TRACKING HURRICANE BUSH….The economy is really kicking ass. From the Washington Post:
The nation’s poverty rate rose to 12.7 percent of the population last year, the fourth consecutive annual increase, the Census Bureau said Tuesday.
The percentage of people without health insurance did not change….Charles Nelson, an assistant division chief at the Census Bureau, said the percentage of uninsured remained steady because of an “increase in government coverage, notably Medicaid and the state children’s health insurance program, that offset a decline in employment-based coverage.”
….The median household income, meanwhile, stood at $44,389, unchanged from 2003.
Question 1: what’s the point of a strong economy if it produces higher poverty rates, declining private sector healthcare coverage, and stagnant incomes?
Question 2: Whenever there are any nuggets of good employment news, the explanation from various quarters is either (a) tax cuts or (b) welfare reform. Do these two things also get the credit when there’s bad news?
Just asking….
