The Era of Lost Dreams
by digby
Via @WalterShapiro, I got pointed to this post by demographer Cheryl Russell, who lays out why all this talk of Morning in America is tripe. This recession is devastating to average Americans and its effects will felt for a long time to come.
More than 1 million homes were foreclosed in 2010, a record. (RealtyTrac.com)
4.5 million Americans have been unemployed for a year or longer, a record. (Bureau of Labor Statistics) Never before have so many American workers been unemployed for so long.
Median household net worth fell 30 percent between 2007 and 2009. (Federal Reserve Board)
Her thesis is that this is all a consequence of the quantum leap that the internet brought upon us, and I’ll have to think more about that. But the point that this has been, and continues to be, a devastating economic era for large number of people, the effects of which in lost time, potential and possibilities will never be reversed for many. People will be digging out of this hole for a very long time and their futures have been altered irrevocably. The ignorance of that wrenching loss of dreams and prospects is one of the great failures of our leadership.
Update: Here’s an interesting statistic for you from this same blog:
Expected years of life, at birth: 77.7
Expected years of healthy life, at birth: 66.7
That’s lucky for me. It’s exactly when I’m allowed to start collecting social security. Too bad for those who are going to be forced to keep working when they’re sick — or starving until they can collect. Of course that won’t be the case for the pampered privileged class that thinks it’s just dandy to raise the retirement age. They’ll be just fine.
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