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New York Slimes: We’re Measuring the Economy All Wrong
New York Slimes ^ | September 14, 2018 | David Leonhardt

Posted on 09/14/2018 7:58:33 PM PDT by EdnaMode

Ten years after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the official economic statistics — the ones that fill news stories, television shows and presidential tweets — say that the American economy is fully recovered.

The unemployment rate is lower than it was before the financial crisis began. The stock market has soared. The total combined output of the American economy, also known as gross domestic product, has risen 20 percent since Lehman collapsed. The crisis is over.

But, of course, it isn’t over. The financial crisis remains the most influential event of the 21st century. It left millions of people — many of whom were already anxious about the economy — feeling much more anxious, if not downright angry. Their frustration has helped create a threat to Western liberal democracy that would have been hard to imagine a decade ago. Far-right political parties are on the rise across Europe, and Britain is leaving the European Union. The United States elected a racist reality-television star who has thrown the presidency into chaos.

Look around, and you can see the lingering effects of the financial crisis just about everywhere — everywhere, that is, except in the most commonly cited economic statistics. So who are you going to believe: those statistics, or your own eyes?

Over the course of history, financial crises — and the long downturns that follow — have reordered American society in all sorts of ways. One of those ways happens to involve the statistics that the government collects. Crises have often highlighted the need for new measures of human well-being.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: davidleonhardt; economy; employment; newyork; newyorkcity; newyorkslimes; racisttimes; unemployment
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To: EdnaMode

Howard Beale was right. The media lies like hell.


21 posted on 09/14/2018 9:32:11 PM PDT by headstamp 2 (My "White Privilege" is my work ethic.)
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To: EdnaMode

Gee, I thought 9/11 was the most influential event of the 21st century.


22 posted on 09/14/2018 9:49:58 PM PDT by twin2
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To: EdnaMode

I have a nephew who is a plumber foreman for the Washington, DC Metro. He tells me he cannot find good qualified plumbers to hire because the good ones get paid better by all the construction going on in and around the District.


23 posted on 09/14/2018 9:56:54 PM PDT by 7thson (I've got a seat at the big conference table! I'm gonna paint my logo on it!)
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To: EdnaMode

Just trying to take away from Trump’s success of getting the economy going.


24 posted on 09/14/2018 10:01:06 PM PDT by Innovative ("Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing." -- Vince Lombardi)
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To: EdnaMode

How many men are on welfare?

How many men are going to college, yes even at 24? How many are illegal immigrants?

All these factors were facing every other president. To hear it told, Obama was getting hosannas to the king when unemployment went sub 5%.

Now all of a sudden 3.9% isn’t quite good enough. No in fact we’re measuring it all wrong.

F these people. Honestly, they are our enemies. They hate our nation and they hate you and I and our families.

I don’t know whose side they are on, but it sure isn’t ours or our nation’s.


25 posted on 09/14/2018 10:32:37 PM PDT by DoughtyOne (01/26/18 DJIA 30 stocks $26,616.71 48.794% > open 11/07/16 215.71 from 5De0% increase 1.2183 yrs)
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To: DoughtyOne

...and they prefer you and yours dead. That is the bottom line .


26 posted on 09/14/2018 10:44:24 PM PDT by hal ogen (First Amendment or Reeducation Camp?)
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To: hal ogen

There was a time when I would have said you had a screw loose, if you said that.

Today you’d have to have a screw loose if you didn’t realize that’s true.


27 posted on 09/14/2018 11:03:03 PM PDT by DoughtyOne (01/26/18 DJIA 30 stocks $26,616.71 48.794% > open 11/07/16 $215.71 from 50% increase in 1.2183 yrs)
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To: EdnaMode

I’d like to chime in on both sides of this question.

First, from what I see around me in my neighborhood, there are a lot of people who have not been affected at all by Trump’s improvement in the economy. Plus, a few friends of mine are struggling to make ends meet.

But also, I think as far as the bottom rung or near-bottom rung are concerned, it takes longer for the changes to reach them. If you didn’t have a leg up to begin with, like choosing a profession that will continue to work for you, you can be stuck. That goes for people who are just plain lazy but also for people who chose something arty or ephemeral. It also goes for those who depended on someone else who eventually disappeared.

Thanks for the hint, NY Times. Maybe Trump will start some kind of a program to lift the lowest and those who are struggling the hardest into a slightly better life. You can’t just leave everything to the free market when some are not able to grab on to the bottom.


28 posted on 09/14/2018 11:20:05 PM PDT by firebrand
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To: ClearCase_guy

The only thing I saw here in California under the OBUNGHOLE Administration was a lot of SIGNS on the freeways telling me to look at all the construction going on with the Infrastructure money.
Never saw any WORK being done, just signs.


29 posted on 09/15/2018 12:25:03 AM PDT by 5th MEB (Progressives in the open; --- FIRE FOR EFFECT!!)
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To: tcrlaf
Those same Lagos are making Trump look like a freaking hero, and the media MUST find a way to stop it.

Lago: An incompetent buffoon who shirks responsibilities in favor of taking leisure time. - Urban Dictionary

When using street slang, please include a short explanation.

Regards,

30 posted on 09/15/2018 12:30:08 AM PDT by alexander_busek (Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.)
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To: EdnaMode
New York Slimes: We’re Measuring the Economy All Wrong Now That Trump Is President

There, fixed it!

Regards,

31 posted on 09/15/2018 2:10:40 AM PDT by alexander_busek (Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.)
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To: EdnaMode

There’s nothing wrong with developing new metrics to analyze new issues, provided that the new tools are well-designed and honestly applied. Some will have utility and stick. Others will disappear with the next news cycle. The big problem arises when people start monkeying with long-running statistical series and contaminate data sets that are used for comparisons over time.


32 posted on 09/15/2018 3:39:32 AM PDT by sphinx
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To: EdnaMode

TDS


33 posted on 09/15/2018 5:54:09 AM PDT by bgill (CDC site, "We don't know how people are infected with Ebola.")
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To: EdnaMode

They even want to change the way reporting is done on the economy. Leftists have a problem with reality. They hate it. This is another word for insanity.


34 posted on 09/15/2018 6:32:39 AM PDT by I want the USA back (Cynicism is the only refuge in a world that is determined to eliminate itself.)
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To: DoughtyOne

“F these people. Honestly, they are our enemies. They hate our nation and they hate you and I and our families.”

They’ll kill you if they think they can get away with it.

Plan accordingly.

L


35 posted on 09/15/2018 6:36:08 AM PDT by Lurker (President Trump isn't our last chance. President Trump is THEIR last chance.)
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To: LukeL

I will add another dimension to this thread:

CRIME is a major factor in where a company decides to locate.

You cannot attract good employees when it isn’t SAFE for them & their families. That drives UP the wages in order to attract ANY employees. It also makes other factors of life more costly-—home owners insurance (due to more break-ins)-—
Auto insurance for more ‘smash & grab’ intrusions-—daily food & other purchases because of more shoplifting-—Medical costs because the gang members NEVER pay to be stitched up & returned to their cesspool lives. The value of YOUR property is constantly devalued due to the criminals who never seem to face true punishment for their daily intrusions into our lives.

You & yours cannot simply attend a concert— a meeting—or go shopping in many areas of the USA because it is too dangerous. Politicians have been so soft on crime that it is truly out of control and it drives up the cost of everything.

IF you sit down & think for awhile about all of this, anyone here at FR can certainly add to this list.


36 posted on 09/15/2018 7:10:29 AM PDT by ridesthemiles
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To: Haiku Guy

Its true because it has been widely reported. Works for FBI cases.

37 posted on 09/15/2018 7:29:06 AM PDT by John 3_19-21 (Opinions do not change the world, change requires action.)
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To: roadcat

When Obama was president, they called it the “new normal”: high run employment, anemic growth, former high paid workers becoming permanently unemployed, etc. We were told to just shut up and take our medicine.


38 posted on 09/15/2018 7:47:11 AM PDT by Atticus
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To: EdnaMode

If the economy is so bad, why are people flooding across our borders in just one direction?

30 million illegal aliens somehow manage to swim across a treacherous river, trek across a dangerous desert and find gainful employment in a country where they don’t even speak the language... often managing not only to support themselves, but even send money back to family in Latin America.

Yet... we need welfare and other public money thrown at the indolent by the shovel load.


39 posted on 09/15/2018 7:56:52 AM PDT by Bon mots
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To: alexander_busek

Apple autocorrect


40 posted on 09/15/2018 8:17:57 AM PDT by tcrlaf (They told me it could never happen in America. And then it did....)
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