Recovery?

I know we hear, from politicians of both parties, from DC and Lansing as well as more local places, that we've turned the corner, that the economy is improving.  I guess my question is this, "Why should we believe these guys now?"

Let's discount what one of my students asked of me several years ago.  "How can you tell if a politician is lying?"  I didn't know, thinking the question was serious.  "When his lips are moving," she replied.  And the more I have thought about it, the question is serious.  But let's discount that.

I have a great deal of anecdotal evidence that this so-called "recovery" is hogwash.  In the past month or so, a couple of my neighbors have lost their jobs.  Local strip malls still appear to have the same number of vacant storefronts.  In fact, what K and I thought were some pretty popular local eateries have closed their doors since the first of the year.

Anyone who does grocery shopping and pays attention knows how much prices have skyrocketed.  Ground beef, the chuck stuff, not sirloin or round, can be found on sale at $2.99 a pound--that's on sale.  Milk, a gallon, was on sale this AM at $2.89--down from the regular $3.29, at least according to the listed price label.  Bread?  We can get the store brand for $1 on sale every so often, but plan on paying about double that on a more normal basis.  When was the last time you paid $1 for a dozen eggs?  If you like honey, the way I do, kiss those 40 oz for $4.99 days away--now, if lucky, the sale price is $7.99 and the sales are far and few between.  Gasoline prices have fluctuated, down to $3.59 a gallon since the $3.99 a gallon of a couple of months ago.  Still, $3.59 is a lot higher than it was in 2010.  I bought the kids each a small cone yesterday at an ice cream stand.  I had a BOGO coupon and I still paid $3.80--for a small cone!

And now there's more than just this anecdotal evidence.  A recent report indicated that the top income earners in the US are holding their own or doing better in this "recovery."  But the upper and lower middle classes are taking a beating.  They have lost a great deal of their income, annual, and net worth.  It's not just that they are losing pay (Local teachers have taken more than $20,000 in pay cuts over the past several years!), but they are paying more for their insurance premiums, health co-pays, etc.  Personally, to keep my same coverage, in January I faced about a $24-2500 annual increase, $200 a month.  The middle classes are losing to inflation, to increased insurance costs, to taxes.

And still, last Tue Michigan voters and, it appears, voters throughout the US decided to send the same people or people just like them back to state legislatures, Washington, DC, and local offices.  What is that old line about the definition of insanity, "Doing the same thing over and over again and just hoping for a better result."

I got a kick out of a Detroit "community organizer" this week insisting that the Detroit water crisis won't be solved until "water is more affordable."  It's too expensive, he ranted and raved.  Well, yeah, water probably does cost a lot more than it could or should.  I wonder if so many people, half or more in Detroit alone, not paying their bills drives up the cost for others.  Let's see, using our trusty calculator, if we divide a big number (the cost of water) by another number (the number of people who actually pay their bills) we get a quotient, an answer.  Try dividing that same big number by another number, a bigger one (the number of people who should be paying their bills) and what happens to the quotient, answer?  Heh Heh Heh.  Community organizer, yeah......

As disheartened as I've been this week, I returned as I always do to reading.  I will read another book about Abraham Lincoln or some other American hero.  This week I opened yet another biog of George Washington.  I continue to be moved by the same stories, ones with which I am usually quite familiar.  This one concerned Washington's actions at the Newburgh Mutiny Conspiracy, when some officers were bent on marching on the new US government in 1783 because they hadn't been paid.  Washington's initial speech didn't move them much, so he asked the potential mutineers if he could read them a letter.  He opened the missive and began to read, stumbling at the beginning.  The officers were startled to see The General pull out a pair of glasses so he could read the words.  Nobody had seen Washington wear glasses in public before!  As he put them on, he asked his audience for forbearance, saying, "Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray, but almost blind in the service of my country."  Eyes watered and tears flowed from these war-hardened officers.  And the potential mutiny was quashed then and there.  And, of course, other aspects of Washington's life are very inspiring--his character, that is honesty and integrity, was second to none.  Like Lincoln, Washington wasn't perfect, but that is what makes him so inspirational.