The irony is that Herbert seems to have forgotten King’s emphasis on guaranteed income in addition to jobs. Here are the last few paragraphs.

Speaking about one of his many antipoverty initiatives, Dr. King told Look magazine in 1968: “We called our demonstration a campaign for jobs and income because we felt that the economic question was the most crucial that black people, and poor people generally, were confronting.”

That was then. The loudest voices against poverty and economic injustice of all kinds have long since faded. The government, reclining comfortably on a vast cushion of campaign contributions, has allied itself with big business and the big banks against the interests of ordinary Americans. Millions upon millions of families are suffering, but mostly in silence.

We honor Dr. King with a national holiday, but his long campaign for economic justice has been all but forgotten.

Here’s Herbert’s complete piece.

Guaranteed income is necessary. That’s the only way to ensure dignity for all. There will never be enough jobs for everyone because in most situations employers profit by cutting jobs, not creating them. I present that logic in more detail in Peaceful, Positive Revolution: Economic Security for Every American.

Steven Shafarman

The sad reality and absurdity of our economic situation is on display in today’s New York Times. Two front-page stories, conveniently – thoughtfully? deliberately? – placed next to each other, present two sides of “the economy.”

First, because it’s higher on the page, is:

$3.4 Billion Profit at Goldman Revives Gilded Pay Packages

(Online title: With Big Profit, Goldman Sees Big Payday Ahead.)

Here are a few key sentences:

Goldman posted the richest quarterly profit in its 140-year history and, to the envy of its rivals, announced that it had earmarked $11.4 billion so far this year to compensate its workers.

At that rate, Goldman employees could, on average, earn roughly $770,000 each this year — or nearly what they did at the height of the boom.

Senior Goldman executives and bankers would be paid considerably more.

Second is:

In Recession, a Bleaker Path for Workers to Slog

(Online title: Part-Time Workers Mask Unemployment Woes)

A few key sentences:

In California and a handful of other states, one out of every five people who would like to be working full time is not now doing so.

It is a startling sign of the pain that the Great Recession is inflicting, and it is largely missed by the official, oft-repeated statistics on unemployment. The national unemployment rate has risen to 9.5 percent, the highest level in more than a quarter-century. Yet it still excludes all those who have given up looking for a job and those part-time workers who want to be working full time.

The complete articles are here and here.

The article on unemployment includes a link to a labor department data report:

U-6 Total unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers, plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all marginally attached worker … 16.5 percent.

The complete table is here.

Income security for all – a guaranteed basic income for every adult citizen, say $1,000 a month – will ensure that all “marginally attached workers” can afford food and shelter, at least. Plus, people spending that money will stimulate economic growth from the bottom up by demanding goods and services. That would be by far the most direct, rapid, just, and democratic way to end the recession.

Recent economic policies, the conventional approaches using bailouts and subsidies, have directly and obviously enriched Goldman Sachs, but not done a lot for the rest of us.

Some of the questions I ask:

Do we still believe that government should “promote the general welfare”?

Does it make sense to continue subsidizing mostly the special welfare of Goldman, AIG, GM, et. al.?

How much are these absurdities and inequities a result of Goldman execs. holding key government positions over the past two decades?

What kind of society do we want to live in?

We need a peaceful, positive revolution.

It’s time to update ideas from the 1890s, 1930s, and 1960s and enact a guaranteed income. The updated idea is to set some amount, say $1,000 a month, and provide that to every adult citizen. It should be enough for food and shelter, but just enough, so people still have strong incentives to work and earn.

Why don’t we have that? Because we individuals and We the People are not demanding it.

The complete plan, the idea, the benefits, and how we can make it happen, is in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Additional information is on the home page and elsewhere on this web site.

I hope you’ll also comment on this blog. And please help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman

Official unemployment is now 9.5 percent, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. As reported in the New York Times:

The American economy lost 467,000 jobs in June and the unemployment rate edged up to 9.5 percent in a sobering indication that the most painful downturn since the Great Depression has yet to release its hold.

(Note the passive phrasing: “the economy lost 467,000 jobs … the unemployment rate edged up.” That’s so common. Much more honest and meaningful, in my opinion, is to focus on real people, not abstractions. “Another 467,000 people lost their jobs last month.”)

The complete Times story is here.

It’s important to remember that 9.5 percent is just the official number. It excludes people who have given up looking for jobs, those who are only working part-time but would like full-time jobs, and those who have only contingent work. Including all of those, using what some analysts call “Effective Unemployment” the rate is 18.70 percent and the Effective Number of Unemployed is now 30,172,000.

Effective Unemployment is the subject of blog posting from Steve Clemons in the Washington Note:

Each month, I receive from Leo Hindery an update on “America’s effective unemployment rate” which includes not only the official unemployment figures but other data points showing off-the-books unemployed or underemployed people.

…

Hindery writes:

Here is a June 2009 version of the summary that calculates the Effective Unemployment Rate, which is now 18.70%, and the Effective Number of Unemployed, which is now 30,172,000.

There are currently 14,729,000 officially unemployed workers, as just announced. However, this figure does not include the combined 15,443,000 workers either (1) in the “labor force reserve” because they have abandoned their job searches (i.e., 4,278,000) or (2) underemployed because they are “part-time of necessity” (i.e., 8,989,000) or “otherwise marginally attached” (i.e., 2,176,000).

…

It’s important to see the entire picture of America’s jobs profile — no matter how unpleasant.

What are those 30 million people, the effectively unemployed, going to do? How are they going to manage? There aren’t enough jobs, and there won’t be. That would be obvious if we were not so numbed, distracted, and confused by the passive language.

Let’s give every one of the 30 million a guaranteed basic income of, say, $1,000 a month. Every adult citizen ought to get the same amount. Guaranteed. Unconditional. We can and must ensure that every citizen has an income independent of any job. Income security for all.

Millions of Americans demanded guaranteed income in the 1930s, and that’s how we won Social Security. In the 1960s, Martin Luther King Jr. and many moderate politicians and many leading economists also endorsed guaranteed income. It’s time to update the idea and enact it.

The complete plan, the idea, the benefits, and how we can make it happen, is in Peaceful, Positive Revolution,.

Additional information is on the home page and elsewhere on this web site.

I hope you’ll also comment on this blog. And please help spread the word.

Steven Shafarman