JFK a democrat cut the 90% tax and the economy took off like a rocket. guess you boys forgot that!
I am very well off, and I never worked under a union, unions hold up the slackers and I don't give a crap workers. I learned what I wanted to do and learned how to do it fast a well. People came to my home asking me to come and work for them while I was already employed. Unions are part of the reason our corporation moved to China and Mexico. There yearly bribery for a new contract drove the Corps away.
When I went to school, there was SHOP, woodshop and metal shop. Kids could learn how to weld and lots
more, a welder today can make $100,000 a year. But no more, we import foreigners and pay them and our kids look for the government to give them aid.
As long as we have dopes things I fear will never change. You guys just want to blame someone
but you have no idea as to what is going on!

JFK a democrat cut the 90% tax and the economy took off like a rocket. guess you boys forgot that!
I am very well off, and I never worked under a union, unions hold up the slackers and I don't give a crap workers. I learned what I wanted to do and learned how to do it fast a well. People came to my home asking me to come and work for them while I was already employed. Unions are part of the reason our corporation moved to China and Mexico. There yearly bribery for a new contract drove the Corps away.
When I went to school, there was SHOP, woodshop and metal shop. Kids could learn how to weld and lots
more, a welder today can make $100,000 a year. But no more, we import foreigners and pay them and our kids look for the government to give them aid.
As long as we have dopes things I fear will never change. You guys just want to blame someone
but you have no idea as to what is going on!

╭∩╮(-_-)╭∩╮

NYT Archive: The Reagan Boom - Greatest Ever

Almost everyone knows that the greatest depression the U.S. ever had was in the 1930's. It was known as the Great Depression, and its infamy merits a separate section in economics textbooks. But what was its counterpart? When did our greatest economic expansion occur?

We just had it. And it is still expanding, setting new records with each passing month.

We don't know whether historians will call it the Great Expansion of the 1980's or Reagan's Great Expansion, but we do know from official economic statistics that the seven year period from 1982 to 1989 was the greatest, consistent burst of economic activity ever seen in the U.S. In fact, it was the greatest economic expansion the world has ever seen - in any country, at any time.

The two key measures that mark a depression or expansion are jobs and production. Let's look at the records that were set. Creation of jobs. From November 1982, when President Ronald Reagan's new economic program was beginning to take effect, to November 1989, 18.7 million new jobs were created. It was a world record: Never before had so many jobs been created during a comparable time period. The new jobs covered the entire spectrum of work, and more than half of them paid more than $20,000 a year. As total employment grew to 119.5 million, the rate of unemployment fell to slightly over 5 percent, the lowest level in 15 years. Creation of wealth.

The amount of wealth produced during this seven year period was stupendous - some $30 trillion worth of goods and services. Again, it was a world record. Never before had so much wealth been produced during a comparable period. According to a recent study, net asset values - including stocks, bonds and real estate - went up by more than $5 trillion between 1982 and 1989, an increase of roughly 50 percent.

There are other important measures. Steady economic growth. As we begin the decade of the 1990's, we are in our 86th straight month of economic growth - a new record for peacetime, five months longer than the wartime growth of World War II and only 23 months short of the wartime record set during the Vietnam War in the 1960's. Most experts now predict that it will last right through 1990, and perhaps beyond.

Income tax rates, interest rates and inflation.

Under President Reagan, top personal income tax rates were lowered dramatically, from 70 percent to 28 percent. This policy change was the prime force behind the record breaking economic expansion. Interest rates and inflation also fell sharply and, so far, have stayed comfortably low - a further indication of the power and pervasiveness of Mr. Reagan's economic policies. The stock market. Perhaps the key indicator of an economy's booms and busts is the stock market, the bottom line economic report card. And here the record has been striking. During the period from 1970 to 1982, the stock market barely moved. The Standard & Poor's index of 500 stocks inched up about 35 percent during that entire period. But starting in late 1982, just as Reaganomics began to work, the stock market took off like a giant skyrocket. Since then, the Standard & Poor's index has soared, reaching a record high of 360, almost triple what it was in 1982.

There were other consequences of the expansion. Annual Federal spending on public housing and welfare, and on Social Security, Medicare and health all increased by billions of dollars. The poverty rate has fallen steadily since 1983.

When you add up the record of the Reagan years, and the first year of President Bush - during which he has faithfully continued Mr. Reagan's economic policies - the conclusion is clear, inescapable and stunning. We have just witnessed America's Great Expansion.

The Reagan economic expansion was not perfect and we will never have one that is. The Federal budget deficits were too high and still are, too many Federal regulations lay unreformed and the trade deficit is worrisome.

In fact, the Reagan expansion may not have been the best economic expansion in history, for every economic expansion must be judged by many criteria. But if we look at the sheer size and immensity of it, at its scope and power, then it cannot be denied that it was the greatest.

The full impact of the powerful economic recovery that President Reagan launched during the 1980s is still unfolding.

Mr. Reagan's expansion provided the financial resources to allow the U.S. to build up the combat capability of its defense forces and to begin blazing the new trail for a protective missile system. This, in turn, convinced the Soviet rulers they could never defeat the U.S., and today the Soviet Union and the U.S. are busily engaged in nuclear disarmament as peace breaks out in country after country throughout the world.

Equally important, it proved beyond doubt to all (except perhaps for a handful of left-wing faculty members in our best universities) that capitalism is superior to Socialism and C*******m. Our economy is the guiding beacon for all those countries that are ripping apart the ruthless collectivist regimes that ruined the lives of their people for so long.

One thing the Marxists got right: Economics is a powerful determining factor of history. But Marxists never dreamed it would be the economics of Ronald Reagan and all those capitalists that would prevail in the end.

When you speak from facts you lived its rather difficult to discredit your t***hs...Well said and Thank You...

My father, a staunch Republican truly admired Kennedy.. He also said LBJ k**led him...Like you he often spoke of the Unions corruption and endeavors to ens***e the workers...Said they would ultimately be the death of the working class mainstream of our country, etc... Seems that is also true. They are big business all right but not for the worker, for those they support in government, absolutely..

If you could go back to 1950, would you do it? There would be no Internet, no cellphones and you would only be able to watch television in black and white. But even though they lacked many of our modern conveniences, people genuinely seemed to be much happier back then.

Families actually ate dinner together, neighbors knew and cared about one another, and being an "American" truly meant something.

Today, we like to think that we are so much more "advanced" than they were back then, but the t***h is that our society is in the process of falling apart all around us. Could it be possible that we could learn some important lessons by looking back at how Americans lived 70 years ago?


Of course there has never been any era in our history when everything has been perfect. But without a doubt, things are vastly different today than they were back in 1950...

In 1950, Texaco Star Theatre, The Lone Ranger and Hopalong Cassidy were some of the most popular shows that Americans watched on television.

In 2020, a Netflix film entitled "Cuties" is so trashy and so d********g that four states have sent a letter to Netflix asking for it to be removed because it is "fodder for those with criminal imaginations, serving to normalize the view that children are sexual beings."

In 1950, television networks would not even show husbands and wives in bed together.

In 2020, "adult websites" get more traffic than Netflix, Amazon and Twitter combined.

In 1950, people would greet one another as they walked down the street.

In 2020, Americans are too enamored with their cellphones to be bothered with actual human contact.

In 1950, gum chewing and talking in class were some of the major disciplinary problems in our schools.

In 2020, kids are literally gunning down police officers in the streets.

In 1950, people would make an effort to dress up and look nice when they would go out in public.

In 2020, most of the population has become utter slobs and "People of Walmart" has become one of our most popular memes.

In 1950, the typical woman got married for the first time at age 20 and the typical man got married for the first time at age 22.

In 2020, the typical woman gets married for the first time at age 27 and the typical man gets married for the first time at age 29.


In 1950, a lot of people would leave their homes and their vehicles unlocked because crime rates were so low.

In 2020, many that live in urban areas are deathly afraid of all the civil unrest that has erupted, and gun sales have soared to all-time record highs.

In 1950, Americans actually attempted to parent their children.

In 2020, we pump our kids full of mind-altering drugs and we let our televisions and our video games raise our children.

In 1950, Baltimore was one of the most beautiful and most prosperous cities on the entire planet.

In 2020, Baltimore regularly makes headlines because of all the murders that are constantly occurring. Of course the exact same thing could be said about many of our other major cities.

In 1950, 78 percent of all households in America contained a married couple.

In 2020, that figure has fallen below 50 percent.

In 1950, about 5 percent of all babies in the United States were born to unmarried parents.

In 2020, about 40 percent of all babies in the United States will be born to unmarried parents.

In 1950, new churches were regularly being opened all over the United States.

In 2020, it is being projected that 1 out of every 5 churches in the U.S. "could be forced to shut their doors in the next 18 months", and the mayor of Lubbock, Texas just said that opening a new Planned Parenthood clinic is like starting a church.

In 1950, we actually had high standards for our elected officials, and people actually did research on the candidates before they cast their v**es.

In 2020, more than 4,000 people in one county in New Hampshire v**ed for a "t***ssexual Satanic anarchist" in the Republican primary, and she is now the Republican nominee for sheriff in Cheshire County.

In 1950, children would go outside and play when they got home from school.


In 2020, our parks and our playgrounds are virtually empty and we have the highest childhood obesity rate in the industrialized world.

In 1950, front porches were community gathering areas, and people would regularly have their neighbors over for dinner.

In 2020, many of us don't know our neighbors at all, and the average American watches more than five hours of television a day.

In 1950, Americans used words such as "knucklehead", "moxie" and "jalopy".

In 2020, new terms such as "nomophobia", "peoplekind" and "social distancing" have been introduced into the English language.

In 1950, the very first credit card was issued in the United States.

In 2020, Americans owe more than 930 billion dollars on their credit cards.

In 1950, one income could support an entire middle class household.

In 2020, tens of millions of Americans have lost their jobs and filed for unemployment, and more than half of all households in some of our largest cities are currently facing "serious financial problems".

In 1950, the American people believed that the free market should govern the economy.

In 2020, most Americans seem to believe that the government in Washington and the Federal Reserve must endlessly "manage" the economy.

In 1950, "socialists" and "c*******ts" were considered to be our greatest national enemies.

In 2020, most of our politicians in Washington have eagerly embraced socialist and c*******t policy goals.

In 1950, the U.S. Constitution was deeply loved and highly revered.

In 2020, anyone that actually admits to being a "constitutionalist" is considered to be a potential d******c t*******t.

In 1950, the United States loaned more money to the rest of the world than anybody else.

In 2020, the United States owes more money to the rest of the world than anybody else.

In 1950, the total U.S. national debt reached the 257 billion dollar mark for the first time in our history.

In 2020, we added 864 billion dollars to the national debt in the month of June alone. In other words, we added over three times more to the national debt in that one month than the total amount of debt that had been accumulated from the founding of our nation all the way to 1950.

In 1950, most Americans were generally happy with their lives.

In 2020, the suicide rate is at an all-time record high, and it has been rising every single year since 2007.

So, where is America going? It is not looking good at all!

jack,, no surprise, I said you had never worked with a union... the lose of unions, most notable under Reagan, was one of the final nails in the coffin of the middle class.. along with the writings from the 70s which demonized the labor section of an economy as an enemy rather then an equal part..

without union representation the average wage earner is underpaid, deprived of opportunity and left with out recourse...

The existence of a union or even the idea of one, also affects the pay/opportunity of low level non-union employees..

If you think a business 1.. gives out jobs as a kindness because they have a lot of money laying around you are among the most gullible in our nation.. Jobs are only given if great need.. the last thing a business wants to do is bring in any new jobs. Only when the need dictates is that done..

And every large business also has people/a person who has the job of keeping pay as low as possible.. with no representation and support from a union the pay and perks will be as low as the subsistence level..

And while Unions and cost of labor are always posed as the great reason for the flood to off shore our mfg economy, as my post stated the real reason was and is to this very day.. the refusal of corporation to invest in our country.. using money from all sources to buy back stock rather the invest demands that they have to find options for the lost infrastructure in the USA. That sends them off shore to the lowest cost country they can find. that is lowest in every way, not only labor but construction , t***sportation and any other operation cost they can reduce..

And again the law that allowed this to happen was passed during the republican administration of Reagan.. that law, along with citizens united are the two major events in the 20th century which have nearly destroyed the middle class.. and trump promises much more of the same..


the fact that you were happy with your wage means not a thing. all of the middle class must be healthy and robust for a strong America, not only a chosen few..

Henry Ford knew this and made the well paid 8 hour day a normal for the workers of America..

And he did it not for the workers but so that he as an auto maker would have the large population who could afford to buy his cars..