I highly recommend this op-ed piece in today’s Washington Post
It’s by Zachary Karabell, who heads a hedge fund and has authored a book. The article’s title is somewhat misleading, describing the less important of the two topics the piece discusses.
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CORRECTION: This is from the comments thread:
Kevin Meyer
April 8, 2016 12:33 pm
FWIW, Karabell does NOT ‘head’ or otherwise run a hedge fund. His employer, Envestnet, is a financial services technology provider providing integrated portfolio, practice management, and reporting solutions to financial advisors and institutions… not a hedge fund.
Me
April 8, 2016 1:57 pm
I stand corrected. His article is still really good.
Even better, in fact.
Added 4/8 at 2:04 p.m.
FWIW, Karabell does NOT ‘head’ or otherwise run a hedge fund. His employer, Envestnet, is a financial services technology provider providing integrated portfolio, practice management, and reporting solutions to financial advisors and institutions… not a hedge fund.
I stand corrected. His article is still really good.
Couple of points from the article. From the quote from Trump, “And I wouldn’t be getting the kind of massive crowds that I’m getting if the number was a real number.”” Trump is implying that the crowds are huge because many in the crowds are from that unemployed group. A big assumption. I’d guess that Trump crowds are made up of working class people focused on Trump’s bold remarks regarding immigration and terrorism. I don’t see the face of economic despair among those pictured at Trump rallies.
Also, “The stubborn persistence of these beliefs should be a reminder that just because the United States is doing well in general, that doesn’t mean everyone in the country is.” Assume for the moment that Trump supporters are focused to some extent on some aspect of the economy and related government reports. Taxation might be one such area of general wide spread dissatisfaction. The question then is what has Trump said to date that would give any supporter reason to assume that such economic concerns will be addressed by Trump. That is beyond his correct all promise to “make better deals.”
In the 1930s, there were a lot fewer government organizations measuring statistics. The 25% of the US is out of work number was produced by a professor at a university, not a government agency, but it reflected the general American experience at the time. Jobs were hard to find, business had a lot of slack and work did not pay well. The FDR administration built its statistical apparatus to quantize what people already knew. Then FDR tried just about a little of everything in hopes of fixing things. By 1936, the depression was supposedly over, but not everyone believed it.
Right now, there are a lot of people who feel that the economy isn’t in very good shape. De gustibus and all that. They are probably right. A good start would be to come up with metrics to capture this. Trump supporters would probably like a ratio of white HS dropout male wages to black male or female college graduate wages much, much larger than one. Liberals might prefer a lot fewer working people eligible for food stamps and more able to afford a comfortable, but modest, apartment within 10 miles of their job. It’s like the wind chill factor. It can be 10F out, but not feel cold if there is no wind stirring.
Granted, the unemployment rate always seems higher when one is looking for a better job. Perhaps we need to adopt Gloria Steinem’s attitude and say “This is what 50 looks like.” Maybe 5% unemployment means that it isn’t all that hard to get a crummy, minimum wage job and that there is little or no wage pressure except in a few limited fields. “That’s what 5% looks like.” In Steinem’s case, she looked pretty good. In contrast, 5% looks pretty lame.
Kaleberg,
5% looks pretty lame compared to how Steinem looked at 50. Sure. Compared to where the rate was at the beginning of Obama’s term, I’d say it looks like Steinem at 50.