Why Rob’s right

by | Sep 25, 2014 | Economy, Editor's Blog, NC Politics | 5 comments

For political junkies the debate between Rob Christensen, columnist for the News & Observer, and John Hood, president of the John Locke Foundation, is just delicious. Hood argues that North Carolina is not exceptional in its growth and is actually quite similar to its Southern neighbors. Christensen calls it revisionist history and that, in fact, North Carolina has outpaced most other Southern states for decades, if not for most of the past century.

I obviously side with Rob in this spat. Hood’s argument relies on a very narrow measure to look at the progress of the state. He relies almost solely on GDP and per capita income. His analysis is about numbers, not people.

Coincidentally, Neil Irwin, the senior economics writer for the New York Times, wrote a piece about the latest Census Bureau report on how well Americans are faring economically. The piece is titled “You Can’t Feed a Family with GDP.” As Irwin notes, GDP says nothing about how the money from growth is distributed or how it affects families.

And that’s the problem with John’s analysis. While we may not have significantly exceeded our neighbors’ GDP or per capita income, the benefits were distributed much more evenly. As Irwin notes, “The rubber-meets-road measure of whether the economy is working for the mass of Americans is median real income and related measures of how much money is making its way into their pockets and what they can buy with that money.”

Using those measures, we have consistently and substantially outpaced our neighbors. Our median income has been higher for decades until the economic crash. On almost every quality of life measure, our families have fared better. That’s because of the political choices our leaders have made. 

Now, as we try to move out of the recession, we’re seeing an unequal recovery. Our per capita income is increasing at a healthy rate but our median income is not. So far, the benefits of our sluggish recovery are going to the people who got hurt the least. 

So if the most important measure of prosperity is the rate of economic growth, then we’ve not done substantially better than our Southern neighbors. If the most important measures are the strength of the middle class and health and welfare of our citizens, we’ve done significantly better.

5 Comments

  1. Mick

    Thanks, Daniel, David, Troy for your input. And too bad, Daniel, that entities like the Locke Foundation will never give any credence to the words of a JFK. Today, even many statements/insights offered by Ronald Reagan are ignored by arch-conservatives, as his words are deemed to be much too liberal, given the current stripe of conservatism.

  2. Mick

    But why should be surprised at all that the Locke Foundation only wants to keep the public discourse on GDP, rate of economic growth, and job numbers? They certainly have never shown signs that they ever try to understand or empathize with the wage earner side of the state’s economic circumstances.

    None of those measures adequately gauge the human context and costs of what’s really going on. As you say, NC’s median income is down, and it’s clear that any growth in our per capita income has been skewed upward by income increases for the top 20 percent of earners. And as far as jobs go, too many of our new jobs are lower paying and at reduced hours, tolerated/accepted by those in those jobs because of harder economic times and a tougher job market..

  3. Troy

    Hood is like most conservative pundits. He wants to lump the majority of people together and claim that they are all relatively the same and non-exceptional, except when he panders for votes, then he shows up with scraps from the table and proclaims it’s ‘just for you’. He reserves the top tiers as an outlier and entity unto itself; statistically, socially, and politically. They are a ‘class’ unto themselves, literally, and the engine around which the entire machine runs.

    Am I promoting class division? Nope, I’m just pointing it out. People like John Hood have bolded the lines with their beliefs and polices and fight to perpetuate them further. They have done their own version of wealth distribution by writing the rules and laws necessary to shift that distribution up.

  4. Daniel Gilligan

    “Our Gross National Product, now, is over $800 billion dollars a year, but that Gross National Product – if we judge the United States of America by that – that Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman’s rifle and Speck’s knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.” – Robert F. Kennedy 3/18/68 http://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Research-Aids/Ready-Reference/RFK-Speeches/Remarks-of-Robert-F-Kennedy-at-the-University-of-Kansas-March-18-1968.aspx

  5. David E. Turner

    It’s a perfect example of how anyone can spin history to fit their ideology. Personally, I agree that the more important gauge is the effect across the entire spectrum for folks in NC. We’re falling behind and seeing more inequality creeping in under the hard right turn the Governor and Legislators are taking the State. Those that can least afford to pay the price, are paying dearly.

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