Last week government figures showed an uptick in the unemployment rate to 9.8 percent. Non farm payrolls reported at more than two thirds "less" than than analyst expectations. The scariest figures reported that would be of interest to the
working class were,
Though the holiday shopping season is officially under way, Retail hiring fell by 28,000 in November. Manufacturing dropped another 13,000 jobs. Healthcare added 19,000, which is consistent with trends throughout the economic downturn of the past few years. Temporary jobs grew by 40,000 in the month.
Yet at the same time the stock market broke out
approaching highs for 2010.
This is counter intuitive and many of the talking heads were at a loss to explain the discrepancy. Some stating that the economy was gaining strength and the unemployment number was an outlier.
We think the discrepancy is perfectly understandable and think that it may be an indicator of things to come.
We believe that were one to take a global perspective and think in relative terms it becomes fairly easy to understand, that the American worker with diminished value, is no longer the driving force in the economy that it once was. Furthermore, we believe that tax breaks for any class of American society will do little to change the dynamic, but only postpone the inevitable. That the proposed continuation of the tax breaks for the rich will only accelerate this process.
Kwame Nkrumah
