> Business cycles are a thing of the past, eh?
Don't twist my words: I said that boom-bust (marked by extremes) have been tamed, not eliminated. Low (but positive) growth, low (but positive) interest rates, low (but positive) unemployment; these are all the product of agressive Fed policy.
> As far as stock options go, these are mostly concentrated in the
> hands of high-flying professionals, managerial elites and rentiers,
> not line workers.
This is changing rapidly as other industries see that there is free money in using employee stock options as part of a compensation package. I expect this trend to continue in the US.
> Only 40% of American workers even have the pension funds
> currently falling over themselves to invest in the Nifty Fifty.
The number of workers who have access to a retirement benefit plan (more than 'pensions') is closer to 65-70%.
>> Is it just because we're not building factories?
>
> Corporations are building them in *other countries*, like
> Thailand and Mexico, is all.
Do we really need more factories in the US?
But you forgot to answer my question: is it only because you don't see the investment in things like communication infrastructure that you think we're not making investments?
/jordan