America, from exceptionalism to nihilism

From the NYT (P. Mishra): America, from exceptionalism to nihilism

Excerpts:

Sub-title: The U.S. leads the free world in its helplessness before the dissolution of its most cherished values.

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Extravagant promises by ruling elites, and their unexamined assumptions, are at least partly to blame for this moral breakdown in the world’s most powerful country. In 2011, for instance, Mr. Obama had claimed, “We are perfectly poised to make the 21st century again the American Century.” But such onward-and-upward narratives seemed to mock the suffering, despair and frustration exposed in different ways by Black Lives Matter or the white Rust-Belt proletariat. Mr. Obama, who recently accepted a very lucrative speaking engagement on Wall Street, now looks like just one of the fortunate members of historically depressed minorities who mistake their own upward mobility for collective advance..

By the 1980s, Reagan or Reaganites would brush aside any suggestion that there was a “national malaise.” The collapse of Communism seemed to vindicate the American model. The disappearance of an antagonist that had defined America’s self-image for much of the 20th century unleashed the solipsistic idealism that Niebuhr, among many midcentury intellectuals, had warned against. Postcommunist Russia received an army of American economists, technocrats and journalists determined to usher the country into American-style democracy and free markets.

Generalizing about the world at large on the basis of personal success, or proclaiming that life has never been so wonderful, can be politically disastrous, it turns out, especially when loss, decay and fear sum up the experiences of many other people. We will have learned nothing from Mr. Trump’s victory if we do not examine today how and why American elites came to indulge in ressentiment-generating boosterism just as economic and cultural inequality was becoming intolerable to so many, and how their loss of intellectual credibility and moral authority brought about the post-truth era.

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The US lost its way with the advent of Reckless Ronnie to the White House - a "celebrity" with exaggerated political instincts. Ronnie returned the favor of supporting his candidature by the wholesale take-down of Upper-income Taxation during his tenure of office. (See here the result of the monumental tax-cut.)

The direct consequence was evident. A flood upwards of Insufficiently taxed Income into Wealth. Which economists at the UofCal were able to observe statistically, as seen here:

The US has come full-circle to the era of the 1920s where most of the wealth is owned by a sickening small percentage of American families. Meaning what?

The Wealth is not returned to the economy, except in "investments" that are a small fraction of the total. So the Wealth just sits and earns interest for the elderly who could care less about increasing it until passed on to their inheritors.

(And is in most case supposedly lost by the second-generation that did absolutely nothing - except being born - to deserve it ...)

Our failure has been in not reinvesting in our people or our country. That comes with a price. And, today we pay.

Just check out how many engineers are pumped out every year in countries like China and India. Just look at which countries are seeing the profits from American corporations invested in their industrial infrastructure. Then compare it to what is being spent state side.

Isn't infrastructure spending a Trump ideal?

What would one expect, when capital becomes the limiting factor. While US labor has stayed more or less at the same level albeit with better access to goods, less expensive labor around the world has been bidding for more capital. This has driven up capital income relative to wages.

This has meant that somewhere around 2 billion people have come from destitution to middle class albeit at a much lower level of income than Americans. So we have been doing pretty well, really. There is no reason to hatefully intone messages to invoke envy. If you want to talk about these things, try to see the whole picture and not like here take an excerpt that looks tawdry, while you are actually describing one of the most exceptional achievements in history and something Americans should be extremely proud of.

WCH said:

Isn't infrastructure spending a Trump ideal?

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Well the GOP wasted 8 years of low interest rates, ready and willing American skilled labor and material abundance, saying NO to President Obama on Infrastructure Spending because America couldn't afford it.

... or could it have been another reason?

:roll:

Cigar said:

Well the GOP wasted 8 years of low interest rates, ready and willing American skilled labor and material abundance, saying NO to President Obama on Infrastructure Spending because America couldn't afford it.

... or could it have been another reason?

:roll:

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Right, 'cause Obama had such a good track record of stimulus spending.

How the $800B stimulus failed | New York Post

Shovel ready?

WCH said:

Isn't infrastructure spending a Trump ideal?

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Words only. In action, his policies are simply a continuation of draining the profits out of the country. Huge tax breaks to corporations will not spur investment. Just the opposite. Tax breaks will accelerate profit taking.

A solution would be creating incentive for corporations to invest directly in the US, in education, industrial infrastructure and production capacity. But, I'm not sure how to encourage that with our current system, which does not reward long term investment, only short term profits.

Here's a good article laying out what went wrong and why. It's the story of the Kindle and why we cannot make it here, even though we basically invented it.

https://hbr.org/2009/10/the-us-cant-manufacture-the-ki.html

E Ink had to have the glass made in Asia because the companies there are the only ones that can deposit patterned silicon on sheets of glass. That capability left U.S. shores when American companies failed to keep up in the LCD flat-panel-display industry.

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WCH said:

Isn't infrastructure spending a Trump ideal?

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We'll see. If he does it I will give him credit for it.

Skeptic Bob said:

We'll see. If he does it I will give him credit for it.

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wrong, all infrastructure is local and should be paid for locally by those who use it, to help avoid waste, especially given that, 1) the Feds are $20 million in debt while the states have Balanced Budget Amendments and, 2) govt spending slows down growth something we don't want ever or at least untill the economy has recovered from Barry's 8 year recession.