Where is the US economy headed?

The economic outlook is, at best, dismal.


ECONOMY
A Taxing Economy
Today is the deadline for Americans to file their tax returns. This past year has been tough on U.S. taxpayers, with their hard-earned money going toward the Bush administration's misplaced priorities: a personal chef for an ineffective Housing and Urban Development Secretary and new contracts for an exploding defense contracting industry. Even the Internal Revenue Service is wasting $37 million in taxpayers' money by hiring expensive, ineffective private debt collectors to "pursue tax scofflaws," a task that could arguably be done more effectively by the agency itself. Most importantly, as Joseph E. Stiglitz and Linda J. Bilmes note in "The Three Trillion Dollar War," each American household is spending approximately $100 each month toward the "current operating costs" of the Iraq war (p. 138). Not surprisingly, the majority of Americans are pessimistic about the U.S. economy as the gap between the rich and the poor widens and Bush's tax cuts fail to deliver on their promises. Consumer confidence is at an all-time low, and fewer Americans now "than at any time in the past half century believe they're moving forward in life."

FALLING INTO THE GAP: In January's State of the Union address, Bush claimed, "In the long run, Americans can be confident about our economic growth." He has also repeatedly attempted to tie his tax cuts and the Iraq war to economic growth. A new Washington Post-ABC News poll released this tax day finds that seven in 10 Americans "now give negative ratings to the president's stewardship of the sinking U.S. economy." American families are facing a "perfect storm" of "[m]assive amounts of debt, falling house prices, disappearing jobs, flat wages, lower benefits, and skyrocketing costs for the most important consumer items." This devastating economic situation has been exacerbated by the Bush administration's policies. A recent study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) finds that the "gap between the richest and poorest families, and between the richest and middle-income families, grew significantly in most states over the past two decades." Average income fell by 2.5 percent for people in the bottom fifth of income earners and 1.3 percent for those in the middle fifth but rose nine percent for people in the top fifth. Seventy-nine percent of respondents in a new Pew Research Center poll say "it is more difficult now than five years ago for people in the middle class to maintain their standard of living."

BOOSTING LARGE CORPORATIONS: Not only has the income gap widened, but the wealthiest Americans have also seen their tax rates drop. According to EPI, between 1960 and 2004, "the average tax rate has fallen by about 14 percentage points (from 44.4% to 30.4%) for the top 1% of earners (those making more than $435,000 in 2007), while it has increased slightly (from 15.9% to 16.1%) for those in the middle 20%." Additionally, in FY 2007, the nation's largest corporations -- with $250 million or more in assets -- were audited at the "lowest level in the last 20 years." At the same time, audits of smaller corporations -- with $50 million or less in assets -- are climbing. The Bush administration has also been turning a blind eye toward federal contractors, who owe $8 billion in unpaid federal taxes. For example, KBR, which until last year was a subsidiary of Halliburton, has avoided paying more than $500 million "in federal Medicare and Social Security taxes by hiring workers through shell companies" based in the Cayman Islands. The Bush administration has aided this tax dodging. One of KBR's shell companies was set up two months after Cheney became Halliburtion's CEO in 1995. Congress is currently considering a bill "to bar federal agencies from awarding contracts to people or companies that have failed to pay their federal taxes."

--americanprogressaction.com

It's one of those "I told you so" so long ago, it doesn't matter any more; it's too late. More Americans are losing their homes and cars, jobs, health insurance, and less food trading with whether to buy gas for their cars to look for a job that doesn't exist. Poor saps; almost 30 percent still believe Bush is doing a good job. They'll take that to their graves.

Economic outlook is dismal in Europe, USA and India is trembling to sooth the citizens .

Thanks to the callous, cultureless,criminal,corrupt captialism the people around the globe are starving,striving,struggling..
**** is a bad word to type

CI: I'm one of those poor saps who lost his job (at finance/investing co) ... and possibly will soon lose my healthcare insurance bennies (can't afford paying for COBRA benefits) and that is critical 'cause of my medical problems. I have no home to lose as I'm renting. This situation is DIRE and not JUST to those saps.

However, I never for one minute believed that Bush was doing a good job nor did I expect that he would once he stole the first election. I count the days he has left and feel that it'll take many years for USA to restore itself from the damage done with hopes that an acclerated w/drawl from Iraq/Afghanistan occurs within the next 2-3 years.

This war (and military expense) is no-win situation that drains our economy and offers no tangible gain as Iraq will NEVER be a democracy. We don't need their oil that badly...not badly enough to be there unethically and fighting for a country that won't fight for itself.

Should i go deep.
None of us will make a pathetic view like some of of NON-US

I often say "I live off the rich". My services and business are a luxury for most people and I can tell you that even the rich are worried. We've had many people scale back their plans this year or cancel completely. These people are not really in threat of losing their jobs, but they are looking at the big economic picture and it makes them nervous. The value of their homes and portfolios are down and it's making them think twice about spending on things they used to take for granted. The poor feel the pain first and worst, but even the rich are getting pinched in an economy like this one.

I think we are in for a long, bumpy ride. I don't think this is a little correction, I think this is going to be a serious decline in US power and influence in the world. Our whole economy depends on foreign oil and foreign factories. As a country we have made bad choices on how to spend our tax money. Instead of investing in our infrastructure, health, alternative energy and education we have an administration that continues to throw our tax money into that bottomless pit called Iraq. Now these same geniuses think they can throw a fistful of dollars back at people and make the economy roar. I think anyone who thinks America is on the right track is delusional and can't admit that their team screwed up big time.

US was/is/will never be a human power( wirhout borrowed brain )

But I do admit USA is the only SUPER POWER to butcher and rape the innocents.

but when the poor are starving, the rich will feel it then. worse even than the poorest of poor.

starving to death sucks.

being beaten to death by a starving man for YOUR food sucks even more.

What scares me is the McCain has a good chance to win. This would mean the continuation of the disastrous Bush policies that are dragging the country down.

Hillary must drop out.

McCain promises to restrain Federal spending, something Bush failed to do. He also promises to sustain the Bush income tax cuts to avoid a significant rise in taxes, just as the economy will be pulling out of a cyclical recession.

The Republicans also have a secret weapon - the daffy duo of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. The public does not trust them to restrain Federal spending - -particularly in a Democrat Administration. And, of course, they are allready committedf to the scheduled tax increase.

There are 6+ months left in the campaign for these ideas to settle in - something they will surely do.

What exactly has the svengali of much talk and little substance have to offer.

Unfortunately we will be forced to chose between a has been and a never was.

georgeob, Exactly where does McCain plan to "restrain Federal spending?"
Where and how much does he "plan to save?"

georgeob, gas tax vacation; good idea?

No, I don't think so. Who has proposed one?

Should McCain be elected, you can expect the national debt to soar. The result would be that the USA would become Argentina.

It is simple, ci. Mr McCain will pound his fist on the desk and snarl that he will veto any bill that comes out of Congress that has "earmarks."
Ignore the fact that every President and every candidate has said the same thing for years.

PS: McCain proposed elimininating the 18 cent Fed gas tax from Memorial Day through Labor Day.

McCain; Republican Presidential candidate John McCain calls for a suspension of federal gas taxes from Memorial Day to Labor Day.

The cost to the Fed govt is estimated to be $10 billion I thought I read. I may be wrong.

If USA is the only soup sipping poor power
the world will be without conflict.
But some corporate cantagerous criminals
had made the whole globe a soup sipping super powerty power.