Last week I argued that fear of downward mobility among Massachusetts middle-class families was a motivating factor in the Scott Brown-Martha Coakley race. Towns that had voted strongly for Obama just 14 months ago went for a conservative Republican. By my rough estimate, about 20% of registered Democrats had to have voted for Brown. My data was anecdotal and impressionistic. Today’s Globe piece, “A lost decade for Bay State jobs” provides convincing evidence that downward mobility is happening. The nut graf: “For the first time since World War II, the state ended a decade with fewer jobs than it had at the beginning.” Who got hit hardest? “The loss of purchasing power was spread across lower- and middle-income families, according to the (Northeastern) center. Only the top 10 percent, those families making more than $190,000 per year, experienced any inflation-adjusted gains over the past 10 years.”
An all-too-typical case: “Gary Nilsson, who worked more than 20 years in the (Lucent Technologies) plant (in North Andover) and served as president of the union local that represented the North Andover employees, is working part time at a big-box retailer, earning just one-fourth of his old salary.”
That, folks, is downward mobility in operation. It doesn’t matter that most of the downturn occurred when both Massachusetts and Washington were under Republican executives. If the Democrats don’t focus on effective ways of job-creation and-just as important-explaining how they, and not the Republicans can fix this, there is big trouble ahead.
Both and Patrick and Obama administrations have been incompetent at framing key issues so that they communicate both a vision and policies that can credibly make that vision real. Your next stop should be George Lakoff’s terrific piece at Daily Kos. Lakoff has been arguing for years that an inability to frame issues leaves progressives weak. In his 2006 book, Thinking Points he says, “…we no longer have the ability to articulate a progressive vision. We have lost hold of the terms of political debate, and even ceded the language of progressive ideals-like “freedom” and “liberty”-to redefinition by an extremist right wing.” Sound familiar? Exit Barack Obama, enter Glenn Beck.
Leveraged buy outs, all the rage on Wall St last 20 years of which Lucent is a prime example. Bain & Co. and other leverage buy out groups buy up companies that have cash, borrow vast sums to pay shareholders then expect the bought companies to finance the debt. All this and a monthly fee payable to the folks that made the deal happen. When revenues drop have to cut expenses. Where are your must expenses; EMPLOYEES. Workers get the shaft on leveraged buy outs.
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p>Ask Mitt and Steve all about it!