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Lautenberg Amendment

H.R. 1685 -- Freedom from Religious Persecution Act of 1997

http://burmalibrary.org/reg.burma/archives/199709/msg00230.html
http://www.visalaw.com/98oct/49oct98.html
http://www.vdare.com/allen/lautenberg.htm
http://www.state.gov/g/prm/rls/fs/44171.htm
http://www.thesocialcontract.com/artman2/publish/tsc0302/article_233.s
html
http://www.jfsla.org/index.php?/article/details/435/
http://www.skokienet.org/american/index.html

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Originally posted by mal4prez:
I mean, am I supposed to feel newly informed after reading this?

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Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Wow. Anyone who believes that making $49,999/yr makes you poor has no fathomable clue what being poor is.

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1. The middle class's standard of living stagnated while the dot-com boom made the super rich even richer. Not really. In fact, the U.S. economy hands out wealth far more evenly.

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Per capita gross domestic product has increased by more than 65 percent since 1979 -- growth that translates to $26,000 per household. If all that money had gone to the richest 10th of the population, it would now hold more than 60 percent of the national income. That's nearly twice as much as the super rich actually have, according to the best census surveys available.

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To be fair, demographic changes have sparked many misunderstandings about the economic health of the middle class. For example, Americans today are more likely to live in single-adult households than they were 30 years ago. Adjust incomes to take into account this shift, along with increasing employer contributions to retirement savings and to health insurance premiums, and you find that the real middle-class median income has risen 33 percent, or $18,000, since 1979. Of course, that's a third less than the $26,000 that those households would have gotten if the growth had been distributed equally. But the middle class didn't stand still, either.

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Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:

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Originally posted by mal4prez:
I mean, am I supposed to feel newly informed after reading this?

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Not if all you can do is read the first words of each paragraph.

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2. The middle class is shrinking.

True, fewer people today live in households with incomes between $30,000 and $100,000 (a reasonable definition of "middle class") than in 1979. But the number of people in households that bring in more than $100,000 also rose from 12 percent to 24 percent. There was no increase in the percentage of people in households making less than $30,000. So the entire "decline" of the middle class came from people moving up the income ladder. For married couples, median incomes have grown in inflation-adjusted dollars by 25 percent since 1979.

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So the entire "decline" of the middle class came from people moving up the income ladder. For married couples, median incomes have grown in inflation-adjusted dollars by 25 percent since 1979.

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3. The only way people cope with the middle-class meltdown is by falling into debt.

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Originally posted by SignyM:
First of all, note that Geezer changed his original post- which defined the middle class as beginning at $50,000- to the middle class beginning at $30,000.

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Originally posted by mal4prez:

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Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:

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Originally posted by mal4prez:
I mean, am I supposed to feel newly informed after reading this?

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Not if all you can do is read the first words of each paragraph.

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My point being, the writer actually agrees with 2 of his 5 "myths" (that would be the "yes" and the "true") and almost agrees with the third ("not really") and the other two points are fuzzy numbers and heresay (sort of).

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Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Many people claim the middle class is shrinking to suggest that the nation is growing poorer, so when the author points out that the middle class is shrinking because the nation is actually growing richer, it is not an agreement with the previous statement.

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Originally posted by Fletch2:


First, I am surprised to discover that I am no longer "middle class" according to this article I earn too much....

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Originally posted by chrisisall:

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Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Many people claim the middle class is shrinking to suggest that the nation is growing poorer, so when the author points out that the middle class is shrinking because the nation is actually growing richer, it is not an agreement with the previous statement.

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This boggles my mind- if a small percentage is getting richer due to many factors, while segments of the middle class are getting poorer, you can say the GNP is up, but you can't say peeps as a whole are better off....*shakes head in confusion*

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Well, this is isn’t really true. The author actually seem to be trying to be fair in his responses to these myths. Many people claim the middle class is shrinking to suggest that the nation is growing poorer, so when the author points out that the middle class is shrinking because the nation is actually growing richer, it is not an agreement with the previous statement. Are you sure you’re just not groping for a reason to dismiss something you’d rather not consider anyway?

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Originally posted by SignyM:

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Well, this is isn’t really true. The author actually seem to be trying to be fair in his responses to these myths. Many people claim the middle class is shrinking to suggest that the nation is growing poorer, so when the author points out that the middle class is shrinking because the nation is actually growing richer, it is not an agreement with the previous statement. Are you sure you’re just not groping for a reason to dismiss something you’d rather not consider anyway?

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The article changes the bases of comparison- for example "what would have been" to "what is", and "middle class" to "married middle class couples"- in order to do ONE THING: to jiggle the numbers until it comes up with good-sounding figures. Now, that is not sound economics or good science. But it IS good propaganda.

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Originally posted by SignyM:
Geezer, I don't believe you. So- whatever.

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Always look upstream.

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Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
According to this article the middle class is shrinking because middle class earners are getting richer, not poorer. It’s not that difficult to understand.

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Originally posted by gorramgroupie:
How does one survive the increasing costs of food, gas, housing, clothing, etc, when wages don't keep up to the increase? Answer me that.

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Originally posted by Fremdfirma:
Otherwise, just accept the futulity of arguing with the brick wall of a zealots faith, and just bait them into revealing their true selves and agendas, which is also more fun, as well.

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Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
So I guess Finn and Geezer are just going to ignore my post then?

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1. Inflation plus the fact that penalties, such as the alternative minimum tax are not adjusted for inflation...largely, if not altogether, dismiss this entire point.

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2. This point is nullified for the reasons that I've stated above. Because of inflation, any family with under $50,000/yr today is basically poor (particularly because of the unaffordability of housing today), and by as soon as 2010 nearly 16 million more homes will be impacted by the alternative minimum tax as our incomes increase (at a rate slower than TRUE inflation, of course).

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3. I can't disagree with the fact that the debt average has been manipulated any more than a lot of your figures have been manipulated....Fortunately for me, I lost everything 7 years ago and really learned what it meant to have a good job and to use that time wisely to prepare for a dark future.

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5. Well thank you very much Mr. Corpo. I'll need that insurance because I've had to go smoke outside in 2 degree winds tonight.

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seem to see a trend in this thread. The folk who have lost a job, or don't make as much as they'd like, or have had other financial trouble, think that the economy is tanking and the middle class shrinking. Folk who have never been out of work, made good money, and always had enough think things are going OK. only natural, I suppose.

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In recent weeks, the global liquidity and credit crunch that started last August has become more severe. This is easy to show: in the United States, the euro zone, and the United Kingdom, spreads between Libor interest rates (at which banks lend to each other) and central bank interest rates – as well as government bonds – are extremely high and have grown since the crisis began. This signals risk aversion and mistrust of counterparties. ... The recent announcement of coordinated liquidity injections by the Fed and four other major central banks is, to be blunt, too little too late. ...
The US is now headed towards recession regardless of what the Fed does. The build-up of real and financial problems – the worst US housing recession ever, oil at $90 a barrel or above, a severe credit crunch, falling investment by the corporate sector, and savings-less and debt-burdened consumers buffeted by multiple negative shocks – make a recession unavoidable. Other economies will also be pulled down as the US contagion spreads.

... Today’s financial markets are dominated by non-bank institutions – investment banks, money market funds, hedge funds, mortgage lenders that do not accept deposits, so-called “structured investment vehicles,” and even states and local government investment funds – that have no direct or indirect access to the liquidity support of central banks. All these non-bank institutions are now potentially at risk of a liquidity run. Indeed, US legislation strictly forbids the Fed from lending to non-depository institutions, except in emergencies.... So the risk of something equivalent to a bank run for non-bank financial institutions owing to their short-term liabilities and longer-term and illiquid assets, is rising... There is little chance that banks will re-lend to these non-banks the funds they borrowed from central banks, given these banks’ own severe liquidity problems and mistrust of non-bank counterparties.

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Originally posted by SignyM:
[B Except me and my SO. We're doing OK financially.
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Always look upstream.

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Originally posted by Kirkules:

It also amazes me how people talk about a recession as if it's the end of the world. In many cases a recession is just a sign of the beginning of another economic cycle. Next time the economists call a recession it's time to load up on stocks that do well in the early stages of the cycle.

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I think it's interesting that when the American people are polled a large majority say exactly what you say.

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Originally posted by SignyM:

Secondly, it's stupid to accept cycles of boom and bust as somehow "necessary" for growth. It's not necessary.

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That "the rich get richer" BS just doesn't fly with me because while the "rich" get richer the "poor" get richer too.

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Originally posted by Kirkules:
As much as I would love to believe we can take money from the "rich" an give it to the "poor" and everything will be just dandy, I know it's not true. Redistribution of wealth by the government will result in a smaller "pie" to divide among the rich and poor and everyone looses in the end.

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