"More than 11 million Americans are now unemployed," reports Louis Uchitelle of the New York Times.Barack Obama, in discussing the situation today, observed that there are "real lives, real suffering, real fears" behind the report.
This unrelenting bad news takes its toll on people. It robs them of their dignity, their self-sufficiency and their self-worth. Even those who have been educated, who earned college degrees and who had every reason to expect that their lives would be better than their parents', find themselves without jobs, without incomes, without lives.
Without hope.
Admittedly, some people lose their jobs because of something they did wrong. Maybe they were using the company's computer to visit adult-oriented websites or maybe they missed work too much.
But most of the people who have lost their jobs in the current recession are hard-working people who tried every day to do the jobs that were expected of them, yet, through no fault of their own, lost their jobs. And, in an attempt to understand what has happened, many of those people are blaming the Bush administration and the Republicans who controlled Congress through the last half of the 1990s and the first half of this decade for, in their eyes, creating a situation that leaves ordinary people feeling powerless.
Anxiety isn't confined to those who are unemployed. At a new blog at the New York Times, "Room for Debate," the editors (who encourage readers to contribute) observe, "Many more millions of Americans worry about their own job security. These anxieties are transforming the workplace. Employees may be working harder, experts say, but they may also be less productive."
One bitter reader had this to say: "This is a Capitalist society and here is the only rule. You work your butt off for whatever the company feels like giving you, you don't ask questions, and the big boss makes the real money."
Another reader wrote, "Work is a euphemism for modern day wage slavery. You are forced to give up big chunks of your life and happiness to make a fragile living. The result is universal misery for those who value human values and progressiveness."
When I was growing up, my parents impressed on me the importance of treating people fairly. Is it fair to blame Bush and his fellow Republicans? Well, I would say the answer to that is both "yes" and "no."
I took economics in college. And, while I'll readily admit that I'm no expert on economics, I know enough to know that it is a complicated matter, too complex to blame any one person or any one policy — or even the leaders of any particular political party.
A president can only make general recommendations. The Congress can pass laws and allocate funds for various industries, even give instructions on how such funds are to be used.
But without regulation, industries are not compelled to act responsibly. Irresponsible decisions have led to this catastrophe, whether they were made at the corporate or government level. Believe me, there is plenty of blame to go around.
Recovery efforts are good, but intentions alone won't be enough. The efforts to reverse this cruel recession must be accompanied by regulations that are not intended to restrict the spirit of entrepreneurial independence but to protect the most vulnerable members of the workforce.
Make no mistake about it. Everyone has a stake in this, even those who are still employed and feel (somewhat) insulated from the recession. Consumers drive this economy, and, until the millions who are unemployed get regular incomes again, retailers will continue to struggle and the stock market will continue to plunge.
We're all in this together.
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