(quoting an article)
> We all know the catechism. America is cradled within the longest
> uninterrupted - uninterruptible! - economic boom in history. Stock prices
> mint fortunes at the speed of a mouse click. Billionaires live next door.
> Yak herders carry Palm Pilots. And so on, et cetera, ad nauseam.
>
> Just how far, I wonder, can our pundits drift from an accurate picture of
> reality without melting from shame? It's not that growth in the aggregate
> economy is not real, not startling. But as social analysis, to say only that
> is to build a stool missing two legs. Pay attention long enough to
> mainstream media and you can catch an occasional glimpse of the stool's
> first absent strut: the exponentially growing levels of economic inequality
> since the early '70s.
I'm working in a company which was just spun off from Ford. We were part of Ford; now we're an independent supplier. 90% dependent on Ford, with management appointed by Ford, etc. Fear, uncertainty and doubt abound. People are leaving like crazy.
A friend of mine works for Parke-Davis. Or did; they were bought by Pfizer, for their drug Lipitor. The rest of the company is being treated as an unwanted burden by Pfizer. Fear, uncertainty and doubt abound. People are leaving like crazy.
I was at a statistical meeting, and many pharmaceutical companies were interviewing. They almost all mentioned that they were in the process of one merger, after completing another in the last year or so. My guess is: Fear, uncertainty and doubt abound. People are leaving like crazy.
Many of the people I know are not in a great economic situation. The low-unemployment economy is not a luxury; it's a necessity, because people are being forced out/driven out like mad.
Once you see that, the question of who low unemployment can coexist with low inflation is solved (IMHO). The reason simply is that 4% unemployment is much more like 10% unemployment, for most people in the US.
Barry