economic angst.

[sophiaserpentia]

If you are a middle-aged software designer still looking for work a year after a layoff, or a former Enron manager now selling shoes in a department store, or a seamstress laid off when a textile mill shut down, you might think President Bush's program for economic recovery isn't working. You'd be wrong.

The president's economy policy is working just as he planned it -- for the well-to-do. The stock market is bouncing back, sales of Rolexes and Range Rovers are humming right along, and compensation for CEOs is still in the stratosphere. Among the president's friends, there is little anxiety about the kids' trust funds. (Notice how well Halliburton has been doing since the invasion of Iraq?)

Bush's multibillion-dollar tax cuts largely benefited the wealthy while doing little to produce jobs for average workers. Conservatives fiercely defended the tax cuts as redress to rich capitalists who paid most of the taxes and who would create jobs if given appropriate incentives. They neglected to mention that many of those jobs would be created in other countries.

So far, the United States has lost 2.4 million jobs during Bush's tenure, threatening him with the worst jobs loss record since Herbert Hoover. The recession may have ended two years ago, but the economic pain continues for many working families. While economists (most of whom have not yet lost their jobs) continue to predict that jobs growth is right around the corner, hundreds of thousands of unemployed workers are so discouraged that they have given up even looking for a job. Others struggle along with part-time work that doesn't meet the obligations of full-time bills.

from According to Plan