."
In other words, Frank said, "working American are producing more wealth for this country than they're being allowed to share, and that is then exacerbated by the fact that prices are going up." The Fed's own report, he said, shows "workers have increased their productivity in cooperation with the employers and have failed to be compensated either to keep up with the productivity or to keep up with prices."
Frank said full participation in the global economy is a positive development, "but if it continues to go forward on terms which give a disproportionate share of the benefits to a relatively small number, And the great majority are...falling behind consumer prices, despite increased productivity, then we have to stop in get our own house in order before we can go further."
"That's why they can't get a trade bill passed," Frank told me in an interview after the hearing.
He said to me that beyond economic stimulus package, banking regulations and housing and energy proposals Congress is debating these days, Congress needs to provide more for American workers in terms of national health insurance and educational opportunities, not to mention revisiting the tax code.
Another interesting moment in our interview -- for a piece that hasn't aired yet -- came when he Frank surmised why Bernanke in the hearing didn't fully explain why the Fed was only now acting to try to get the sub-prime mortgage crisis under control.
"He was being very gracious because he was not giving the answer which was: it was Alan Greenspan who didn't act," Frank said, since Bernanke only recently was appointed Fed chair. "If Greenspan had done it 10 years ago, it wouldn't have happened."
- jpt
July 16, 2008 | Permalink | Share | User Comments (12)
You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.
With Congress' approval rating at just 18%, hopefully a good number of them will be among the 1 million come November.
Posted by: HoosierSue | Jul 17, 2008 7:39:54 PM
Brooklyn Democrat, you are correct.
But to clarify the comment from p0s3r, in the late 1980s Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), had a relationsip with an individual who -- WITHOUT Rep. Frank's knowledge -- was running a prostitution service out of their Washington D. C. apartment.
Posted by: James Danley | Jul 17, 2008 9:51:10 AM
dl, you continue to spread the same inaccurate information. Here are the facts (Source: US Treasury Department):
The top 5% of the nation's wage earners in 1990 amounted to 27% of the total wage earners; and they accounted for 44% of the total federal income tax revenue.
The top 5% of the nation's wage earners in 2000 amounted to 35% of the total wage earners; and they accounted for 56% of the total federal income tax revenue.
Now then, AFTER the Bush 2001 and 2003 tax cuts: The top 5% of the nation's wage earners in 2005 amounted to 36% of the total wage earners; and they accounted for 60% of the total federal income tax revenue. So even with, as the Liberals erroneously put it, "the taxcuts for the wealthy," the tax liability percentage of the top 5% INCREASED FOUR PERCENTAGE POINTS.
Incidentally, in 2006 (the latest published information) the median household income in the United States was $48,000. That means half of all households are above and half are below that line. The half that are above that line account for 97% of all the total federal income tax revenue. So conversely, the half earning below that line account for just 3% of the total federal income tax revenue.
Posted by: James Danley | Jul 17, 2008 9:32:50 AM
westcoastmessenger
Obama does have a plan he keeps talking about...
it resolves the disparity in tax burden ration that over 3-4 decades has grown in the lower 95% of income makers...at double the rate of the wealthiest top 5%.
and that does not take into account the diparity the IRS itself says it has between their accuracy on income tax...99% reported as accurate) to business and investment taxes which although the republicans are trying to spin the other way help the wealthiest Americans most of whom can afford a personal accountant all year long...(they sais only 2 years ago with those they are about70% accurate)
so stop...
this country has been (especially since GW took office and that disparity has seen what some are saying will be reported the biggest spike in disparity we have seen yet) on a road to enhance the wealthiest wealth... and the people who pushed for all of this and focused on policies and structure to protect and enhance the wealth of those top earners...
are the same people running JOhn McCain's campaign.
Posted by: dl | Jul 17, 2008 8:32:20 AM
So tell me exactly why the congress has not shut down the Iraq money drain, reduced taxation, and restimulate the economy accordingly? Why are the green job incentives not already happening? Why aren't their mandates to shut off dependence on mideast oil? THE GOVERNMENT IS COMPLETELY STUCK ON STUPID, I don't care if you are a Democrat or a Republican!
========================================
And, If you think Obama has the answers, well you are just some kind of zombie aren't you?
========================================
Posted by: WestCoastMessenger | Jul 17, 2008 12:31:46 AM
Pity, this current round of inflation is a direct result of the high cost of energy. Businesses are passing along their added expenses to the consumers. Transporting goods costs more so the goods cost more! It's that simple.
Posted by: James Danley | Jul 16, 2008 11:39:48 PM
It's NOT energy prices... it's inflation that's killing the economy. When you compare the price of oil to the price of gold they are identical. It's the inflation coming from the federal reserve pumping more new dollars into the system that is driving the price of oil and food, and energy up. Granted the war has allowed an excuse for OPEC to cut off production in Iraq and Afghanistan to lower than pre invasion levels of crude on the market. So they get more money and the US gets another excuse to invade Iran. If this war was about oil, the price would have gone down. It was about turning OFF the flow of oil and controlling who gets to have any according to US/OPEC policy. OPEC gets the money, and the US gets to invade who they choose. With the phony "economic/national security/creating democracy" (Huh???) excuse. It's a WIN/WIN for everybody except YOU the consumer, and the persons whose lives are destroyed because they have the misfortune to live under so much oil. It's inflation and speculation coming from the financial weight of our ever expanding militaristic empire that we can no longer afford that is doing us in. Wether we can bring ourselves to admit it, or not.
Posted by: pity | Jul 16, 2008 11:01:58 PM
Maybe Barney can just hire them all at his government subsidized male-prostitute brothel.
Posted by: p0s3r | Jul 16, 2008 10:53:49 PM
In a year when the GOP was on the ropes the energy crisis comes to their rescue. All they have to do is keep calling for more drilling, while the Dems do nothing and it's deja vu all over again.
Posted by: Independent | Jul 16, 2008 10:41:32 PM
Seems our best economic years were during the Democratic Clinton Administration, so stop blaming the Democrats. The Bush people cost our economy too much for supporting an illegal and immoral war. We starting losing jobs within the first year of the republicans in the White House.
Posted by: Mary | Jul 16, 2008 10:36:24 PM
Barney Frank as usual doesn't understand or wants you to believe that the economy is being ruined by the Bush Administration. The Congress and Senate both in majority by Democrates are as responsible as anyone. High oil prices are the real blame for job losses and increased price increases in everything that lowers purchasing power. The goverment both branches want you to believe this was long time coming yet oil prices went up drastically in less than a year. In the scheme of things almost overnight. As stated by OPEC there is no shortage of oil only people driving up the price. Speculators and oil companies and OPEC are responsible. The only way to defeat these people is to reduce depenancy by investing in our railroads, public transportation and finding other sources of energy. Not by throwing blame around and sitting on our hands doing nothing.
Posted by: Frank DeWitt | Jul 16, 2008 8:43:00 PM
The skyrocketing of energy prices is what has caused the dip in our economy. And it has been the 30-year agenda of the Democrats and Liberals to drive up the price of energy in order to lower the demand of oil. They have continually blocked new exploration and drilling, building new refineries and building nuclear plants. And now the Democrats and Liberals want to blame President Bush and the Republicans for the high cost of energy!!!
As for the job loses, they are a direct result of the high energy prices. It is not a coincidence that there was a 54-month increase (a record) in jobs UNTIL the Democrats took control of Congress!
Posted by: James Danley | Jul 16, 2008 8:39:12 PM
Post a comment
