US slide on Global Competitive Index.

US has fallen from 1st to 7th place in just five years – on the Global Competitiveness Index done by the World Economic Forum.

Germany now more competitive than the US.

In 2012:

1. Switzerland
2. Singapore
3. Finland
4. Sweden
5. Netherlands
6. Germany
7. United States

The US recent track record was 1st (2008), 2nd (2009), 4th (2010) and 5th (2011).

From Der Spiegel:

Blasting Europe has become a reflex in the US presidential campaign, with Republican nominee Mitt Romney leading the way. But a new report ranking economic competitiveness has found that the US is no longer the leader it once was. This year, the country even dropped behind Germany.

(..) This week, though, brought yet another indication that Romney might want to refine his trans-Atlantic message. According to the Global Competitiveness Index released annually by the World Economic Forum, the United States once again lost ground. Ahead of the economic superpower on the list? Four European Union countries and Switzerland. Indeed, the report hints that the US might not be working in the US.

Read more here.

Reagan Architect on Ryan’s “Empty Sermons”

Here’s one of the big architects of Reaganomics in the 80′s – David Stockman:

I did it in the 80′s. It resulted in disaster.

On the last thirty years:

Thirty years of Republican apostasy — a once grand party’s embrace of the welfare state, the warfare state and the Wall Street-coddling bailout state — have crippled the engines of capitalism and buried us in debt. Mr. Ryan’s sonorous campaign rhetoric about shrinking Big Government and giving tax cuts to “job creators” (read: the top 2 percent) will do nothing to reverse the nation’s economic decline and arrest its fiscal collapse.

On Ryan’s fantasies:

“The Ryan Plan boils down to a fetish for cutting the top marginal income-tax rate for ‘job creators’ — i.e. the superwealthy — to 25 percent and paying for it with an as-yet-undisclosed plan to broaden the tax base. Of the $1 trillion in so-called tax expenditures that the plan would attack, the vast majority would come from slashing popular tax breaks for employer-provided health insurance, mortgage interest, 401(k) accounts, state and local taxes, charitable giving and the like, not to mention low rates on capital gains and dividends. The crony capitalists of K Street already own more than enough Republican votes to stop that train before it leaves the station.”

“In short, Mr. Ryan’s plan is devoid of credible math or hard policy choices. And it couldn’t pass even if Republicans were to take the presidency and both houses of Congress. Mr. Romney and Mr. Ryan have no plan to take on Wall Street, the Fed, the military-industrial complex, social insurance or the nation’s fiscal calamity and no plan to revive capitalist prosperity — just empty sermons.”

H/T Jack at politicaldog101.

About those Tax Havens.

A recent report found that the super-duper rich have something like at least $26 trillion hidden away in secret tax havens.

That’s close to twice the size of the US economy, exempt from taxes – and presumably playing no part of the productive economy.

What was a bit alarming apart from the size of this – was the developments over the last decade:

Extracting the World Economies.

Seems like something like $15 trillion was removed from the world economy over a period of just eight years. And this skews the bigger picture about inequality, tax burdens – and it says something fundamental about where the fruits of people’s labor apparently ends up. A large part of the cake is removed before we even start discussing who should get what.

More on the report is here.

It’s the Middle Class, Stupid!

This latest book by James Carville and Stan Greenberg was a little bit of a disappointment, mostly because of a messy style – but also because there was very little news or fresh analysis on politics or economics. But it is important stuff.

From the opening:

WE ARE WRITING THIS BOOK BECAUSE WE FAILED AND THAT’S NOT GOOD ENOUGH

There’s no other way to put it. We failed. It is as simple as that. Both of us have spent our lives focused on what’s happening with working people and seeing them get a fair shake for a hard day’s work—seeing them get the chance to move up the ladder and be honored. We put the middle class at the center of the world, because you can’t have an America without a middle class.

Well, we failed, and we have got to do better, and that’s why we are writing this book.

And this chart sums up the basis for the book:

Income distribution – something changed in the late 1970′s.

More here.

JP Morgan up to $6 billion in losses.

First it was two, then four, now six billion.

But when it comes to derivates it seems that no one really knows the full extent of the numbers if the dams are breaking.

$6 billion losses, and new charges.

And criminal charges are mounting:

“I see little doubt that someone is going to get charged with fraud,” said Bill Singer, a lawyer at Herskovits in New York who provides legal counsel to securities industries firms, and publishes the BrokerandBroker website. Criminal charges are possible, he added.

The trading losses and possible deception from traders are a black eye for JPMorgan Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon, who was respected for keeping his bank consistently profitable during the financial crisis.

Read the full story..

Krugman on the Euro Crisis

Krugman walks us through some of the background and possible outcomes for the current economical crisis in Europe, and he ends up with two equally “impossible” end games, at an even probability.

Something will happen soon.

“I say it’s 50/50 … Either the Germans have to accept something they consider unacceptable, or they have to accept something, the breakup of the euro, that they consider something unacceptable.”

As for which way the Germans lean, he says, “They’re complicated … they’re not all as rigid as they are in official positions.”

Here’s the full interview.

Clinton: Back to Work.

Back to Work.

The beginning of this short book is kind of interesting, as Bill explains why he chose to write it.. And the lack of campaigning and coherent message on the part of the Democrats in the 2010 midterms caused in his view a dramatic loss and indirectly – the problems and perhaps even the downgrade this summer.

From there on he outlines the whole standard centrist, third-way, progressive argument and brings lots of charts and facts about the last thirty years and problems in America.

It’s a bit dry – but it’s an important document, a short read, and it’s sort of a pamphlet with underpinnings for the whole 99% movement and the right-wing destruction of US in the last decades. It’s very “old news” if you follow centrist or liberal/progressive websites – but it gets a different weight coming from a former President who balanced the budget, put the country on the path to eliminating the debt and adding 22 million jobs in the process.

More.

Downgrade.

Kleptocracy hits a wall.

So there it was – one of the big three agencies putting US on a second-rate level in regards to the ability and willingness to fulfill its financial obligations and pay the bills on time.

And in one way it’s just a very lagging indicator, and something that lowers the US position on the economic credit list – after already falling way down on other national indexes like education quality, health care, infrastructure, political system and federal budget sustainability. It’s just the facts.

The S&P had previously put the bar on a $4tr deficit reduction over a decade to maintain the AAA rating, a similar amount to what the political leaders initially tried but failed to accomplish, and thus the agency lost faith in the country’s outlook after the debt-deal landed short of this requirement. The agencies are somewhat reluctant to state things public that could turn them into political players – but between the lines it’s all obvious – a balanced approach could’ve avoided this.

So now the US is downgraded by US rating agencies (top chinese agencies have already done it twice this year), the deficit is still growing, the debt crossed 100% of GDP last week, unemployment is standing still (with unofficial numbers at 20%), companies are hoarding cash, new jobs are made overseas, and a bunch of delusional and angry folks in Congress are blocking everything.

This has to shred at some point.

Watching some interesting cable shows on russian or iranian state tv networks gave some refreshing perspectives last night. Lots of centrist and pragmatic americans are starting to fill up the international talk shows and saying things out loud that would’ve been quickly banned by the US corporate media. Moderate politicians, academics and pundits are sharing their straight views with the rest of the world. The gist of it: the 1% parasites are driving this. And it’s taken too far.

And one misplaced thing about the whole debate in Washington, from a centrist point of view, is this wrapping of necessary policy choices into terms like “shared sacrifice” and “protecting the most vulnerable”. It’s simply about what works. Delusional economics creates disaster for all. At this point it’s not about “fairness” – it’s about survival.

Luckily though, according to polls, a solid 80% of the people are already on the right page in terms of choosing a balanced approach, views on the digusting July in congress, taking the middle road for the future, and doing what’s right to fix the country and move forward.

So right now it’s all about cleaning out the crazies in congress, passing some bills to make jobs and new revenues, and curbing the 1% parasites. The sooner, the better.