On September 6, 2013, Jerome R. Corsi writes on WND.com:
Just after Labor Day, the Bureau of Labor statistics reported more than 90 million Americans age 16 and older were not in the labor force in August, the highest level recorded since the Department of Labor began collecting the data during the Truman administration three years after the end of World War II.
On Friday, the BLS reported that the 90,473,000 Americans not currently in the labor force marked the first time the figure exceeded the 90 million threshold.
In January 2009, when President Obama first took office, there were 80.5 million Americans 16 years and older not in the labor force, meaning the number of Americans not in the labor force has increased 10 million during his presidency.
For men, the BLS reported the labor force participation rate, the percentage of the population working or considered looking for work, was 63.2 percent in August, basically unchanged from 63.5 percent in July. It’s also a record low.
The BLS also reported the unemployment rate dropped 0.1 percent to 7.3 percent in August, but the figure was almost completely driven by negative factors.
The total number of people employed fell by 115,000 in August, but the unemployment rate dropped because the overall labor force dropped by a larger 312,000, a phenomenon the Wall Street Journal interpreted as a possible sign of discouraged long-term jobless workers dropping out of the labor force altogether.
Alternative calculations place “true unemployment statistics” at 23.3 percent for August, with nearly 1 of every 4 workers out of work, not the politically adjusted figure of 7.3 percent the BLS reported.
This would not be a problem if those 90 million Americans OWNED viable, diversified stock portfolios of major American companies who payed out to their stock holders their full earnings profits. But that is not the reality. The vast 99 percent of Americans are job serfs or welfare serfs, with constantly declining prospects for income earnings tied to a job due to tectonic shifts in the technologies of production, which are destroying jobs and devaluing the worth of labor. The jobs just are not there which will provide a level of income to support survival, or general affluence.
There is no solace in the statistics. Researchers at the American Enterprise Institute and the Center for Economic and Policy Research shows that a worker between the ages of 50 and 61 unemployed for over a year has only a 9 percent chance of finding a job in the next three months and only a 6 percent chance if he or she is 62 years or older. According to the Economic Policy Institute, there are approximately 3.3 unemployed workers for every job seeker.
Because for the vast majority of Americans a JOB is their ONLY source of income, millions of families are one layoff or family emergency away from going into bankruptcy, and then what? Start over with nothing and extremely poor JOB prospects.
Unfortunately, our political leaders, academia, and the national media offer up ONLY the same old conventional won’t-work suggestions for the government to take the lead and arrange the marriage of private and public capital to regenerate real growth without the realization and requirement that the ownership of FUTURE productive capital wealth must be broad. No longer will we achieve growth the old-fashioned way, by investing in projects that enrich our productive capacity in the name of JOB CREATION, which is expected to have a multiplier effect, when in actual reality such investment continues to further CONCENTRATE OWNERSHIP of America’s future wealth-creating, income-generating productive capital assets among a tiny ownership class.
Of course, all this would be moot if 1) all people were capital owners and the price of labor could rise or sink to its “real” level, 2) all financing for new, non-speculative capital investment came out of future savings instead of past savings, and 3) government was prohibited from creating money (“emitting bills of credit”), living within its tax revenues, and borrowing out of existing savings to cover temporary shortfalls or meet emergencies.
That’s what “Capital Homesteading” would do.
Capital Homesteading is the ONLY viable solution to the economic decline of America. Its implementation requires that our leaders, academia and the national media recognize that all individuals to be adequately productive cannot do so when a tiny minority (capital owners) produce (via the productive assets they own) a major share and the vast majority (labor workers), a minor share of total output of the economy’s products and services. The system must be reformed to create a world in which the most productive factor of the FUTURE — physical capital — now owned by a handful of people — is owned by a majority — and ultimately 100 percent — of the consumers, while respecting all the constitutional and private property rights of present capital owners.
A balanced Just Third Way approach to building a FUTURE economy that supports general affluence for EVERY American is presently not in the national discussion. It appears that the President of the United States, the elected Congressional representatives and Senators, academia, and the media are oblivious to this principled solution that has the ingredients to power economic growth at double-digit GDP rates.
This goal requires investment in FUTURE wealth-creating, income-generating productive capital assets while simultaneously broadening private, individual ownership of the resulting expansion of existing large corporations and future corporations. Not only is employee ownership the norm to be sought wherever there are workers but beyond employee ownership the norm should be to create an OWNERSHIP CULTURE whereby EVERY American can benefit financially by owning a diversified SUPER IRA-TYPE Capital Homestead Account (CHA) portfolio of income-producing, full-voting, full-dividend payout securities in America’s expanding corporations and those newly created to produce the future products and services needed and wanted by society.
Those who read this and are in a position of influence should reach out to President Obama and the leadership of his Organizing for Action as well as to other political leaders, and call for them to convene a national discussion using the national media and social media, and our educational institutions, to open up a discussion on EVERY CITIZEN AN OWNER opportunity. We need fresh and inspired leaders who can educate on this issue at this time because academia, the media, and our so-called leaders are not addressing how people make money and the significance of OWNING wealth-creating, income-generating productive capital assets. We need to get people to understand that as with today, in the FUTURE we will continue to experience tectonic shifts in the technologies of production, which will destroy jobs and devalue the worth of labor. This is a crucial understanding because at present for the 99 percent of the nation a JOB is the ONLY source of income to support themselves and their families. We need political leaders who will commit to a government policy focus on OWNERSHIP CREATION, by which jobs will result and naturally follow as the economy revs up to double-digit GDP growth and fully applies technological innovation and invention to shift from unnecessary labor toil to human-intelligent machines, super-automation, robotics, and digital computerized operations.
Essentially, the pressing need is for everyone in a position of influence to encourage President Obama to raise the consciousness of the America people by making his NUMBER ONE focus the introduction of a National Right To Capital Ownership Bill that restores the American dream of responsible property ownership as a primary source of personal wealth.
This is the solution to America’s economic decline in wealth and income inequality, which will result in double-digit economic growth and simultaneously broaden private, individual ownership so that EVERY American’s income significantly grows, providing the means to support themselves and their families with an affluent lifestyle and to financially sustain them in their retirement.
The Just Third Way Master Plan for America’s future is published at http://foreconomicjustice.org/?p=5797.
Support the Capital Homestead Act at http://www.cesj.org/homestead/index.htm and http://www.cesj.org/homestead/summary-cha.htm
See “Financing Economic Growth With ‘FUTURE SAVINGS’: Solutions To Protect America From Economic Decline” at NationOfChange.org http://www.nationofchange.org/financing-future-economic-growth-future-savings-solutions-protect-america-economic-decline-137450624 and “The Income Solution To Slow Private Sector Job Growth” at http://www.nationofchange.org/income-solution-slow-private-sector-job-growth-1378041490.
http://www.wnd.com/2013/09/record-90-million-americans-not-in-labor-force/
