Companies are hoarding massive amounts of cash and are not creating jobs in U.S.

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HERE’S A CURRENT PORTRAIT OF WHO THE TEAPARTY REPUBLICANS ARE WILLING TO DESTROY OUR COUNTRY FOR, just to spare them any small tax increase or loss of a loophole or tax subsidy: The Great American “Job Creators” from NPR –

Companies can borrow money very cheaply right now, so instead of paying off their debts, they can sit on cash as long as possible. But there’s a more basic reason companies are hoarding money: The U.S. economy simply isn’t growing enough.

The labor market is weak, which hampers consumption, notes Charles Biderman, chief executive officer of the research firm TrimTabs. “So without growing income, where’s the money to buy more stuff?” he says. “Absent a change in demand, the fact that companies have all this cash, well, good for them. It’s not going to help us.”

And with the economy limping along, companies are simply reluctant to invest and hire.

“The bottom line is that a large number of very successful U.S. companies are on a wait-and-see mode with the U.S. economy in particular,” says Anant Sundaram, who teaches at Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business.

[...] during recessions, companies usually try to rebuild their balance sheets. They lay people off, they pay off their debts, and they emerge healthier and ready to invest their money again. But not this time. “That is something we’re not seeing a great deal of, and that is leading to the cash increase,” Sundaram says. And this means companies are also not hiring, at least in the United States. Moody’s Lane says a lot of American companies make more and more of their profits overseas in fast-growing places like China, Brazil and India.

Read the rest….

It comes back to this cycle we’ve been running through for 30+ years: erosion of the working- and middle-class and labor unions = no good jobs = no extra money to spend = no demand for goods / services = no new jobs created as demand shrinks = the wealthy hoarding their money…

The Republican party has set up a bottom-to-top income redistribution system that’s increased the wealth of the wealthy and increased the profits of profitable corporations — and both groups are now rolling in cash. It’s no surprise that they’re hoarding their cash and NOT reinvesting in the United States of America.

It seems like Patriotism is so 1950s. It used to mean one was devoted to the USA’s success and well-being. But today’s teabagger is patriotic only to ‘Republican Jesus’ (who magically lives in the Old Testament) and fundamentalist politicians who promise to step on the rights of people or ideas that they personally abhor. The Teaparty has proven that they’ll gladly see America crash and burn for their twisted ideology. And, similarly, today’s corporate CEO feels patriotic only to his company’s shareholders and his year-end bonus checks — there’s no country even involved!

Meanwhile, the rest of us American slobs are trying to decide what federal benefits and services we’ll have to do without to continue financing the tax breaks and loopholes and subsidies for the richest 1 – 2%. No extra revenue? No extra services. Do you receive Social Security disability? Maybe the definition of disability needs to be redefined — save some money, lay off some SS feds, smaller government – hooray! We could retire at 85 (if we’re lucky), and that would cut back spending. We’d be supporting our children into their 50s and 60s, because we’d still be working jobs they’ve been waiting to fill — but it’ll all work out. And forget student loans and Pell Grants — why pay for people to go to college when there are no jobs anyway.

QUESTION FOR THE TEAPARTY BASE VOTER: If 400 individuals currently have more wealth than 50% of Americans combined — and these 400 have held on to (or increased) that wealth since the Reagan Administration according to the WSJ — how much more should they need to amass before we can stop cuts to our services and benefits?  By funding the tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires with spending cuts to benefits and services used by 99% of us, when will they have enough? Will it be enough when they own more wealth than 60% of Americans combined… 70%? 80%? Or maybe not until they own ALL OF IT.

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