Is All the Economic Growth a Crock?

The recent claims that the economy has been growing at “record pace”, at least a record for the last few dismal years, is coming under fire from many who will be surprised to see any sort of economic growth or strength continue beyond the massive government payouts and programs that have been put into place to help artificially inflate the economy. Once these programs are done, and many of them are, they think we will start to see a true picture of how fragile this recovery really is, and how strong this so called recovery is for real.

Very scary thoughts I know, but it’s good sometimes to be realistic about these things too and not get too caught up in these artificial numbers that are being thrown out there to make people feel a little better and not totally freak out and lose all hope over the state of the economy. The latest news shows that incomes are still flat, unemployment is flirting with ten percent, which is over a quarter decade high still, and that the consumer spending we’ve seen in months past was largely due to government backed programs that simply can’t go on forever. So, where is the sustainability in that?

There really isn’t, and that is the problem that people are now starting to see. The true, lasting recovery is going to be fueled by employment. When more people have jobs and less people are getting paycuts or getting laid off, that is when we will see the start of a truly sustainable, realistic recovery that we will all benefit from in numerous ways.

My fiance just worked for a soup kitchen and he said that some of the stories he heard were pretty close to home. There were men and women coming there who had jobs, but got laid off and couldn’t find other work. Of course, there are always people there that don’t try also, but there were a lot who seemed to be genuinely trying and not having luck. Unfortunately, this is the state of things right now, and we’re going to have to wait it out a little longer for a true recovery to begin.