GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS.

The Great Depression of the XXI Century

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky and Andrew Gavin Marshall

Global Research, November 20, 2010

2 August 2010

Global Research is pleased to announce the publication of a new book entitled The Global Economic Crisis, The Great Depression of the XXI Century, Michel Chossudovsky and Andrew Gavin Marshall, Editors.
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In all major regions of the world, the economic recession is deep-seated, resulting in mass unemployment, the collapse of state social programs and the impoverishment of millions of people. The meltdown of financial markets was the result of institutionalized fraud and financial manipulation. The economic crisis is accompanied by a worldwide process of militarization, a “war without borders” led by the U.S. and its NATO allies.
This book takes the reader through the corridors of the Federal Reserve, into the plush corporate boardrooms on Wall Street where far-reaching financial transactions are routinely undertaken.
Each of the authors in this timely collection digs beneath the gilded surface to reveal a complex web of deceit and media distortion which serves to conceal the workings of the global economic system and its devastating impacts on people`s lives.
Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (Emeritus) at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal. He is the author of The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order (2003) and America’s “War on Terrorism” (2005). He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His writings have been published in more than twenty languages.
Andrew Gavin Marshall is an independent writer both on the contemporary structures of capitalism as well as on the history of the global political economy. He is a Research Associate with the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

“This important collection offers the reader a most comprehensive analysis of the various facets – especially the financial, social and military ramifications – from an outstanding list of world-class social thinkers.” -Mario Seccareccia, Professor of Economics, University of Ottawa
“In-depth investigations of the inner workings of the plutocracy in crisis, presented by some of our best politico-economic analysts. This book should help put to rest the hallucinations of ‘free market’ ideology.” -Michael Parenti, author of God and His Demons and Contrary Notions
“Provides a very readable exposé of a global economic system, manipulated by a handful of extremely powerful economic actors for their own benefit, to enrich a few at the expense of an ever-growing majority.” -David Ray Griffin, author of The New Pearl Harbor Revisited

The complex causes as well as the devastating consequences of the economic crisis are carefully scrutinized with contributions from Ellen Brown, Tom Burghardt, Michel Chossudovsky, Richard C. Cook, Shamus Cooke, John Bellamy Foster, Michael Hudson, Tanya Cariina Hsu, Fred Magdoff, Andrew Gavin Marshall, James Petras, Peter Phillips, Peter Dale Scott, Bill Van Auken, Claudia von Werlhof and Mike Whitney.
Despite the diversity of viewpoints and perspectives presented within this volume, all of the contributors ultimately come to the same conclusion: humanity is at the crossroads of the most serious economic and social crisis in modern history.

“This meticulous, vital, timely and accessible work unravels the history of a hydra-headed monster: military, media and politics, culminating in “humanity at the crossroads”; the current unprecedented economic and social crisis… From the first page of the preface of The Global Economic Crisis, the reasons for all unravel with compelling clarity. For those asking “why?” this book has the answers.” –Felicity Arbuthnot, award-winning author and journalist based in London.
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“This work is much more than a path-breaking and profound historical analysis of the actors and institutions, it is an affirmation of the authors’ belief that a better world is feasible and that it can be achieved by collective organized actions and faith in the sustainability of a democratic order.” -Frederick Clairmonte, distinguished analyst of the global political economy and author of the 1960s classic, The Rise and Fall of Economic Liberalism: The Making of the Economic Gulag
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The Global Economic Crisis
The Great Depression of the XXI Century
Michel Chossudovsky and Andrew Gavin Marshall (Editors)
TO READ THE PREFACE, CLICK HERE
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface Michel Chossudovsky and Andrew Gavin Marshall
PART I THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS
Chapter 1 The Global Economic Crisis: An Overview Michel Chossudovsky
Chapter 2 Death of the American Empire Tanya Cariina Hsu
Chapter 3 Financial Implosion and Economic Stagnation John Bellamy Foster and Fred Magdoff
Chapter 4 Depression: The Crisis of Capitalism James Petras
Chapter 5 Globalization and Neoliberalism: Is there an Alternative to Plundering the Earth? Claudia von Werlhof
Chapter 6 The Economy’s Search for a “New Normal” Shamus Cooke
PART II GLOBAL POVERTY
Chapter 7 Global Poverty and the Economic Crisis Michel Chossudovsky
Chapter 8 Poverty and Social Inequality Peter Phillips
PART III WAR, NATIONAL SECURITY AND WORLD GOVERNMENT
Chapter 9 War and the Economic Crisis Michel Chossudovsky
Chapter 10 The “Dollar Glut” Finances America’s Global Military Build-Up Michael Hudson
Chapter 11 Martial Law, the Financial Bailout and War Peter Dale Scott
Chapter 12 Pentagon and Intelligence Black Budget Operations Tom Burghardt
Chapter 13 The Economic Crisis “Threatens National Security” in America Bill Van Auken
Chapter 14 The Political Economy of World Government Andrew Gavin Marshall
PART IV THE GLOBAL MONETARY SYSTEM
Chapter 15 Central Banking: Managing the Global Political Economy Andrew Gavin Marshall
Chapter 16 The Towers of Basel: Secretive Plan to Create a Global Central Bank Ellen Brown
Chapter 17 The Financial New World Order: Towards A Global Currency Andrew Gavin Marshall
Chapter 18 Democratizing the Monetary System Richard C. Cook
PART V THE SHADOW BANKING SYSTEM
Chapter 19 Wall Street’s Ponzi Scheme Ellen Brown,
Chapter 20 Securitization: The Biggest Rip-off Ever Mike Whitney
Purchase the Global Economic Crisis. The Great Depression of the XXI Century, Michel Chossudovsky and Andrew Gavin Marshall (Editors)

Articles by: Prof Michel Chossudovsky and Andrew Gavin Marshall

About the author:

Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal and Editor of the globalresearch.ca website. He is the author of The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order (2003) and America’s “War on Terrorism”(2005). His most recent book is entitled Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War (2011). He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His writings have been published in more than twenty languages.

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Robber Barons, Revolution, and Social Control

The Century of Social Engineering, Part 1

By Andrew Gavin Marshall

Global Research, March 10, 2011

10 March 2011

Region: USA

Theme: Culture, Society & History

Robber Barons, Revolution, and Social Control

Introduction
In Part 1 of this series, “The Century of Social Engineering,” I briefly document the economic, political and social background to the 20th century in America, by taking a brief look at the major social upheavals of the 19th century. For an excellent and detailed examination of this history, Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States (which provided much of the research for this article) is perhaps the most expansive and detailed examination. I am not attempting to serve it justice here, as there is much left out of this historically examination than there is included. The purpose of this essay is to examine first of all the rise of class and labour struggle throughout the United States in the 19th century, the rise and dominance of the ‘Robber Baron’ industrialists like J.P. Morgan and John D. Rockefeller, their convergence of interests with the state, and finally to examine the radical new philosophies and theories that arose within the radicalized and activated populations, such as Marxism and Anarchism. I do not attempt to provide exhaustive or comprehensive analyses of these theoretical and philosophical movements, but rather provide a brief glimpse to some of the ideas (particularly those of anarchism), and place them in the historical context of the mass struggles of the 19th century.
America’s Class Struggle
Unbeknownst to most Americans – and for that matter, most people in general – the United States in the 19th century was in enormous upheaval, following on the footsteps of the American Revolution, a revolution which was directed by the landed elite in the American colonies, a new revolutionary spirit arose in the working class populace. The 19th century, from roughly the 1830s onwards, was one great long labour struggle in America.
In the early decades of the 19th century, Eastern capitalists in America began to expand to the West, “and it became important to keep that new West, tumultuous and unpredictable, under control.”[1] The new capitalists favoured monopolization over competition as a method of achieving ‘stability’ and “security to your own property.” The state played its traditional role in securing business interests, as state legislatures gave charters to corporations, granting them legal charters, and “between 1790 and 1860, 2,300 corporations were chartered.”[2] However, as Howard Zinn wrote in A People’s History of the United States:
The attempts at political stability, at economic control, did not quite work. The new industrialism, the crowded cities, the long hours in the factories, the sudden economic crises leading to high prices and lost jobs, the lack of food and water, the freezing winters, the hot tenements in the summer, the epidemics of disease, the deaths of children – these led to sporadic reactions from the poor. Sometimes there were spontaneous, unorganized uprisings against the rich. Sometimes the anger was deflected into racial hatred for blacks, religious warfare against Catholics, nativist fury against immigrants. Sometimes it was organized into demonstrations and strikes.[3]
In the 1830s, “episodes of insurrection” were taking place amid the emergence of unions. Throughout the century, it was with each economic crisis that labour movements and rebellious sentiments would develop and accelerate. Such was the case with the 1837 economic crisis, caused by the banks and leading to rising prices. Rallies and meetings started taking place in several cities, with one rally numbering 20,000 people in Philadelphia. That same year, New York experienced the Flour Riot. With a third of the working class – 50,000 people – out of work in New York alone, and nearly half of New York’s 500,000 people living “in utter and hopeless distress,” thousands of protesters rioted, ultimately leading to police and troops being sent in to crush the protesters.[4]
In 1835 there had been a successful general strike in Philadelphia, where fifty trade unions had organized in favour of a ten-hour work day. In this context, political parties began creating divides between workers and lower class people, as antagonisms developed between many Protestants and Catholics. Thus, middle class politicians “led each group into a different political party (the nativists into the American Republican party, the Irish into the Democratic party), party politics and religion now substituting for class conflict.”[5]
Another economic crisis took place in 1857, and in 1860, a Mechanics Association was formed, demanding higher wages, and called for a strike. Within a week, strikes spread from Lynn, Massachusetts, to towns across the state and into New Hampshire and Maine, “with Mechanics Associations in twenty-five towns and twenty thousand shoe-workers on strike,” marking the largest strike prior to the Civil War.[6] Yet, “electoral politics drained the energies of the resisters into the channels of the system.” While European workers were struggling for economic justice and political democracy, American workers had already achieved political democracy, thus, “their economic battles could be taken over by political parties that blurred class lines.”[7]
The Civil War (1861-1865) served several purposes. First of all, the immediate economic considerations: the Civil War sought to create a single economic system for America, driven by the Eastern capitalists in the midst of the Industrial Revolution, uniting with the West against the slave-labour South. The aim was not freedom for black slaves, but rather to end a system which had become antiquated and unprofitable. With the Industrial Revolution driving people into cities and mechanizing production, the notion of slavery lost its appeal: it was simply too expensive and time consuming to raise, feed, house, clothe and maintain slaves; it was thought more logical and profitable (in an era obsessed with efficiency) to simply pay people for the time they engage in labour. The Industrial Revolution brought with it the clock, and thus time itself became a commodity. As slavery was indicative of human beings being treated as commodities to be bought and sold, owned and used, the Industrial Revolution did not liberate people from servitude and slavery, it simply updated the notions and made more efficient the system of slavery: instead of purchasing people, they would lease them for the time they can be ‘productive’.
Living conditions for the workers and the vast majority, however, were not very different from the conditions of slavery itself. Thus, as the Civil War was sold to the public on the notion of liberating the slaves in the South, the workers of the North felt betrayed and hateful that they must be drafted and killed for a war to liberate others when they themselves were struggling for liberation. Here, we see the social control methods and reorganizing of society that can take place through war, a fact that has always existed and remains today, made to be even more prescient with the advances in technology. During the Civil War, the class conflict among the working people of the United States transformed into a system where they were divided against each other, as religious and racial divisions increasingly erupted in violence. With the Conscription Act of 1863, draft riots erupted in several Northern U.S. cities, the most infamous of which was the New York draft riots, when for three days mobs of rioters attacked recruiting stations, wealthy homes, destroying buildings and killing blacks. Roughly four hundred people were killed after Union troops were called into the city to repress the riots.[8] In the South, where the vast majority of people were not slave owners, but in fact poor white farmers “living in shacks or abandoned outhouses, cultivating land so bad the plantation owners had abandoned it,” making little more than blacks for the same work (30 cents a day for whites as opposed to 20 cents a day for blacks). When the Southern Confederate Conscription Law was implemented in 1863, anti-draft riots erupted in several Southern cities as well.[9]
When the Civil War ended in 1865, hundreds of thousands of soldiers returned to squalor conditions in the major cities of America. In New York alone, 100,000 people lived in slums. These conditions brought a surge in labour unrest and struggle, as 100,000 went on strike in New York, unions were formed, with blacks forming their own unions. However, the National Labour Union itself suppressed the struggle for rights as it focused on ‘reforming’ economic conditions (such as promoting the issuance of paper money), “it became less an organizer of labor struggles and more a lobbyist with Congress, concerned with voting, it lost its vitality.”[10]
The Robber Barons Against Americans
In 1873, another major economic crisis took place, setting off a great depression. Yet, economic crises, while being harmful to the vast majority of people, increasing prices and decreasing jobs and wages, had the effect of being very beneficial to the new industrialists and financiers, who use crisis as an opportunity to wipe out competition and consolidate their power. Howard Zinn elaborated:
The crisis was built into a system which was chaotic in its nature, in which only the very rich were secure. It was a system of periodic crisis – 1837, 1857, 1873 (and later: 1893, 1907, 1919, 1929) – that wiped out small businesses and brought cold, hunger, and death to working people while the fortunes of the Astors, Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, Morgans, kept growing through war and peace, crisis and recovery. During the 1873 crisis, Carnegie was capturing the steel market, Rockefeller was wiping out his competitors in oil.[11]
In 1877, a nation-wide railroad strike took place, infuriating the major railroad barons, particularly J.P. Morgan, offered to lend money to pay army officers to go in and crush the strikes and get the trains moving, which they managed to accomplish fairly well. Strikes took place and soldiers were sent in to Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, and Indiana, with the whole city of Philadelphia in uproar, with a general strike emerging in Pittsburgh, leading to the deployment of the National Guard, who often shot and killed strikers. When all was said and done, a hundred people were dead, a thousand people had gone to jail, 100,000 workers had gone on strike, and the strikes had roused into action countless unemployed in the cities.[12] Following this period, America underwent its greatest spur of economic growth in its history, with elites from both North and South working together against workers and blacks and the majority of people:
They would do it with the aid of, and at the expense of, black labor, white labor, Chinese labor, European immigrant labor, female labor, rewarding them differently by race, sex, national origin, and social class, in such a way as to create separate levels of oppression – a skillful terracing to stabilize the pyramid of wealth.[13]
The bankers and industrialists, particularly Morgan, Rockefeller, Carnegie, Mellon and Harriman, saw enormous increases in wealth and power. At the turn of the century, as Rockefeller moved from exclusively interested in oil, and into iron, copper, coal, shipping, and banking (with Chase Manhattan Bank, now J.P. Morgan Chase), his fortune would equal $2 billion. The Morgan Group also had billions in assets.[14] In 1900, Andrew Carnegie agreed to sell his steel company to J.P. Morgan for $492 million.[15]
Public sentiment at this time, however, had never been so anti-Capitalist and spiteful of the great wealth amassed at the expense of all others. The major industrialists and bankers firmly established their control over the political system, firmly entrenching the two party system through which they would control both parties. Thus, “whether Democrats or Republicans won, national policy would not change in any important way.”[16] Labour struggles had continued and exacerbated throughout the decades following the Civil War. In 1893, another economic depression took place, and the country was again plunged into social upheaval.
The Supreme Court itself was firmly overtaken by the interests of the new elite. Shortly after the Fourteenth Amendment was added to the Constitution to protect newly freed blacks, the Supreme Court began “to develop it as a protection for corporations,” as corporate lawyers argued that corporations were defined as legal ‘persons’, and therefore they could not have their rights infringed upon as stipulated in the Fourteenth Amendment. The Supreme Court went along with this reasoning, and even intervened in state legislative decisions which instead promoted the rights of workers and farmers. Ultimately, “of the Fourteenth Amendment cases brought before thee Supreme Court between 1890 and 1910, nineteen dealt with the Negro, 288 dealt with corporations.”[17]
It was in this context that increasing social unrest was taking place, and thus that new methods of social control were becoming increasingly necessary. Among the restless and disgruntled masses, were radical new social theories that had emerged to fill a void – a void which was created by the inherent injustice of living in a human social system in which there is a dehumanizing power structure.
Philosophies of Liberation and Social Dislocation
It was in this context that new theories and philosophies emerged to fill the void created by the hegemonic ideologies and the institutions which propagate them. While these various critical philosophies expanded human kind’s understanding of the world around them, they did not emerge in a vacuum – that is, separate from various hegemonic ideas, but rather, they were themselves products of and to varying degrees espoused certain biases inherent in the hegemonic ideologies. This arose in the context of increasing class conflict in both the United States and Europe, brought about as a result of the Industrial Revolution. Two of the pre-eminent ideologies and philosophies that emerged were Marxism and Anarchism.
Marxist theory, originating with German philosopher Karl Marx, expanded human kind’s understanding of the nature of capitalism and human society as a constant class struggle, in which the dominant class (the bourgeoisie), who own the means of production (industry) exploit the lower labour class (proletariat) for their own gain. Within Marxist theory, the state itself was seen as a conduit through which economic powers would protect their own interests. Marxist theory espoused the idea of a “proletarian revolution” in which the “workers of the world unite” and overthrow the bourgeoisie, creating a Communist system in which class is eliminated. However, Karl Marx articulated a concept of a “dictatorship of the proletariat” in which upon seizing power, the proletariat would become the new ruling class, and serve its own interests through the state to effect a transition to a Communist society and simultaneously prevent a counterrevolution from the bourgeoisie. Karl Marx wrote in the Communist Manifesto (1848) also on the need for a central bank to manage the monetary system. These concepts led to significant conflict between Marxist and Anarchist theorists.
Anarchism is one of the most misunderstood philosophies in modern historical thought, and with good reason: it’s revolutionary potential was boundless, as it was an area of thought that was not as rigid, doctrinaire or divisive as other theories, both hegemonic and critical. No other philosophy or political theory had the potential to unite both socialists and libertarians, two seemingly opposed concepts that found a home within the wide spectrum of anarchist thought, leading to a situation in which many anarchists refer to themselves as ‘libertarian socialists.’ As Nathan Jun has pointed out:
[A]narchism has never been and has never aspired to be a fixed, comprehensive, self-contained, and internally consistent system of ideas, set of doctrines, or body of theory. On the contrary, anarchism from its earliest days has been an evolving set of attitudes and ideas that can apply to a wide range of social, economic, and political theories, practices, movements, and traditions.[18]
Susan Brown noted that within Anarchist philosophy, “there are mutualists, collectivists, communists, federalists, individualists, socialists, syndicalists, [and] feminists,” and thus, “Anarchist political philosophy is by no means a unified movement.”[19] The word “anarchy” is derived from the Greek word anarkhos, which means “without authority.” Thus, anarchy “is committed first and foremost to the universal rejection of coercive authority,” and that:
[C]oercive authority includes all centralized and hierarchical forms of government (e.g., monarchy, representative democracy, state socialism, etc.), economic class systems (e.g., capitalism, Bolshevism, feudalism, slavery, etc.), autocratic religions (e.g., fundamentalist Islam, Roman Catholicism, etc.), patriarchy, heterosexism, white supremacy, and imperialism.[20]
The first theorist to describe himself as anarchist was Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, a French philosopher and socialist who understood “equality not just as an abstract feature of human nature but as an ideal state of affairs that is both desirable and realizable.”[21] While this was a common concept among socialists, anarchist conceptions of equality emphasized that, “true anarchist equality implies freedom, not quantity. It does not mean that every one must eat, drink, or wear the same things, do the same work, or live in the same manner. Far from it: the very reverse in fact,” as “individual needs and tastes differ, as appetites differ. It is equal opportunity to satisfy them that constitutes true equality.”[22]
Mikhail Bakunin, one of the most prominent anarchist theorists in history, who was also Karl Marx’s greatest intellectual challenger and opposition, explained that individual freedom depends upon not only recognizing, but “cooperating in [the] realization of others’ freedom,” as, he wrote:
My freedom… is the freedom of all since I am not truly free in thought and in fact, except when my freedom and my rights are confirmed and approved in the freedom and rights of all men and women who are my equals.[23]
Anarchists view representative forms of government, such as Parliamentary democracies, with the same disdain as they view overtly totalitarian structures of government. The reasoning is that:
In the political realm, representation involves divesting individuals and groups of their vitality—their power to create, transform, and change themselves. To be sure, domination often involves the literal destruction of vitality through violence and other forms of physical coercion. As a social-physical phenomenon, however, domination is not reducible to aggression of this sort. On the contrary, domination operates chiefly by “speaking for others” or “representing others to themselves”—that is, by manufacturing images of, or constructing identities for, individuals and groups.[24]
Mikhail Bakunin wrote that, “Only individuals, united through mutual aid and voluntary association, are entitled to decide who they are, what they shall be, how they shall live.” Thus, with any hierarchical or coercive institutions, the natural result is oppression and domination, or in other words, spiritual death.[25]
Anarchism emerged indigenously and organically in America, separate from its European counterparts. The first anarchists in America could be said to be “the Antinomians, Quakers, and other left-wing religious groups who found the authority, dogma, and formalism of the conventional churches intolerable.” These various religious groups came to develop “a political outlook which emphasized the anti-libertarian nature of the state and government.” One of the leaders of these religious groups, Adin Ballou, declared that “the essence of Christian morality is the rejection of force, compromise, and the very institution of government itself.” Thus, a Christian “is not merely to refrain from committing personal acts of violence but is to take positive steps to prevent the state from carrying out its warlike ambitions.”[26] This development occurred within the first decades of the 19th century in America.
In the next phase of American philosophical anarchism, inspiration was drawn from the idea of individualism. Josiah Warren, known as the “first American anarchist,” had published the first anarchist periodical in 1833, the Peaceful Revolutionist. Many others joined Warren in identifying the state as “the enemy” and “maintaining that the only legitimate form of social control is self-discipline which the individual must impose upon himself without the aid of government.” Philosophical anarchism grew in popularity, and in the 1860s, two loose federations of anarchists were formed in the New England Labor Reform League and the American Labor Reform League, which “were the source of radical vitality in America for several decades.” American anarchists were simultaneously developing similar outlooks and ideas as Proudhon was developing in Europe. One of the most prominent American anarchists, Benjamin Tucker, translated Proudhon’s work in 1875, and started his own anarchist journals and publications, becoming “the chief political theorist of philosophical anarchism in America.”[27]
Tucker viewed anarchism as “a rejection of all formalism, authority, and force in the interest of liberating the creative capacities of the individual,” and that, “the anarchist must remove himself from the arena of politics, refusing to implicate himself in groups or associations which have as their end the control or manipulation of political power.” Thus, Tucker, like other anarchists, “ruled out the concepts of parliamentary and constitutional government and in general placed himself and the anarchist movement outside the tradition of democracy as it had developed in America.” Anarchism has widely been viewed as a violent philosophy, and while that may be the case for some theorists and adherents, many anarchist theorists and philosophies rejected the notion of violence altogether. After all, its first adherents in America were driven to anarchist theory simply as a result of their uncompromising pacifism. For the likes of Tucker and other influential anarchist theorists, “the state, rather than being a real structure or entity, is nothing more than a conception. To destroy the state then, is to remove this conception from the mind of the individual.” Thus, the act of revolution “has nothing whatever to do with the actual overthrow of the existing governmental machinery,” and Proudhon opined that, “a true revolution can only take place as mankind becomes enlightened.” Revolution, to anarchists, was not an imminent reality, even though it may be an inevitable outcome:
The one thing that is certain is that revolution takes place not by a concerted uprising of the masses but through a process of individual social reformation or awakening. Proudhon, like Tucker and the native American anarchists, believed that the function of anarchism is essentially educational… The state will be abolished at the point at which people in general have become convinced of its un-social nature… When enough people resist it to the point of ignoring it altogether, the state will have been destroyed as completely as a scrap of paper is when it is tossed into a roaring fire.[28]
In the 1880s, anarchism was taken up by many of the radical immigrants coming into America from Europe, such as Johann Most and Emma Goldman, a Jewish Russian feminist anarchist. The press portrayed Goldman “as a vile and unsavory devotee of revolutionary violence.” Goldman partook in an attempted assassination of Henry C. Frick, an American industrialist and financier, historically known as one of the most ruthless businessmen and referred to as “the most hated man in America.” This was saying something in the era of J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller. Emma Goldman later regretted the attempted assassination and denounced violence as an anarchist methodology. However, she came to acknowledge a view similar to Kropotkin’s (another principle anarchist philosopher), “that violence is the natural consequence of repression and force”:
The state, in her opinion, sows the seeds of violence when it lends it authority and force to the retardation of social change, thereby creating deep-seated feelings of injustice and desperation in the collective unconscious. “I do not advocate violence, government does this, and force begets force.”[29]
The general belief was that “social violence is never arbitrary and meaningless. There is always a deep-seated cause standing behind every deed.” Thus:
Social violence, she argued, will naturally disappear at the point at which men have learned to understand and accommodate themselves to one another within a dynamic society which truly values human freedom. Until then we can expect to see pent up hostility and frustration of certain individuals and groups explode from time to time with the spontaneity and violence of a volcano.[30]
Thus we have come to take a brief glimpse of the social upheaval and philosophies gripping and spreading across the American (and indeed the European) landscape in the 19th century. As a radical reaction to the revolutionizing changed brought by the Industrial Revolution, class struggle, labor unrest, Marxism and Anarchism arose within a populace deeply unsatisfied, horrifically exploited, living in desperation and squalor, and lighting within them a spark – a desire – for freedom and equality. They were not ideologically or methodologically unified, specifically in terms of the objectives and ends; yet, their enemies were the same. It as a struggle among the people against the prevailing and growing sources of power: the state and Capitalist industrialization. The emergence of corporations in America after the Civil War (themselves a creation of the state), created new manifestations of exploitation, greed and power. The Robber Barons were the personification of ‘evil’ and in fact were quite openly and brazenly ruthless. The notion of ‘public relations’ had not yet been invented, and so the industrialists would openly and violently repress and crush struggles, strikes and protests. The state was, after all, firmly within their grip.
It was this revolutionary fervour that permeated the conniving minds of the rich and powerful within America, that stimulated the concepts of social control, and laid the foundations for the emergence of the 20th century as the ‘century of social engineering.’
In Part 2 of “The Century of Social Engineering,” I will identify new ideas of domination, oppression and social control that arose in response to the rise of new ideas of liberation and resistance in the 19th century. This process will take us through the emergence of the major universities and a new educational system, structure and curriculum, the rise of the major philanthropic foundations, and the emergence of public relations. The combination of these three major areas: education, philanthropy, and public relations (all of which interact and are heavily interdependent), merged and implemented powerful systems of social control, repressing the revolutionary upheaval of the 19th century and creating the conditions to transform American, and in fact, global society in the 20th century.
Andrew Gavin Marshall is a Research Associate with the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). He is co-editor, with Michel Chossudovsky, of the recent book, “The Global Economic Crisis: The Great Depression of the XXI Century,” available to order at Globalresearch.ca. He is currently working on a forthcoming book on ’Global Government’.
Notes
[1]        Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States (Harper Perennial: New York, 2003), page 219
[2]        Ibid, pages 219-220.
[3]        Ibid, page 221.
[4]        Ibid, pages 224-225.
[5]        Ibid, pages 225-226.
[6]        Ibid, page 231.
[7]        Ibid, page 232.
[8]        Ibid, pages 235-236.
[9]        Ibid, pages 236-237.
[10]      Ibid, pages 241-242.
[11]      Ibid, page 242.
[12]      Ibid, pages 245-251.
[13]      Ibid, page 253.
[14]      Ibid, pages 256-257.
[15]      Ibid, page 257.
[16]      Ibid, page 258.
[17]      Ibid, pages 260-261.
[18]      Nathan Jun, “Anarchist Philosophy and Working Class Struggle: A Brief History and Commentary,” WorkingUSA: The Journal of Labor and Society (Vol. 12, September 2009), page 505
[19]      Ibid, page 506.
[20]      Ibid, pages 507-508.
[21]      Ibid, page 509.
[22]      Ibid, page 510.
[23]      Ibid, pages 510-511.
[24]      Ibid, page 512.
[25]      Ibid, page 512.
[26]      William O. Reichert, “Toward a New Understanding of Anarchism,” The Western Political Quarterly (Vol. 20, No. 4, December 1967), page 857.
[27]      Ibid, page 858.
[28]      Ibid, pages 858-860.
[29]      Ibid, pages 860-861.
[30]      Ibid, page 862.

Articles by: Andrew Gavin Marshall

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Towards a World War III Scenario.

New E-Book from Global Research Publishers

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky

Global Research, June 30, 2011

8 June 2011

Region: USA

Theme: US NATO War Agenda

6 4 11
404

The following is a preview from the preface of a newly released E-book by Global Research Publishers
“Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War” by Michel Chossudovsky

E-Book Series No. 1.0
Global Research Publishers
Montreal, 2011,
ISBN 978-0-9737147-3-9
76 pages (8.5×11)
Tables, color photographs, maps, text boxes.
Active hyperlinks to major references in the text, hyperlinked footnotes.
Scroll down for Detailed Table of Contents
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Introductory offer: $5.00 (plus $1.50 processing fee. Sent directly to your email!)
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The World is at a critical crossroads. The Fukushima disaster in Japan has brought to the forefront the dangers of Worldwide nuclear radiation.
Coinciding with the onset of the nuclear crisis in Japan, a new regional war theater has opened up in North Africa, under the disguise of a UN sponsored “humanitarian operation” with the mandate to “protect civilian lives”.
These two seemingly unrelated events are of crucial importance in understanding both the nuclear issue as well as the ongoing US-NATO sponsored war, which has now extended its grip into Libya. The crisis in Japan has been described as “a nuclear war without a war”. Its potential repercussions, which are yet to be fully assessed, are far more serious than the Chernobyl disaster, as acknowledged by several scientists.
The crisis in Japan has also brought into the open the unspoken relationship between nuclear energy and nuclear war. Nuclear energy is not a civilian economic activity. It is an appendage of the nuclear weapons industry which is controlled by the so-called defense contractors. The powerful corporate interests behind nuclear energy and nuclear weapons overlap. In Japan at the height of the disaster, “the nuclear industry and government agencies [were] scrambling to prevent the discovery of atomic-bomb research facilities hidden inside Japan’s civilian nuclear power plants”.[1] The media consensus is that the crisis at Fukushima’s five nuclear power plants has been contained. The realties are otherwise. The Japanese government has been obliged to acknowledge that “the severity rating of its nuclear crisis … matches that of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster”. Moreover, the dumping of highly radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean constitutes a potential trigger to a process of global radioactive contamination. Radioactive elements have not only been detected in the food chain in Japan, radioactive rain water has been recorded in California:
“Hazardous radioactive elements being released in the sea and air around Fukushima accumulate at each step of various food chains (for example, into algae, crustaceans, small fish, bigger fish, then humans; or soil, grass, cow’s meat and milk, then humans). Entering the body, these elements – called internal emitters – migrate to specific organs such as the thyroid, liver, bone, and brain, continuously irradiating small volumes of cells with high doses of alpha, beta and/or gamma radiation, and over many years often induce cancer”.[2]
A New War Theater in North Africa
The War on Libya was launched within days of the Fukushima disaster. As we go to press, a dangerous process of military escalation is ongoing. NATO warplanes are hitting civilian targets in Libya including residential areas and government buildings in violation of international law.
The war on Libya is an integral part of the broader military agenda in the Middle East and Central Asia which until recently consisted of three distinct areas of conflict : Afghanistan and Pakistan (the AfPak War), Iraq, Palestine. A fourth war theater has opened up in North Africa, which raises the issue of escalation over a vast geographical area. These four war theaters are interrelated. They are part of a broader region of conflict, which extends from North Africa and the Middle East, engulfing a large part of the Mediterranean basin, to China’s Western frontier with Afghanistan, and Northern Pakistan.
How does the war on Libya relate to this broader US-NATO military agenda?
Is a World War III scenario unfolding?
Is the use of nuclear weapons contemplated in North Africa?
With regard to nuclear doctrine, the concept of a US sponsored pre-emptive nuclear attack applies to a number of countries or “rogue states” including Libya. An all out war against the Qadhafi regime has been on the drawing board of the Pentagon for more than 20 years, Moreover, Libya was the first country to be tagged for a preemptive attack using tactical nuclear weapons.[3] The Clinton administration’s plan to nuke Libya had been announced in no uncertain terms in a 1996 Department of Defense press briefing:
“[The] Air Force would use the B61-11 [nuclear weapon] against Libya’s alleged underground chemical weapons plant at Tarhunah if the President decided that the plant had to be destroyed. ‘We could not take [Tarhunah] out of commission using strictly conventional weapons,’ Smith told the Associated Press. The B61-11 ‘would be the nuclear weapon of choice,’ he [Assistant Secretary of Defense Harold P. Smith] told Jane Defence Weekly.[4]
Clinton’s Defense Secretary William Perry had confirmed in a statement to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that “the U.S. retained the option of using nuclear weapons against countries [e.g. Libya] armed with chemical and biological weapons.”[5] The Department of Defense’s objective was to fast track the “testing” of the B61-11 nuclear bomb on an actual country and that country was Libya: “Even before the B61 came on line, Libya was identified as a potential target”.[6]
While the 1996 plan to bomb Libya using tactical nuclear weapons was subsequently shelved, Libya was not removed from the “black list”: “The Qadhafi regime” remains to this date a target country for a pre-emptive (“defensive”) nuclear attack. As revealed by William Arkin in early 2002, “The Bush administration, in a secret policy review… [had] ordered the Pentagon to draft contingency plans for the use of nuclear weapons against at least seven countries, naming not only Russia and the “axis of evil” Iraq, Iran, and North Korea but also China, Libya and Syria.[7]
Operation Odyssey Dawn. Nuclear Weapons against Libya? How Real is the Threat?
Has the project to nuke Libya been definitively shelved or is Libya still being contemplated as a potential target for a nuclear attack? (This preface serves as an update on the potential dangers of a nuclear war against a defenseless non-nuclear State). The air campaign directed against Libya commenced on March 19, 2011. America deployed its Bat-shaped B-2 Spirit Stealth bombers operating out of the Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri. Described as “deadly and effective”, the B-2 was used as an instrument of “humanitarian warfare”.
Barely two weeks after the commencement of the war, the Pentagon announced the testing of the B61-11 nuclear bomb using the same B-2 Stealth bombers which had been deployed to Libya at the very outset of Operation Odyssey Dawn. The B-2 Spirit Stealth bomber is the US Air Force’s chosen “carrier” for the delivery of the B61-11 nuclear bomb. These timely tests pertained to the installed equipment, functionality and weapon’s components of the B61-11 nuclear bomb. The tests were conducted by the B-2 bombers operating out of the same Air Force base, from which the B-2 bombing raid on Libya were conducted.[8]
Is the timing of these tests in any way related to the chronology of the Libya bombing campaign?
The U.S. Air Force Global Strike Command was in charge of both the JTA tests of the B61-11 as well as the deployment of three B-2 Spirit Stealth bombers to Libya on March 19 under operation Odyssey Dawn. Both the deployment of the B-2s to the Libya war theater as well as the tests of the equipment of the B61-11 (using the B-2 bomber for delivery) were coordinated out of Whiteman Air Force base.
America’s Long War: The Global Military Agenda
The US has embarked on a military adventure, “a long war”, which threatens the future of humanity. The first two chapters of this E-book focus on the “Cult of Death and Destruction” underlying this global military agenda. US-NATO weapons of mass destruction are portrayed as instruments of peace. Mini-nukes are said to be “harmless to the surrounding civilian population”. Pre-emptive nuclear war is portrayed as a “humanitarian undertaking”. Nuclear war has become a multibillion dollar undertaking, which fills the pockets of US defense contractors. What is at stake is the outright “privatization of nuclear war”.
US nuclear doctrine is intimately related to “America’s War on Terrorism” and the alleged threat of Al Qaeda, which in a bitter irony is considered as an upcoming nuclear power. Under the Obama administration, Islamic terrorists are said to be preparing to attack US cities. Proliferation is tacitly equated with “nuclear terrorism”. Obama’s nuclear doctrine puts particular emphasis on “nuclear terrorism” and on the alleged plans by Al Qaeda to develop and use nuclear weapons.
Chapter III focusses on America’s Holy Crusade and the Battle for Oil. The “Global War on Terrorism” requires going after the terrorists, using advanced weapons systems. US foreign policy upholds a pre-emptive religious-like crusade against evil, which serves to obscure the real objectives of military action. In the inner consciousness of Americans, the attacks of September 11, 2001 justify acts of war and conquest against evil-doers. The Global War on Terrorism is presented as a “clash of civilizations”, a war between competing values and religions, when in reality it is an outright war of conquest, guided by strategic and economic objectives. The lies behind 9/11 are known and documented. The American people’s acceptance of this crusade against evil is not based on any rational understanding or analysis of the facts. “The American inquisition” purports to extend Washington’s sphere of influence. Military intervention is justified as part of an international campaign against “Islamic terrorists”. Its ultimate intention, which is never mentioned in press reports, is territorial conquest and control over strategic resources. Ironically, under the Global War on Terrorism, these plans of conquest are instrumented by covertly supporting Islamic paramilitary armies, which are then used to destabilize non-compliant governments and impose Western standards of “governance” and “democracy”.
World War III Scenario
The contours of a World War III scenario are discussed in Chapter IV. The Pentagon’s global military design is one of world conquest. The military deployment of US-NATO forces is occurring in several regions of the World simultaneously. Militarization at the global level is instrumented through the US military’s Unified Command structure: the entire planet is divided up into geographic Combatant Commands under the control of the Pentagon. According to (former) NATO Commander General Wesley Clark, the Pentagon’s military road-map consists of a sequence of war theaters: “[The] five-year campaign plan [includes]… a total of seven countries, beginning with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Iran, Somalia and Sudan.”
Chapter V focusses on war preparations pertaining to Iran, including the launching of a pre-emptive nuclear attack on the Islamic Republic. While Iran remains on the Pentagon’s drawing board, a fundamental shift in the sequencing of military operations has occurred. The US-NATO-Israel alliance realizes that Iran has significant capabilities to respond and retaliate. With the onset of the US-NATO led war in North Africa, Washington and its allies have chosen to wage war on countries with lesser military capabilities. This factor in itself has been crucial in the decision by the US and its allies to put “the Iran operation” on hold, while launching a “humanitarian war” on Libya.
How to Reverse the Tide of War
Chapter VI focusses on antiwar actions directed against this diabolical military agenda. Central to an understanding of war, is the media campaign which grants it legitimacy in the eyes of public opinion. A good versus evil dichotomy prevails. The perpetrators of war are presented as the victims. Public opinion is misled: “We must fight against evil in all its forms as a means to preserving the Western way of life.” Breaking the “big lie” which upholds war as a humanitarian undertaking, means breaking a criminal project of global destruction, in which the quest for profit is the overriding force. This profit-driven military agenda destroys human values and transforms people into unconscious zombies.
The holding of mass demonstrations and antiwar protests is not enough. What is required is the development of a broad and well organized grassroots antiwar network, across the land, nationally and internationally, which challenges the structures of power and authority. People must mobilize not only against the military agenda, the authority of the state and its officials must also be challenged. This war can be prevented if people forcefully confront their governments, pressure their elected representatives, organize at the local level in towns, villages and municipalities, spread the word, inform their fellow citizens as to the implications of a nuclear war, initiate debate and discussion within the armed forces.
The object of this E-Book is to forcefully reverse the tide of war, challenge the war criminals in high office and the powerful corporate lobby groups which support them.
Break the American Inquisition.
Undermine the US-NATO-Israel military crusade.
Close down the weapons factories and the military bases.
Members of the armed forces should disobey orders and refuse to participate in a criminal war.
Bring home the troops.
Notes
1. See Yoichi Shimatsu, Secret Weapons Program Inside Fukushima Nuclear Plant? Global Research, April 12, 2011
2. Helen Caldicott, Fukushima: Nuclear Apologists Play Shoot the Messenger on Radiation, The Age, April 26, 2011
3. See Michel Chossudovsky, America’s Planned Nuclear Attack on Libya, Global Research, March 25, 2011.
4. Federation of American Scientists, The Nuclear Information Project: the B61-11
5. Ibid, See also Greg Mello, The Birth Of a New Bomb; Shades of Dr. Strangelove! Will We Learn to Love the B61-11? The Washington Post, June 1, 1997
6. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists – September/ October 1997, p. 27. For further details see Michel Chossudovsky, America’s Planned Nuclear Attack on Libya, Global Research, March 25, 2001
7. See William Arkin, “Thinking the Unthinkable”, Los Angeles Times, March 9, 2002.
8. In late March or early April (prior to April 4), the B-2 Spirit Stealth bomber from the 509th Bomber Wing operating out of Whiteman Air Force Base, was used in the so-called “Joint Test Assembly” (JTA) of the B61 Mod 11 nuclear bomb.
The announcement of these tests was made public on April 4; the precise date of the tests was not revealed, but one can reasonably assume that it was in the days prior to the April 4 press release by the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA. Press Release, NNSA Conducts Successful B61-11 JTA Flight Test, April 4, 2011. For further details see Michel Chossudovsky, Dangerous Crossroads: Is America Considering the Use of Nuclear Weapons against Libya? Global Research, April 7, 2011
Montreal, May 2011
Order your pdf of this important new book from Global Research here
Introductory offer: $5.00 (plus $1.50 processing fee. Sent directly to your email!)
OR receive this book FREE with your Global Research Annual Membership! Click to learn more.

Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (Emeritus) at the University of Ottawa. He is the Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal and Editor of the globalresearch.ca website. He is the author of The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order (2003) and America’s “War on Terrorism” (2005). He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His writings have been published in more than twenty languages.
This E-Book is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alice C. Tang, who devoted her life to global peace, the pursuance of truth, military disarmament and the prevention of nuclear war. Alice Tang’s proposal was titled “Two Percent, No First Strike.” The pledge would be that no nation shall spend more than 2 percent of its GDP on military purposes, and no nation would be a “first strike” aggressor with nuclear weapons.
Acknowledgments
Research for this E-book was conducted over a period of almost ten years. Our sincere thanks to Global Research members and our readers, whose support has enabled us to develop our publishing and educational outreach activities.
I am much indebted to Maja Romano of the Center for Research on Globalization (CRG) for her support in the editing process as well for the creative design of the front page graphics. I extend my thanks and appreciation to Réjean Mc Kinnon, for the careful typesetting, layout and production of the E-Book and to Drew McKevitt for her assistance in the copyediting of the manuscript.

“Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War” by Michel Chossudovsky

E-Book Series No. 1.0
Global Research Publishers
Montreal, 2011
ISBN 978-0-9737147-3-9
76 pages (8.5×11)
Tables, color photographs, maps, text boxes.
Active hyperlinks to major references in the text, hyperlinked footnotes.
Order your pdf of this important new book from Global Research here
Introductory offer: $5.00 (plus $1.50 processing fee. Sent directly to your email!)
OR receive this book FREE with your Global Research Annual Membership! Click to learn more.
DETAILED TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE
A New War Theater in North Africa
Operation Odyssey Dawn
Nuclear Weapons against Libya? How Real is the Threat?
America’s Long War: The Global Military Agenda
How to Reverse the Tide of War
World War III Scenario
Acknowledgments
CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

The Cult of Killing and Destruction
America’s Mini-nukes
War and the Economic Crisis
Real versus Fake Crises
CHAPTER II: THE DANGERS OF NUCLEAR WAR

Hiroshima Day 2003: Secret Meeting at Strategic Command Headquarters
The Privatization of Nuclear War: US Military Contractors Set the Stage
9/11 Military Doctrine: Nuclear Weapons and the “Global War on Terrorism”
Al Qaeda: “Upcoming Nuclear Power”
Obama’s Nuclear Doctrine: The 2010 Nuclear Posture Review
Post 9/11 Nuclear Doctrine
“Defensive” and “Offensive” Actions
“Integration” of Nuclear and Conventional Weapons Plans
Theater Nuclear Operations (TNO)
Planned Aerial Attacks on Iran
Global Warfare: The Role of US Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM)
Nuclear Weapons Deployment Authorization
Israel’s Stockpiling of Conventional and Nuclear Weapons
The Role of Western Europe
Germany: De Facto Nuclear Power
Pre-emptive Nuclear War: NATO’s 2010 Strategic Concept
The World is at a Critical Crossroads
CHAPTER III: AMERICA’S HOLY CRUSADE AND THE BATTLE FOR OIL
America’s Crusade in Central Asia and the Middle East
“Homegrown Terrorists”
The American Inquisition
Washington’s Extrajudicial Assassination Program
The Battle for Oil
The Oil Lies in Muslim Lands
Globalization and the Conquest of the World’s Energy Resources
CHAPTER IV: PREPARING FOR WORLD WAR THREE

Media Disinformation
A “Pre-emptive” Aerial Attack Directed Against Iran would Lead to Escalation
Global Warfare
US “Military Aid”
The Timetable of Military Stockpiling and Deployment
World War III Scenario
The United Nations Security Council
The American Inquisition: Building a Political Consensus for War
CHAPTER V: TARGETING IRAN WITH NUCLEAR WEAPONS
Building a Pretext for a Pre-emptive Nuclear Attack
“Theater Iran Near Term”
The Military Road Map: “First Iraq, then Iran”
Simulated Scenarios of a Global War: The Vigilant Shield 07 War Games
The Role of Israel
Cheney: “Israel Might Do it Without Being Asked”
US Israel Military Coordination
Tactical Nuclear Weapons directed against Iran
Radioactive Fallout
“The Mother of All Bombs” (MOAB) Slated to be Used Against Iran
Extensive Destruction of Iran’s Infrastructure
State of the Art Weaponry: “War Made Possible Through New Technologies”
Electromagnetic Weapons
Iran’s Military Capabilities: Medium and Long Range Missiles
Iran’s Ground Forces
US Military and Allied Facilities Surrounding Iran
CHAPTER VI: REVERSING THE TIDE OF WAR
Revealing the Lie
The Existing Anti-War Movement
Manufacturing Dissent
Jus ad Bellum: 9/11 and the Invasions of Yugoslavia and Afghanistan
Fake Antiwar Activism: Heralding Iran as a Nuclear Threat
The Road Ahead
The Antiwar Movement within the State Structure and the Military
Abandon the Battlefield: Refuse to Fight
The Broader Peace Process
What has to be Achieved
Order your pdf of this important new book from Global Research here

Introductory offer: $5.00 (plus $1.50 processing fee. Sent directly to your email!)
OR receive this book FREE with your Global Research Annual Membership! Click to learn more.

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Meet The 24 Robber Barons Who Once Ruled America

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Michel Chossudovsky

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Michel Chossudovsky (born 1946) is a Canadian economist.
He is professor of economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa. Chossudovsky has been a visiting professor internationally, and has been an advisor to governments of developing countries. In 1999, Chossudovsky joined the Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research as an adviser.^[1] Chossudovsky is a signatory of the Kuala Lumpur declaration to criminalize war. He is the author of The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order (2003) and America’s “War on Terrorism” (2005) and Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War (2011).^[1]^[2]^[3]^[4]

Biography

Chossudovsky is the son of the academician, Russian born Evgeny Chossudovsky (1914–2006) and Rachel, from Northern Ireland. Raised in Geneva, he is a graduate of the University of Manchester, and obtained a PhD at the University of North Carolina.
Based at the University of Ottawa from 1968 he is founder, editor, and director of the Centre for Research on Globalisation (CRG), located in Montreal, Canada. It is “committed to curbing the tide of globalisation and disarming the new world order“.^[5]^{[verification needed]} CRG maintains the website GlobalResearch.ca which is critical of United States foreign policy and NATO, as well as theories concerning the September 11 attacks in 2001 and the war on terror, media disinformation, poverty and social inequality, the global economic crisis, and politics and religion. Chossudovsky was profiled in the Ottawa Citizen in an article by Juliet O’Neill.^[6]

Writings

Global economic crisis

Chossudovsky believes that the 2007–2012 global economic crisis was caused by deliberate fraud perpetuated by powerful institutions. This coupled with increased militarization around the world is contributing to mass unemployment, global poverty and decrease of government social programs.^[7] He predicted in 1998 that “the late 20th century will go down in world history as a period of global impoverishment marked by the collapse of productive systems in the developing world, the demise of national institutions and the disintegration of health and education programs.”^[8]

HAARP

Chossudovsky argues that from a military standpoint, the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) is an operational weapon of mass destruction with the potential to be used against “rogue states”, with the power to alter the weather, disrupt regional electrical power systems, and modify the Earth’s magnetic field, as well as potentially trigger earthquakes and affect people’s health. Chossudovsky stated that the policy guidelines already contain weather intervention techniques and that the technology has finished its final stages of development according to an interview with physicist Bernard Eastlund in 1997.^[9]^[10]^[11] He explains that these techniques are not a new concept and that mathematician, John von Neumann, had begun research on the topic in the late 1940s in coordination with the U.S. Department of Defense.^[12]

IMF

Chossudovsky asserts that Dominique Strauss-Kahn was framed with sexual assault charges by powerful members of the financial establishment in order to install a more compliant leader. Dominique Strauss-Kahn was pushing for reforms within the International Monetary Fund (IMF).^[13]

Libya

Chossudovsky asserted at the outset of the Libya conflict that this was part of a larger agenda for corporate interests to take over 60% of the world’s oil reserves.^[14] He has written that the rebels of Libya, who formed an alliance with NATO, were former members of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) and that this same group was listed as a bona fide terrorist organization with the United Nations Security Council.^[15]^[16]

Syria

Chossudovsky asserts that the protestors against the government regime are covertly supported by western intelligence and are the cause of the unrest in Syria. He claims the western media shows bias in their reporting by not showing the evidence of massive support for Assad shown in a rally on March 29, 2011 in Damascus and claims that there are Assad forces that are also being killed, which he says is also ignored.^[17]

Swine flu

Chossudovsky has argued that reports released in the British press regarding the plans for mass morgues due to H1N1 were totally fabricated and that “the British government is deliberately misleading the British public”, claiming that there were reports from Britain’s Health Protection Agency that confirmed that the proposed vaccines would be more deadly than the disease.^[18]

Terrorism

After the September 11 attacks he highlighted the historical relationship between the US government, Bin Laden and Al Qaeda. He asserted in 2004 that the invasion of Afghanistan had long been planned by the United States and NATO, with the 9/11 attacks used as an excuse to justify the war.^[19]^[20] In a speech given at the Perdana Global Peace Forum in 2005, Chossudovsky stated that “Osama bin Laden and the Taliban were identified as the prime suspects of the 9/11 attacks, without a shred of evidence” and that “Amply documented, the war on terrorism is a fabrication.”^[21]
On the internationally available Russian station RT in 2010, he stated that U.S. President Barack Obama, not Osama bin Laden, is the biggest threat to global security.^[22] In the Preface of America’s “War on Terrorism” he wrote:

The myth of the “outside enemy” and the threat of “Islamic terrorists” was the cornerstone of the Bush administration’s military doctrine, used as a pretext to invade Afghanistan and Iraq, not to mention the repeal of civil liberties and constitutional government in America. Without an “outside enemy”, there could be no “war on terrorism”.^[23]

Yugoslavia

Chossudovsky has questioned the widespread notion that the Yugoslav Wars were primarily motivated by ethnic or nationalist conflict. In his 1996 article “Dismantling Yugoslavia: Colonizing Bosnia”, he wrote that the macroeconomic restructuring and the deep-seated economic crisis of the 1980s helped destroy Yugoslavia, but that the global media have carefully overlooked or denied the central role of Western-backed neoliberal policies in the process, and that after the war the Western powers have concentrated on debt repayment and potential energy bonanzas rather than rebuilding the economy.^[24]
In Mike Karadjis’ 2000 book Bosnia, Kosova, and the West, Chossudovsky is referred to as a “pro-Milošević leftist”, as well as accused of “systematically distorting events in Albania and the wars in the Balkans in the 1990s”.^[25]

Criticism

A 2005 article in The Jewish Tribune has criticized GlobalResearch.ca as “rife with anti-Jewish conspiracy theory and Holocaust denial.” B’nai Brith Canada had complained that there were comments on a forum moderated by Chossudovsky that questioned how many Jews died in the holocaust. Chossudovsky responded that there was a disclaimer that the website was not to be held responsible for the views expressed in the forum, and he had the comment removed. He also said that he was of Jewish heritage and would be one of the last people to condone antisemitic views.^[26] The same article also reported that B’nai Brith Canada wrote a letter to the University of Ottawa asking for the university “to conduct its own investigation of this propagandist site.”^[26]
In a 2006 op-ed by Terry O’Neill in the conservative Canadian news magazine, Western Standard, Chossudovsky was included on the list of “Canada’s nuttiest professors, those whose absurdity stands head and shoulders above their colleagues.”^[27] Listed alongside Chossudovsky were Sunera Thobani, Shannon Bell, John McMurtry, Shadia Drury, Michael Keefer,^[28]Taiaiake Alfred, Leo Panitch, Kathleen Mahoney, Thomas Homer-Dixon, Sophie Quigley, and Joel Bakan. Specifically, the op-ed referred to GlobalResearch.ca as “anti-U.S. and anti-globalization”^[27] and criticized Chussodovsky’s thesis and views — namely: that the U.S. had knowledge of the 911 attacks before they happened; that Washington had weapons that could influence climate change; and lastly, that the large banking institutions are the cause of the collapse of smaller economies — as “wild-eyed conspiracy theories”.^[27]

Bibliography

With Fred Caloren and Paul Gingrich, Is the Canadian Economy Closing Down? (Montreal: Black Rose, 1978) ISBN 0-919618-80-4
Towards Capitalist Restoration? Chinese Socialism After Mao (New York: St Martin’s, 1986 and London: Macmillan, 1986) ISBN 0-333-38441-5
The Globalization of Poverty: Impacts of IMF and World Bank Reforms, (Penang: Third World Network, 1997) and (London: Zed, 1997) ISBN 81-85569-34-7 and ISBN 1-85649-402-0
Exporting Apartheid to Sub-Saharan Africa (New Delhi: Madhyam, 1997) ISBN 81-86816-06-2
‘Washington’s New World Order Weapons Can Trigger Climate Change’, (November 26, 2000)
Guerres et Mondialisation: A Qui Profite Le 11 Septembre? (Serpent a Plume, 2002) ISBN 2-84261-387-2
The Globalization of Poverty and the New World Order (Oro, Ontario: Global Outlook, 2003) ISBN 0-9731109-1-0– Excerpt.
America’s “War on Terrorism” (Pincourt, Quebec: Global Research, 2005) ISBN 0-9737147-1-9

References

^ ^a ^b “TFF Associates”. The Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research.
^ Scott A. Bessenecker (October 31, 2006). The New Friars: The Emerging Movement Serving the World’s Poor. IVP Books. p. 156.
^Michel Chossudovsky – Department of Economics. Socialsciences.uottawa.ca. Retrieved on 2012-01-08.
^Towards a World War III Scenario. New E-Book from Global Research Publishers. By Prof Michel Chossudovsky. Global Research, June 30, 2011.
^“Globalization Links: Anti-Establishmentarians on the Web”. The University of Iowa Center for International Finance and Development. June 2002. Retrieved 19 May 2011.^{[dead link]}
^Battling Mainstream Economics. By Juliet ONeill.
^The Global Economic Crisis. Globalresearch.ca. Retrieved on 2012-01-08.
^ Chossudovsky (1998). “Global Poverty in the Late 20th Century”. Journal of International Affairs52. Retrieved 7 January 2012.
^ Michel Chossudovsky, “The Ultimate Weapon of Mass Destruction: ‘Owning the Weather’ for Military Use,” Global Research (27 September 2004).
^ Michel Chossudovsky, “H.A.A.R.P. It’s not only greenhouse gas emissions: Washington’s new world order weapons have the ability to trigger climate change.”http://www.FromTheWildrness.com (November 2000)
^ Michel Chossudovsky, “Weather Warfare: Beware the US military’s experiments with climatic warfare,” Global Research (December 7, 2007).
^Weather warfare. The Ecologist (2008-05-22). Retrieved on 2012-01-08.
^Regime Change at the IMF: The Frame-Up of Dominique Strauss-Kahn? [Voltaire Network]. Voltairenet.org. Retrieved on 2012-01-08.
^“Operation Libya” and the Battle for Oil: Redrawing the Map of Africa. Globalresearch.ca. Retrieved on 2012-01-08.
^The “Liberation” of Libya: NATO Special Forces and Al Qaeda Join Hands. Globalresearch.ca. Retrieved on 2012-01-08.
^Foreign Terrorist Organizations – Multimedia Counterterrorism Calendar. Nctc.gov (2011-12-27). Retrieved on 2012-01-08.
^“SYRIA: Who is Behind The Protest Movement? Fabricating a Pretext for a US-NATO “Humanitarian Intervention”". Retrieved 7 January 2012.
^“H1N1 October surprise prevention”. Retrieved 7 January 2012.
^ Michel Chossudovsky, “‘Revealing the Lies’ on 9/11 Perpetuates the ‘Big Lie’,” Global Research, 27 May 2004. Text of Michel Chossudovsky’s keynote presentation at the opening plenary session (27 May 2004) to The International Citizens Inquiry Into 9/11, Toronto, 25–30 May 2004.
^ Michel Chossudovsky, “9/11 and the “American Inquisition”,” Global Research (September 11, 2008).
^The Anglo-American War of Terror: An Overview by Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, December 21, 2005.
^ Chossudovsky, Michel. “April 4, 2010 VIDEO: Obama, not Osama, is Threat No.1 to Global Security by Michel Chossudovsky”. Globalresearch.ca. Retrieved 2011-12-18.
^ Chossudovsky, Michel (2005-09-15). “Preface to the second edition”. America’s “War on Terrorism” (2nd ed.). Global Research. p. XII.
^ Chossudovsky, “Dismantling Yugoslavia: Colonizing Bosnia,”Covert Action, No. 56 (Spring 1996).
^ Karadjis (2000). Bosnia, Kosova, and the West. pp. 172–178, 207.
^ ^a ^b “Conspiracy web site by Ottawa Professor sets dangerous examples for students”. Jewish Tribune Canada. 2005-08-25.
^ ^a ^b ^c Terry O’Niell (2006-09-25). “Canada’s nuttiest professors”. Western Standard.
^In Defence of Michel Chossudovsky. By Michael Keefer. September 4, 2005.

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Michel Chossudovsky

Chossudovsky’s articles at Centre for Research on Globalization
A list of audio interviews: (French Connection Audio Archive)
War and Globalization presentation. (Google Video)

Andrew Marshall (foreign policy strategist)

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Andrew W. Marshall (born 1921) is the director of the United States Department of Defense‘s Office of Net Assessment. Appointed to the position in 1973 by United States President Richard Nixon, Marshall has been re-appointed by every president that followed.

Biography

Raised in Detroit, Marshall earned a graduate degree in economics from the University of Chicago before he joined the Rand Corporation, the original “think tank,” in 1949. During the 1950s and ’60s Marshall was a member of “a cadre of strategic thinkers” that coalesced at the Rand Corporation, a group that included Daniel Ellsberg, Herman Kahn, and James Schlesinger; Schlesinger later became the U.S. Secretary of Defense, and oversaw the creation of the Office of Net Assessment. The original main task of the office was to provide strategic evaluations on nuclear war issues. James Roche, Secretary of the Air Force in the administration of George W. Bush, worked for Marshall during the 1970s.^[1]
Andrew Marshall was consulted for the 1992 draft of Defense Planning Guidance (DPG), created by then-Defense Department staffers I. Lewis Libby, Paul Wolfowitz, and Zalmay Khalilzad.

We studied RMA exhaustively. Our great hero was Andy Marshall in the Pentagon. We translated every word he wrote.
- General Chen Zhou, PLA^[2]

Marshall has been noted for fostering talent in younger associates, who then proceed to influential positions in and out of the federal government: “a slew of Marshall’s former staffers have gone on to industry, academia and military think tanks.”^[3]Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz, among others, have been cited as Marshall “star protégés.”^[4]
In an interview in 2012 the main author of four of the Chinese defence white papers General Chen Zhou stated that Marshall was one of the most important and influential figures in changing Chinese defence thinking in the 1990s and 2000s.
Foreign Policy named Marshall one of its 2012 Top 100 Global Thinkers, “for thinking way, way outside the Pentagon box”.^[5]

References

^ Lehman, Nicholas. “Dreaming About War.” The New Yorker, July 16, 2001.
^“The dragon’s new teeth”. The Economist. Apr 7th 2012. Retrieved April 6, 2012.
^ Silverstein, Ken. “The Man from ONA.” The Nation, October 25, 1999.
^ McGray, Douglas. “The Marshall Plan.” Wired, February 2003.
^“The FP Top 100 Global Thinkers”. Foreign Policy. 26 November 2012. Archived from the original on 28 November 2012. Retrieved 28 November 2012.

External links

Journalism coverage of Andrew W. Marshall.
Works by or about Andrew Marshall (foreign policy strategist) in libraries (WorldCat catalog)

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Foreign Policy Magazine
Friday, March 8, 2013 Follow
100 Global Thinkers
«»
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The FP Top 100 Global Thinkers
Foreign Policy presents a unique portrait of 2012′s global marketplace of ideas and the thinkers who make them.
DECEMBER 2012
44 ANDREW MARSHALL
For thinking way, way outside the Pentagon box.
Military futurist | Washington
Known as the Pentagon’s “futurist in chief” — or, more affectionately, “Yoda” among Defense Department insiders — Andrew Marshall has spent the past 40 years speculating about over-the-horizon threats to the United States. At the top of his list today: a rapidly militarizing and increasingly belligerent China. As the longtime director of the Pentagon’s Office of Net Assessment, the nonagenarian Marshall has spent recent years devising battle plans for an admittedly unlikely showdown with Beijing.
But unlikely scenarios are Marshall’s specialty. The details of his blueprint, known as the Air-Sea Battle, are classified, but its aim is to coordinate the U.S. Air Force and Navy more closely in order to respond to future threats to the global commons, not just in potential flash points like the South China Sea but all over the world — even helping the military reach melting ice caps in the Arctic. Marshall’s ambitious “organizing concept,” as Air Force Secretary Michael Donley calls it, has moved outside the realm of ideas as Barack Obama’s administration has sought to turn its proclaimed “pivot” to Asia into military reality. A hot war with China, for one, would be one of the most complicated logistical problems in U.S. military history. In that sense, Air-Sea Battle is bigger than any single military doctrine — it’s a bureaucratic reorientation that has already inspired more than 200 Air Force and Navy initiatives, including a new precision conventional-weapons system called Prompt Global Strike, as well as the Next-Generation Bomber program. Wired magazine has called Marshall’s concept a “help desk for 21st Century warfare.”
Marshall, an appointee of Richard Nixon who has been reappointed by every president since, seems also to have shaped Chinese military strategy. Gen. Chen Zhou, who helped write China’s four most recent defense white papers, told the Economist,“Our great hero was Andy Marshall in the Pentagon. We translated every word he wrote.”
Search the University of Ottawa Web site
Faculty of Social Sciences
Michel Chossudovsky
Telephone : 613-562-5800 ext. 4899
Fax : 613-562-5999
E-Mail Address : Michel.Chossudovsky@uottawa.ca
Office (building, room number) :
Social Science Building, 9005

Member of the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies
© University of Ottawa
North Korea or the United States: Who is a Threat to Global Security?
North Korea lost thirty percent of its population as a result of US led bombings in the 1950s.
By Prof Michel Chossudovsky
Global Research, March 05, 2013
Region: Asia
Theme: Crimes against Humanity
In-depth Report: NORTH KOREA
281 58 27
490
Most people in America consider North Korea as an inherently aggressive nation and a threat to global security.
Media disinformation sustains North Korea as a “rogue state”.
The history of the Korean war and its devastating consequences are rarely mentioned. America is portrayed as the victim rather than the aggressor.
North Korea lost thirty percent of its population as a result of US led bombings in the 1950s.
US military sources confirm that 20 percent of North Korea’s population was killed off over a three year period of intensive bombings:
“After destroying North Korea’s 78 cities and thousands of her villages, and killing countless numbers of her civilians, [General] LeMay remarked,“Over a period of three years or so we killed off – what – twenty percent of the population.”
It is now believed that the population north of the imposed 38th Parallel lost nearly a third its population of 8 – 9 million people during the 37-month long “hot” war, 1950 – 1953, perhaps an unprecedented percentage of mortality suffered by one nation due to the belligerence of another.” (See War Veteran Brian Willson. Korea and the Axis of Evil, Global Research, April, 2002)

Official South Korean government sources estimate North Korean civilian deaths at 1,550,000

Long lines of refugees fleeing from Yongdong on 26 July 1950. The day before, hundreds of refugees
were massacred by U.S. soldiers and warplanes at bridge at No Gun Ri, eight miles away.
During The Second World War the United Kingdom lost 0.94% of its population, France lost 1.35%, China lost 1.89% and the US lost 0.32%.
During the Korean war, North Korea lost 30 % of its population. In the words of General Curtis Lemay:
There are no innocent civilians. It is their government and you are fighting a people, you are not trying to fight an armed force anymore. So it doesn’t bother me so much to be killing the so-called innocent bystanders. (emphasis added)
Reflect for a few minutes on these figures: If a foreign power had bombed the US and America had lost thirty percent of its population as result of foreign aggression, Americans across the land would certainly be aware of the threat to their national security emanating from this unnamed foreign power.
Now put yourself in the shoes of the North Koreans, who lost 30 percent of their population as a result of 37 months of relentless US bombings.
From their standpoint, the US is the threat to Global Security.
Their country was destroyed. Town and villages were bombed. General Curtis Lemay acknowledges that “[we] eventually burned down every town in North Korea anyway, someway or another, and some in South Korea too.”
There is not a single family in North Korea which has not lost a loved one.
Everyone I talked with, dozens and dozens of folks, lost one if not many more family members during the war, especially from the continuous bombing, much of it incendiary and napalm, deliberately dropped on virtually every space in the country. “Every means of communication, every installation, factory, city, and village” was ordered bombed by General MacArthur in the fall of 1950. It never stopped until the day of the armistice on July 27, 1953. (See War Veteran Brian Willson. Korea and the Axis of Evil, Global Research, April, 2002)

For the people of North Korea, in their inner consciousness as human beings, the aggressor, which inflicted more than two million deaths on a country of 8-9 million (1950s) is the United States of America.
These facts continue to be concealed by the Western media to sustain the “Axis of Evil” legend, which portrays North Korea as a threat and “rogue state”, to be condemned by the “international community”.
Genocide is defined under the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG) as the
“the deliberate and systematic destruction of, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group”. Article 2 of this convention defines genocide as “any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”
What is at stake is an act of genocide committed by the US. During the Korean War an entire civilian population was the target of deliberate and relentless bombings, with a view to destroying and killing a national group, which constitutes an act of genocide under the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
281 58 27
490
Articles by: Prof Michel Chossudovsky
About the author:
Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal and Editor of the globalresearch.ca website. He is the author of The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order (2003) and America’s “War on Terrorism”(2005). His most recent book is entitled Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War (2011). He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His writings have been published in more than twenty languages.
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  The Spirit of Christmas and the End to All Wars: The Christmas Truce of 1914By Global Research, December 24, 2012
  9/11 Revisited: Resisting Government Lies and PropagandaBy Cynthia McKinney, December 24, 2012
  The Spirit of Christmas: George W. Bush and Tony Blair banned from the Birthplace of Jesus ChristBy Prof Michel Chossudovsky, December 24, 2012
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Backgrounder #1791

This is a Backgrounder On Taxes

Two Americas: One Rich, One Poor? Understanding Income Inequality in the United States

By Rea S. Hederman, Jr. and Robert Rector
August 24, 2004

Class warfare has always been a mainstay of liberal politics. Politicians frequently depict the United States as a nation starkly divided between the rich and poor. For example, vice presidential candidate John Edwards decries “two Americas…one privileged, the other burdened…one America that does the work, another that reaps the reward. One America that pays the taxes, another America that gets the tax breaks.”1
How accurate is this characterization? How unequal is the distribution of economic resources in our society? This paper will attempt to answer these questions. Specifically, it will seek to provide:

A clearer understanding of the existing level of income equality in U.S. society, and
An appreciation of the social and economic forces contributing to existing inequality.

Census Figures on Income Distribution

This paper analyzes the existing distribution of income in the United States. The term “income” refers to new revenues and economic resources received by individuals and families during the course of a year.2 The distribution of annual income is thus distinct from the distribution of wealth, which refers to economic assets saved from prior years.
Discussions of income distribution usually begin with annual data provided by the Census Bureau. To measure income distribution, the Census Bureau first ranks households from highest to lowest income. It then divides society into five groups, called quintiles, and determines the share of total income received by each quintile.3
On the surface, the Census figures appear lucid and easily understandable. However, the conventional Census data are marred by four problems that lead to an overstatement of the level of economic inequality:

Conventional Census income figures are incomplete and omit many types of cash and non-cash income.
The conventional Census figures do not take into account the equalizing effects of taxation.
The Census quintiles actually contain unequal number of persons, a fact that greatly magnifies the apparent level of economic inequality.
Differences in income are substantially affected by large differences in the amount of work performed within each quintile, yet these differences in work effort are rarely acknowledged.

An Accurate Picture of the Distribution of Economic Resources

This paper analyzes the distribution of income in the United States based on data taken from the Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey (CPS) from March 2003 (covering incomes for 2002).4 Income distribution data change very little from one year to the next; therefore, the conclusion reached in this paper would apply with little change for incomes in 2003.
The paper presents data on income distribution in four separate stages:

Stage 1: Conventional money income distribution.
Stage 2: Incorporation of the effect of taxes and social welfare benefits.
Stage 3: Adjustment of quintiles to contain equal numbers of persons.
Stage 4: Hypothetical equalization of work and employment between the quintiles.

Stage 1: Conventional Income Distribution Data

As noted, the Census presents income distribution by dividing U.S. households into five groups or quintiles. The share of total income going to each quintile is then determined. The conventional quintile distribution of income for 2002 is shown in Chart 1. In that year, the Census reported that the top or most affluent quintile had 49.7 percent of income, while the bottom quintile had only 3.5 percent. Thus, the top fifth of households is shown to have 14.3 times more income than the bottom fifth.5

Stage 2: Impact of taxes and Non-Cash Benefits on Economic Equality

The conventional Census income distribution data are based on the concepts of “money income.” Money income includes earnings, interest, dividends, rents, Social Security retirement benefits, pension or retirement income, survivors’ benefits, disability benefits, veterans’ benefits, workers’ compensation, alimony, and some cash welfare benefits.
Despite this list, it is now widely acknowledged that the Census money income figures grossly underreport the economic resources available to the American people.6 For example, the aggregate “money income” figures reported by the Census in 1996 equaled only 70 percent of the comparable personal income figures reported in the Commerce Department’s National Income and Production Accounts (NIPA), which serve as the basis for measuring gross national product.7
Increasingly, Americans receive “non-cash” incomes that are not included in the Census income distribution figures based on “money income.” For example, many Americans receive health insurance from their employers. Such insurance is an important augmentation to salaries. Families who have health coverage are clearly better off, ceteris paribus, than those who must pay health costs out of pocket.
Similarly, the poor and the elderly receive extensive and costly non-cash benefits from the government. In 2002, the government spent $522 billion on means-tested aid to the poor and the near poor.8 This aid included cash, food, housing, medical care, and social services such as subsidized day care. Virtually none of this assistance was included in the Census income distribution figures. In the same year, the government spent $257 billion subsidizing medical care for the elderly through the Medicare program; this assistance was also ignored in the Census income distribution figures.
The social safety net represents a massive transfer of economic resources away from affluent families and toward the less affluent. Each year, the government taxes higher-income families and transfers economic resources to the poor and elderly through means-tested welfare and Medicare. Overall, the resources transferred in this manner are over $750 billion per year, or more than 8 percent of total personal income. Yet almost none of this massive redistribution of economic resources is recorded in the conventional Census income distribution figures shown in stage 1.
Fortunately, the Census Bureau’s annual Current Population Survey (CPS) collects data on taxes and on the receipt of many additional types of income beyond those included under “money income.” While these additional income data are excluded from the Census’ conventional (stage 1) income distribution figures, which are based on “money income” only, they are available to researchers in electronic form. We have used these excluded data as the basis for the analyses provided in this paper.9
Table 1 shows the effects of incorporating a more complete count of income and taxes on the distribution of income. Adjustments to income are presented in sub-stages. First, capital gains and losses are added (stage 2A). This adjustment raises total annual income by some $320 billion and increases income inequality. Next, employee health benefits and government non-cash transfers are added (stage 2B). Government transfers include the earned income tax credit, food stamps, school lunch programs, public housing, Medicaid, and Medicare. Medicaid and Medicare benefits are counted at their insurance or market value, which equals the average government expenditures on benefits to individuals in specific age and risk categories. These adjustments add nearly $700 billion to the total annual income and decrease income inequality. Finally, the effects of federal income tax, state income tax, and Social Security taxes are shown in stage 2C. This adjustment reduces annual total income by some $1.4 trillion and markedly decreases inequality. We term the income figures in stage 2C “comprehensive post-tax income.”10

Inclusion of taxes and non-cash aid substantially reduces economic inequality. In stage 1, the bottom quintile was shown to have 3.5 percent of total income; by stage 2C, this number had risen to 5.35 percent. The income share of the top quintile falls from 49.6 percent in stage 1 to 46.16 percent in stage 2C.

Stage 3: Adjustment of Quintiles to Contain Equal Numbers of Persons

When decision-makers, journalists, and the public view the government’s official income distribution figures, there is a common and implicit assumption that the quintiles contain equal shares of the population. After all, the notion that we should measure “inequality” by comparing the aggregate income of groups that are themselves unequal in size is at best confusing. However, as noted, the official Census income “quintiles” do not contain equal shares of the population, and this fact skews the Census’ measure of income distribution.
No one would think it valid to measure inequality between New York State and Delaware by simply comparing the aggregate incomes in the two states. In such a comparison, income differences would mainly reflect vast differences in state populations. But the Census makes precisely this sort of unbalanced comparison whenever it compares quintiles of unequal size.
Chart 3 shows the percent of the population contained within each Census “quintile.” While the middle quintile does contain roughly one-fifth of the population, the others do not. The high disparity in population between the highest and lowest income quintiles is of particular interest. The top quintile contains 24.6 percent of the population, but the bottom quintile contains only 14.3 percent. In raw numbers, there are 69.4 million persons in the top quintile compared to 40.3 million in the bottom. Thus, for every person in the lowest quintile there are 1.7 persons in the top quintile. This imbalance in population is a major factor contributing to the apparent levels of inequality in Census Bureau figures.
The Census Bureau quintiles are unequal in size because they are based on a count of households rather than persons. A household is defined as a person or group of persons living in a single housing unit. In the United States, high-income households tend to be married couples with many members and earners. Low-income households tend to be single persons with little or no earnings. Thus, it should be of no surprise that the average household in the Census’ top quintile contains 3.2 persons, while the average household in the bottom quintile contains 1.8 persons.
The typical Census practice of measuring inequality by comparing aggregate incomes between “quintiles” that contain widely differing numbers of persons can be extremely misleading. To a considerable degree, the relative poverty of the Census’ official bottom quintile shown in Chart 1 results from the simple lack of people within the quintile rather than from economic factors.
A far clearer picture of income inequality can be obtained by adjusting the quintiles so that each actually contains 20 percent of the population. In Chart 4, incomes have been corrected to include taxes and non-cash benefits, and the quintiles are adjusted to contain equal numbers of persons. As a result, the income share of the bottom quintile rises to 9.4 percent of total income and the share of the top quintile falls to 39.6 percent.

Stage 4: Inequality of Income and Inequality of Work

Counting taxes and safety net benefits while balancing the quintiles to contain equal shares of the population dramatically transforms the picture of inequality in the United States. However, it is possible to probe the issue even further.

In many respects, economic inequalities between the quintiles are a direct reflection of disparities in work performed. Chart 5 reverts to the conventional Census quintiles with unequal numbers of persons. The chart shows the total annual hours of paid labor in each quintile. In 2002, individuals in the bottom quintile performed 4.3 percent of all the work in the U.S. economy, while those in the top quintile performed 33.9 percent. Thus, the top quintile performed almost eight times as much labor as did the bottom quintile.
In part, the low levels of paid employment in the bottom quintile reflect the low numbers of working-age adults (ages 18 to 64) within the group. In the conventional Census figures (with unequal quintiles), the bottom quintile contains only 11.2 percent of all working-age adults, while the top quintile contains 27.6 percent. Not only does the bottom quintile contain fewer adults of working age, but each adult, on average, works fewer hours during the year than does his counterpart in the higher-income quintiles. On average, working-age adults in the bottom quintile worked about half as many hours during the year as did adults in the top quintile. The combination of relatively few working-age adults and low levels of work per adult contributes significantly to the low income levels in the bottom quintile.
The stage 4 analysis shows what the distribution of income would be if working-age adults in the bottom quintile worked as many hours as those in higher-income families. In contrast to the adjustments in stages 2 and 3, stage 4 represents a hypothetical rather than an actual condition, since the non-elderly adults in the bottom quintile clearly do not work as much as higher-income adults.
The stage 4 figures incorporate the adjustments made in stages 2 and 3 before making the hypothetical adjustments in hours of work. The results are presented in Chart 6. The working-age adults in each quintile are assumed, on average, to perform equal hours of paid labor during the year. The outcome would be a substantial equalization of incomes. The income share of the bottom quintile would rise to 12.3 percent, while that of the top quintile would fall to 35.8 percent.

Ratio of Incomes Between the Top
and Bottom Quintiles

Chart 7 summarizes the ratios of income of the top quintile compared to the bottom quintile in various scenarios. In the conventional figures from stage 1, households in the top quintile appear to have, on average, $14.30 of income for each $1.00 of income in the bottom quintile. When the impact of taxes and non-cash benefits is included in stage 2, the ratio falls to $8.60 in the top for each $1.00 in the bottom. If the quintiles are then corrected to contain equal numbers of persons, the ratio falls to $4.21 to $1.00. Finally, if the annual work levels of working-age adults in each quintile were hypothetically made equal, the income ratio of the top to the bottom would fall to $2.91 to $1.00.

Increasing Inequality?

A frequent complaint is that the distribution of income is becoming less equal over time. There is some merit to this charge: According to conventional Census numbers, the income share of the top fifth of households rose from 43.7 percent of total income in 1980 to 49.7 percent in 2002. But nearly all of that increase occurred in the 1980s and mid-1990s. For the past five years, the distribution of income has remained static, as charts 8 and 9 show. A tiny increase in the income share of the top quintile corresponds to a small increase in the share of population and total work occurring within the quintile. After adjusting quintiles to contain equal numbers of persons, the top quintile in 1997 had $4.22 in post-tax, post-benefit income for every $1.00 of similar income at the bottom.11 In 2002, the ratio was $4.21 to $1.00.
The conventional Census figures also suggest that the incomes of the two poorest quintiles have fallen over the past 30 years. The Census reports that in 1970, the two poorest quintiles had 14.9 percent of all money income. By 2002, the figure had fallen to 12.3 percent. However, this apparent decline is a result of the exclusion of non-cash benefits from the count of income. Means-tested welfare and Medicare has risen greatly over time, from 1.5 percent of total personal income in 1950 to over 8 percent in 2002. If these benefits were properly included in the income count, the income share of the two poorest quintiles would be shown to have risen considerably in the 1960s and to have remained relatively unchanged over the past 30 years.

Conclusion

The Census income distribution figures are the foundation of most class-warfare rhetoric. On the surface, these figures show a high level of inequality: The top fifth of households have $14.30 of income for every $1.00 at the bottom.
However, these figures are flawed by the exclusion of taxes and social safety net spending and by the fact that the “fifths” do not contain equal numbers of people. Adjustment for these factors radically alters the picture of income distribution: The top fifth of the population has $4.21 of income for every $1.00 at the bottom.
The remaining inequality in society is heavily influenced by the lack of work at the bottom. If working-age adults in the lower quintiles worked as much as their higher-income counterparts, the income disparity of the top to the bottom quintiles would fall to $2.91 to $1.00.
Still, the top fifth of U.S. households (with incomes above $84,000) remain perennial targets of class-warfare enmity. These families, however, perform a third of all labor in the economy. They contain the best educated and most productive workers, and they provide a disproportionate share of the investment needed to create jobs and spur economic growth. Nearly all are married-couple families, many with two or more earners. Far from shirking the tax burden, these families pay 82.5 percent of total federal income taxes and two-thirds of federal taxes overall. By contrast, the bottom quintile pays 1.1 percent of total federal taxes.12
In one sense, John Edwards is correct: There is one America that works a lot and pays a lot in taxes, and there is another America that works less and pays little. However, the reality is the opposite of what Edwards suggests. It is the higher-income families who work a lot and pay nearly all the taxes. Raising taxes even higher on hard-working families would be unfair and, by reducing future investments, would reduce economic growth, harming all Americans in the long run.
Robert Rector is Senior Research Fellow in Domestic Policy Studies, and Rea S. Hederman, Jr., is a Senior Policy Analyst in the Center for Data Analysis, at The Heritage Foundation.
Methodological Appendix
This paper examines the distribution of income and income inequality with data extracted from the Current Population Survey for the year 2002, conducted in March 2003. Like the Census Bureau, this paper studies income at the household level. Group quarters are not included in this survey. The authors also used data extracted from the Heritage Income Tax Model, which contains a sample of actual tax returns designed to replicate the total tax returns received by the Internal Revenue Service. In general, this study does not account for the underreporting of income to the Census Bureau.

Post-Tax Income

Comprehensive post-tax income includes money income plus realized capital gains, the earned income credit, employer-provided health insurance, school lunch benefits, food stamp benefits, government rent subsidies, Medicaid, and Medicare benefits. Federal and state income taxes, payroll taxes, and property taxes are subtracted. Income variables that were given only at the family or person level were aggregated to the household level. Thus, all FICA taxes paid by a household were added together by person and then subtracted from the household’s final income. Food stamps and other family-level income data were treated in the same manner.
Comprehensive post-tax income is very similar to the Census income “definition 14″ as detailed in the Census Bureau’s Current Population Reports, Income, poverty and Valuation on Noncash Benefits, except that it employs the basic market or insurance value for Medicaid and Medicare without the “fungible” adjustment.13 The insurance value of Medicaid and Medicare (also called the market value) equals the average net government outlay for persons of a specific risk class within a given state. The risk classes used are elderly, disabled persons, non-disabled adult, and non-disabled child. Under this approach, the value of Medicaid or Medicare equals the average cost to the government of medical services provided to a given class of persons; it does not report specific medical expenditures for particular individuals.
The fungible method of valuing Medicare and Medicaid begins with the insurance value of benefits but then alters the values based on the family’s income class. The full insurance value is assigned to benefits received by the middle class, but a lower value or zero value is assigned when the same benefits are received by a low-income household. The fungible adjustment was devised for the measurement of poverty, not income distribution. In measuring poverty, it is used to determine whether a household’s income should be considered above the poverty threshold. However, the fungible adjustment, which deliberately reduces the value of benefits received by low-income groups, is not appropriate for the measure of income equality that seeks to compare the economic resources of one household relative to others. The fungible adjustment results in a substantial undercounting of government transfers to low income groups.

Top Coding

An adjustment was made to compensate for the Census’ top coding restriction. Top coding limits the maximum value of capital gains reported in the CPS to $99,999. With normal CPS data, capital gains values that exceed this limit are simply reported as $99,999. In order to obtain a more thorough estimate of high levels of capital gains income, we have replaced those capital gains values subject to the top coding restriction with higher values taken from Internal Revenue Service data. This adjustment was made in the following manner: The Heritage Tax Model was used to determine the mean amount of capital gains income for those returns that reported capital gains income above $99,999. The new mean amount of capital gains was substituted to replace each CPS top-coded value of capital gains. As a result, the amount of capital gains income in the study was increased substantially. These adjustments mainly increase reported incomes in the top quintile.

Ranking

Adjustments to income in stages 2 and 3 were performed at the level of individual households. After each adjustment, the households were re-ranked based on their new income figures. Households then were weighted according to the CPS household weight variable. The stage 4 adjustments are more general; earnings were adjusted at the quintile level based the aggregate earnings and average labor data within the quintile.

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The top fifth of U.S. households perform a third of all labor,
contain the best educated and most productive workers, provide a
disproportionate share of the investment needed to create jobs and
spur economic growth, and pay 82.5 percent of federal income taxes
and two-thirds of federal taxes overall. Raising their taxes even
higher would reduce economic growth, harming all Americans.

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Jan K. Brueckner

Southern Economic Journal

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You are here: Blog / Over 100 Million Now Receiving Federal Welfare

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Over 100 Million Now Receiving Federal Welfare

2:40 PM, Aug 8, 2012 • By DANIEL HALPER

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A new chart set to be released later today by the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee details a startling statistic: “Over 100 Million People in U.S. Now Receiving Some Form Of Federal Welfare.”

“The federal government administers nearly 80 different overlapping federal means-tested welfare programs,” the Senate Budget Committee notes. However, the committee states, the figures used in the chart do not include those who are only benefiting from Social Security and/or Medicare.
Food stamps and Medicaid make up a large–and growing–chunk of the more than 100 million recipients. “Among the major means tested welfare programs, since 2000 Medicaid has increased from 34 million people to 54 million in 2011 and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, or food stamps) from 17 million to 45 million in 2011,” says the Senate Budget Committee. “Spending on food stamps alone is projected to reach $800 billion over the next decade.”
The data come “from the U.S. Census’s Survey of Income and Program Participation shows that nearly 110,000 million individuals received a welfare benefit in 2011. (These figures do not include other means-tested benefits such as the Earned Income Tax Credit or the health insurance premium subsidies included in the President’s health care law. CBO estimates that the premium subsidies, scheduled to begin in 2014, will cover at least 25 million individuals by the end of the decade.)”
This is not just Americans, however. “These figures include not only citizens, but non-citizens as well,” according to the committee.
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« From the Bankers Who Brought You President Obama Comes NEW PRESIDENT™!

Wealth Inequality in America»

Government Spends More on Corporate Welfare Subsidies than Social Welfare Programs

Time Magazine, Vol. 152 No. 19

About $59 billion is spent on traditional social welfare programs. $92 billion is spent on corporate subsidies. So, the government spent 50% more on corporate welfare than it did on food stamps and housing assistance in 2006.

Before we look at the details, a heartfelt plea from the Save the CEO’s Charitable Trust:
There’s so much suffering in the world. It can all get pretty overwhelming sometimes. Consider, for a moment the sorrow in the eyes of a CEO who’s just found out that his end-of-year bonus is only going to be a paltry $2.3 million.
“It felt like a slap in the face. Imagine what it would feel like just before Christmas to find out that you’re going to be forced to scrape by on your standard $8.4 million compensation package alone. Imagine what is was like to have to look into my daughter’s face and tell her that I couldn’t afford to both buy her a dollar sign shaped island and hire someone to chew her food from now on, too. To put her in that situation of having to choose… She’s only a child for God’s sake.”
It doesn’t have to be this way. Thanks to federal subsidies from taxpayers like you, CEO’s like G. Allen Andreas of Archer Daniels Midland was able to take home almost $14 million in executive compensation last year. But he’s one of the lucky ones. There are still corporations out there that actually have to provide goods and services to their consumers in order to survive. They need your help.

For just $93 billion a year the federal government is able to provide a better life for these CEO’s and their families. That’s less than the cost of 240 million cups of coffee a day. Won’t you help a needy corporation today?

The Traditional Welfare Queen

Definition: social welfare

n. Financial aid, such as a subsidy, provided by a government to specific individuals.

When one thinks about government welfare, the first thing that comes to mind is the proverbial welfare queen sitting atop her majestic throne of government cheese issuing a royal decree to her clamoring throngs of illegitimate babies that they may shut the hell up while she tries to watch Judge Judy. However, many politically well-connected corporations are also parasitically draining their share of fiscal blood from your paycheck before you ever see it. It’s called corporate welfare. The intent here is to figure out which presents the greater burden to our federal budget, corporate or social welfare programs.

There are, of course, positive and negative aspects to this spending.The primary negative aspect is that you have to increase taxes to pay for it. Taxing individuals lowers their standard of living. It reduces people’s ability to afford necessities like medical care, education, and low mileage off-road vehicles.The common usage definition of social welfare includes welfare checks and food stamps. Welfare checks are supplied through a federal program called Temporary Aid for Needy Families. Combined federal and state TANF spending was about $26 billion in 2006. In 2009, the federal government will spend about $25 billion on rental aid for low-income households and about $8 billion on public housing projects. For some perspective, that’s about 3 percent of the total federal budget.
Note: I do not consider Medicaid to be included in the term “welfare” as it is used in common parlance. Typically, if one states that someone is “on welfare”, they mean that the person is receiving direct financial aid from the government. If we included Medicaid in our definition of social welfare, we would also have to consider any service that the government pays for to be “welfare”. For instance, public roadways to individuals’ homes would also be considered “welfare” under that expansive definition.

TANF (Temporary Aid to Needy Families)

Another negative aspect relates to the fact that social welfare programs reduce the incentive for recipients to become productive members of society. However, in 1996, Congress passed a bill enacting limited welfare reform, replacing the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program with the new Temporary Aid to Needy Families (TANF) program. One key aspect of this reform required recipients to engage in job searches, on the job training, community service work, or other constructive behaviors as a condition for receiving aid. The bill was signed by a man named Bill Clinton, who is much better known for an act of fellatio which, of course, had far greater societal implications. Regardless, the success of this reform was pretty dramatic. Caseloads were cut nearly in half. Once individuals were required to work or undertake constructive activities as a condition of receiving aid they left welfare rapidly. Another surprising result was a drop in the child poverty rate. Employment of single mothers increased substantially and the child poverty rate fell sharply from 20.8 percent in 1995 to 16.3 percent in 2000.

Graph of US Child Poverty Rates by Living Arrangements (1975-2009)

Graph Source: http://census.gov/hhes/www/poverty.html

The Corporate Welfare Queen

Now, let’s consider the other kind of welfare.

Definition: corporate welfare

n. Financial aid, such as a subsidy, provided by a government to corporations or other businesses.
The Cato Institute estimated that, in 2002, $93 billion were devoted to corporate welfare. This is about 5 percent of the federal budget.To clarify what is and isn’t corporate welfare, a “no-bid” Iraq contract for the prestigious Halliburton, would not be considered corporate welfare because the government technically directly receives some good or service in exchange for this expenditure. Based on the Pentagon’s Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA) findings of $1.4 billion of overcharging and fraud, I suppose the primary service they provide could be considered to be repeatedly violating the American taxpayer.On the other hand, the $15 billion in subsidies contained in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, to the oil, gas, and coal industries, would be considered corporate welfare because no goods or services are directly returned to the government in exchange for these expenditures.

US Energy Subsidies Infographic by GOOD Magazine & Deeplocal

Infographic Source: http://awesome.good.is/transparency/web/1012/subsidize-this/flat.html

Tax breaks targeted to benefit specific corporations could also be considered a form of welfare. Tax loopholes force other businesses and individual taxpayers without the same political clout to pick up the slack and sacrifice a greater share of their hard-earned money to decrease the financial burden on these corporations. However, to simplify matters, we’ve only included financial handouts to companies in our working definition of corporate welfare.
Whenever corporate welfare is presented to voters, it always sounds like a pretty reasonable, well-intended idea. Politicians say that they’re stimulating the economy or helping struggling industries or creating jobs or funding important research. But when you steal money from the paychecks of working people, you hurt the economy by reducing their ability to buy the things they want or need. This decrease in demand damages other industries and puts people out of work.
Most of the pigs at the government trough are among the biggest companies in America, including the Big 3 automakers, Boeing, Archer Daniels Midland, and now-bankrupt Enron.

Farm Subsidies

However, the largest fraction of corporate welfare spending, about 40%, went through the Department of Agriculture, most of it in the form of farm subsidies. (Edwards, Corporate Welfare, 2003) Well, that sounds OK. Someone’s got to help struggling family farms stay afloat, right? But in reality, farm subsidies actually tilt the cotton field in favor of the largest industrial farming operations. When it comes to deciding how to dole out the money, the agricultural subsidy system utilizes a process that is essentially the opposite of that used in the social welfare system’s welfare system. In the corporate welfare system, the more money and assets you have, the more government assistance you get. Conversely, social welfare programs are set up so that the more money and assets you have, the less government assistance you get. The result is that the absolute largest 7% of corporate farming operations receive 45% of all subsidies. (Edwards, Downsizing the Federal Government, 2004) So instead of protecting family farms, these subsidies actually enhance the ability of large industrial operations to shut them out of the market.

Graph of Direct Government Payments to Farmers (1990-2004)

Graph Source: http://ers.usda.gov/data

Wal-Mart. Always high subsidies. Always.

The same is true in all other industries, too. The government gives tons of favors to the largest corporations, increasing the significant advantage they already have over smaller competing businesses. If, in the court of public opinion, Wal-Mart has been tried and convicted for the murder of main street, mom-and-pop America, then the government could easily be found guilty as a willing accomplice. Wal-Mart receives hundreds of millions of dollars of subsidization by local governments throughout the country. These subsidies take the form of bribes by local politicians trying to convince Wal-Mart to come to their town with the dream of significant job creation. Of course, from that follows a larger tax base. For example, a distribution center in Macclenny, Florida received $9 million in government subsidies in the form of free land, government-funded recruitment and training of employees, targeted tax breaks, and housing subsidies for employees allowing them to be paid significantly lower wages. A study by Good Jobs First found that 244 Wal-Marts around the country had received over $1 billion in government favors.

The Big Picture

So now let’s look at the big picture. The final totals are $59 billion, 3 percent of the total federal budget, for regular welfare and $92 billion, 5 percent of the total federal budget, for corporations. So, the government spends roughly 50% more on corporate welfare than it does on these particular public assistance programs.
Should we spend less on corporate welfare and/or social welfare programs? Or should we spend even more? It’s up to you. A bunch of people died horrible deaths to make sure this country remained a democracy, so if you feel strongly about this issue you owe it to them to call or write your congressman and senators and give them a piece of your mind.

Some More Sources:

2013 Budget: http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/budget/fy2013/assets/budget.pdf
Source: Office of Management and Budget, Budget of the United States Government (Washington: Government Publishing Office), various years; and data from the American Association for the Advancement of Science R&D Budget and Policy Program, various years.
Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, http://www.ers.usda.gov/data.
Source: Export-Import Bank, 2006 Annual Report (Washington: Export-Import Bank, 2007).
Source Data from Chris Edwards at Cato:
Corporate Welfare by Agency
Corporate Welfare by Agency 2
Corporate Welfare by Company
I am extremely appreciative of any corrections or additional info that I left out. Please include hyperlinked SOURCES. I want to update this post with more recent numbers and more expansive definitions of both corporate and social welfare. My ultimate solution to this problem is wiki-izing ThinkByNumbers.org so that good citizens such as yourselves can correct any unfortunate omissions. I hope to have that feature functional in the coming months.

Advance the Empiricist Movement!

billion cato ceo corporate welfare corporate welfare king corporate welfare queen corporations lobbyists satire subsidies subsidize subsidizing tanf tarp tax breaks welfare welfare statistics

This entry was posted by Mike P. Sinn on March 6, 2011 at 9:03 pm, and is filed under Corporate Welfare, Government Spending, Welfare. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0.You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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Wednesday, March 13, 2013 | 8:20 p.m.

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Posted: 7:39 p.m. Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Fla. Lt. Gov. Carroll resigns; won’t be replaced till after legislative session

By John Kennedy
Palm Beach Post Capital Bureau
TALLAHASSEE —

Gov. Rick Scott said Wednesday that Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carroll “did the right thing for the state and for her family,” by abruptly resigning amid a wide-ranging criminal probe into a purported charity operating internet cafes in Florida.
Carroll worked as a consultant for the company in 2009 and 2010, while she was serving in the state House of Representatives. Financial disclosure records reviewed by The Palm Beach Post show she reported earning less than $1,000 from Allied Veterans of the World.
“I appreciate the efforts she made on behalf of the great state of Florida,” Scott said. “She was tireless. She put a lot of effort into the military and getting jobs going, and I’m very grateful for her service.”
Scott read from a statement at a crowded news conference outside the Capitol, moments after state and federal law enforcement officials in Orlando laid out allegations contained in 57 arrest warrants issued in Florida and five other states: South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Nevada and Pennsylvania. Two others accused of racketeering in the case also were arrested Monday in Oklahoma.
Asked about Carroll’s role, Scott said, “I’m not going to talk about the investigation at all. But I have no knowledge that she broke the law.”
Scott also said he would not make a decision on Carroll’s successor until after the legislative session’s scheduled May 3 finish.
The Republican governor told reporters, “It’s very disappointing to have to bring this news to you.”
Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi said charges will be formally filed next week against Allied Veterans officials. Charges will include racketeering, conspiracy, money laundering and possession of slot machines.
“It’s callous and it’s despicable,” Bondi said, adding it, “insults every American who ever wore a military uniform.”
Law enforcement officials also would not discuss Carroll’s involvement. A Navy veteran who served in the Gulf War, Carroll appeared in a 2011 TV ad promoting Allied Veterans’ charitable work.
Allied Veterans of the World and Affiliates Inc., based in St. Augustine, operates internet cafes at 49 sites around the state, mostly in North and Central Florida.
In 2011, it claimed to have contributed more than $2.5 million to veterans and first responders. The Post reported, however, that documents submitted to the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, which regulates charities, provided no detail of the donations.
Investigators said Wednesday they could vouch for more than $6 million of charitable contributions by Allied Veterans from 2007 to early 2012. But that amount represented only about 2 percent of the more than $290 million made from gambling during that time period.
Most of the money went to for-profit companies and Allied Veterans’ executives, law enforcement officials said.
Authorities said they had seized about 300 bank accounts worth $64.7 million, along with high-end vehicles including Maseratis, Porsches and Ferraris.
Internet cafes – which have been dubbed the “casinos on the corner” – have flourished over the past decade, profiting even during years when Florida’s economy was punishing.
As many as 1,000 cafes are believed to operate in the state, part of what critics call a murky, billion-dollar industry that exploits gambling laws and preys on Floridians who can least afford to lose cash.
Those visiting the cafes purchase internet time – paying $15 and $25, more or less. They can browse the web – but most play sweepstakes games, in which computer credit or time is won. These winnings can be redeemed for payouts of as much as a few hundred dollars.
While law enforcement and local government officials have attempted to limit the number of cafes or gain more regulatory authority, industry leaders have pushed back, touting their lavish contributions to charities.
Internet cafes also have built a muscular lobbing force in Tallahassee, while contributing heavily to candidates.
Carroll, in 2010, introduced legislation that would have benefited the industry, but withdrew it after being questioned by reporters, later saying it was filed by a staffer without her approval.
Carroll submitted her two-sentence resignation letter late Tuesday, hours after she had been questioned by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and then met with Scott chief-of-staff Adam Hollingsworth.
Scott staff said they believed the governor had not spoken with Carroll since Sunday.
In an emailed statement, Carroll said Wednesday she resigned because she didn’t want “allegations facing a former client of my public relations firm to undermine” the work of the administration. She also said, “Although I have made a decision to leave public office, I will not withdraw from public life.”
Carroll was already widely considered doubtful to remain as Scott’s running mate for his re-election campaign next year. But the governor was unwilling to address that Wednesday.
“It doesn’t matter…now about that,” Scott said.
Scott faces no legal time limit on appointing Carroll’s successor. State law says only that if there is no lieutenant governor and the governor’s post becomes vacant, the state’s attorney general — now Bondi — would become governor.
“Lots of people are interested in the job,” Scott said Wednesday. “But we’re not going to focus on that until after the end of the session.”
Former Gov. Jeb Bush’s lieutenant governor, Frank Brogan, resigned only months into the administration’s second term in 2003 – to take the job of president of Florida Atlantic University.
Bush named former two-time Senate President Toni Jennings as lieutenant governor, a post she held until both left office in 2006.
Jennings’ name came up again Wednesday in hall talk around the Capitol, possibly as a short-term successor to Carroll. Also mentioned was Sen. Anitere Flores, a Miami Republican, who was among those Scott considered before he chose Carroll in 2010.
But even Scott seemed not to be thinking much about a replacement – and whether his selection would be his running mate for next year.
Sen. John Thrasher, R-St. Augustine, a former Florida Republican Party chairman, said Scott can use the choice to help retool his administration, and sharpen his upcoming campaign.
“The governor now has to pick, frankly, somebody that he believes can help him in the campaign,” Thrasher said. “So I think it will be a benefit to him…down the road.”
Carroll, Florida’s first black lieutenant governor and the first woman elected to that position, was seen as a smart choice as Scott’s running mate.
Her legislative experience was a plus for Scott, a first-time candidate. But her career began unraveling only months after she took office.
A former aide, Carletha Cole, was accused of violating state law by recording a conversation without first notifying the other party, a recording she later shared with a newspaper reporter.
She defended herself, though, by claiming she was targeted for prosecution after having seen Carroll and a female travel aide in a “compromising position” inside the lieutenant governor’s office. Cole also said that Carroll’s chief-of-staff, John Konkus, had regularly recorded office conversations on orders from Scott’s staff and her own taping of her exchange with him last summer was designed to show how disjointed relations had become between the two offices.
The criminal case against Cole is still pending.
Even with Carroll removed, Florida Democratic Party Chair Allison Tant was quick to use the Carroll case against Scott.
“Floridians expected an administration focused on solving the problems facing Florida’s families, but instead got a scandal plagued governor and a revolving staff door,” Tant said. “Rick Scott and his administration have made a mockery of the governor’s office — embarrassing Floridians while failing to accomplish his legislative priorities.
“Scott campaigned on changing Tallahassee but his first three years have been more of the same corruption and waste that taxpayers have come to expect from Florida Republicans,” Tant concluded.

Staff writer Dara Kam contributed to this story.

Jennifer Carroll
Personal: Age 53. Married, three children, including Miami Dolphin Nolan Carroll II. U.S. Navy veteran. Legally immigrated to the United States from Trinidad as an 8-year-old.
Political: Republican. Lieutenant governor, 2010-present. State representative from Fleming Island, 2003-10. Florida Secretary of Veterans Affairs, 2000-2002. Ran twice unsuccessfully for Congress.
Successes: Florida’s first black lieutenant governor and first woman elected to post; was sole black Republican in Legislature when Rick Scott chose her as running mate. Addressed 2000 Republican National Convention urging a new direction for Republican Party, one “embracing values of people like Colin Powell and Harriet Tubman.”
Controversies: Resigned Tuesday as lieutenant governor for having represented a purported charity that is being accused of skimming money from internet cafes. Also has dealt with accusations that she earned an MBA from a university revealed as an online diploma mill; questions linger from criminal case against a former aide who accused her of having a possible lesbian affair with another aide.
The Investigation
Operation: “Reveal the Deal,” a multi-state probe involving state, federal and local law enforcement.
Begun: July 2009 in Seminole County.
Focus: Allied Veterans of The World, a purported charity, accused in a $300 million conspiracy to pocket profits from 49 internet cafes in northern and central Florida.
Action: Authorities have executed 54 search warrants and 57 arrest warrants in 23 Florida counties and five additional states. Charges expected to be formally filed next week.

Search For “gambling casino”

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356 items

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie gestures as he gives details on his 2014 state budget in Trenton, N.J., Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2013. Christie delivers his fourth budget proposal before a joint session of the Legislature at the State House during an election year as the state rebounds from the worst natural disaster in its history. (AP Photo/Rich Schultz)

Christie signs NJ Internet gambling bill into law

Get ready for betting in your jammies, at work, from the kitchen table, or at the beach: New Jerseyans — and possibly many others — will soon be able to gamble over the Internet. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie signed a bill Tuesday legalizing Internet gambling, hours after the state …

Updated: 7:07 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2013

Wanna bet gambling gets even bigger in Florida? Legislators take up the issue

Get ready for a lot of talk about more gambling in Florida. But it might take awhile before you have more places to plunk down a bet. With a new leadership in Tallahassee, a stalled economy and Las Vegas companies eager to build casinos in the Sunshine State, legislators will …

Updated: 3:11 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 11, 2011

Report: Indian casinos revenue up slightly in 2011

Indian casinos brushed off weak consumer spending in a sluggish U.S. economic recovery to post a modest increase in revenue in 2011, an industry study reported Wednesday. Not only did revenue rise 3 percent, to $27.4 billion, but Indian casinos are holding on to their share of total casino gambling …

Updated: 4:06 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013

South Florida turning into a gambling strip

It’s a glitzy megalopolis that attracts gamblers throughout the United States, if not the entire world, a place where there’s high- and low-stakes action aplenty, plus shopping, dining and entertainment opportunities galore.Sound like Las Vegas? Try South Florida in just a decade.While the state’s gambling industry may be locked in …

Updated: 8:52 a.m. Friday, Nov. 27, 2009

Land around Miami Dolphins stadium, Miami Beach hall eyed for casinos

The Miami Dolphins may want the land surrounding their football stadium to be considered for a casino license, and have dispatched a lobbyist to preserve that option should Florida lawmakers approve a landmark expansion of gambling. Also on Friday, the Miami Beach Convention Center emerged as a potential casino site. …

Updated: 12:04 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 22, 2011

A file photo of the Seminole Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood in 2008.

Casino rivals face off in Fort Lauderdale

In a debate here Tuesday, state Sen. Ellyn Bogdanoff, who favors an expansion of casino gambling in Florida, put her cards on the table.”We’ve always had a legislature here in Florida that is anti-gaming, but in the last 10 years we’ve become fourth in the nation in gaming anyway,” said …

Updated: 9:25 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 29, 2011

Schultz: Gambling supporters trying to game Floridians

‘ Despite the broad agreement that exists for such an approach, there’s still too many Republicans in Congress who have refused to listen to the voices of reason and compromise that are coming from outside of Washington.’PRESIDENT OBAMA on the debt committee’s failure to reach a dealPoker players look for …

Updated: 7:04 p.m. Friday, Nov. 25, 2011

Coconut Creek is notoriously smokey, to the point that some guests wear gas masks. Players filled all 12 of the tables at the Seminole Casino Coconut Creek for the first hand of blackjack at the casino.

Unhealthy habit – smoking – brings casinos healthy business

One casino boasts that it is endorsed by the American Lung Association. Its main competitor has so much smoke that patrons sometimes wear surgical masks.Guess which one is making the most money?Sometimes the amenity that swings players to choose one casino over another has nothing to do with gambling. It’s …

Updated: 6:41 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 31, 2010

FILE - In this May 31, 2011 file photo, players compete in a Heads-Up poker tournament during the World Series of Poker at the Rio hotel and casino in Las Vegas. At the height of the poker fad, Las Vegas couldn't get enough of poker rooms. Now some of those rooms are folding. Four casinos yanked their poker tables last year, including the Tropicana, and three other rooms closed shop in 2011. (AP Photo/Eric Jamison, File)

As trend wanes, Vegas casinos fold on poker rooms

The Tropicana hoped to step back into the big leagues when it opened its poker room in the heart of the Las Vegas Strip, touting it as the coolest in town. But that same morning, federal agents shut down the three biggest online poker sites on the Internet. Last September, …

Updated: 12:17 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 28, 2013

South Florida lawmakers push bill to expand casino gambling in Broward, Miami-Dade

The possibility of casino gambling outside of tribal lands in Florida has gained traction in the state legislature this year after decades of lawmakers being reluctant to take on the issue.Senate GOP leaders are backing a proposal that would allow three casino resorts to open in Broward and Miami-Dade counties, …

Updated: 9:23 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 25, 2011

Las Vegas casino execs roll dice in Tally; pitch idea of 6 resorts in Florida

Multibillion-dollar hotel resorts with casino gambling, celebrity chefs and luxury shopping.It could all come to Florida — if the state wants to cash in on its image as a sun-soaked haven for tourists and authorize sprawling, Vegas-style casino resorts, gambling executives told lawmakers Thursday.Executives from Las Vegas Sands, which operates …

Updated: 9:41 a.m. Friday, March 12, 2010

Head off a casino invasion: What happens in Vegas should stay in Vegas

To Rep. Bill Galvano, R-Bradenton, the Legislature is debating whether gambling “is going in a different direction in the state of Florida.”But to Nick Iarossi, who addressed Rep. Galvano’s committee 11 days ago on behalf of the Las Vegas Sands Corp., the debate is over: “There is a recognition now …

Updated: 5:34 p.m. Sunday, March 21, 2010

Recent editorials published in Nebraska newspapers

The Grand Island Independent. March 3, 2013. Gambling decisions should remain in the hands of the voters The Legislature’s General Affairs Committee heard a proposed constitutional amendment last week that would dramatically change the authorization of gambling in Nebraska. Currently, any expansion of gambling in the state, such as allowing …

Updated: 1:07 p.m. Monday, March 4, 2013

Florida casino gambling bill ‘dead for this year,’ House Rules chair says

The push to bring resort casinos to South Florida fizzled Friday, with the House sponsor of the measure abandoning the multibillion-dollar proposal for this year.Facing a hostile House panel — where opponents of expanding gambling said they had 10 of 15 members on their side — Rep. Erik Fresen, R-Miami, …

Updated: 11:23 p.m. Friday, Feb. 3, 2012

Florida casinos bill a catch-all, addressing the lottery, dog tracks, jai-alai, and Internet cafes

It’s already tough enough to get conservative lawmakers behind the concept of three new casinos in Florida, no matter how swanky. But the resorts’ prospects may be even trickier now that a rewrite of the “destination resorts” bill overhauls all types of gambling in the state, from greyhound races to …

Updated: 7:04 p.m. Monday, Jan. 2, 2012

Florida casino bill hits opposition; Rules chair calls it ‘major expansion’ of gambling

The allure of the money and jobs that three casinos might bring to Florida is fading even before the plan receives its first committee vote.State Sen. Ellyn Bogdanoff’s “destination resorts” proposal faced fierce opposition Wednesday morning from at least one GOP leader after three hours of testimony during the Regulated …

Updated: 7:50 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2011

Casino bill is the wrong bet

Backers of the bill to allow “destination resort” casinos claim that allowing more gambling in Florida would mean less gambling in Florida.No, it won’t. Common sense says it won’t. History definitely says it won’t. From the lottery, which voters approved in 1986, to slots at Miami-Dade and Broward parimutuels (“racinos”), …

Updated: 7:53 p.m. Friday, Nov. 18, 2011

Southern Baptists concerned over Gingrich’s casino-related backing

A top official with the Southern Baptist Convention said it’s troubling that a casino magnate’s $10 million is funding much of the effort to make Newt Gingrich president. Gingrich should distance himself from casino gambling, said Richard Land, president of the Nashville-based Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, the public policy …

Updated: 9:35 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 26, 2012

New casino bill worse deal

First reports to the contrary, the revised “destination resort” casino bill from state Sen. Ellyn Bogdanoff, R-Fort Lauderdale, wouldn’t ban Internet cafes. So there goes what we potentially liked most about her new effort, one of the most controversial issues the Legislature will consider as it convenes this week. In …

Updated: 6:50 p.m. Friday, Jan. 6, 2012

Projections on how many jobs and how much money new luxury casinos would bring to South Florida vary widely.

Estimates on permitting S. Fla. casinos range from break even to $1.7 billion in new taxes

Disagreements about how much cash and how many jobs luxury casinos would bring to the Sunshine State dominated Wednesday’s first public airing of a “destination resorts” bill designed to transform South Florida into an international gambling mecca. Allowing up to three full-fledged casinos in Miami-Dade and Broward counties could ring …

Updated: 1:57 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 17, 2011

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SiDevilIam

37 million poor hidden in the land of plenty

Americans have always believed that hard work will bring rewards, but vast numbers now cannot meet their bills even with two or three jobs. More than one in 10 citizens live below the poverty line, and the gap between the haves and have-nots is widening

Paul Harris in Kentucky
The Observer, Saturday 18 February 2006

The flickering television in Candy Lumpkins’s trailer blared out The Bold and the Beautiful. It was a fantasy daytime soap vision of American life with little relevance to the reality of this impoverished corner of Kentucky.The Lumpkins live at the definition of the back of beyond, in a hollow at the top of a valley at the end of a long and muddy dirt road. It is strewn with litter. Packs of stray dogs prowl around, barking at strangers. There is no telephone and since their pump broke two weeks ago Candy has collected water from nearby springs. Oblivious to it all, her five-year-old daughter Amy runs barefoot on a wooden porch frozen by a midwinter chill.It is a vision of deep and abiding poverty. Yet the Lumpkins are not alone in their plight. They are just the negative side of the American equation. America does have vast, wealthy suburbs, huge shopping malls and a busy middle class, but it also has vast numbers of poor, struggling to make it in a low-wage economy with minimal government help.A shocking 37 million Americans live in poverty. That is 12.7 per cent of the population – the highest percentage in the developed world. They are found from the hills of Kentucky to Detroit’s streets, from the Deep South of Louisiana to the heartland of Oklahoma. Each year since 2001 their number has grown.Under President George W Bush an extra 5.4 million have slipped below the poverty line. Yet they are not a story of the unemployed or the destitute. Most have jobs. Many have two. Amos Lumpkins has work and his children go to school. But the economy, stripped of worker benefits like healthcare, is having trouble providing good wages.Even families with two working parents are often one slice of bad luck – a medical bill or factory closure – away from disaster. The minimum wage of $5.15 (£2.95) an hour has not risen since 1997 and, adjusted for inflation, is at its lowest since 1956. The gap between the haves and the have-nots looms wider than ever. Faced with rising poverty rates, Bush’s trillion-dollar federal budget recently raised massive amounts of defence spending for the war in Iraq and slashed billions from welfare programmes. For a brief moment last year in New Orleans, Hurricane Katrina brought America’s poor into the spotlight. Poverty seemed on the government’s agenda. That spotlight has now been turned off. ‘I had hoped Katrina would have changed things more. It hasn’t,’ says Cynthia Duncan, a sociology professor at the University of New Hampshire.
Oklahoma is in America’s heartland. Tulsa looks like picture-book Middle America. Yet there is hunger here. When it comes to the most malnourished poor in America, Oklahoma is ahead of any other state. It should be impossible to go hungry here. But it is not. Just ask those gathered at a food handout last week. They are a cross section of society: black, white, young couples, pensioners and the middle-aged. A few are out of work or retired, everyone else has jobs.
They are people like Freda Lee, 33, who has two jobs, as a marketer and a cashier. She has come to the nondescript Loaves and Fishes building – flanked ironically by a Burger King and a McDonald’s – to collect food for herself and three sons. ‘America is meant to be free. What’s free?’ she laughs. ‘All we can do is pay off the basics.’
Or they are people like Tammy Reinbold, 37. She works part-time and her husband works full-time. They have two children yet rely on the food handouts. ‘The church is all we have to fall back on,’ she says. She is right. When government help is being cut and wages are insufficient, churches often fill the gap. The needy gather to receive food boxes. They listen to a preacher for half an hour on the literal truth of the Bible. Then he asks them if they want to be born again. Three women put up their hands.
But why are some Tulsans hungry?
Many believe it is the changing face of the US economy. Tulsa has been devastated by job losses. Big-name firms like WorldCom, Williams Energy and CitGo have closed or moved, costing the city about 24,000 jobs. Now Wal-Mart embodies the new American job market: low wages, few benefits.
Well-paid work only goes to the university-educated. Many others who just complete high school face a bleak future. In Texas more than a third of students entering public high schools now drop out. These people are entering the fragile world of the working poor, where each day is a mere step away from tragedy. Some of those tragedies in Tulsa end up in the care of Steve Whitaker, a pastor who runs a homeless mission in the shadow of a freeway overpass.
Each day the homeless and the drug addicted gather here, looking for a bed for the night. Some also want a fresh chance. They are men like Mark Schloss whose disaster was being left by his first wife. The former Wal-Mart manager entered a world of drug addiction and alcoholism until he wound up with Whitaker. Now he is back on track, sporting a silver ring that says Faith, Hope, Love. ‘Without this place I would be in prison or dead,’ he says. But Whitaker equates saving lives with saving souls. Those entering the mission’s rehabilitation programme are drilled in Bible studies and Christianity. At 6ft 5in and with a black belt in karate, Whitaker’s Christianity is muscular both literally and figuratively. ‘People need God in their lives,’ he says.
These are mean streets. Tulsa is a city divided like the country. Inside a building run by Whitaker’s staff in northern Tulsa a group of ‘latch-key kids’ are taking Bible classes after school while they wait for parents to pick them up. One of them is Taylor Finley, aged nine. Wearing a T-shirt with an American flag on the front, she dreams of travel. ‘I want to have fun in a new place, a new country,’ she says. Taylor wants to see the world outside Oklahoma. But at the moment she cannot even see her own neighbourhood. The centre in which she waits for mom was built without windows on its ground floor. It was the only way to keep out bullets from the gangs outside.
During the 2004 election the only politician to address poverty directly was John Edwards, whose campaign theme was ‘Two Americas’. He was derided by Republicans for doing down the country and – after John Kerry picked him as his Democratic running mate – the rhetoric softened in the heat of the campaign.
But, in fact, Edwards was right. While 45.8 million Americans lack any health insurance, the top 20 per cent of earners take over half the national income. At the same time the bottom 20 per cent took home just 3.4 per cent. Whitaker put the figures into simple English. ‘The poor have got poorer and the rich have got richer,’ he said.
Dealing with poverty is not a viable political issue in America. It jars with a cultural sense that the poor bring things upon themselves and that every American is born with the same chances in life. It also runs counter to the strong anti-government current in modern American politics. Yet the problem will not disappear. ‘There is a real sense of impending crisis, but political leaders have little motivation to address this growing divide,’ Cynthia Duncan says.
There is little doubt which side of America’s divide the hills of east Kentucky fall on. Driving through the wooded Appalachian valleys is a lesson in poverty. The mountains have never been rich. Times now are as tough as they have ever been. Trailer homes are the norm. Every so often a lofty mansion looms into view, a sign of prosperity linked to the coal mines or the logging firms that are the only industries in the region. Everyone else lives on the margins, grabbing work where they can. The biggest cash crop is illicitly grown marijuana.
Save The Children works here. Though the charity is usually associated with earthquakes in Pakistan or famine in Africa, it runs an extensive programme in east Kentucky. It includes a novel scheme enlisting teams of ‘foster grandparents’ to tackle the shocking child illiteracy rates and thus eventually hit poverty itself.
The problem is acute. At Jone’s Fork school, a team of indomitable grannies arrive each day to read with the children. The scheme has two benefits: it helps the children struggle out of poverty and pays the pensioners a small wage. ‘This has been a lifesaver for me and I feel as if the children would just fall through the cracks without us,’ says Erma Owens. It has offered dramatic help to some. One group of children are doing so well in the scheme that their teacher, Loretta Shepherd, has postponed retirement in order to stand by them. ‘It renewed me to have these kids,’ she said.
Certainly Renae Sturgill sees the changes in her children. She too lives in deep poverty. Though she attends college and her husband has a job, the Sturgill trailer sits amid a clutter of abandoned cars. Money is scarce. But now her kids are in the reading scheme and she has seen how they have changed. Especially eight-year-old Zach. He’s hard to control at times, but he has come to love school. ‘Zach likes reading now. I know it’s going to be real important for him,’ Renae says. Zach is shy and won’t speak much about his achievements. But Genny Waddell, who co-ordinates family welfare at Jone’s Fork, is immensely proud. ‘Now Zach reads because he wants to. He really fought to get where he is,’ she says.
In America, to be poor is a stigma. In a country which celebrates individuality and the goal of giving everyone an equal opportunity to make it big, those in poverty are often blamed for their own situation. Experience on the ground does little to bear that out. When people are working two jobs at a time and still failing to earn enough to feed their families, it seems impossible to call them lazy or selfish. There seems to be a failure in the system, not the poor themselves.
It is an impression backed up by many of those mired in poverty in Oklahoma and Kentucky. Few asked for handouts. Many asked for decent wages. ‘It is unfair. I am working all the time and so what have I done wrong?’ says Freda Lee. But the economy does not seem to be allowing people to make a decent living. It condemns the poor to stay put, fighting against seemingly impossible odds or to pull up sticks and try somewhere else.
In Tulsa, Tammy Reinbold and her family are moving to Texas as soon as they save the money for enough petrol. It could take several months. ‘I’ve been in Tulsa 12 years and I just gotta try somewhere else,’ she says.
Savethechildren.org
From Tom Joad to Roseanne
In a country that prides itself on a culture of rugged individualism, hard work and self-sufficiency, it is no surprise that poverty and the poor do not have a central place in America’s cultural psyche.
But in art, films and books American poverty has sometimes been portrayed with searing honesty. John Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath, which was made into a John Ford movie, is the most famous example. It was an unflinching account of the travails of a poor Oklahoma family forced to flee the Dust Bowl during the 1930s Depression. Its portrait of Tom Joad and his family’s life on the road as they sought work was a nod to wider issues of social justice in America.
Another ground-breaking work of that time was James Agee’s Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, a non-fiction book about time spent among poor white farmers in the Deep South. It practically disappeared upon its first publication in 1940 but in the Sixties was hailed as a masterpiece. In mainstream American culture, poverty often lurks in the background. Or it is portrayed – as in Sergio Leone’s crime epic Once Upon A Time In America – as the basis for a tale of rags to riches.
One notable, yet often overlooked, exception was the great success of the sitcom Roseanne. The show depicted the realities of working-class Middle American life with a grit and humour that is a world away from the usual sitcom settings in a sunlit suburbia, most often in New York or California. The biggest sitcoms of the past decade – Friends, Frasier or Will and Grace – all deal with aspirational middle-class foibles that have little relevance to America’s millions of working poor.
An America divided
· There are 37 million Americans living below the poverty line. That figure has increased by five million since President George W. Bush came to power.
· The United States has 269 billionaires, the highest number in the world.
· Almost a quarter of all black Americans live below the poverty line; 22 per cent of Hispanics fall below it. But for whites the figure is just 8.6 per cent.
· There are 46 million Americans without health insurance.
· There are 82,000 homeless people in Los Angeles alone.
· In 2004 the poorest community in America was Pine Ridge Indian reservation. Unemployment is over 80 per cent, 69 per cent of people live in poverty and male life expectancy is 57 years. In the Western hemisphere only Haiti has a lower number.
· The richest town in America is Rancho Santa Fe in California. Average incomes are more than $100,000 a year; the average house price is $1.7m.

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Poverty Main

The Census Bureau reports poverty data from several major household surveys and programs. The Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC) to the Current Population Survey (CPS) is the source of official national poverty estimates. The American Community Survey (ACS) provides single and multi-year estimates for smaller areas. The Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) provides longitudinal estimates. The Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates (SAIPE) program provides model-based poverty estimates for counties and school districts. See Description of Income and Poverty Data Sources to determine which survey or program meets your specific needs.

Latest Releases

Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2011 (P60-243)
Poverty Rates for Selected Detailed Race and Hispanic Groups by State and Place: 2007–2011 (ACSBR/11-17)
Poverty and Shared Households by State: 2011 (ACSBR/11-05)
Poverty: 2010 and 2011 American Community Survey (ACSBR/11-01)
Sharing a Household: Household Composition and Economic Well-Being: 2007-2010 (P60-242)
Areas With Concentrated Poverty: 2006-2010 (ACSBR/10-17) [PDF - 764k]
Child Poverty Brief 2009 and 2010: Rates by Race & Hispanic Origin by State (ACSBR/10-05) [PDF - 1.3M]
Poverty: 2009 and 2010 American Community Survey (ACSBR/10-01) [PDF - 737k]
Dynamics of Economic Well-Being: Poverty 2004-2006
Latest Research – Supplemental Poverty Measure
Tables of NAS-based Experimental Poverty Estimates: 2009
Effect of Benefits and Taxes on Income and Poverty: 2009 (R&D)
Model-based Small Area Income & Poverty Estimates (SAIPE) for School Districts, Counties, and States for 2009
Poverty: 2008 and 2009 American Community Survey (ACSBR/09-01) [PDF - 234k]
Supplemental Poverty Measure — Federal Register Notice
Observations from the Interagency Technical Working Group on Developing a Supplemental Poverty Measure [PDF - 138k]

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Source: U.S. Census Bureau | Social, Economic, and Housing Statistics Division: Poverty | Last Revised: February 20, 2013

Sheldon Danziger

After Welfare Reform and an Economic Boom:

Why is

Child Poverty Still So Much Higher in the U.S.

than in

Europe?

PSC Research Report

Report No. 02-506

June 2002

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ESEARCH

NIVERSITY

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PSC

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Poverty in the United States

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Poor mother and children during the Great Depression. Elm Grove, California, USA.

In November 2012 the U.S. Census Bureau said more than 16% of the population lived in poverty in the United States, including almost 20% of American children,^[1] up from 14.3% (approximately 43.6 million) in 2009 and to its highest level since 1993. In 2008, 13.2% (39.8 million) Americans lived in poverty.^[2]
In 2011, Extreme poverty in the United States, meaning households living on less than $2 per day before government benefits, doubled from 1996 levels, to 1.5 million households, including 2.8 million children.^[3] In 2013, child poverty reached record high levels, with 16.7 million children living in food insecure households, about 35% more than 2007 levels.^[4] The number of people in the U.S. who are in poverty is approaching 1960s levels that led to the national War on Poverty.^[5]
Poverty is a state of privation, or a lack of the usual or socially acceptable amount of money or material possessions.^[6] The most common measure of poverty in the U.S. is the “poverty threshold” set by the U.S. government. This measure recognizes poverty as a lack of those goods and services commonly taken for granted by members of mainstream society.^[7] The official threshold is adjusted for inflation using the consumer price index. The government’s definition of poverty is based on total income received. For example, the poverty level for 2012 was set at $23,050 (total yearly income) for a family of four.^[8] Most Americans (58.5%) will spend at least one year below the poverty line at some point between ages 25 and 75.^[9] Poverty rates are persistently higher in rural and inner city parts of the country as compared to suburban areas.^[10]^[11]

Measures of poverty

Measures of poverty can be either absolute or relative.

Two official measures of poverty

Percent and number below the poverty threshold.^[12]

The poverty rate for selected age groups. Those under the age of 18 are most likely to fall below

There are two basic versions of the federal poverty measure: the poverty thresholds (which are the primary version) and the poverty guidelines. The Census Bureau issues the poverty thresholds, which are generally used for statistical purposes—for example, to estimate the number of people in poverty nationwide each year and classify them by type of residence, race, and other social, economic, and demographic characteristics. The Department of Health and Human Services issues the poverty guidelines for administrative purposes—for instance, to determine whether a person or family is eligible for assistance through various federal programs.^[13]
Since the 1960s, the United States Government has defined poverty in absolute terms. When the Johnson administration declared “war on poverty” in 1964, it chose an absolute measure. The “absolute poverty line” is the threshold below which families or individuals are considered to be lacking the resources to meet the basic needs for healthy living; having insufficient income to provide the food, shelter and clothing needed to preserve health.
The “Orshansky Poverty Thresholds” form the basis for the current measure of poverty in the U.S. Mollie Orshansky was an economist working for the Social Security Administration (SSA). Her work appeared at an opportune moment. Orshansky’s article was published later in the same year that Johnson declared war on poverty. Since her measure was absolute (i.e., did not depend on other events), it made it possible to objectively answer whether the U.S. government was “winning” this war. The newly formed United States Office of Economic Opportunity adopted the lower of the Orshansky poverty thresholds for statistical, planning, and budgetary purposes in May 1965.
The Bureau of the Budget (now the Office of Management and Budget) adopted Orshansky’s definition for statistical use in all Executive departments. The measure gave a range of income cutoffs, or thresholds, adjusted for factors such as family size, sex of the family head, number of children under 18 years old, and farm or non-farm residence. The economy food plan (the least costly of four nutritionally adequate food plans designed by the Department of Agriculture) was at the core of this definition of poverty.^[14]
The Department of Agriculture found that families of three or more persons spent about one third of their after-tax income on food. For these families, poverty thresholds were set at three times the cost of the economy food plan. Different procedures were used for calculating poverty thresholds for two-person households and persons living alone. Annual updates of the SSA poverty thresholds were based on price changes in the economy food plan.
Two changes were made to the poverty definition in 1969. Thresholds for non-farm families were tied to annual changes in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rather than changes in the cost of the economy food plan. Farm thresholds were raised from 70 to 85% of the non-farm levels.
In 1981, further changes were made to the poverty definition. Separate thresholds for “farm” and “female-householder” families were eliminated. The largest family size category became “nine persons or more.”^[14]
Apart from these changes, the U.S. government’s approach to measuring poverty has remained static for the past forty years.

Recent poverty rate and guidelines

United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) figures for poverty in 2012^[8]
Persons in Family Unit	48 Contiguous States and D.C.	Alaska	Hawaii
1	$11,170	$13,970	$12,860
2	$15,130	$18,920	$17,410
3	$19,090	$23,870	$21,960
4	$23,050	$28,820	$26,510
5	$27,010	$33,770	$31,060
6	$30,970	$38,720	$35,610
7	$34,930	$43,670	$40,160
8	$38,890	$48,620	$44,710
Each additional person adds	$3,960	$4,950	$4,550

The poverty guideline figures are not the figures the Census Bureau uses to calculate the number of poor persons. The figures that the Census Bureau uses are the poverty thresholds. The Census Bureau provides an explanation of the difference between poverty thresholds and guidelines.^[15] The Census Bureau uses a set of money income thresholds that vary by family size and composition to determine who is in poverty.^[14] The 2010 figure for a family of 4 with no children under 18 years of age is $22,541, while the figure for a family of 4 with 2 children under 18 is $22,162.^[16] For comparison, the 2011 HHS poverty guideline for a family of 4 is $22,350.

Numbers in other countries

The official number of poor in the United States in 2008 is about 39.1 million people, greater in number but not percentage than the officially poor in Indonesia, which has a far lower Human Development Index and the next largest population after the United States.^[17]^[18] The poverty level in the United States, with 15% (46.2 million people in poverty, of a total of 308.5 million) is comparable to the one in France, where 14% of the population live with less than 880 euros per month.^[19]^[20]
Number of poor are hard to compare across countries. Absolute income may be used but does not reflect the actual number of poor, which depend on relative income and cost of living in each country. Among developed countries, each country then has its own definition and threshold of what it means to be poor, but this is not adjusted for cost of living and social benefits. For instance, despite the fact that France and US have about the same threshold in terms of dollars amount for poverty, cost of living benefits differ, with universal health care and highly subsidized post-secondary education existing in France. In general, it might be better to use the Human Poverty Index (HPI), Human Development Index (HDI) or other global measure to compare quality of living in different countries.

Relative measures of poverty

Another way of looking at poverty is in relative terms. “Relative poverty” can be defined as having significantly less access to income and wealth than other members of society. Therefore, the relative poverty rate is a measure of income inequality. When the standard of living among those in more financially advantageous positions rises while that of those considered poor stagnates, the relative poverty rate will reflect such growing income inequality and increase. Conversely, the poverty rate can decrease, with low income people coming to have less wealth and income if wealthier people’s wealth is reduced by a larger percentage than theirs. In 1959, a family at the poverty line had an income that was 42.64% of the median income.^{[citation needed]} If the poverty line in 1999 was less than 42.64% of the median income, then relative poverty would have increased.
In the European Union and for the OECD, “relative poverty” is defined as an income below 60% of the national median equalized disposable income after social transfers for a comparable household. In Germany, for example, the official relative poverty line for a single adult person in 2003 was 938 euros per month (11,256 euros/year, $12,382 PPP. West Germany 974 euros/month, 11,688 euros/year, $12,857 PPP). For a family of four with two children below 14 years the poverty line was 1969.8 euros per month ($2,167 PPP) or 23,640 euros ($26,004 PPP) per year. According to Eurostat the percentage of people in Germany living at risk of poverty (relative poverty) in 2004 was 16% (official national rate 13.5% in 2003). Additional definitions for poverty in Germany are “poverty” (50% median) and “strict poverty” (40% median, national rate 1.9% in 2003). Generally the percentage for “relative poverty” is much higher than the quota for “strict poverty”. The U.S concept is best comparable to “strict poverty”. By European standards the official (relative) poverty rate in the United States would be significantly higher than it is by the U.S. measure. A research paper from the OECD calculates the relative poverty rate for the United States at 16% for 50% median of disposable income and nearly 24% for 60% of median disposable income^[21] (OECD average: 11% for 50% median, 16% for 60% median).
Some critics argue that relying on income disparity to determine who is impoverished can be misleading. The Bureau of Labor Statistics data suggests that consumer spending varies much less than income. In 2008, the “poorest” one fifth of Americans households spent on average $12,955 per person for goods and services (other than taxes), the second quintile spent $14,168, the third $16,255, the fourth $19,695, while the “richest” fifth spent $26,644. The disparity of expenditures is much less than the disparity of income.^[22]^{[neutrality is disputed]}

The income distribution and relative poverty

Although the relative approach theoretically differs largely from the Orshansky definition, crucial variables of both poverty definitions are more similar than often thought. First, the so-called standardization of income in both approaches is very similar. To make incomes comparable among households of different sizes, equivalence scales are used to standardize household income to the level of a single person household. In Europe, the modified OECD equivalence scale is used, which takes the combined value of 1 for the head of household, 0.5 for each additional household member older than 14 years and 0.3 for children. When compared to the US Census poverty lines, which is based on a defined basket of goods, for the most prevalent household types both standardization methods show to be very similar.
Furthermore, the poverty threshold in Western-European countries is not always higher than the Orshansky threshold for a single person family. The actual Orchinsky poverty line for single person households in the US ($9645 in 2004) is very comparable to the relative poverty line in many Western-European countries (Belgium 2004: €9315), while price levels are also similar.^{[citation needed]} The reason why relative poverty measurement causes high poverty levels in the US, as demonstrated by Förster,^[21] is caused by distributional effects rather than real differences in well-being among EU-countries and the USA.
The median household income is much higher in the US than in Europe due to the wealth of the middle classes in the US, from which the poverty line is derived. Although the paradigm of relative poverty is most valuable, this comparison of poverty lines show that the higher prevalence of relative poverty levels in the US are not an indicator of a more severe poverty problem but an indicator of larger inequalities between rich middle classes and the low-income households. It is therefore not correct to state that the US income distribution is characterized by a large proportion of households in poverty; it is characterized by relatively large income inequality but also high levels of prosperity of the middle classes.^{[neutrality is disputed]} The 2007 poverty threshold for a three member family is 17,070.

Poverty and demographics

In addition to family status, race/ethnicity and age also correlate with high poverty rates in the United States. Although data regarding race and poverty are more extensively published and cross tabulated the family status correlation is by far the strongest.

Poverty and family status

Homeless children in the United States.^[23] The number of homeless children reached record highs in 2011,^[24] 2012,^[25] and 2013^[26] at about three times their number in 1983.^[25]

According to the US Census, in 2007 5.8% of all people in married families lived in poverty,^[27] as did 26.6% of all persons in single parent households^[27] and 19.1% of all persons living alone.^[27] More than 75% of all poor households are headed by women (2012).^[28]

By race/ethnicity and family status, based on data from 2007

Camden, New Jersey is one of the poorest cities in the United States.

Among married couple families: 5.8% lived in poverty.^[27] This number varied by race and ethnicity as follows:
5.4% of all white persons (which includes white Hispanics),^[29]
9.7% of all black persons (which includes black Hispanics),^[30] and
14.9% of all Hispanic persons (of any race)^[31] living in poverty.
Among single parent (male or female) families: 26.6% lived in poverty.^[27] This number varied by race and ethnicity as follows”
22.5% of all white persons (which includes white Hispanics),^[29]
44.0% of all black persons (which includes black Hispanics),^[30] and
33.4% of all Hispanic persons (of any race)^[31] living in poverty.
Among unrelated individuals living alone: 19.1% lived in poverty.^[27] This number varied by race and ethnicity as follows:
18% of white persons (which includes white Hispanics)^[32]
27.9% of black persons (which includes black Hispanics)^[31] and
27% of Hispanic persons (of any race)^[33] living in poverty

Poverty and race/ethnicity

The US Census declared that in 2010 15.1% of the general population lived in poverty:^[34]
9.9% of all non-Hispanic white persons
12.1% of all Asian persons
26.6% of all Hispanic persons (of any race)
27.4% of all black persons.
About half of those living in poverty are non-Hispanic white (19.6 million in 2010),^[34] but poverty rates are much higher for blacks and Hispanics. Non-Hispanic white children comprised 57% of all poor rural children.^[35]
In FY 2009, black families comprised 33.3% of TANF families, non-Hispanic white families comprised 31.2%, and 28.8% were Hispanic.^[36]

Poverty and age

The US Census declared that in 2010 15.1% of the general population lived in poverty:
22% of all people under age 18
13.7% of all people 19–64, and
9% of all people ages 65 and older^[34]
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) uses a different measure for poverty and declared in 2008 that child poverty in the US is 20% and poverty among the elderly is 23%.^[37] The non-profit advocacy group Feeding America has released a study (May 2009) based on 2005–2007 data from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Agriculture Department, which claims that 3.5 million children under the age of 5 are at risk of hunger in the United States. The study claims that in 11 states, Louisiana, which has the highest rate, followed by North Carolina, Ohio, Kentucky, Texas, New Mexico, Kansas, South Carolina, Tennessee, Idaho and Arkansas, more than 20 percent of children under 5 are allegedly at risk of going hungry. (Receiving fewer than 1,800 calories per day) The study was paid by ConAgra Foods, a large food company.^[38]

Child poverty

In 2013, child poverty reached record high levels in the U.S., with 16.7 million children living in food insecure households. 47 million Americans depend on food banks, more than 30% above 2007 levels. Households headed by single mothers are most likely to be affected. Worst effected are the District of Columbia, Oregon, Arizona, New Mexico and Florida, while North Dakota, New Hampshire, Virginia, Minnesota and Massachusetts are the least affected.^[4]

Poverty and education

Poverty affects individual access to quality education. The U.S. education system is funded by local communities; therefore the quality of materials and teachers is reflective of the affluence of community. Low income communities are not able to afford the quality education that high income communities are. Another important aspect of education in low income communities is the apathy of both students and teachers. To some the children of the poor or ignorant are seen as mere copies of their parents fated to live out the same poor or ignorant life. The effect of such a perception can be teachers that will not put forth the effort to teach and students that are opposed to learning; in both cases the idea is that the poor student is incapable. Due to these and other reasons the quality of education between the classes is not equal.^[39]

Food security

Eighty-nine percent of the American households were food secure throughout the entire year of 2002, meaning that they had access, at all times, to enough food for an active, healthy life for all of the household members. The remaining households were food insecure at least some time during that year. The prevalence of food insecurity rose from 10.7% in 2001 to 11.1% in 2002, and the prevalence of food insecurity with hunger rose from 3.3% to 3.5%.^[40]
In 2008, eighty-five percent of American households were food secure throughout the entire year.^[41]

Factors in poverty

There are numerous factors related to poverty in the United States.

Income and intelligence have been found to be related. Charles Murray compared the earnings of 733 full sibling pairs with differing intelligence quotients (IQ’s). He referred to the sample as utopian in that the sampled pairs were raised in families with virtually no illegitimacy, divorce or poverty. The average earnings of sampled individuals with an IQ of under 75 was $11,000, compared to $16,000 for those with an IQ between 75 and 90, $23,000 for those with an IQ between 90 and 110, $27,000 for those with an IQ between 110 and 125, and $38,000 for those with an IQ above 125. ^[42]

Income has a high correlation with educational levels. In 2007, the median earnings of household headed by individuals with less than a 9th grade education was $20,805 while households headed by high school graduates earned $40,456, households headed holders of bachelor’s degree earned $77,605, and families headed by individuals with professional degrees earned $100,000.^[43]

In many cases poverty is caused by job loss. In 2007, the poverty rate was 21.5% for individuals who were unemployed, but only 2.5% for individuals who were employed full-time.^[43]

In 1991, 8.3% of children in two-parent families were likely to live in poverty; 19.6% of children lived with father in single parent family; and 47.1% in single parent family headed by mother.^[44]

Income levels vary with age. For example, the median 2009 income for households headed by individuals age 15–24 was only $30,750, but increased to $50,188 for household headed by individuals age 25–34 and $61,083 for household headed by individuals 35–44.^[45] Although the reasons are unclear, work experience and additional education may be factors.

Income levels vary along racial/ethnic lines: 21% of all children in the United States live in poverty, about 46% of black children and 40% of Latino children live in poverty.^[46] The poverty rate is 9.9% for black married couples and only 30% of black children are born to married couples (see Marriage below). Citing the Pew Researh Center,The Economist reports that in 2007,11% of black women aged 30–44 without a high school diploma had a working spouse.^[47]^{[copyright violation?]} The poverty rate for native born and naturalized whites is identical (9.6%). On the other hand, the poverty rate for naturalized blacks is 11.8% compared to 25.1% for native born blacks suggesting race alone does not explain income disparity. Not all minorities have low incomes. Asian families have higher incomes than all other ethnic groups. For example, the 2005 median income of Asian families was $68,957 compared to the median income of white families of $59,124.^[48] Asians, however, report discrimination occurrences more frequently than blacks. Specifically, 31% of Asians reported employment discrimination compared to 26% of blacks in 2005.^[49]

The relationship between tax rates and poverty is disputed. A study comparing high tax Scandinavian countries with the U. S. suggests high tax rates are inversely correlated with poverty rates.^[50] The poverty rate, however, is low in some low tax countries such as Switzerland. A comparison of poverty rates between states reveals that some low tax states have low poverty rates. For example, New Hampshire has the lowest poverty rate of any state in the U. S., and has very low taxes (46th among all states).It is true however that in those instances, both Switzerland and New Hampshire have a very high household income and other measures to levy or offset the lack of taxation. For example, Switzerland has Universal Healthcare and a free system of education for children as young as four years old.^[51] New Hampshire has no state income tax or sales tax, but does have the nation’s highest property taxes.^[52]

The conservative Heritage Foundation speculates that illegal immigration increases job competition among low wage earners, both native and foreign born. Additionally many first generation immigrants, namely those without a high school diploma, are also living in poverty themselves.^[53]

Concerns regarding accuracy

In recent years, there have been a number of concerns raised about the official U.S. poverty measure. In 1995, the National Research Council‘s Committee on National Statistics convened a panel on measuring poverty. The findings of the panel were that “the official poverty measure in the United States is flawed and does not adequately inform policy-makers or the public about who is poor and who is not poor.”
The panel was chaired by Robert Michael, former Dean of the Harris School of the University of Chicago. According to Michael, the official U.S. poverty measure “has not kept pace with far-reaching changes in society and the economy.” The panel proposed a model based on disposable income:

“

According to the panel’s recommended measure, income would include, in addition to money received, the value of non-cash benefits such as food stamps, school lunches and public housing that can be used to satisfy basic needs. The new measure also would subtract from gross income certain expenses that cannot be used for these basic needs, such as income taxes, child-support payments, medical costs, health-insurance premiums and work-related expenses, including child care.^[54]

”

Understating poverty

Many sociologists and government officials have argued that poverty in the United States is understated, meaning that there are more households living in actual poverty than there are households below the poverty threshold.^[55] A recent NPR report states that as much as 30% of Americans have trouble making ends meet and other advocates have made supporting claims that the rate of actual poverty in the US is far higher than that calculated by using the poverty threshold.^[55] A study taken in 2012 estimated that roughly 38% of Americans live “paycheck to paycheck.”^[56]
According to William H. Chafe, if one used a relative standard for measuring poverty (a standard that took into account the rising standards of living rather than an absolute dollar figure) then 18% of families was living in poverty in 1968, not 13% as officially estimated at that time.^[57]
As far back as 1969, the Bureau of Labor Statistics put forward suggested budgets for families to live adequately on. 60% of working-class Americans lived below one of these budgets, which suggested that a far higher proportion of Americans lived in poverty than the official poverty line suggested. These findings were also used by observers on the left when questioning the long-established view that most Americans had attained an affluent standard of living in the two decades following the end of the Second World War.^[58]^[59]

A neighborhood of poor white southerners, Chicago, 1974

Using a definition of relative poverty (reflecting disposable income below half the median of adjusted national income), it was estimated that, between 1979 and 1982, 17.1% of Americans lived in poverty, compared with 12.6% of the population of Canada, 12.2% of the population of Australia, 9.7% of the population of Britain, 5.6% of the population of West Germany, 5.3% of the population of Sweden, and 5.2% of the population of Norway.^[60]
As noted above, the poverty thresholds used by the US government were originally developed during the Johnson administration’s War on Poverty initiative in 1963–1964.^[61]^[62] Mollie Orshansky, the government economist working at the Social Security Administration who developed the thresholds, based the threshold levels on the cost of purchasing what in the mid 1950s had been determined by the US Department of Agriculture to be the minimal nutritionally-adequate amount of food necessary to feed a family. Orshansky multiplied the cost of the food basket by a factor of three, under the assumption that the average family spent one third of its income on food.
While the poverty threshold is updated for inflation every year, the basket of food used to determine what constitutes being deprived of a socially acceptable minimum standard of living has not been updated since 1955. As a result, the current poverty line only takes into account food purchases that were common more than 50 years ago, updating their cost using the Consumer Price Index. When methods similar to Orshansky’s were used to update the food basket using prices for the year 2000 instead of from nearly a half century earlier, it was found that the poverty line should actually be 200% higher than the official level being used by the government in that year.^[63]
Yet even that higher level could still be considered flawed, as it would be based almost entirely on food costs and on the assumption that families still spend a third of their income on food. In fact, Americans typically spent less than one tenth of their after-tax income on food in 2000.^[64] For many families, the costs of housing, health insurance and medical care, transportation, and access to basic telecommunications take a much larger bite out of the family’s income today than a half century ago; yet, as noted above,^[61]^[62] none of these costs are considered in determining the official poverty thresholds. According to John Schwarz, a political scientist at the University of Arizona:

“

The official poverty line today is essentially what it takes in today’s dollars, adjusted for inflation, to purchase the same poverty-line level of living that was appropriate to a half century ago, in 1955, for that year furnished the basic data for the formula for the very first poverty measure. Updated thereafter only for inflation, the poverty line lost all connection over time with current consumption patterns of the average family. Quite a few families then didn’t have their own private telephone, or a car, or even a mixer in their kitchen… The official poverty line has thus been allowed to fall substantially below a socially decent minimum, even though its intention was to measure such a minimum.

”

The issue of understating poverty is especially pressing in states with both a high cost of living and a high poverty rate such as California where the median home price in May 2006 was determined to be $564,430.^[65] With half of all homes being priced above the half million dollar mark and prices in urban areas such as San Francisco, San Jose or Los Angeles being higher than the state average, it is almost impossible for not just the poor but also lower middle class worker to afford decent housing,^{[citation needed]} and no possibility of home ownership. In the Monterey area, where the low-pay industry of agriculture is the largest sector in the economy and the majority of the population lacks a college education the median home price was determined to be $723,790, requiring an upper middle class income which only roughly 20% of all households in the county boast.^[65]^[66]
Such fluctuations in local markets are, however, not considered in the Federal poverty threshold, and thus leave many who live in poverty-like conditions out of the total number of households classified as poor.
In 2011, the Census Bureau introduced a new supplementary poverty measure aimed at providing a more accurate picture of the true extent of poverty in the United States. According to this new measure, 16% of Americans lived in poverty in 2011, compared with 15.2% using the official figure. The new measure also estimated that nearly half of all Americans lived in poverty that year, defined as living within 200% of the federal poverty line.^[67]
Duke University Professor of Public Policy and Economics Sandy Darity, Jr. says, “There is no exact way of measuring poverty. The measures are contingent on how we conceive of and define poverty. Efforts to develop more refined measures have been dominated by researchers who intentionally want to provide estimates that reduce the magnitude of poverty.”^[68]

Overstating poverty

Youth play in Chicago’s Stateway Gardens high-rise housing project in 1973.

Some critics assert that the official U.S. poverty definition is inconsistent with how it is defined by its own citizens and the rest of the world, because the U.S. government considers many citizens statistically impoverished despite their ability to sufficiently meet their basic needs. According to a 2011 paper by poverty expert Robert Rector, of the 43.6 million Americans deemed to be below the poverty level by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2009, the majority had adequate shelter, food, clothing and medical care. In addition, the paper stated that those assessed to be below the poverty line in 2011 have a much higher quality of living than those who were identified by the census 40 years ago as being in poverty.^[69]
The federal poverty line also excludes income other than cash income, especially welfare benefits. Thus, if food stamps and public housing were successfully raising the standard of living for poverty stricken individuals, then the poverty line figures would not shift since they do not consider the income equivalents of such entitlements.^[70]
A 1993 study of low income single mothers titled Making Ends Meet, by Kathryn Edin, a sociologist at the University of Pennsylvania, showed that the mothers spent more than their reported incomes because they could not “make ends meet” without such expenditures. According to Edin, they made up the difference through contributions from family members, absent boyfriends, off-the-book jobs, and church charity.
According to Edin: “No one avoided the unnecessary expenditures, such as the occasional trip to the Dairy Queen, or a pair of stylish new sneakers for the son who might otherwise sell drugs to get them, or the Cable TV subscription for the kids home alone and you are afraid they will be out on the street if they are not watching TV.” However many mothers skipped meals or did odd jobs to cover those expenses. According to Edin, for “most welfare-reliant mothers food and shelter alone cost almost as much as these mothers received from the government. For more than one-third, food and housing costs exceeded their cash benefits, leaving no extra money for uncovered medical care, clothing, and other household expenses.” ^[71]
Moreover, Swedish libertarian think tank Timbro points out that lower-income households in the U.S. tend to own more appliances and larger houses than many middle-income Western Europeans.^[72]

Fighting poverty

There have been many governmental and nongovernmental efforts to reduce poverty and its effects. These range in scope from neighborhood efforts to campaigns with a national focus. They target specific groups affected by poverty such as children, people who are autistic, immigrants, or people who are homeless. Efforts to alleviate poverty use a disparate set of methods, such as advocacy, education, social work, legislation, direct service or charity, and community organizing.
Recent debates have centered on the need for policies that focus on both “income poverty” and “asset poverty.”^[73] Advocates for the approach argue that traditional governmental poverty policies focus solely on supplementing the income of the poor, through programs such as Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) and Food Stamps. According to the CFED 2012 Assets & Opportunity Scorecard, 27 percent of households – nearly double the percentage that are income poor – are living in “asset poverty.” These families do not have the savings or other assets to cover basic expenses (equivalent to what could be purchased with a poverty level income) for three months if a layoff or other emergency leads to loss of income. Since 2009, the number of asset poor families has increased by 21 percent from about one in five families to one in four families.
Additionally, the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC or EIC) is a credit for people who earn low-to-moderate incomes. This credit allows them to get free money from productive taxpayers who must do without so the taxabsorbers can get free money. The Earned Income Tax Credit is viewed as the largest poverty reduction program in the United States.

References

^“Census: U.S. Poverty Rate Spikes, Nearly 50 Million Americans Affected”CBS. November 15, 2012
^“Poverty rate hits 15-year high”Reuters. September 17, 2010
^“Extreme Poverty in the United States, 1996 to 2011″National Poverty Center, February 2012
^ ^a ^b Walker, Duncan (6 March 2013). “The children going hungry in America”. BBC News. Retrieved 13 March 2013.
^“US poverty on track to post record gain in 2009 – Yahoo! News”. News.yahoo.com. 2009-04-13. Retrieved 2010-09-16.
^ Zweig, Michael (2004) What’s Class Got to do With It, American Society in the Twenty-first Century. ILR Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-8899-3
^ Schwartz, J. E. (2005). Freedom reclaimed: Rediscovering the American vision. Baltimore: G-University Press.
^ ^a ^b 2012 HHS Poverty GuidelinesU.S. Department of Health & Human Services, Accessed: 14 June 2012
^ Hacker, J. S. (2006). The great risk shift: The new insecurity and the decline of the American dream. New York: Oxford University Press (USA).
^ Savage, Sarah. “Child Poverty High in Rural America”. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
^Child Poverty High in Rural America Newswise, Retrieved on August 26, 2008.
^“Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2008″. U.S. Census Bureau. September 2009.
^ Fisher, G.M. (2003) The Development of the Orshansky Poverty Thresholds. Accessed: 2003-12-27
^ ^a ^b ^c Poverty Definition U.S. Census Bureau. Accessed: 2003-12-27.
^Census Bureau answer to What is the difference between poverty thresholds and guidelines?
^Census Bureau Poverty thresholds
^Census Bureau:Poverty: 2007 and 2008 American Community Surveys
^BPS:Miskin
^[1]
^INSEE Nombre et taux de personnes vivant sous le seuil de pauvreté selon leur âge
^ ^a ^b Michael Foerster/Marco Mira d’Ercole, “Income Distribution and Poverty in OECD Countries in the Second Half of the 1990s”, OECD Social, employment and migration working papers No. 22, Paris 2005, page 22, figure 6.
^ Bureau of Labor Statistics’ 2008 Consumer Spending Survey, Table 1 ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/special.requests/ce/standard/2008/quintile.txt. The reported expenditures were computed by dividing the average annual expenditures (reduced by real property, income and other taxes) by the average number of persons in the household.
^ Bassuk, E.L., et al. (2011) America’s Youngest Outcasts: 2010 (Needham, MA: The National Center on Family Homelessness) page 20
^“Homeless children at record high in US. Can the trend be reversed?”Christian Science Monitor, December 13, 2011
^ ^a ^b “State of the Homeless 2012″Coalition for the Homeless, June 8, 2012
^“600 homeless children in D.C., and no one seems to care”Washington Post, February 8, 2013
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f U.S. Census Bureau. Current Population Survey. People in Families by Family Structure, Age, and Sex, Iterated by Income-to-Poverty Ratio and Race: 2007: Below 100% of Poverty – All Races.
^ Dáil, Paula vW. (2012). Women and Poverty in 21st Century America. NC, USA: McFarland. pp. 27. ISBN 978-0-7864-4903-3.
^ ^a ^b U.S. Census Bureau. Current Population Survey. People in Families by Family Structure, Age, and Sex, Iterated by Income-to-Poverty Ratio and Race: 2007: Below 100% of Poverty – White Alone.
^ ^a ^b “Poverty 3-Part 100_06″. Pubdb3.census.gov. 2008-08-26. Retrieved 2010-09-16.
^ ^a ^b ^c “Poverty 2-Part 100_09″. Pubdb3.census.gov. 2008-08-26. Retrieved 2010-09-16.
^“Poverty 1-Part 100_03″. Pubdb3.census.gov. 2008-08-26. Retrieved 2010-09-16.
^“Poverty 1-Part 100_09″. Pubdb3.census.gov. 2008-08-26. Retrieved 2010-09-16.
^ ^a ^b ^c“Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2010“. U.S. Census Bureau
^“Poverty Is a Persistent Reality for Many Rural Children in U.S.“, William O’Hare (September 2009), Population Reference Bureau.
^“Characteristics and Financial Circumstances of TANF Recipients – Fiscal Year 2009“. United States Department of Health and Human Services.
^http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/47/2/41528678.pdf
^“3.5M Kids Under 5 On Verge Of Going Hungry
Study: 11 Percent Of U.S. Households Lack Food For Healthy Lifestyle” (“SHTML). Health. CBS NEWS. 2009-05-07. Retrieved 2009-05-08.
^ Doob, Christopher (2013). Social Inequality and Stratification in US Society. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education Inc.. pp. 38. ISBN 978-0-205-79241-2.
^Household Food Security in the United States, 2002– United States Department of Agriculture
^Household Food Security in the United States, 2008– United States Department of Agriculture
^ Charles Murray (1998). Income Inequality and IQ. Washington: AEI Press.
^ ^a ^b “U. S. Census: Income, Expenditures, Poverty and Wealth” (PDF). Retrieved 2010-03-20.
^futureofchildren.org
^ Census Bureau, Income Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the U. S.:2009 http://www.census.gov/prod/2010pubs/p60-238.pdf
^ Center for the Future of Children, The Future of Children. Vol. 7, No 2, 1997.
^“Sex and the single black woman“. The Economist. April 8, 2010.
^ Source: U. S. Census, Family Income Tables, http://pubdb3.census.gov/macro/032006/faminc/toc.htm.
^ Amy Joyce, “The Bias Breakdown,” The Washington Post, December 9, 2005, p. D01 citing Gallop Poll data.)
^“The Social Benefits and Economic Costs of Taxation” (PDF). Retrieved 2007-12-20.
^ The Swiss education system swissworld.org, Retrieved on 2009-06-23
^“New Hampshire’s State and Local Tax Burden, 1970–2006″. The Tax Foundation. 2008-08-07. http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxdata/show/468.html. Retrieved 2010-07-31.
^“Heritage Foundation’s views of immigration and poverty”. Retrieved 2007-02-25.
^ Harms, W. (1995) Poverty definition flawed, more accurate measure needed The University of Chicago Chronicle, 14:17.
^ ^a ^b Adams, J.Q.; Pearlie Strother-Adams (2001). Dealing with Diversity. Chicago, IL: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company. ISBN 0-7872-8145-X.
^http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505144_162-57477881/more-americans-live-paycheck-to-paycheck/
^ The Unfinished Journey: America Since World War II by William H. Chafe
^http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=TXdWbwEPIO0C&pg=PA482&dq=bureau+labor+statistics+1969+60%25+working-class&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Qi4fT_akHtG7hAfUz73zDQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=bureau%20labor%20statistics%201969%2060%25%20working-class&f=false
^http://www.thenation.com/article/155492/seventies-show?page=full
^http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=tPE0opidIxMC&pg=PA147&dq=Peter+Townsend+poverty+in+UK+percentage&hl=en&sa=X&ei=p2yQT9bvIcql0QW78Z34AQ&ved=0CDQQ6AEwADgK#v=onepage&q=Peter%20Townsend%20poverty%20in%20UK%20percentage&f=false
^ ^a ^b Fisher, Gordon M.. “The Development of the Orshansky Poverty Thresholds and Their Subsequent History as the Official U.S. Poverty Measure”. Poverty – Experimental Measures. U.S. Census Bureau. Retrieved 11 January 2012.
^ ^a ^b Fisher, Gordon M.. “Remembering Mollie Orshansky – The Developer of the Poverty Thresholds”. U.S. Social Security Administration Office of Retirement and Disability Policy. Retrieved 11 January 2012.
^ Schwarz, John E. (2005). Freedom Reclaimed: Rediscovering the American Vision. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University. pp. 194 note 13. ISBN 0-8018-7981-7.
^ Clauson, Annette (September 2000). “Despite Higher Food Prices, Percent of U.S. Income Spent on Food Remains Constant”. Amber Waves (U.S. Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service).
^ ^a ^b “California median home price”. Retrieved 2006-07-06.^{[dead link]}
^“Monterey County income distribution”. Retrieved 2006-07-06.
^http://www.epi.org/publication/poverty-measure-highlights-dire-circumstances/
^[2]
^ Rector, Robert; Rachel, Sheffield (July 18, 2011). “Air Conditioning, Cable TV, and an Xbox: What is Poverty in the United States Today?”. The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved July 27, 2011.
^Poor Poverty Yardsticks by Rea Hederman, Heritage Foundation, Washington Post. September 7, 2006. Accessed: 2007-02-18
^Devising New Math to Define Poverty by Louis Uchitelle, New York Times. 1999-10-18. Accessed: 2006-06-16
^“E.U. vs U.S.A,Timbro” (PDF). Retrieved 2007-11-10.
^http://assetsandopportunity.org/scorecard/

External links

U.S. Census Bureau Poverty Definition
U.S. Census Bureau Poverty in the United States
Why Poverty Doesn’t Rate, American Enterprise Institute
Social Solutions to Poverty: America’s Struggle to Build a Just Society. Scott Myers-Lipton, (2006).
Child Poverty and Tax: a simple graph of child disposible income disparity in OECD countries against tax burdens.
F.H.C. Ministries Charity is not Reform!
From Poverty to Prosperity: A National Strategy to Cut Poverty in Half, The Center for American Progress, April 2007.
Explanation of poverty definition by economist Ellen Frank in Dollars & Sense magazine, January/February 2006
“Deciding Who’s Poor” by economist Barbara Bergmann in Dollars & Sense magazine, March/April 2000
37 million poor hidden in the land of plenty
David Walls, Models of Poverty and Planned Change
U.S. Government Does Relatively Little to Lessen Child Poverty Rates
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Poverty Guidelines, Research, and Measurement
Cities Tolerate Homeless Camps by Jennifer Levitz, The Wall Street Journal, August 11, 2009
The Forgotten Americans PBS series by Hector Galan about colonias.
Americans living in Third World conditions This article discusses the living conditions of people inhabiting colonias (with pictures).
Steve Suitts, “The Worst of Times: Children in Extreme Poverty in the South and Nation,”Southern Spaces, 29 June 2010.

[show] v t e Life in the United States

[show] v t e Demographics of the United States

[show] v t e United States topics

[show] v t e Poverty in North America

Categories (+⁺):

The Other America

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The Other America, a book by Michael Harrington, (ISBN 0-684-82678-X) was an influential study of poverty in the United States, published in 1962 by Macmillan. A widely read review, “Our Invisible Poor,” in The New Yorker by Dwight Macdonald brought the book to the attention of President John F. Kennedy. The Other America argued that up to 25% of the nation was living in poverty. Many (such as historian Maurice Isserman^[1]) believe that this book is responsible for President Lyndon B. Johnson’s “War on Poverty.” The Penguin Books paperback editions have sold over one million copies.^[1] The Boston Globe editorialized that Medicaid, Medicare, food stamps and expanded social security benefits were traceable to Harrington’s ideas. Harrington became the pre-eminent spokesman for democratic socialism in America.^[1]

Documentary film

The 1999 documentary filmMichael Harrington and Today’s Other America: Corporate Power and Inequality captured the essence of Harrington’s ideas through the use of archival footage and interviews with his colleagues and opponents.^[2] Over thirty interviews were filmed, including:

John Kenneth Galbraith
Gloria Steinem
William F. Buckley
Charles Murray
as well as ordinary people who struggle to make a living, or are dependent on social services.

The documentary included a brief history of socialism in America, and raised questions concerning

the merits and relevance of unions today
the problems of migrant workers, farmers, and big business
and the American health care system.

References

^ ^a ^b ^c Isserman, Maurice (2009-06-19). “Michael Harrington: Warrior on poverty”. The New York Times.
^http://www.filmakers.com/index.php?a=filmDetail&filmID=1006

Two Americas

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Two Americas is a catch phrase referring to social stratification in American society, made famous in a speech by former US Senator and former presidential candidate John Edwards, originally referring to haves and have-nots.^[1] The speech has since become popular and inspired many parodies and similar metaphors.

Background

Although not necessarily the most prominent issue for other candidates in the seasons in which he campaigned for president, poverty has typically been a mainstay of liberal politics and a major focus for Edwards’ campaign efforts.^[2] Edwards has since expanded the metaphor further, for instance in a guest blog entry in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina:^[3]

“

During the campaign of 2004, I spoke often of the two Americas: the America of the privileged and the wealthy, and the America of those who lived from paycheck to paycheck. I spoke of the difference in the schools, the difference in the loan rates, the difference in opportunity. All of that pales today. Today … we see a harsher example of two Americas. We see the poor and working class of New Orleans who don’t own a car and couldn’t evacuate to hotels or families far from the target of Katrina. We see the suffering of families who lived from paycheck to paycheck and who followed the advice of officials and went to shelters at the Civic Center or the Superdome or stayed home to protect their possessions.

”

The speech

The following are excerpts from a speech given by Senator John Edwards as Democratic vice presidential nominee to the 2004 Democratic National Convention on 28 July 2004, based on the idea of Two Americas. For the complete transcript, see External links.

“I have spent my life fighting for the kind of people I grew up with. For two decades, I stood with kids and families against big HMOs and big insurance companies. When I got to the Senate, I fought those same fights against the Washington lobbyists and for causes like the Patients’ Bill of Rights. I stand here tonight ready to work with you and John [Kerry] to make America stronger. And we have much work to do, because the truth is, we still live in a country where there are two different Americas… [applause] one, for all of those people who have lived the American dream and don’t have to worry, and another for most Americans, everybody else who struggle to make ends meet every single day. It doesn’t have to be that way…
“We can build one America where we no longer have two health care systems: one for families who get the best health care money can buy, and then one for everybody else rationed out by insurance companies, drug companies, HMOs. Millions of Americans have no health coverage at all. It doesn’t have to be that way. We have a plan…
“We shouldn’t have two public school systems in this country: one for the most affluent communities, and one for everybody else. None of us believe that the quality of a child’s education should be controlled by where they live or the affluence of the community they live in. It doesn’t have to be that way. We can build one school system that works for all our kids, gives them a chance to do what they’re capable of doing…
“John Kerry and I believe that we shouldn’t have two different economies in America: one for people who are set for life, they know their kids and their grand-kids are going to be just fine; and then one for most Americans, people who live paycheck to paycheck…
“So let me give you some specifics. First, we can create good-paying jobs in this country again. We’re going to get rid of tax cuts for companies who are outsourcing your jobs… [applause] and, instead, we’re going to give tax breaks to American companies that are keeping jobs right here in America…
“Well, let me tell you how we’re going to pay for it. And I want to be very clear about this. We are going to keep and protect the tax cuts for 98 percent of Americans — 98 percent. We’re going to roll back — we’re going to roll back the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. And we’re going to close corporate loopholes…

Other applications

Edwards later revisited the Two Americas theme frequently in his 2008 presidential election campaign.

References

^Edwards brings ‘two Americas’ to center stage (USA TODAY)
^Two Americas: One Rich, One Poor? Understanding Income Inequality in the United States (Heritage Foundation)
^http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/9/2/14749/71454

External links

The original speech from the 2004 Democratic National Convention
A stump speech using the metaphor
A 2007 campaign ad explaining the Two Americas concept

[hide] v t e John Edwards

On the Bowery

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On the Bowery
Film poster
Directed by	Lionel Rogosin
Produced by	Lionel Rogosin
Written by	Mark Sufrin (uncredited)
Starring	Gorman Hendricks, Frank Matthews, Ray Salyer
Music by	Charles Mills
Cinematography	Richard Bagley (uncredited)
Editing by	Carl Lerner
Distributed by	Milestone Films
Release date(s)	1956
Running time	65 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

On the Bowery is a 1956 American docufiction film directed by Lionel Rogosin. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.^[1]
After the Second World War Lionel Rogosin made a vow to fight fascism and racism wherever he found it. In 1954 he left the family business (Beaunit Mills-American Rayon Corp.) in order to make films in accordance with his ideals. As he needed experience, he looked around for a subject and was struck by the men on the Bowery and decided that this would make a strong film. Thus On the Bowery was to be Rogosin’s provocative film school that would prepare him for the filming of his anti-apartheid film: Come Back, Africa (1960).
In 2008, On the Bowery was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”.

Filming

Greatly influenced by Robert Flaherty and Italian neorealism tradition, Rogosin submerged himself on the Bowery for many months before filming. He got to know the street and the men intimately, befriending a Bowery man: Gorman Hendricks. Together they wandered through the Bowery for several months until Rogosin started filming himself with a hidden camera. Not satisfied with the result he then hired a commercial crew but decided that these attempts were not satisfactory. At this time he was living in New York City’s Greenwich Village and he frequently went to the White Horse Tavern where he met writer Mark Sufrin and cinematographer Dick Bagley (recently part of the crew of Sydney Myers The Quiet One). They got along right away and agreed to work with Rogosin. Shooting began with no script or story in July 1955. The first rushes were not working well, so that Rogosin, Sufrin and Bagley worked out a simple script based on the lives of the Bowery men.
In July 1955 Rogosin and his crew started filming. With these Bowery men, Rogosin quickly developed his own method of creating dialogue and improvisation. The filming continued through October 1955 in a grueling schedule of long days and late nights. When the film was finished the first edit with editor Helen Levitt did not meet Rogosin’s approval and he solicited the help of Carl Lerner. Lerner was instrumental in pulling the film together according to Rogosin’s vision and acted as a mentor and editor as Rogosin learned this aspect of his craft.

Plot

The film chronicles three desperate days in a then impoverished lower Manhattan neighborhood, New York’s skid row: the Bowery. It is the story of Ray, a railroad worker, who drifts on to the Bowery to have a drunken spree after a long bout of laying tracks and then falls in with a band of drunks who help him spend his money. Ray, the “new guy on the Bowery,” whose biceps still fill out his sleeves, looks preoccupied as he enters the “Confidence Bar & Grill”. Surrounded by various alcoholics in advanced states of decay, he buys them rounds of drinks, then blacks out on his first night, and wakes up to discover that his suitcase has been stolen. The thief will become the closest thing to a friend…and just like that, Ray embarks on a trip to hell, becoming part of the Bowery. In a series of Beckettian portraits, the protagonists, congregations of winos, listless listeners, blubber through numerous bar scenes, games of dominos around a flophouse stove, and a sermon at the Bowery Mission. Will Ray find his way out of this uncaring urban jungle?

Cast

Ray Salyer, the lead character in the film, was offered a Hollywood contract but chose to remain on the Bowery.
Gorman Hendricks died weeks after the film opened. Rogosin helped both men and took care of Hendricks’ burial.

Crew

Dick Bagley
Mark Sufrin
Carl Lerner edited Rogosin’s second film Come Back, Africa
Darwin Deen, Assistant Cameraman and Second Camera Operator

Reception

In September 1956, Rogosin became the first American director to win the Best Documentary award at the Venice Film Festival with “On The Bowery.” Attacked by Bosley Crowther in the New York Times and shunned by the American Ambassador to Italy Claire Boothe Luce at the Venice Festival, Rogosin found support with the Flaherty family and many favorable reviews. In 1957, “On the Bowery” opened at the 55th Street Playhouse in New York, and was nominated for an Academy Award. Despite this success, distribution was extremely difficult. With On The Bowery, Rogosin became one of the founding fathers in the development of Independent cinema in America, along with Sydney Myers and Morris Engel. On the Bowery would become an influence to many future independent filmmakers worldwide.
“..a film made from the inside…In the bars and on the sidewalks, the camera leans sympathetically across table or grating towards these men and women who have passed the point of no return, and have reached a hideous sort of happiness achieved at best by gin and whiskey, and at worst by a shared squeeze from a can of metal polish. We are with these people and we hear what they say. And Rogosin insists that we must love them; he seems to say, with Dostoyevsky, “the sense of their own degradation is as essential to those reckless unbridled natures as the sense of their own generosity.” —Basil Wright, Sight and Sound
“…brilliantly revealing photography by Richard Bagley matched to the patient, thoughtful construction and organization of director-producer Lionel Rogosin and writer Mark Sufrin…what stays in your mind permanently, striking you like a hammer when you first see it, is the face of the Bowery…the caked filth, the stubble beard, the clothes of eternity, the physical weakness and the shambling walk, and the unmistakable brand of liquor…” —Arthur Winston, New York Post
“…an extraordinary, agonizing document…filled with an overwhelming sense of veracity and an unvoiced compassion for the men who have surrendered their dignity for a drink” —Arthur Knight, Saturday Review
“This film, without the pity that secretly insults, without the disgust that indirectly compliments, studies its subjects with honest human interest, tries to see what they see in their lives, tries to find what they find in the bottom of the bottle.” —Time Magazine

Home media

Milestone Films released On the Bowery on DVD and Blu-ray in 2012.^[2]

Awards

Grand Prize in the Documentary and short film Category, Venice Film Festival, 1956
British Film Academy Award, “The Best Documentary of 1956”
The Robert Flaherty Award 1957
Nominated for an Academy Award 1957^[3]
Gold Medal Award, Sociological Convention, University of Pisa 1959
Selected as one of the “Ten Best Movies of Ten Years Between 1950-59” by Richard Griffith, Museum of Modern Art Film Library
Festival of Popoli, 1971

Quotes

“Making ‘On the Bowery’ taught me a method of molding reality into a form that could touch the imagination of others. The total reality of a community or a society is so vast that any attempt to detail its entirety would result in nothing more than a meaningless catalogue of stale, factual representation—-a result which I call ‘documentary.’ Flaherty’s great work has no more to do with ‘documentary’ than great poetry has to do with the factual report of a sociologist.” Lionel Rogosin
“To tell the truth as you see it, incidentally, is not necessarily the truth. To tell the truth as someone else sees it is, to me, much more important and enlightening. Some documentaries are fantastic. Like Lionel Rogosin’s pictures, for instance; like “On the Bowery”. This is a guy who’s probably the greatest documentary filmmaker of all time, in my opinion.” John Cassavetes
“On The Bowery” was restored in 2006 from the original negatives by the Cineteca di Bologna and the laboratory L’Immagine Ritrovato, in cooperation with Rogosin Heritage Inc.

References

^ Crowther, Bosley. “On the Bowery”. The New York Times. Retrieved 2008-11-08.
^ Kehr, Dave. “Out of the Bowery’s Shadows (Then Back In)”. The New York Times. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
^“The 30th Academy Awards (1958) Nominees and Winners”. oscars.org. Archived from the original on 6 July 2011. Retrieved 2011-08-21.

External links

Milestone Films’ On the Bowery website
On the Bowery at Film Forum, (November 2010)
Review by Bill Weber on September 14, 2010 (Slant Magazine)
On the Bowery / Good Times, Wonderful Times– Article by Nick Bradshaw (Sight and Sound review, BFI)
Lionel Rogosin: Making reality exciting and meaningful– Essay by Ntongela Masilela (Pitzer College)
On the Bowery at the Internet Movie Database

Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor

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Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor is a classical political-economic argument, stating that in the advanced capitalist societies state policies assure that more resources flow to the rich than to the poor, for example in form of transfer payments. The term corporate welfare is widely used to describe the bestowal of favorable treatment to particular corporations by the government. One of the most commonly raised forms of criticism are statements that the capitalist political economy toward large corporations allows them to “privatize profits and socialize losses.”^[1] The argument has been raised and cited on many occasions.

History and usage

The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with the United States and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please improve this article and discuss the issue on the talk page. (March 2011)

The phrase may have been first popularized by Michael Harrington‘s 1962 book The Other America^[2]^[3] in which Harrington cited Charles Abrams,^[4] well-known authority on housing.
Andrew Young has been cited for calling the United States system “socialism for the rich and free enterprise for the poor”, and Martin Luther King, Jr. frequently used this wording in his speeches.^[5]^[6] Since at least 1969, Gore Vidal used the expression “free enterprise for the poor and socialism for the rich” to describe the U.S. economic policies,^[7]^[8] and he used it from the 1980s in his critiques of Reagonomics.^[9]
In winter 2006/2007, in response to criticism about oil imports from Venezuela, that country being under the leadership of Hugo Chávez, the founder and president of Citizens Energy Corporation Joseph P. Kennedy II countered with a critique of the U.S. system which he characterized as “a kind of socialism for the rich and free enterprise for the poor that leaves the most vulnerable out in the cold”.^[10] Also Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has become known for expressing to large audiences that the United States is now a land of “socialism for the rich and brutal capitalism for the poor”.^[11]
Economist Dean Baker expressed similar views in his book The Conservative Nanny State: How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer, in which he pointed out several different policy areas in which government intervention is essential to preserving and enhancing wealth in the hands of a few.^[12]
Linguist Noam Chomsky has criticized the way in which free market principles have been applied. He has argued that the wealthy use free-market rhetoric to justify imposing greater economic risk upon the lower classes, while being insulated from the rigours of the market by the political and economic advantages that such wealth affords.^[13] He remarked, “the free market is socialism for the rich—[free] markets for the poor and state protection for the rich.”^[14]
Arguments along a similar line were raised in connection with the financial turmoil in 2008. With regard to the federal takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Ron Blackwell, chief economist of AFL-CIO, used the expression “Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor” to characterize the system.^[15] In September 2008, the US Senator from Vermont, Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders said regarding the bailout of the U.S. financial system: “This is the most extreme example that I can recall of socialism for the rich and free enterprise for the poor”.^[16] The same month, economist Nouriel Roubini stated: “It is pathetic that Congress did not consult any of the many professional economists that have presented […] alternative plans that were more fair and efficient and less costly ways to resolve this crisis. This is again a case of privatizing the gains and socializing the losses; a bailout and socialism for the rich, the well-connected and Wall Street”.^[17]
Former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich adapted this phrase on The Daily Show on October 16, 2008: “We have socialism for the rich, and capitalism for everyone else.”^[18]
Journalist John Pilger included the phrase in his speech accepting Australia‘s human rights award, the Sydney Peace Prize, on 5th November 2009: “Democracy has become a business plan, with a bottom line for every human activity, every dream, every decency, every hope. The main parliamentary parties are now devoted to the same economic policies – socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor – and the same foreign policy of servility to endless war. This is not democracy. It is to politics what McDonalds is to food.”^[19]
U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders referenced the phrase during his eight-and-a-half-hour speech on the senate floor on December 10, 2010 against the continuation of Bush-era tax cuts, when speaking on the federal bailout of major financial institutions at a time when small-businesses were being denied loans. ^[20]

Variations

Privatize profits/gains, and socialize risks/losses/debts
Markets, free enterprise, private enterprise, and capitalism for the poor, while state protection and socialism for the rich

Notes

^Stealth Public Bailout of Countrywide: Privatize profits and socialize losses, Nouriel Roubini
^ Harrington 1962, p.170, quote: “socialism for the rich and private enterprise for the poor”
^ Robert P. Engvall (1996) The connections between poverty discourse and educational reform: When did “Reform” become synonymous with inattention? in The Urban Review Volume 28, Number 2 / June, 1996, pp. 141-163
^Michael Harrington (1962) The Other America, p.58, quote: This is yet another case of “socialism for the rich and free enterprise for the poor,” as described by Charles Abrams in the housing field
^King’s Light, Malcolm’s Shadow, January 18, 1993
^ Thomas F. Jackson, Martin Luther King: From Civil Rights to Human Rights: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Struggle for Economic Justice, ISBN 0-8122-3969-5, ISBN 978-0-8122-3969-0, page 332
^ Gore Vidal: Reflections Upon a Sinking Ship, Little, Brown, 1969
^ Gore Vidal: Imperial America, September 1, 2004
^‘Free enterprise for the poor, socialism for the rich’: Vidal’s claim gains leverage, irishtimes.com, September 20, 2008
^Kennedy: U.S. oil companies profit; Citgo helps the poor, MetroWest Daily News, January 24, 2007
^ Mark Jacobson: American Jeremiad, New York Magazine, February 5, 2007, see page 4
^ Baker, Dean (2006). The Conservative Nanny State: How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer. Washington, D.C.: Center for Economic and Policy Research. ISBN 1-4116-9395-7. Reviewed in: Scott Piatkowski: Socialism for the rich, http://www.rabble.ca, May 25, 2006
^ Takis Michas, “The Other Chomsky”, Wall Street Journal, November 4, 2005. Reproduced on Chomsky’s official site.
^ Noam Chomsky, “The Passion for Free Markets”, Z Magazine, May 1997. Reproduced on Chomsky’s official site.
^Fannie/Freddie’s “Socialism for Rich”, July 15, 2008
^Sanders Op-Ed: Billions for Bailouts! Who Pays?, September 19, 2008
^Nouriel Roubini: Nouriel Roubini’s Global EconoMonitor, September 28, 2008
^ Interview with Jon Stewart, The Daily Show, Oct 16, 2008: Available at The Daily Show Site
^ Full transcript of the John Pilger speech at the Sydney Opera House to mark his award of Australia’s human rights prize, the Sydney Peace Prize: [1]
^http://www.c-span.org/Events/Sen-Sanders-Held-a-Tax-Cut-Filibuster/20338/

References

Harrington, Michael (1962). The Other America. Macmillan. ISBN 0-684-82678-X.
Ralph NaderWelfare for the Rich New York Times Op-Ed, May 15, 1999
Noam Chomsky, How Free is the Free Market?Resurgence no. 173. November-December 1995
Peter McLaren and Ramin Farahmandpur Reconsidering Marx in Post-Marxist Times: A Requiem for Postmodernism? Educational Researcher, Vol. 29, No. 3 (Apr., 2000), pp. 25-33
Coontz, Stephanie (1995) The American Family and the Nostalgia Trap. KAPPAN Special Report. Phi Delta Kappan, v76 n7 pK1-K20 Mar 1995
Reich, Michael (1972). “Does the U.S. Economy Require Military Spending?”. American Economic Review (American Economic Association) 62 (1–2): 296–303. JSTOR 1821555.
What will real economic change look like? August 1, 2008 The Real News
The U.S. Economy Is Socialism for the Rich
Joel Bakan (2004) Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power, Free Press, 2004 p. 151 Distribution of wealth

Skid row

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For other uses, see Skid row (disambiguation).

Two photos of the original “Skid Road” (Mill Street, now Yesler Way) in Seattle, Washington. Top: View looking west to Yesler’s Mill at the end of the street (see smokestack) and nearby cookhouse; the tall pole in the road on the right is where the Pioneer Square pergola stands today, (1874) Bottom: Yesler’s Mill, stores, and taverns on Skid Road

Skid row or skid road is a shabby urban area with cheap taverns, dive bars, and dilapidated hotels frequented by lowlifes, alcoholics, and itinerants.^[1] The term skid road originally literally referred to a path along which timber workers skidded logs.^[2] Its current sense appears to have originated in the Pacific Northwest.^[3] Areas identified by this name include Pioneer Square in Seattle, Washington;^[4]Old Town Chinatown, Portland, Oregon;^[5]Downtown Eastside in Vancouver; Skid Row in Los Angeles, and San Francisco‘s Tenderloin District.

Origins

The term “skid road” dates back to the 17th century, when it referred to a log road, used to skid or drag logs through woods and bog.^[3] The term was in common usage in the mid-19th century and came to refer not just to the corduroy roads themselves, but to logging camps and mills all along the Pacific Coast.^[6]
The source of the term “skid road” as an urban district is heavily debated, and is generally identified as originating in either Seattle or Vancouver.^[3] One job on the skid road was lubricating it to make the logs slide more easily. The person with that job was called the “grease monkey”,^[7] predating, and probably giving rise to the modern usage of grease monkey as a mechanic.

Seattle

The name “Skid Road” was in use in Seattle by 1865 when the city’s historic Pioneer Square neighborhood began to expand from its commercial core.^[8] The district centered near the end of what is now Yesler Way, often said to have been the original “Skid Road” in the literal sense serving a saw mill owned by Henry Yesler.
Henry Yesler acquired land from Doc Maynard at a small point of land at what is today near the intersection of 1st Ave and Yesler Way. He also acquired a swath of land 450 feet wide from his property up First Hill to a box of land about 10 acres in size full of timber spanning what is today 20th to 30th Avenues. His steam-powered logging mill was built in 1853^[8] on the point of land that looked south towards a small island (Denny’s Island, part of his land purchase from Doc Maynard) that has since been filled in around and is the heart of today’s Pioneer Square. The mill operated seven days a week, 24 hours per day on the waterfront.^[8] The street’s end near the mill, attracted cookhouses and inexpensive hotels for itinerant workers, along with several establishments that served beer and liquor.^[8]
The Skid Road was built on that 450 foot wide slice of land from the top of First Hill to the logging mill on the point. Timber cut in nearby forests was greased and skidded down a long, steeply sloping dirt road.^[8] Since the building of the mill much of what is today’s Seattle is the result of extensive terra-forming by the local people to make the hilly landscape of Seattle habitable. At the time of the building of the mill it was some of the only flat land available. The Skid Road became the demarcation line between the affluent members of Seattle and the mill workers and more rowdy portion of the population.^[9] The road became Mill Street, and eventually Yesler Way, but the nickname “Skid Road” was permanently associated with the district at the street’s end.^[8]

Vancouver

Main article: Downtown Eastside

The 100-block of East Hastings Street in Vancouver, British Columbia, the heart of that city’s “skid road” neighborhood, lies on a historical skid road. The Vancouver Skid Road was part of a complex of such roads in the dense forests surrounding the Hastings Mill and adjacent to the settlement of Granville, Burrard Inlet (Gastown).^[10]
The city began as a sawmill settlement called Granville, in the early 1870s.^[11] By at least the 1950s, “Skid Road” was commonly used to describe the more dilapidated areas in the city’s Downtown Eastside,^[12] which is focused on the original “strip” along East Hastings Street due to a concentration of single room occupancy hotels (SROs) and associated drinking establishments in the area. The area’s seedy origins date back to the early concentration of saloons in pre-Canadian Prohibition (1915–1919) and its popularity with loggers, miners and fishermen whose work was seasonal and who spent their salaries in the area’s cheap accommodations and public houses.
Opium and heroin use became popular early on; Vancouver was for many years the main port-of-entry for the North American opium supply. During the Great Depression, the railway rights-of-way and other vacant lots in the area were thronged by the unemployed and poor, and the pattern of social decay became well-established. In the 1970s, the endemic alcohol and poverty problems in the area were exacerbated by the expansion of the drug trade, with crack cocaine becoming high-profile in the 1980s as well as a reconcentration of the prostitution trade in the area because of the relocation of hooker strolls in conjunction with city policy for Expo 86.
A portion of Vancouver’s Skid Row, Gastown, has also been gentrified; however it is in a difficult coexistence with the nearby impoverished Downtown Eastside along East Hastings Street. Downtown Eastside is infamous for its open drug trade, drug-related deaths (Vancouver’s Skid Row has the highest per capita heroin-related deaths in the entire North American continent), prostitution and the highest rate of HIV and Hepatitis C infection in North America.^{[citation needed]}
The poorest urban area in Canada,^[13] it is wedged between Downtown, Chinatown and Gastown. These areas are frequented by tourists, and East Hastings Street is a major thoroughfare. These avenues of exposure make the Downtown Eastside a highly visible example of a skid row. The Downtown Eastside (sometimes abbreviated D.T.E.S.) is also home to Insite, the only legal intravenous drug safe injection site in North America, part of a harm reduction policy aimed at helping the area’s drug addicted residents.

Los Angeles

Main article: Skid Row, Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles’s Skid Row in an area of Downtown Los Angeles, formally known as Central City East, has one of the largest stable populations of transient persons (homeless) in the United States.^{[citation needed]} Local homeless count estimates have ranged from 3,668 to 5,131. In 2011, the homeless population estimate for Los Angeles’ Skid Row was 4,316.^[14] L.A.’s Skid Row is sometimes called “the Nickel”, referring to a section of Fifth Street.^[15]
Several of the city’s homeless and social-service providers (such as Weingart Center Association, Volunteers of America, Frontline Foundation, Midnight Mission, Union Rescue Mission and Downtown Women’s Center) are based in Skid Row. While downtown Los Angeles has experienced a recent revitalization, developers have mostly neglected Skid Row.^{[citation needed]} Between 2005 and 2007, several local hospitals and suburban law-enforcement agencies were accused by Los Angeles Police Department and other officials of transporting those homeless people in their care to Skid Row.^[16]^[17]
The name Skid Row is sufficiently official that the fire apparatus at LAFD Fire Station # 9, the fire station that serves the neighborhood, have historically^[when?] had “Skid Row” emblazoned on their sides.^{[citation needed]} On 1 June 2006, the Los Angeles Times reported^{[citation needed]} that fire officials plan to change the legend on the vehicles to read “Central City East”. Many residents support the change, but it is opposed by firefighters and some residents who take pride in the sense that they live in a tough place.^[18]
In recent years, the Safer City Initiative set to clean up Skid Row was enacted by the city and police department and has resulted in dramatic changes in the area.^[19]

San Francisco

O’Farrell Street in the Tenderloin section of downtown San Francisco, near Union Square

Main article: Tenderloin, San Francisco

The Tenderloin neighborhood is a small, dense neighborhood near downtown San Francisco. In addition to its history and diverse and artistic community, there is significant poverty, homelessness, and crime.^[20]
It is known for its immigrant populations, single room occupancy hotels, ethnic restaurants, bars and clubs, alternative arts scene, large homeless population, public transit and close proximity to Union Square, the Financial District, and Civic Center.^[20] The 2000 census reported a population of 28,991 persons, with a population density of 44,408/mi² (17,146/km²), in the Tenderloin’s 94102 Zip Code Tabulation Area, which also includes the nearby Hayes Valley neighborhood.^[21]
During the 1960s, when development interests and the Redevelopment Agency were using eminent domain to clear out a large area populated by retired men in the South of Market area, that area was termed “Skid Row” in the media. The City’s convention center was built after the clearing of long term low-income residents.^[22]^[23]

New York

In New York, Skid Row was a nickname given to the Bowery during much of the 20th century.^[24]

Chicago

Traditonal Skid Row areas in Chicago were centered along West Madison Street just west of the Chicago River and, to a lesser degree, North Clark Street just north of the Chicago River. Since the 1980s both of these areas have been gentrified.

Philadelphia

Philadelphia once had a highly visible skid row centered on Vine Street, just west of the approaches to the Benjamin Franklin Bridge. This area was essentially obliterated by highway construction starting in the late 1970s.

Popular references

‘Skidrow’ is the title of a playable multiplayer map in the video game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Its design takes a very similar appearance to a typical skid row.
The term was memorialized in the song “Skid Row” from the musical Little Shop of Horrors.
“Skid Row” is the name of an American heavy metal band formed in New Jersey.
“Skid Row” is also the name of a Dublin, Ireland-based blues-rock band from the late 1960s and early 1970s that included such musicians as singer Phil Lynott and guitarist Gary Moore, both who later were part of Thin Lizzy.
Kurt Cobain, playing in a band that at the time had no name, came up with the name “Skid Row” to put on the marquee at a gig on the spur of the moment. That band’s name would change frequently after that. He would later go on to form Nirvana.^[25]
SKiDROW is one of the prominent warez groups in software. Whether this is based on the band is unknown.
In the 1976 film Rocky, the title character grows angry when finding out that his gym locker has been given to another boxer. He asks the attendant, “You put my stuff on Skid Row?”
In Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong’s Double Trouble, there’s a level called “Skidda’s Row”, which derives its name from Skid Row.

References

Notes

^ Random House Dictionary, Random House, Inc.. “Skid row”. Dictionary.com. Retrieved 15 January 2013.
^ The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. “Skid road”. The Free Dictionary by Farlex.
^ ^a ^b ^c Turner, Wallace (December 2, 1986). “A Clash Over Aid Effort on the First ‘Skid Row’”. The New York Times. p. A20.. Convenience link on Proquest (requires account).
^“National Register Information System”. National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. 2010-07-09.
^“Portland’s History”. Retrieved 2011-10-09.
^ Rochester, Junius; Walt Crowley (October 17, 2002). “Yesler, Henry L. (1810-1892)”. History Ink.. Retrieved 2007-01-27.
^“Using Oxen to move the Redwoods on the Mendocino coast”. Retrieved 2012-07-31.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Keniston-Longrie, Joy (2009). Seattle’s Pioneer Square. Chicago, San Francisco, & Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing. pp. 128. ISBN 978-0-7385-7144-7.
^ William C. Speidel, “Sons of the Profits, The Seattle Story 1851 to 1901″
^“Gastown”. Virtual Vancouver. Retrieved 2008-02-10.
^“About Vancouver”. City of Vancouver. 2007. Retrieved 2007-01-27.
^“Demolish City’s Skid Road, Murder Protest Demands.” Vancouver Sun. April 6, 1962. p. 1.
^ Kalache, Stefan (January 12, 2007). “The Poorest Postal Code Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside in Photos”. The Dominion. Retrieved 2007-10-15.
^“2011 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count (page 38 — Skid Row section)”. Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority. Retrieved 2011-11-16.
^“For Some, L.A.’s Skid Row Is For Beginnings”. NPR. Retrieved 2009-09-21.
^“LA Downtown News Online”. Downtownnews.com. Retrieved 2009-09-21.
^“A Plan to Spread Homeless Countywide – Los Angeles Times”. Latimes.com. 2006-03-24. Retrieved 2009-09-21.^{[dead link]}
^“Fire Station 9 Skid Row”. Fire Station 9 Skid Row. 2006-06-01. Retrieved 2009-09-21.
^The Reclamation of Skid Row by Heather Mac Donald, City Journal Autumn 2007. City-journal.org (2007-11-07). Retrieved on 2012-09-16.
^ ^a ^b The Sidewalks of San Francisco by Heather Mac Donald, City Journal Autumn 2010. City-journal.org (2010-10-14). Retrieved on 2012-09-16.
^ American FactFinder, United States Census Bureau. “941 3-Digit ZCTA by 5-digit ZIP Code Tabulation Area – GCT-PH1. Population, Housing Units, Area, and Density: 2000″. Factfinder.census.gov. Retrieved 2009-09-21.
^ Hartman, Chester. 1984. The Transformation of San Francisco. Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Allanheld.
^ Averbach, Alvin. 1973. “San Francisco’s South of Market District, 1858-1958: The Emergence of a Skid Row.” California Historical Quarterly 52(3):196223.
^ Jesse McKinley (2002-10-13). “Along the Bowery, Skid Row Is on the Skids”. The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-04-06.
^Who killed Kurt Cobain, Chapter 2. Books.google.com. Retrieved 2009-09-21.

Bibliography

Holbrook, Stewart H. (1961). Yankee Loggers. New York: International Paper Company.
Newell, Gordon (1956). Totem Tales of Old Seattle. Seattle: Superior Publishing Company.
Morgan, Murray (1960). Skid Road. Ballantine Books (revised edition; first edition was 1951).

External links

Welfare dependency

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Welfare dependency is the state in which a person or household is reliant on government welfare benefits for their income for a prolonged period of time, and without which they would not be able to meet the expenses of daily living. The United States Department of Health and Human Services defines welfare dependency as the proportion of all individuals in families which receive more than 50 percent of their total annual income from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), food stamps, and/or Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits.^[1] Typically viewed as a social problem, it has been the subject of major welfare reform efforts since the mid-20th century, primarily focused on trying to make recipients self-sufficient through paid work. While the term “welfare dependency” can be used pejoratively, for the purposes of this article it shall be used to indicate a particular situation of persistent poverty.

Conversation on FP.com

Kriegsakademie

Perhaps it is best to look at FM 3-24 the way one might look at a Swiss Army manual on mountain infantry tactics. If, for whatever reason, a battalion from the U.s. 10th Mountain found itself in the Austrian Alps, there would probably be much to be learned and used from the Swiss FM. If the 10th Mountain Bn was fighting in the Pyrenees, the fit might be a bit less. If they were deployed in the Atlas mountains, considerable chunks of the Swiss FM might not apply, and when they took on a skilled mountain opponent in the Peruvian Andes they might have to discard almost the entire FM. FM 3-24 sought to capture some experiences from Algeria and from a couple of other very specific settings. When we seek to apply the FM’s Algerian lessons in Afghanistan or Somalia, they probably don’t fit much better than the Swiss FM applied to mountain warfare in the Andes. FM 3-24 should be seen for what it is, a compendium of interesting, quaint, parochial and largely obsolete military experience that has limited relevance to most of what the American military has to face in the coming decades.

2 hours agoReply Like

JPWREL

Kriegsakademie
Just as a side note I have heard that the 10th Mountain Div., is ‘Mountain’ in name only. The troops are neither trained nor physically fit for Alpine service in any mountains whether it is the Andes or the Adirondacks. This is sort of the same as calling Major Mcilwaine's regiment ‘Hussars’, except people know that the Major turned in his horse and sabre a long time ago. But in this case they actually think that the US Army has a real ‘mountain’ division.

34 minutes agoReply Like

Tyrtaios

Excellent, the good Major is back on the money with COIN having briefly dabbled at being a movie critic.

Before I go into my ramble on the question at hand, let me briefly throw a couple of COINs into the fountain to remind everyone who believes in wishes coming true that if one takes an old shit sandwich, but rather than starting anew with a different filling, such as the duct tape of meat, Spam for instance, and merely put fresh raisin bread around it, one will only get a magnificent looking shit sandwich that in the end, tastes the same.

The foregoing above stated, the question as I interpret it is whether some historical case studies on insurgent conflicts might not actually stand up to scrutiny which may give us cause to question if our doctrine contained in FM 3-24 might be based on less than complete actual case studies in their entirety?

In response to that let me use as an example of Frenchman LtCol David Galula and his petit secteur militaire assigned to him in 1950s Algeria, and from which he later chronicled his methods along with theories in his book, "Counterinsurgency Warfare: Theory and Practice," which Dr. Bernard B. Fall, no lightweight himself, gave high praise to as well . . . And I might add, is where I first heard of the man during my reading of Fall's, "Street Without Joy," which would seem on the face of it, a pretty good recommendation . . . not from me but from Fall.

However, some closer inspection of the French war in Algeria shows that several methods were successfully used and not one particular method may have been workable as a whole, nor I would add should we or could we use many of those same methods so some perspective must be used when offering up examples of what are held-up as past successful models of counter-insurgency.

In this particular case that perspective is remembering that Galula was a colonialist, and unlike ourselves that are supposed to be using the ole 'hearts and minds counter-insurgency model as an appeal to a populations' aspirations for liberty, justice, good governance, etc. Galula, on the flip-side of the COIN, felt strongly that military control of the population was first priority, regardless of that populations' right to self-determination.

Adding further that Galula operated quite a distance from the French Tri-Color flag with more leeway than others perhaps, and although good or bad, France was the government in Algeria, none of that good or bad, had reached his small military sector, and therefore he was able to become the defacto government and not have to be concerned about appealing to local elites trying to keep their status quo or disturbing the economy by passing cash around continually.

Therefore, although I believe something can be learned from other's past experiences and theories, to include those of the more prominent insurgent themselves. The bottom line is that after this long period of foreign military involvement we need to take a look at what has and hasn't worked for us, not old colonial models, determining where and why it might not have worked elsewhere due to various factors.

Once we do that, we can then point to our doctrine without question that it is based on our own theories and practices, and not partially on one long dead man that we can no longer talk with for clarification and came to America, to some degree down on his luck, and found the timing right with America's early involvement in Viet-Nam.

4 hours agoReply Like

The good Major’s suggestion that COIN via FM 3-24 may have transmuted itself in to Gentile’s 'evidence free’ doctrine reminds me of something I read awhile back in Robert Citino’s ‘The German Way of War’. Following the Versailles Peace Treaty with Germany in 1919, General Hans von Seeckt inherited the remnants of the German Army. Von Seeckt was a refined intellectual soldier who believed in a rigorous examination of all evidence and theories pertaining to war.

As Citino explains von Seeckt thought there was nothing he disliked more than ‘Schlagworte’ (slogans). With his unsentimental and purely objective view von Seeckt believed that catchy turns of phase were an anathema because they took on the ring of truth but were in reality spoken out of context, mis-understood and usually could not stand up to deeper analysis.

“Slogans, according to von Seeckt “were a way of life for those unable to think for themselves. Every slogan should leave the listener asking one question. Is this really true?” In von Seeckt's time he used as an example the famous double–envelopment at the battle of ‘Cannae’ in 216 BC. In our time perhaps ‘COIN’ fills that one-size–fits-all solution to low intensity war and has not withstood rigorous examination?

6 hours agoReply Like

Major Tom: were they in fact relying more on a narrow spectrum of British and French experiences: Malaya, Kenya and Algeria. As one of the legions who worked on the US COIN doctrine, the answer is “Yes”......... Is that a pretty small sample? Yes. ............ It is too small a sample to permit any conclusions? Perhaps, but it suggests (to me) that COIN is a very limited tool-set that worked to some degree in a few places under special conditions. The United States has never run a COIN-like venture under those conditions and in those places. I suspect we never will At the time (of sriting the COIN manual) the worker-bees recognized that of that small sample (Malaya, Kenya and Algeria) only one really turned out decently in the long run. ..................So, if the sample boils down to one long-term success, it is a great foundation for planning the force posture of America’s military for the 21st century? Probably not……………….K

7 hours agoReply Like

DILNIR

How about this campaign? Not a sniff of a colonial struggle here. Who knows, perhaps there is a COIN study, with the Contras being the evil-doers.

http://www.army.mil/professionalWriting/volumes/volume2/march_2004/3_04_3.html

STEVE358

12:49 PM ET

December 16, 2011

It remains amazing to me how

It remains amazing to me how complete debates of Counter-Insurgency, a tactic intended to bolster and protect a seated government of any nation from insurgencies, can be fully argued by military analysts with no mention whatsoever of the state of national, provincial and local governance, or any voices or consideration from the nation itself.
Where, on either side of this debate, is the foundation strategy and objective against which the merits of COIN can be measured?
Iraq was, initially, a limited exercise in regime replacement which, without planning, resourcing and intentionality, stumbled quickly into a nation-building exercise of which COIN was a part and parcel, coming, with substantial prior baggage, to the fore as a necessary precondition for exit AFTER governance, economic, cultural and security conditions deteriorated to a hair's breadth of catastrophe.
Reading a debate on COIN (Ryan's, Ucko's, Gentile's, Exum's or Nagl's) that is wholly contained within the military community of the external nation, and devoid of genuine context to the nation for which it was applied is a meaningless exercise.
Of course, COIN is a tactic used throughout history, and one which will never die. The question is: How applicable, useful, well-applied, etc..., is/was it in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc...?
This month is the anniversary of the start of Siege of Kut (1915-1916) during and after which 4,400 British Soldiers died following the hapless British Mesopotamian Campaign.
How was the US effort in Iraq (or Afghanistan) any different than the British Colonial Campaigns, right down to the delusional myths of Lawrence and Gertrude Bell in the romantic bedouin but feeble "infidel" culture which, in the end, had little relevance to actual Arab countries which, in their urban cores, were complex cultures of inter-generationally competing and cooperating masses of peoples with their own unique histories, religions, politics, and economic positions?
My read of mid-2008, from first hand involvements across ministries and provinces, was the emergence of Iraqi confidence in its ability to govern without US gun trucks in the middle of their street---as expressed in the 2008 SOFA. As with the British Occupancy, they just wanted to the foreigners out, and would deal with the serious results on their own.
That Iraqi change, expressed through its formally executed SOFA, is why General Austin "cased the colors" on December 15, 2011.
Where and how did COIN fit into that now-historical fact?
How did COIN support or drive Iraqi confidence in self-governance, positive and negative, as it probably did?
What legacies has COIN left that will impact Iraqi futures (including the "money as a weapon," and the Lawrence-inspired tribal reinforcement attributes) for better or for worse?
How does this whole COIN effort, for example, relate to Edward Wadie Said's entire "Orientalism" critique which has, within academia, haunted the US military's and "failed state/colonialist" parties' love affair with Lawrence and the "infidels" in need of what the US can bring to them?
This debate needs much more context, breadth and depth before it can be meaningfully analyzed.

RYANEVANS

1:34 PM ET

Limits and Context of COIN Operations

Steve,
Thank you for your comment and for reading the article. You may be encouraged to know I am working on an article on the specific context of Central Helmand Province and the limits of COIN operations there due to specific local political, historical, and economic circumstances.
Best,
Ryan

2:03 PM ET

Ryan: For obvious reasons,

Ryan:
For obvious reasons, well-researched and supported articles on COIN, applied to particular places and circumstances by people who were actually there doing it, always seem to be about "the limits of COIN" and the humility earned by the author during the exercise.
I look forward to such an article.

GYPSYSNIPE

11:57 AM ET

December 19, 2011

Insightful

Correct in so many ways. The problem that we had in Iraq was we were not partnered with anyone until we made the deal with the Sunni's. It got better, we routed AQ and all the other jihadists opposing stability. It will NEVER work in A-stan due to the many ethnic and tribal groups. The "country" will remain fractured, and the Talibs are not coming to any table no time no how.

MIKE FEW

1:08 PM ET

Quote me correctly

I never said either ego or profit.
"Today, population-centric counterinsurgency has become a cottage industry that lines the pockets of think tanks and defense contractors who have vested financial and political interests in ensuring that these unproven theories are cemented into Army doctrine. At the same time, our country is facing massive fiscal restraints. As the COIN industry has grown, we’ve had to seriously consider handing out pink slips to many multi-tour combats troops as well as cutting back on benefits for retirees and veterans."

1:21 PM ET

Sorry, Mike. I neglected to

Sorry, Mike.
I neglected to mention your substantial critiques in my listing of COIN debaters.
I have always been more interested in your initial comments about the lack of homework, the genuine background, intelligence and research, that is lacking in support of the effort.
Without foundation, of course, the effort becomes unmeasurable---with substantial domestic budget ramifications. How do you know who, what, when, where or How Much?
The important and effective military parts I saw in Iraq were those non-Coin ones, of McCrystal's snipers, and lots and lots of patrolling, bad guy chasing, and route clearance and protection (the regular military efforts), for which a separate analysis of its contributions are warranted.
PS: I saw no rose petals on the way in or the way out. Isn't a successful COIN effort measured by the love and respect engendered with the people of the host nation? Militarily, on the other hand, the US did what it was tasked to do.

1:32 PM ET

No worries Steve

My comment was for the author. He's misquoting me here as he did in the comments section of my article at Carl Prine's Line of Departure. Speaking of ego's, the author is a former HTT guy. Doesn't the Af-Pak channel know that he might have an ax to grind?
I am neither for or against COIN. I just want us to talk openly about it and fully understand what it is and what it isn't.

1:44 PM ET

Mike: I think that is the

Mike:
I think that is the point. COIN is a basic tactic, arguably used since Alexander's time and before, by which local populations are controlled, coerced, co-opted, pacified or protected. It is not a thing to be for or against, and will always have validity under certain circumstances.
Your separate point about the HTT folks is, to me, as interesting as the discussion about COIN.
Assuming these folks had an accurate bead on things, they should have been deeply immersed in the social/societal background and context needed to effect substantial changes at the strategic level.
What serious purpose is there in having an anthropologist peering out the muddy window of a HumVee to advise on ground-level phenomenon, but devoid of a valid bigger picture?
Despite having seen some very good work product from some HTT folks, that program, as applied, warrants its own discrete analysis (and not just within the five walls of the Pentagon.

1:51 PM ET

Spot on. I'm just glad the

Spot on. I'm just glad the discussion is happening again. I find it funny when people that don't know me try to corner me into one side or the other. It's also funny that the author labels me as an armor officer without knowing my full background. By the way, he never asked :).
But, what the military is going to have to figure out is if they are going to call COIN a strategy or not. A more senior officer the other day was referring to COIN as a method with it's own separate doctine, tactics, and strategy. That has implications. Better yet, and I continue to ask with no replies--- On the company and platoon level, with the exception of implementation of new technology, what exactly is "new" that was not included in the old tank platoon, infantry platoon, scout platoon, or special forces manual?

2:20 PM ET

Armor? Oh, that's right. I

Armor?
Oh, that's right. I was a sergeant/tank commander back in the black boot days. (3/64 Armor, 3ID)
Down the street in 2/64 Armor was young LT, now LTG Mark Hertling, who I had the opportunity to work with in Northern Iraq (2007/2008, 1AD/MND-North).
Didn't seem to know or care much about COIN, but he was exactly the right combination of soldier/diplomat to make a difference. He and his staff knew a lot about Iraq on many levels from multiple deployments, including to avoid too much money as a weapon (CERP efforts), and to focus Iraqis on their own way forward.
His personal stand-off between the Peshmerga and Iraqi Army in Diyala in September 2008 is the stuff of legend.
The good thing about Armor, I guess, is learning the terrain, and how to maneuver in it without getting stuck.

1:50 PM ET

Quoting correctly

Major Few,
All of my quotations of your post are correct. And my characterization of your arguments (for ego and profit) are also accurate. Quoting your LoD post:
1) "population-centric counterinsurgency has become a cottage industry that lines the pockets of think tanks and defense contractors" = For profit
2) "To flatter intellectually the theories of a few, we’ve had to sacrifice..." = For ego
If you did not intend to argue that ego or profit are driving this "cottage industry," I apologize.
I'm not sure what pro- or anti-COIN biases my HTT experience would have left me with (if anything, it would be anti-, and you can listen to me talk here about that: http://icsr.info/seminar/counter-insurgency-in-helmand-and-beyond), but I'd appreciate any further comments you have that engage with the substance of my arguments rather than accusations of bias. A tendency to attack the analyst rather than his arguments is one of the problems of the COIN debate I point to in my article.
If you are for an open conversation about COIN, what it is, and what it isn't, we are in 100% agreement.
Best,
Ryan

1:53 PM ET

Ryan, what does the whole

Ryan, what does the whole sentence say?

1:55 PM ET

Sentence Fragment

Ryan, you speak of context, but you took a sentence fragment out of my article that had nothing to do with either the full context of the sentence or the intent of the article.

1:58 PM ET

I quote the rest of it in my

I quote the rest of it in my article. :) So now we have the whole thing. But for your benefit:
"To flatter intellectually the theories of a few, we’ve had to sacrifice trillions of dollars, thousands of lives and abandoned security projects elsewhere that could have benefited our republic exponentially more than what we’ve garnered during a generation-long struggle in the Middle East and South Asia."
Read more: http://www.lineofdeparture.com/2011/12/12/is-coin-too-big-to-fail/#ixzz1gj33WnZP

2:08 PM ET

amazing how you leave out the

amazing how you leave out the important part

Bottom line is you rushed to

Bottom line is you rushed to judgement. You can either fix your error now or live with it. If you want to get to know my extensive background and writing on COIN, then please feel free to visit Small Wars Journal.

2:09 PM ET

I will have to respectfully

I will have to respectfully disagree as I think I interpreted your comments accurately. But I appreciate your input.

GIANGENTILE

2:01 PM ET

critical discussion

I am happy that there is critical discussion of it all now, and folks who are coin advocates are feeling the need to defend it. Three years ago when we really needed to have this discussion it didnt happen since all there was at time was the FM 3-24 matrix, super charged by the surge triumph narrative. Nobody really questioned Coin critically then, which is partially why we ended up taking the foolish approach to trying to do Surge 2 in Afghanistan.
Prine's criticism of Ucko was spot on correct. Sure it was full of Prine-isms and sarcasm, but that is just how he rolls, and there were no "personal attacks" in it as you say.
Lastly since you mentioned Galula please do consider the fact that Galula, when he applied his 8 methods in Algeria (contrary to what he says in his book) actually FAILED at most of them. This argument is made in a new book by French researcher Gregor Mathias. The book is based on primary source evidence. So this thing we call American Coin as codified in FM 3-24, of which its writers have frequently acknowledged that it was influenced heavily by Galula's book and senior generals like McChrystal publicly noted that it was on his bed stand to read every night, is based on an operational method that failed.

2:04 PM ET

COL Gentile: I am critical of

COL Gentile: I am critical of the over-reliance on Galula in my article. Thank you for your comments and Mathias' book is on my shelf waiting to be cracked open.

2:30 PM ET

Gian: Just as Lawrence and

Gian:
Just as Lawrence and Gertrude Bell's efforts to insert the bedouin prince Faisal did not work well.
Steve

2:34 PM ET

So what's new here?

Ryan,
We're still trying to figure this stuff out. Outside of implementing new technology, what are these COIN lessons learned? Can you name one on the ground level?

2:57 PM ET

A couple issues

There are a few I am writing about now (in draft form), but just to name a few interrelated issues: The structure of ISAF precludes those confronted most directly with underlying causes of violence from not just addressing these causes, but having any meaningful input up the chain on how to address them. We are great at addressing symptoms, but not the actual problems. In Helmand, these include land tenure disputes, the systemic incentives of the narcotics trade, enduring mujahideen factional disputes...These are all political issue and we always talk about how COIN is 80% political, but we do not get involved in any of these political issues in a meaningful way, nor do we seriously seek to nudge the Afghan government (which we fund) in the right direction on any of these issues... This is an old lesson IDENTIFIED, but not a lesson LEARNED.

3:04 PM ET

I would not address 1.

I would not address 1. international peacekeeping structure issues, 2. Afghanistan drug trade, or 3. Tribal factions disputes (political issues) as COIN issues. Nothing there falls solely in the realm of so-called COIN.
So, again, what's new here?

3:34 PM ET

You'll all just have to wait

You'll all just have to wait until my next article comes out...but thank you for engaging!

OLD BLUE

1:14 PM ET

Particulars

These three issues, which you would not include, are some key issues that do need to be addressed in the context of Afghanistan. It appears that you are addressing COIN separately from the context in which it is currently being attempted. That discussion is valid, but it appears that you and the author are talking past each other.
I would disagree with you on the issue of political issues as being in the realm of COIN, since an insurgency is at its core a struggle for political power. In fact, one of the key failures of implementing COIN in Afghanistan, other than in discrete areas, is the near-total failure to engage in improving governance. Even if we separate the issue of COIN from Afghanistan in particular, COIN requires an approach that cannot rely solely on the military. As such, the discussion of the inability to engage in political solutions (again, other than in discrete successes by individual units and/or commanders) remains a failure mode that we keep defaulting to. This is a COIN issue, not just an Afghanistan issue.
It matters not if the locale is Afghanistan or any other; the failure to meaningfully engage in resolving the political drivers of conflict/instability will have poor results for a counterinsurgent.
Unfortunately, this is not the only area in which American counterinsurgents rather consistently fail. Some of the failures are due to systemic separations and distrust amongst our own institutions. There are other systemic behaviors which inhibit the ability to conduct effective COIN/stability operations. Our inability to adapt to circumstances and convert a political imperative into a developed strategy and a clearly understood commander's intent and desired end state, work together with other institutions and work towards a common goal, similar to the dysfunctional structure of ISAF, is an issue that must be addressed in future discussions of COIN as well.
Since the military cannot succeed at COIN by itself, and unity of effort is necessary, a methodology for establishing that unity of effort in the absence of unity of command is needed. The demonstrated inability of most American military officers to work well with the officers of other arms of our government indicates a disabling weakness that will haunt any future efforts. So perhaps a look at the dysfunction of Afghanistan's framework for application would indeed be appropriate.

3:08 PM ET

The Limits of COIN

Ryan:
Now we are back to the substantial limits of US COIN as applied.
Mostly political/domestic issues, but not in the military's bailiwick. The military in Iraq did what it could, but too often piecemeal and out-of-context. Afghanistan? The same.
During British control of Iraq, Gertie and Winnie (along with Bomber Harris) found those pesky Kurds to be a bothersome disturbance to their man Faisal.
Costs (British blood and treasure) dictated the best military method was an air campaign: machine guns and chemical bombs. In the end, these were strong motivators to route Faisal and the British.
Same limitations for the US?

3:11 PM ET

but FM 3-24 is Galula

Ryan:
Then if you are critical of the over reliance on Galula, then in turn you should be quite critical of FM 3-24 since it is largely a rehash of Galula. I mean think about it, we have a text (Galula's book) which has come to be seen in almost canonic form within the American army over the past three years (pundits like Ricks and Nagl promoted it endlessly, McChrystal says it is on his bedstand at night, at the Coin Academy in Taji in Dec 05 when I attended the course was basically Galula 101, people like Doug Ollivant after their tours in Iraq come back and write articles on how they did Galula in Iraq) yet the text of Galula was never understood in its context, and the context that surrounded Galula shows that he failed. So our entire Coin doctrine is based on a method that did not work in the first place.
Dont as an analyst you see a problem with this?
gian

3:20 PM ET

Gian, I think if you take

Gian,
I think if you take another look at my article, you'll see that I am critical of the FM 3-24 framework, but FM 3-24 only offers one conceptualization of what COIN is. It is not the final word on COIN, as I think you will agree.
These disagreements are not quite so black and white. For example, David Ucko, who you have devoted a lot of typing to criticizing lately, wrote the forward to the Mathius book you recommend on Galula.
Best,
Ryan

2:10 PM ET

Question

Sir, one book says that Galula's attempt of his principles in Algeria failed. As an analyst, don't you see a problem with that?
One book says that 8-10 CAV made a poor showing in Baghdad in 2006. I know you've got a problem with that.
One book invalidates Galula, and that's definitive. One book invalidates 8-10 CAV in the pre-surge, and that is arguable. The metrics are broken, and there is a problem with that. Either one book is enough or not. In short, cherry-picking when one book is definitive and when one book is not definitive is a roll of the dice. It all depends on when that book agrees with one's personal opinion, doesn't it?

Ryan: Before jumping into

Ryan:
Before jumping into international efforts, you would do well to read the frightfully accurate "Chasing the Flame," Samantha Powers' book on UN SRSG Sergio De Mello.
It accurately depicts a group of often very dedicated UN people working in an organization with very serious structural political limitations.
The Wiki Cables on disputed boundaries issues, for example, describes the substantial 2008 external (NY) pressures against UN staff going forward with disputed boundaries resolutions.
Today, the Kurds believe they were "sold out" by the UN, which is, in fact, an over-simplification of the substantial limitations on that organization, and its otherwise highly motivated folks.
Too, often, US military analysts simply point to some other US or international organization as a culprit, or responsible party, and move on with their own opinions. Reality is much more complex, recognizing, as Powers does, the real limitations of these organizations. (Re: Ucko's comment: the civilian effort in Afghanistan was never up to the task....)

3:35 PM ET

What is COIN?

So Ryan,
If COIN is not Galula and not FM 3-24, what is COIN. You seem to claim that it can't die, so what is it?

3:58 PM ET

Ucko's Forward

It was the wrong forward to what is otherwise an exceptionally good book. Ucko wants to salvage the reputation of Galula when based on the book itself, that kind of argument just doesnt make sense.
What the Forward should have highlighted is what i pointed out above; that the American Army based its coin doctrine on a text, but without a contextual understanding of Galula and his failed operations.

SANGUOX

8:38 AM ET

January 11, 2012

The nature of combat

The nature of combat operations in conventonal war varies less at the lower echelons of command, and increases the higher one goes. The adaptation of one form of war versus others was always built into the Army's order of battle refined after the Lousiana Maneuvers. video to iMovie

DAVID UCKO

7:34 PM ET

My foreword

Gian: I'm just shocked that you did not like the foreword. Man, I just can't do anything right... Still, at least the author was happy with it. And I rather liked it too.
But then I am a COIN pamphleteer. Which explains how I concluded it:
"All of this – Galula’s mixed record and his tentativeness in proposing his concept – should instill a much-needed measure of humility about what is possible in counterinsurgency operations, and through military intervention writ large. For this very reason, it is incumbent on those militaries with expeditionary ambitions to study the history of their intellectual forefathers, to learn from their experiences, and try not to repeat their mistakes."
Complete rubbish, right??

GWYATT

1:43 AM ET

December 17, 2011

Thanks and continue the debate

Ryan and co,
A few points
1) Thanks for writing this very important article. I've been following the COIN debate closely. I'm now in graduate school after a tour in Iraq, and it has concerned me immensely that the military might respond to our strategic failure in Iraq (and likely failure in Afghanistan), by merely deciding that we don't want to fight these kinds of wars anymore.
That, to me, doesn't seem to be an option, because our enemies have a say. It seems logical to me that we will face a series of threats that at least partially resemble insurgency, or have an insurgency element within them. For example I think long term strategic competition with China is likely to involve a mix of insurgency, cyberwar, and conventional war (if not the whole spectrum of conflict).
2) I've been equally concerned that we might come away from these conflicts thinking that we have institutionalized a strong counterinsurgency capability. I think most of the US Army, but not all, UNDERSTAND counterinsurgency, but that doesn't mean that we have actually learned how to implement good counterinsurgency operations.
I think some of Colonel Gentile's writing is correct, COIN has been part of a larger strategic failure. But insurgency is not dead. To draw upon an analogy familiar to the US Army, Germany had a terrible Grand Strategy for both WWI and WWII, but they produced some amazing operational and tactical advances. I think we need to be careful to develop on our operational successes with COIN, and learn how to enhance it, without throwing out COIN all together just because these wars have been, to a degree, strategic failures.
3) I appreciate the tone of the article and the comments that follow. That you and Colonel Gentile can have a productive discussion (which I am learning from), speaks volumes to the tone and intent of the article. An open productive discussion about COIN is absolutely needed and it needs to be as little about personalities as possible.

12:29 PM ET

Thank you for your comment.

Thank you for your comment. Food for thought!

MARTY MARTEL

9:15 AM ET

COIN = Hire one set of thugs to kill other

COIN is based on hiring one set of local thugs (beautifully named 'awakening') to kill the other set.
So COIN dies when the payroll stops and first set is fired while second set was never totally vanquished.

AJOB

11:20 AM ET

December 18, 2011

good

Gian P. Gentile, Paul Olsen, and others are debating over whether counterinsurgency is dead. Elsewhere, Colin Clark reports that COIN is being “scrapped” by the military. Gentile and Douglas Ollivant has written about the formation of a dominant COIN narrative, and it’s clear that at for a combination of material, academic, and political reasons this narrative is no longer dominant. But is COIN dead? In suspended animation? Some quick thoughts as I continue to hack away at the information warfare and deception research project…
First, it is a bit too soon for us to hail or mourn the death of COIN. What this represents is the end of COIN as practiced and theorized by elements within the Army and Marine Corps from 2006-2010, just as the Kennedy-era idea of counterinsurgency within elements of the US defense establishment died with Vietnam. The United States has faced insurgencies, terrorists, armed rebellions, guerrillas, partisans, and irregular raiding forces since the early days of colonization. It will continue to do so in the near future as long as American allies, clients, and proxies face irregular threats, although the shape of the response will vary.
Second, COIN, for all of the heat and noise about it, is still rather poorly understood in Iraq and Afghanistan. So much of the debate is weighted down with external baggage, mainly because it was never entirely about Iraq or Afghanistan. Rather, the COIN debate was often a proxy for many different political, professional, interdepartmental, and other battles within the United States political and defense establishments. Ollivant’s paper, and newer research highlights significant uncertainty to cause and effect in both sides of the COIN debate that will likely not be definitely settled soon.
Most importantly, it is important not to replace one orthodoxy for another. The emerging consensus of drones, special forces, and Asia has its own flaws which need their own airing.
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GFOWKES

2:17 PM ET

January 3, 2012

COIN v STABOPS v Specops

The core curriculum that came out of Vietnam was packaged as Stability Operations the substance of which carried on in the Petraeus FM. The foundation of FM 23-4 is presuming that a given political entity (nation) has been already destabilized by insurgents, hence step by step the insurgents are suppressed and the necessary nation repairing is done.
The concept of fixing up a shot up country is not the same as nation building. One assumes a nation exists in some form acceptable to the citrizenry. Nation building starts with no nation and builds from there. The steps may look alike on papar, as building a nation whee none was before has a short shelf life.
Iraq has a concept of nation hood a few millenia long, and calling those who fought against the Coallition occupation authority created by an invasion did not create a credible replacement for Saddam. Any such regime we built fits the same model as what the Japanese and Germans did in WW2. We called them puppet regimes of no legitimacy,
The irony of that is that Indonesia and Burma were built on a military framwork trained by Japan, although with no love lost over Japan.
I don't think we have a good word to use in describing patriots fighting to get their own country back, and I don't ascribe any buzz to the patriot word. The psychology of a patriot counter movement is more clearly defined than an insurgency who efforts are destabilitzation.
In this regard, the Taliban plays the patriot card, and Al Qaeda are the insurgents. The Taliban was dragged into this war for refusing to out Osama bin Ladin in a most insulting way, Insulting Afghans is not considered good form.
The basic problem of defining the next war is that nothing is new under the sun, and Murphy holds the cards. The nature of combat operations in conventonal war varies less at the lower echelons of command, and increases the higher one goes. The adaptation of one form of war versus others was always built into the Army's order of battle refined after the Lousiana Maneuvers. There were two kinds of battalions: divisional and non divisional. Corps and higher were just headquarters companies.
The destruction of that battle tested order of battle in Transformation which ignores any variation in conditions of MET-TC. The concept is so ludicrous in battle that no one really pays attention to it. The adaptiveness of the US soldier adaptd and has been more effective in task organization than ever before.
The trouble for the future is that no cohesive structure for contingency operations above brigade is chaotic and dependant on civil servants and contractors like it was done in the 1600's (Sixteen hundreds). This can be fixed with a simple swearing in ceremony.
The codification of types of war needs review but fundamenally needs to be cranked into the culture of the parties inovlved on all sides. A deal that is not acceptable to the defeated means anotther war.

TOMKINTON

11:49 AM ET

January 12, 2012

COIN and Army structure

Here is an oped of mine published in the Des Moines (Iowa) Register. Not sure if it fits this discussion but my sense is that it does.........
Right Force, WrongLeaders For Afghanistan
When asked about forms ofgovernment, Winston Churchill famously remarked, “democracy is the worst formof government, except for all the others”. I would use Churchill’s observation in another manner: the U.S. Department of Defense is the worstof all groups at practicing stability operations, except for all the others. Itis time to operationalize this observation by putting the right set of militaryleaders in the drivers seat.
The wrong branch of the military isleading stability operations in Afghanistan. The largest part of stabilityoperations is essentially a distribution network that provides goods (bridgerepair, school construction) and services (mentoring of government workers,monitoring of performance, creating transparent legal and financialnetworks). Stability operations willonly fully succeed when U.S. Department of State and other non-lethal decisionmakers are able to authoritatively direct the significant assets that the U.S.Department of Defense brings to the table.
Like most of us, combat armscommanders are slaves to their own background, training and, most importantly,their performance evaluations. Combatarms commanders are rewarded for the conduct of combat operations. Asking themto do anything else is unfair to them. Puttingcombat arms officers in charge of stability operations is the wrong use of anotherwise excellent tool.
The “right set” of militaryleadership should be sourced from other branches of the military. Combatcommanders and casual observers of events in Afghanistan (and other places)will violently object to this proposition, citing the chimera of “security” asthe most important piece of the stability operations puzzle, and they are notwrong. It’s just that combat commandersare the wrong leaders for the operation as a whole.
There is a place for the militarycombat commander, and that place is the conduct of combat operations. And until we put the right type of commanderin charge of stability operations, we will continue to reward ourselves with marginaland unsustainable gains.
-30-
I welcome your comments. tom

EUGNID

12:25 PM ET

January 14, 2012

COIN-- Santayana was right!

The American military is doomed to failure because: (a) it has to compete with high paying careers like on Wall Street that pay wonderfully so you can buy your self-satisfaction and (b) the dull-witted in command can hide as top secret the products of their dullness and bureaucratic in-fighting far better than even the CIA from the President. All Americans care about when it comes to the military is that we don't lose. That makes them feel insecure and humiliated. So long as commanders can hide that from the public, they can always squeeze more money, war toys and troops from the nation. The media will, for the most part, prostitute itself to the Pentagon for access as it lives only on scoops. So in these times of voluntary service when Americans can say: "ain't my kid going to war," so long as they're not seen as losing, generals can always intimidate presidents into more, more more in men and supplies to cover-up their failures with yet another surge. Indeed, Petraeus in a high school level PhD thesis at Princeton argues that COIN success depends on having enough PR guys in your force. Hasting's new book, THE OPERATORS, kind of exposes the "yes sir" losers in the civilian realm where the best and brightest do operate, that command is made up of stunt-men who blame their failure always on the civilians above them. Many of the West Point grads that command were there during the great engineering math cheeting on exams scandal so one just might suspect that abstract calculation is not their forte. Having come up the ranks as "YES SIR" men, one cannot see them as the best of recipients of field criticism from below. What our intel commanders write about the gathering and use of intel by command makes clear why surge-king Petraeus would feel that PR men rather than intel is what he needed. COIN, in the final analysis is stealing the hearts and minds of the people back home with PR rather than winning those of the locals with good CONSTRUCTIVE plans. Thus, our real field focus has been on killing and destroying (even a return to "body count" as PR) rather than on modernizing the society so that it leaves Jihad behind culturally. All that our killer generals produced is ever more people ready to die killing our men in revenge for their relatives that we killed with our mass destruction war toys. Indeed, over the post-war decades we'll discover how during the war a lot of our officers retired in order to come back to the contractor role of COIN and steal $billions. Thus, the concept of COIN was never really testes as our goals were body count of locals killed indiscriminately and $$ stolen, also indiscriminately. The thesis requires, not our best minds to dream up COIN, but to implement it. The high-school drop out or grad seeking college tuition means by joining up, led by the duller knives in the drawer cannot be considered a good test of the COIN warfare thesis. We were warned about this by Marines Gen. Greene in Vietnam but we never learned. Instead, we listened to the "yes sir" wooden heads as we do now who think self-deception the way to eventual victory. History does repeat itself when the best and brightest are silenced by dull command and covered-up by a parallel army of PR men, as recommended by Petraeus based on his "analysis" (sic) of the Vietnam War.

Some questions about COIN (III): Just what do we think we are doing out there?

Posted By Thomas E. RicksFriday, February 8, 2013 - 10:24 AM Share

By Major Tom Mcilwaine, Queen's Royal Hussars
Best Defense guest columnist
Question Set Three -- If we aren't fighting a series of counterinsurgency campaigns, then what are we doing? There are (at least) two possible answers to this question, both of which raise further questions.
The first is that we are fighting a series of punitive campaigns, designed to show to the world the effect of our wrath and the results of crossing us. In which case, why are we concerned with cultural sensitivities and the like -- given that it is presumably their culture (or some part of it) that has led them to displease us in the first place? This may be simplistic (it is) but it is still a question that requires an answer.
The second possible answer is that we are fighting old-fashioned wars of imperial aggression, designed to alter the behavior of other countries so that they better fit into the global system at the head of which sits us; in short, we are compelling our opponent to do our will. This raises a further intriguing question -- if this is the case, why do we look to historical case studies of decolonization for guidance, rather than case studies of colonization? Is it simply so we can feel better about ourselves? There is a third option: We are compelled to invade a country to change its government because it is sheltering terrorist networks that are attacking us. What then?
Or another option, we are compelled to invade a country because of its foreign or nuclear policy that is hostile to our interests but have no interest in reshaping the society and culture in our image at all. What then?

Ah, Kashmir. If it were not for Pakistan, the outside world would consider it about as much as the North-East, by which I mean Nagaland and Mizoram. My best guess is that Indian Army COIN borrows from the usual suspects ; that is, case studies such as Malaya and US experience in South-East Asia. In the times I remember, the Army was called out for, among other things, flag marches through the streets of riot-struck towns and cities. I remember seeing grinning little Gurkhas swanning about Mahim-Matunga-Dadar way with jeeps mounting 106mm RCLs (muzzles shrouded) as well as machine-gun posts at various intersections. Not the sort of thing even the nuttiest Shiv Sainik would have wanted to bugger around with.To be sure that wasn’t COIN just communal rioting The language problem (as well as disproportionate use of force) was illustrated from an anecdote (North-East) where a jawan broke the collar-bone of a local for, what the jawan thought was a bit of lip. Turns out the local was just replying in good faith but was misunderstood; it was a question of local usage. This sort of thing was rarely mentioned at the time (a minimum of 25 years ago).

Kashmir has been a blow hot and cold affair for as long as I remember. Back in those days, there was the double Farooq equation. That is Farooq Abdullah and the Mirwais who had the same name (this last was bumped off at some time) Must have been about the same time that there was a Notable Kidnap, the daughter of a State Government Minister. Demanded something like prisoners release. Now, had it been some ordinary daughter there would have been no negotiation and in the fullness time a headless body would have been discovered. However, the daughter of a Minister being a little different, there was negotiation and release. Next thing you know….(shrugs) Mind you, back then it was the JKLF doing most of the running. The hanging of Maqbool Butt and the related Ravindra Mhatre affair Or Tales of the Duplicity of the British Scum. From Sheikh Abdullah to Farooq Abdullah to the present probably Abdullah to the Next Generation. Etc etc.

Naxals? Been around for years, from when I was still a smallish chap. Only in the beginnings there were decapitations of local politicians, shooting policemen, petty stuff. Nowadays command-detonated bombs seem commonplace and widespread. Bit of a difference between West Bengal where the Naxalites bumpe d off Communists as happily as anybody else ("„When Naxalites have finished CPM, we shall finish Naxalites.*) as the tribal areas. Chhattisgarh was around when when I was still in-country. Not really Jharkand and Orissa though that would be a tribals-associated affair, I shouldn’t wonder. In those old days of t he Cold War there was a Congress warhorse (Keyur Bhushan) who blamed the CIA for Chhattisgarh rumblings. The funny part is that there is a Chattisgarh State now (and apparently Jharkand also) and it is not the CIA in the State Government. The presence of Harry Barnes (with cameo appearance in ‚Who’s Who In The CIA‘) as US Ambassador and his periodic visits to MP doubtless had something to do with it. I myself saw the arrival of a cyclostyled pamphlet with the names of purported ‚CIA‘ agents. Including Ranjit Gupta, who’d by that time been cutting a swathe through WB Naxals like nobody’s business. Good times, I miss them.

3 days agoReply Like

fuzair

My father had Robert Asprey's "The Guerilla in History" in his library and I think I read it somewhere around my senior year in HS (using US equivalent terminology--actually A levels) instead of what I was supposed to be reading. I think it was at that time I came to the conclusion that there are really only two ways to defeat an insurgency: you either flood the country with so many troops that you almost literally drown the insurgents or, if you don't have that many troops to spare, you apply a lot of (intelligently applied and calculated) brutality to make the ‘locals’ fear the government more than they fear the insurgents. In both cases it really helps if you have troops who can speak the language and know the region, although this is not an absolute must.

India in Kashmir has done the former. They have somewhere between 600,000-700-000 security forces in a province whose population is 7.5 million tops--although many of these soldiers are stationed on the border with Pakistan and so are not really COIN troops. Indian COIN philosophy has undergone many changes and, for the Army, has now finally resulted in a policy where they have withdrawn regular battalions from COIN duty and replaced them with specialized COIN battalions, the Rashtriya Rifles. Each RR battalion—and there are 65 of them, more than most armies have regular troops!—is an overstrength infantry battalion (6 companies) with personnel seconded from ‘linked’ regular infantry regiments. This ensures that RR soldiers are trained at the same infantry regiment centre (Bihar, Punjab, Sikh, etc) sent out to the affiliated RR battalion and after a 2-3 year tour are sent back to their ‘home’ regiment; their officers are also from their ‘parent’ regiment. So a Rashtriya Rifle unit will be refered to as 36 RR (Garwhal) or 40 RR (Dogra) to indicate which regiment it is affiliated with and provided its men by, which regimental centre 'looks after' its paperwork, etc. They could have simply created a new formation--such as the Border Security Force, which also takes part in COIN ops--but I guess the Army didn't want to create another competitor.

RR units also have only light weapons and are stationed permanently in COIN areas so there is no ‘institutional loss of memory’ as when an entire unit is posted out. Part of the reason for this is because the Indian Army was afraid of losing its ‘regular war fighting’ capability and training degradation if it continually rotated units in and out of COIN operations. A typical RR battalion will have something like 24 officers, 38 JCOs (warrant officers, sort of) and 1,100 other ranks. All men posted to the RR battalion get an automatic 25% ‘hazard pay’.

There are very few men in the IA who would speak any Kashmiri but most Kashmiris speak Urdu/Hindi so language is not really an issue. RR units posted in the East (Assam etc) I would think would have more of a language issue so the IA is recruiting from there quite heavily, not so much ‘locals’ as Gorkhas settled there (in some cases 3rd or 4th generation) who have no hesitation in serving in the Army.

However, even for the Indian Army 65 battalions (80,000 plus men) is no joke. This meant completely restructuring the Army and changing officers’ career paths, etc., since COIN is now a permanent part of the Army’s mission, just that of a specialized branch of the Army like Armor or Artillery are specialized. There are at least five major generals in the COIN areas (they don’t call them Division commanders but Force Commanders: R-Romeo, D-Delta, V-Victor, K-Kilo, U-Uniform, etc)so specializing in COIN for an officer is not a career-killer as it might have been in the past. The Director General of the RR is a Lt. Gen and the current Indian Army COAS is a former RR Force Commander.

IF you’re going to do COIN, you need to seriously think about how you are going to force your army to take it seriously. I wonder how much people like Maj. Mcilwaine, Petraeus, Nagl, Kilcullen, etc, have studied the Indian Army’s counter-insurgency experience? My guess is not a whole heck of a lot. While the Indians are not really ‘expeditionary COIN’ (despite what some ‘locals’ may think!), it should have given them some thought as to what a military without any legitimacy in the COIN areas has to do to wage COIN there. The more I look at US COIN policy, the more i wonder why anyone thought it had even a remote chance of succeeding.

4 days agoReply Like

fuzairThe situation in Kashmir may get the bulk of the attention, but calling a spade a shovel, India has a bit of an issue from West Bengal in the northeast to Andhra Pradesh in the south with the Naxalites - what some dub the Red Taliban.

To tell you the truth, I'm not sure India or Pakistan (the latter country for sure) are any better at COIN than the U.S.?

Tyrtaios
The PA sees COIN much the same way that the US Army used to (still does?) as a distraction from its real task of preparing to fight the Indians on the Eastern Border.You'll note that I'm not holding the PA up as an exemplar of COIN ;-)
The PA's approach to COIN is a very different matter entirely and probably I'll write an article on it at some point in the very distant future....

The Indians sat down and completely rethought how they were going to handle the insurgent problem and came up with the RR concept. They still have the same problems of a corrupt and shambolic governance structure that helps delegitimize the state but they at least have a more competent military response to the insurgency problem that has kept the lid down.

With the Naxalites outside Assam, from what I know, it is more of a political problem than anything else in the sense that the government is unwilling to let the Army operate in the 'real India'; as opposed to turning it loose in Kashmir and Assam of course.

The Indian government has proposed redeploying some RR battalions to 'static' posts (presumbably to guard key installations), but not to be used in active operations, in the worst hit areas but the Army has essentially refused. The Army wants full-operational control or nothing to do with the mess.

The Indians have about 80+ battalions of various paramilitary troops under the Home Ministry (Central Reserve Police Force, Railway Police, what not and various odds and sods) deployed on CI duty outside Kashmir but these are pretty much useless for anything other than deterrring casual theft and breaking and entering. If you've ever seen the typical Indian policeman, you'd understand why they are less than useless. Every now and then the Naxalites carry out a particularly nasty ambush or police thana raid and butcher a platoon or company of these poor bastards.Unsurprisingly, these troops tend to run at the first shot fired.

The Home Ministry had proposed stationing some 30+ battalions of these in Kashmir and sending the relieved RR units out to the worst affected areas. The Army's counter-proposal was to raise the strength of the RR to 100 battalions (sanctioned strenght; vs. 65 actually raised) and then use these in the Naxalite areas.The local politicans have refused to turn over large parts of their states to the Army since even the 'kinder gentler COIN' of the Indian Army has a very real iron fist that tends to smash both the guilty and the innocent pretty hard. And calling in teh Army is a complete admission of failure.

The compromise has been that the Army has started training the Central Paramilitary Forces in the worst hit areas of Jharkhand, Chattisgarh and Orissa. But like most such compromises, it really isn't working particularly well.

fuzairAn interesting perspective . . . . Thank you!

williejoe

If we are looking for successful models why not study how we came out of the Revolutionary War ( or the colonial unpleasantness) with our necks of normal length and a constitution. Why and how did Mao beat the Nationalists? The V C P defeat the French colonial regime? If you want to know the conditions of success against an insurgency find the critical and common elements of the ones that succeeded and devise ways to undermine those conditions or accept that sometimes the bear and the beer get you.

5 days agoReply Like

williejoe There is something to learn from many examples and sources, but most of all is to recognize that conditions vary from one example to another and one template will never fit all.

Mao Tse Tung decided that success might take decades to achieve and one should be ready for set-backs, which should point to strategic patience being needed by anyone deciding to intervene, whether in the cold or hot phase of a challenge to the stability of a foreign government and recognize whether the resources expended are worth it.

Additionally, when reading "On Guerrilla Warfare," which in essence is a training manual, the would be counter-insurgent needs to recognize Mao's further writings which point to a successful insurgency as having multiple lines of effort toward revolutionary war, of which only one is violence, and always include a strategically political end.

Also keep in mind that the Mao had phases for revolutionary warfare, and we saw the recent modern insurgents streaming out of Libya jumping right into a hot phase in Mali. Therefore, as Clausewitz stated, war evolves and insurgency is only one aspect of war.

So, it is possible revolutionary war has evolved beyond what Mao recognized, or General George Washington as well. Which is why it is important to ask the questions the good Major of Queen's Royal Hussars is asking so that as counter-insurgents we also evolve?

Tyrtaios williejoe An excellent point well made as usual. I was trying to get at the human element in the equation. To revolt against a state is to risk it all,persons of both the right and left who have tried to carry out armed struggle or rebellion in the U.S. have swiftly fallen to the police agencies of the state. God help the poor fools who tangle with a Marine company or a Stryker unit. Yet some have tried it or proposed it, why? I'm looking at post 1865 America of course only a madman would want to wish that horror on the nation again. The same question arises in the world right now,in Syria,North Africa,Somalia,Afganistan why are people willing to pay the horrendous price of the Syrian rebellion and how are they succeeding against a modern,trained and heavily armed force that is holding nothing back. The Pashtun have been fighting in Afghanistan for how long now against all comers- why? What don't we understand about the human element that has led to frustration and very limited success.

backischance

Tyrtaios williejoe All points well made. COIN manuals won't do it. The world is way too complex for doctrines. History tells us no doctrine will stand, trumping reality and the complexities of the human spirit. Flexibility, top notch intel, and training for the unexpected have a chance from time to time.

There's a world of difference between insurgency and terrorism. We've gotten them confused, IMHO.

Tyrtaios On the topic of evolution the article entitled Start-Up Sovereigns in today's F P is very interesting, it reminds me of the book Stand on Zanzibar by John Brunner(1968).

Afghanistan. There may well have been a punitive element here. Notably the bombing of dams and other infrastructure without any obvious military rationale. Though the Kajaki Dam did, for a short while, permit UK forces to trumpet their grand success in transporting a turbine on a long journey and claiming a hefty body-count into the bargain. Though for some reason, power generation from this site appears near non-existent. The arrival of the turbine was, presumably, done in a COIN context. Then again, perhaps not. God alone knows what these damn gora log are about.

In the days of yore, the punitive expedition didn’t take cultural considerations into account, or any consideration of any sort, truth be told. Then again, the idea was, well, punitive, and not intended to support a local puppet government. Whenever punitive didn’t provide a lasting solution, which was probably most of the time, the Punisher often opted for occupation combined with a local despot who could be clobbered if he didn’t come across with the tribute on time.

The notion of altering the ‘behaviour’ of a nation must surely be considered as a comical notion. A nation isn’t an individual, after all. But it does make for a succint sound-bite, usually accompanied by an imbecilic grin and an off-handed delivery. Historical case studies of decolonisation ; not at all a bad idea. Top of the list for the contemporary world would undoubtedly be the British departure from Aden circa 1967. Another way, not connected with colonialism, would be the saga of Anwar Sadat and his supporting role behind Abdullah Sallal and the Nasserist experiment in Yemen (the non-Communist one, that is).

Nice to know that the author contemplates invading Iran. Where is he studying ?

6 days agoReply Like

HUNTERS

This poster makes the classic Western mistake of trying to bifurcate a problem. That is to say, this is either this or that. The fact is these conflicts aren't easy to categorize because they are a little bit of everything. At USAWC we had to write a paper deining whether Vietnam was a conventional war, a hybrid, a counter insurgency, a civil war, etc. The correct answer, if there is one, is all of the above...but at different moments in time. You also have the issue of personalities snd their separate motivations. Bush Jr. Might have only wanted revenge for a planned attack on his daddy, while Cheney might have sought co trol of oil...and Rumsfeld wanted to demonstrate the nee technocentric military. All may be true, or none...or varying degrees. If it was easy anyone could do it.

@HUNTERS............... Hunters, I think this is not a fair rap on Maj Tom’s intent. To successfully design a war that you can win, you must have clarity about the nature of the objectives, the nature of the opponents, and the degree of commitment you bring to the effort. In Vietnam we did not start with the clarity, so the war morphed as the circumstances and the personalities changed. That is not the way things should be. I give the major points for asking useful questions. This is not “bifurcatuing”, it is “clarifying”. Yes, it is possible that in some situation the answer might be a compound of more than one of his options, but you get to that compound objective by clear and focused analysis of your war aims and their context. K

Iraq and Afghanistan were waged more or less along the lines of Answer #2: we sought to compel our opponent to do our will The sub-question to #2 is a good one: If we are doing what classical wars used to do, why do we look at colonial wars for our models? One answer may be that as a super-power our lens on war says “Big war = classical war” and “Small war = some variant of colonial war” Perhaps if we had started with a clearer lens in conceptualizing our aims in Irag and especially in Afghanistan we would have recognized that we were setting out on a path of classical war……………….K

Kriegsakademie
As usual an excellent and thoughtful response by Kriegsakademie. However, Major Mcilwaine uses the term ‘we’ as if the thinking in Whitehall and Washington was joined at the hip. Perhaps I am a hopeless cynic but I suspect it wasn’t with the exception of Blair whose ego drove him to pretend he was a global player. The London felt compelled to follow Churchill’s formula to never allow space to open up between themselves and the US.

The British showed more sense and backbone during Vietnam when they intuitively realized that we didn’t know what the hell we were doing and declined the honor to participate. Perhaps in the meantime they thought we had matured and learned something since that fiasco and would be more responsible and calculating. Looks like the joke was on them.

Gold Star Father

JPWREL Were the British not mired down in Eire and Rhodesia during this time period and absolutely ill-prepared to extend to satisfy Washington? Did they do some backdoor phoning to Canberra to move in their stead, SEATO and all that, what?

Gold Star Father JPWREL
Eire? Rhodesia? More likely, the Retreat from Empire would have made participation prohibitively expensive. They did of course participate in Korea; yes, that was supposedly a UN operation. As for Australia, must have depended on the PM. As they said:

Menzies: British to the boot-straps.
Holt: All the way with LBJ.
Gorton: Australia first.

No idea of how NZ went, given that some of their SAS did participate in Vietnam (unless I'm mistaken)

AndyWisniewski1

Gold Star Father JPWREL The British weren't militarily committed at all in Rhodesia, Rhodesia unilaterally declared independence and Briton threw sanctions on them and said choke on your "freedom".

Gold Star Father
Major British troop presence in Northern Ireland was more a 70's thing after ‘Bloody Sunday’ and I don't recall any significant British troop presence in Rhodesia. A MOD document that was opened to the public indicates that they felt the war was unwinnable as early as 1965 and wanted the Americans to quickly find a way to extract themselves.

JPWREL
Ireland, no? Rhodesia, no? ah...Canada? No? ah...Belize? No?

Maybe the British just listened to The Greatest: "I ain't no quarrel with them Viet Cong".

Gold Star Father Cassius Clay's (aka The Louisville Lip) advice was a lot better than all the 'best and brightest' in Washington were able to manage.

@DILNIR NZ in VN...............the Kiwis were in for a good chunk of the NV war period. They sent infantry and SAS. Much of the time they co-located with the Aussies at Bearcat - since the Aussies had considerable support infrastructure. Plenty of Kiwis fought (and died) in our war. ................ Not surprisingly, the effort was not popular at home. Kiwi civilians tend toward an Islander's view of war - - - "if we're not threatened, best to stay out".

Michael_Vredenburg

Gold Star Father JPWREL Aden and Oman.

DILNIR Gold Star Father JPWREL
I thought the Australians were concerned that the British Empire would no longer be able to provide them with 'protection' and so were looking for another source. Ergo their decision to send about 7,500 troops IIRC. The Australians were part of SEATO and took their obligations seriously.

However, their troop contribution, I would think, was too small to make much of an impact on the overall situation, their experience in Malaya and the Confrontation notwithstanding. Very few--obvious exceptions on this board!--remember that the S. Koreans contributed two divisions and a reinforced Marine brigade to Vietnam--although Park Chung Hee really squeezed the US for it monetarily. OK troop strength did reach just about 50,000 IIRC. I've read they were extremely effective, albeit extremely brutal, in suppressing the VC. Massacares and brutality seemed to be the hallmark of their operations. Apparently the North Koreans also sent troops--AA units and a fighter squadron--but obviously to fight on the other side!

Incidentally, LBJ also asked Pakistan for troops (IIRC two infantry divisions) but Ayub Khan's response was on the lines of "If Kennedy had consulted us, as he had promised to do, before arming India, we'd be inclined to favorably consider the request. As it is, we can't spare the troops since we now face a much stronger India." Probably a self-serving reply but it keep Pakistan out of Vietnam.

fuzair DILNIR Gold Star Father Diggers always seem to be worth more than their absolute numbers.

JPWREL KriegsakademieOddly, although the British opted out of Viet-Nam, another part of the Common Wealth participated, and did an admirable job in a bankrupt cause, the Australians who brought lessons learned in Malaysia earlier.

However, why look at colonial models? If for no other reason not to look at them, the methods used as a whole are no longer available to us, nor, if one really looks at those methods closely should a democratic nation use them.

If we are to look backward for lessons learned to go forward with we should find where we and others were successful and study the varying conditions present that allowed a particular approach to be taken. But in doing so not cherry pick such in El Salvador where one might be quick to point out our success, but also fail to admit the death squads kept status quo until the political climate changed due to outside dynamics and both sides negotiated . . . Although, an often forgotten successful model after our 1950s success in the Philippines to look at might be our advisory role by 1st Special Forces in Thailand.

Remember, it is the Tet Lunar New Year and one should not eat shrimp during the celebration as shrimp move backward in their natural environment and we don't want to go into the year of the snake with a propensity to move backward, but rather forward.

Chuc mung nam moi!

Tyrtaios
Bia cua ban co the la tuyet voi trong nam nay Marine

Gold Star Father Tyrtaios
Since GSF has brought up the extremely import subject of beer, let it be know that I have finally mastered the art of a 'Black & Tan'.

What Afghanistan needs after 2014: A lighter, smarter, long-term commitment

By Gianni Koskinas Tuesday, February 12, 2013 - 12:16 PM Share

Maintaining a large military presence in Afghanistan is not in the strategic interests of either the U.S. or the Afghan government. It does not help the United States accomplish its long-term goal of countering terrorism from the Afghanistan-Pakistan region, nor its short-term goal of helping Afghanistan achieve stability and self-reliance in fighting insurgency. It is also economically unsustainable. However, retaining a smaller, lighter, residual presence in Afghanistan is critical to U.S. strategy and vital to core U.S. interests.
Additionally, U.S. strategy in Afghanistan must be based on a vision that goes out decades: Considering only short-term goals amounts to strategic myopia, unworthy of the sacrifices made by almost 2,200 U.S. service members in Afghanistan alone.
A Case for Lighter, Smarter, Long-term Residual Presence
With Osama Bin Laden dead and al-Qaeda's capabilities diminished in the Af-Pak region, the immediate threat of attacks on the U.S. from the region has greatly diminished. But the ingredients that could help Al Qaeda regenerate in the next decade remain, and thus the mission endures.
In fact, the "surge" of U.S. troops in Afghanistan in 2009 had little to do with bin Laden; rather, it was an attempt to rescue the failing mission of stabilizing Afghanistan. Bin Laden was hunted and killed not by the surge, but by a small, specialized group, the likes of which I argue should remain in Afghanistan to monitor and guard against the long-term threat of terrorist cells.
More importantly, a comprehensive counter-terrorism strategy must include the training of the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) to counter domestic threats. But this will take significantly longer than estimates suggest. As such, the U.S. must alter its stated strategy in Afghanistan to consider the training and equipping of the ANSF a key element of its plan to counter threats, and support Afghanistan in its domestic fight against terrorists that, left unchecked, could re-emerge. The numbers of trainers must be kept low and should not be outsourced to contractors. Currently, the only elements specifically designed to counter insurgencies are the U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF). Considering the nuanced task, the training force should be predominantly SOF.
With nearly 2,200 troops dead, thousands more wounded, and half a trillion dollars spent in America's longest war, merely staying the course in Afghanistan is no longer possible. In fact, with no sound opposition to President Obama's plan of swift withdrawal, the U.S. has decided to accelerate the transition from combat to training mission and, arguably less advertised, concentrate forces in a few heavily fortified locations such as Bagram Air Base.
Eleven one-year strategies in Afghanistan have brought us to a point where people consider "strategic retreat" the best of the worst options available. In pursuing this plan, however, the United States and its strategic partners in the Afghan Government risk a return to a time where fractured Afghan groups battled for supremacy, and an apathetic and financially exhausted U.S. didn't want to spend any more blood or treasure. History has shown that this "strategic retreat," fails to consider the greater geo-strategic importance of maintaining a U.S. presence in Afghanistan
Without a firm presence in Afghanistan, the U.S. will have no bases in South-Central Asia. The only other alternative is Manas Transit Center in Kyrgyzstan, whose lease is going to expire in 2014, and Kyrgyz President Almaz Atambayev has made it clear that his government will not extend the agreement any further. From a regional perspective alone, the U.S. must maintain a residual footprint in Afghanistan as a mechanism of influencing Central and South Asia. Stability in the AfPak region is critical in monitoring and combating a reemergence of al-Qaeda.
Ultimately, for the Obama Administration to achieve its objective of maintaining pressure on al-Qaeda and its affiliates in the region, and supporting Afghanistan as a strategic partner - it must consider a nuanced strategy when looking at the composition of the U.S. residual presence. After 2014, Obama should employ a specialized force with a light footprint, but a big contribution. I recommend the following elements be in the mix:
1. A counter-terrorism task force to focus on the remnants of al-Qaeda and any insurgent groups that pose a threat to U.S. assets and interests. The specialized CT elements need to be able to engage targets throughout the country, so this will have to include both primary bases, and lily pads to extend their reach. These elements should train and utilize their Afghan counterparts as much as possible; ultimately, the Afghan counter-terrorism elements themselves should take over.
2. A robust counter-insurgency training force comprised of both ground and air special operations forces that will focus on the training of Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) in specialized COIN training - similar to that in Colombia. This extends to the mentoring of the Afghan Air Force, civil affairs, etc.
3. The only "conventional force" presence should be in the protection of U.S./Coalition bases. These bases should have maximum flexibility by maintaining minimal infrastructure in only 4 locations (Bagram in the East, Mazar-e-Sharif in the North, Herat in the West, and Bastion in the South). Additionally, a limited aviation training presence should be kept in the main training base for the Afghan Air Force, Shindand Airfield. The U.S. will probably maintain Bagram and Kabul, whereas Mazar-e-Sharif, Herat, and Bastion should be supported by NATO partners.
4. In Kabul, all that should remain are the headquarters at ISAF - with some of its coalition partners' participation - a limited contingent on the military side of the Kabul airfield, and a NATO Training Mission Afghanistan command.
5. SOF should abandon the "Afghan Local Police" (ALP) in most areas and focus more on the development of the ANSF. A few years ago, with over 100,000 U.S. personnel in country, SOF could afford to focus on the ALP concept. Now, with only a few thousand U.S. service members in-country, the emphasis must be on the uniformed security services.
In terms of numbers, the right mix is about 4,000 SOF and SOF enablers, and 4-5,000 conventional forces and headquarters support. While the 9,000 U.S. personnel seems to be the "just enough" figure for an enduring presence, it seems the President may now be set on a lower figure due to financial constraints.
Setting a Long-Term U.S. Strategy for Afghanistan
The United States non-military strategic course in Central and South Asia needs to start in 2015, not end in 2014. The U.S. needs to consider its 2025 strategic vision, and make smaller contributions to the region but with bigger payoffs.
For example, the U.S. should work with other key allies to coordinate on increasing trade and creating more jobs in a region that is currently plagued with high rates of unemployment and poverty. Coordinating with Pakistan and investment giants such as the United Arab Emirates to secure funding for a road or railroad from Helmand to the port of Gwadar, or with Qatar to invest in Afghanistan's and Pakistan's natural resources can create thousands of jobs and boost economies. This is not something that is purely altruistic; such activities can greatly benefit U.S. interests. Furthermore, a strategic "pivot to Asia" can only be accomplished if there is stability in Central and South Asia. Afghanistan is critical to trade corridors from oil-gas rich Central Asia states (including Afghanistan) to the end users of South and East Asia. In effect, Afghanistan's geo-strategic importance goes far beyond trans-national terrorism threats.
Over the past 11 years, the international community has committed billions of dollars in an effort to stabilize and reconstruct a country ravaged by three decades of war. The U.S. alone has spent over $600 billion in the longest war in its history, with over $20 billion in governance and development funds. And yet, Afghanistan is still not economically self-sustainable. Perhaps that is not so shocking, though. President Obama himself made it clear (as early as May 2012) that, "Our goal is not to build a country in America's image, or to eradicate every vestige of the Taliban. These objectives would require many more years, many more dollars and many more American lives."
Another way of looking at this, however, is the way most American veterans of the conflict view their sacrifices: as a strategic investment. They might argue that the dollars spent and the lives lost deserve a much more impressive outcome than simply a strategic retreat with Afghanistan in dire straits.
For their part, few Afghans welcome the U.S. withdrawal. While important to equip and strengthen the Afghan security forces, Presidents Karzai and Obama did not address crafting a long-term strategy that looks towards a stable Afghanistan in 2030, rather than a short-term "stable enough to transition security" by 2014.
Presidents Karzai and Obama - two leaders unable to seek reelection and concerned about their legacy - may still be able to give the people of Afghanistan a gift that can help stabilize Afghanistan. President Karzai has a unique opportunity to leverage his last year in government to broker a deal that can offer real hope of change and progress. On the American side, the U.S. and other donors should minimize "hand out" aid and focus on investments in Afghanistan. Donor programs don't create revenue, but rather act as symptomatic relief. Public funds, partnered with private firms, can help develop a self-sustaining Afghan economy. For the past three decades, the United States has appeared to prefer short-term strategies. They did not recognize the long-term consequences of inattention following the Soviet withdrawal. They seemed satisfied with the near term and non-committal cruise missile-targeting of Osama Bin Laden after a series of terrorist attacks in the late 1990s.
President Obama's inaugural speech last month made it clear that the "decade of war" has come to a close. By 2014, the U.S. should conclude this chapter by leaving behind a small training force, a robust counter-terrorism force, and an economic support model that is viable in the long-term. Significant intellectual and limited monetary capital must go toward achieving sustainable Afghan economic growth in the mid-to-long-term. Rather than how much is spent in Afghanistan, donors - and in particular, the U.S. as the largest - need to start paying attention more to effectiveness of what is spent.
Ultimately, the most important date on our 2014 calendar should be the April Afghan Presidential election rather than the December withdrawal deadline. If the election is not credible or moderately successful in maintaining the trust of key stakeholders in the democratic progress, the numbers of U.S. troops remaining will not make much difference in the post-election environment. The Afghan people and the international community will be watching closely to ensure that the election is an example of the democratic progress that 13 years of Coalition presence made possible. The troop levels, important as they may be, are only secondary to the success of the political process.
Gianni Koskinas was a military officer for over twenty years and now focuses on economic development projects in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

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s-i-a
5 minutes ago

the only economist worth listening to to is John Kenneth Galbraith who said, among other worthwhile observations "Economics is extremely useful as a form of employment for economists."

piecrust71
14 minutes ago

Did he call him a 'fudge packer' ???

seneca
23 minutes ago

Niall Ferguson's military history work is interesting but if he knew more about international political theory it would be stronger. I don't care what he says in off the cuff comments.

mhayworth
16 minutes ago

I don't care either - but I'm worried about living in a world where people have to apologise publicly for having an opinion that doesn't fit with the government and their current social engineering project. We are becoming more like North Korea every day. How long before we are no longer 'allowed' to disagree'?

piecrust71
13 minutes ago

mhayworth
BINGO!

fromrightfield
28 minutes ago

Your comment might have been insensitive and possibly stupid. However, the more important question is whether it was true and a fair, though somewhat crass, observation of the great man's frame of reference. Surely if we are to have vigorous debate this is more important than upsetting sensitivities and being politically correct.

3spartan
32 minutes ago

Economists produce nothing and don't do any good. Gravy train meddlers no less.

Top Comments

RulerL0rd 4 days ago
Evrything is achievebale through science.
· 30
Mooseracks 4 days ago
Pretty cool stuff... So, what are the options when there is a shortage of pure clean water...OR can this idea work with ANY type of water; eg. waste-water, salt-water, un-distilled water... Is it possible to collect moisture from the atmosphere..just a few thoughts...
· 18

All Comments (88)

Perry Smith 36 minutes ago
I wonder how the big oil companies will view this potential encroachment on their profits.
·
sesc79 6 hours ago
I agree that that's an important point, but I'd say if you build the system accordingly (as a closed cycle), you only need (reasonably) clean water once. The distilled water coming from the exhaust will then dilute any minerals etc. that are there from the initial fill, won't it?
·in reply to Stuart Halliday (Show the comment)
sesc79 6 hours ago
OTOH, burning the product of these leaves doesn't spill out carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, only water vapour. :-)
·in reply to Francisco Valdés Perezgasga (Show the comment)
sesc79 6 hours ago
You can quite easily run this system in a closed cycle, i.e., collect the water (vapour) at the exhaust of the engine/fuel cell, condense it, and feed it back to the artificial leaves. That way you only need to process the very first fill of the tank (and occasional small replenishments).
·in reply to Mooseracks (Show the comment)
sesc79 6 hours ago
Water is scarce in many parts of the world and isn't in many others. More to the point, you can run this system in a closed cycle if you like (catch the water at the exhaust and reuse it)! Either way, the technology may well prove sensible: A battery delivers less energy than what it was charged with (in techie speech, it hasn't 100 % efficiency), and liquid/gaseous fuel can be better in some applications (transport, cooking, ...).
·in reply to Rev. Jay Goldstein (Show the comment)
DualWorlds1 13 hours ago
Dangerous statement....
Science needs ethics to move it toward holistically benefitting humanity.
·in reply to RulerL0rd (Show the comment)
XDragonsXCryX 18 hours ago
You apparently still are on the thought process that we are the only ones in this universe. Has history ever accept the possibilities of life on other planets? No, because that is the PAST. Don't you remember the movie with harold and kumar? Why do you think it was even made. Times ARE changing, and religion is become coherent with science. I'm sure you know all about the service men being killed because they refuse to be silenced. I don't support him,I stand by his opinion, as he is president
·in reply to CampQwitchaBitchin (Show the comment)
Priya C 22 hours ago
This is brilliant!
·
CampQwitchaBitchin 22 hours ago
It doesn't take that much water. Renewable is the word. This can work. Did you know that world hunger could be ended for one year with about $35 Billion. I could imagine similar figures and technology such as HAARP could fix the drought problems too. The families that own the central banks which control the world are worth around $500 Trillion. They could permanently end the worlds problems and still remain mega-wealthy, This energy is do-able but not in this current corporate-fascist system.
·in reply to Rev. Jay Goldstein (Show the comment)
CampQwitchaBitchin 22 hours ago
Only the ignorant or lovers of Stalinism remain supporting this treasonous monster. Four letters for you "NDAA". Obama has given himself the right to indefinitely detain Americans DOMESTICALLY, no judge, jury, lawyer, phone call or even notifying anyone your in custody. Without any charges!!! They can torture and execute you with no one knowing. Historically, any leader makes a move like this? That country is in deep shit!! You put your faith in despot Obama, I'll keep mine in Jesus. Good luck!
·in reply to XDragonsXCryX (Show the comment)

CampQwitchaBitchin 22 hours ago
Got your message. Are you serious? The "good things" Obama has done for us are "hidden". We are talking about the most corrupt pres we have ever had!! He has removed more freedom, placed more draconian laws and inflated our debt more than all presidents combined. How do you think they support these social programs you praise? BY SPENDING 8 TIMES THE REVENUE THEY PULL IN!!! Our real debt now is 122 trillion. We can never recover! He's a banker puppet like the last few. (continued-->)
·in reply to XDragonsXCryX (Show the comment)
Francisco Valdés Perezgasga 23 hours ago
Real leaves take up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. This carbon sink effect is not present in this artificial "leaf". Engineering comes short of Nature. Again.
·
Stuart Halliday 1 day ago
Sadly then it will be a waste of time. The heat and cleaning process will use more energy that the leaf can make with the collected water.
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Stuart Halliday 1 day ago
However it also needs pure water, a rare commodity not found in nature.
(Rain water isn't pure).
Why pure?
As the water is split, the water is used up and any residue minerals dissolved in the water will remain behind slowly coating the 'leaf therefore stopping it working! So it'll need regular cleaning and that takes energy!
I give it 10 years before these problems can be solved. :)
·
CYellowan 1 day ago
Pure water can rather easy be made by heating up dirty water; this should be a decent temporary solution.
·in reply to Stuart Halliday (Show the comment)
terence galland 1 day ago
hopefully daniels invention will help to reduce the tax burden on humaity as well as saving the planet!!
·
baba sheikh 1 day ago
anything is possible only imaginations needed
·
QuinZZR 1 day ago
Except religious tolerance.
·in reply to RulerL0rd (Show the comment)
e g 1 day ago
Very cool and great potential, but rarely in history do we see those in power allow inventions like this to become mainstream because of the loss of revenue in their own pockets. This is good for humanity and the environment but bad for oil/coal/natural gas fat cats.
·
Andreas Kurniawan 2 days ago
I want this now
·

S1KRYD 2 days ago
Almost anything. But not quite
·in reply to RulerL0rd (Show the comment)
S1KRYD 2 days ago
That is the coolest thing I have seen in a decade!!!
·
premachu2 2 days ago
You mean spelling.
·in reply to xlovenuggetx (Show the comment)
Hendrik Huizing 2 days ago
Amazing what come out of a lab these days hoping it will work but next question how will society be reformed, no tax coming off self generated fuel or even power at present, but wait there was once a tax on the size of windows there's a starting point.
·
Root121212 2 days ago
Almost everything, remember my friend.
·in reply to RulerL0rd (Show the comment)
RulerL0rd 2 days ago
"Almost" everything is not even close to a scientific term because if you analyse it you will realise that almost can't be determined. Just like infinity. Infinity represents everything. You can never say almost infinity. It has no natural meaning. So your sentense is infinitely erroneous.
·in reply to Root121212 (Show the comment)
Root121212 2 days ago
I appreciate your comment; It´s hard for me write in Italian and English
·in reply to RulerL0rd (Show the comment)
RulerL0rd 3 days ago
Fuck off retard.
·in reply to xlovenuggetx (Show the comment)
GalaxySuperGirl 3 days ago
This was possible because of this discovery of Michael Grätzel. Search Dye-sensitized_solar_cell
·
Harley Quintero 3 days ago
We*
·in reply to Blitz4000 (Show the comment)

Harley Quintero 3 days ago
I wish this well but have not much hope that the big company's will not stop it.
·
VariusMayhem 3 days ago
Everyone should buy blueprints and small-sized examples of that technology. It this spreads, we could end the oil industry and wars over oil would be history. It starts with several households, then streets powered by this technology. Soon whole districts, cities and countries... You can't put on the lid forever to suppress progress.
·
theseustoo 3 days ago
I wonder if, since they are 'self-replicating' they will grow like 'artificial trees'?
·
staphy82 3 days ago
Did that scientist say "backside" as in ass, as in buttocks, as in bum-bum on national TV!?
·
staphy82 3 days ago
the scientist looks deranged
·
Blitz4000 3 days ago
This scientist should hide in the mountains and avoid being murdered by the evil rulers of the oil industry.
like the dinosaurs, humans are just another glitch in the system that will be
eradicated. They are nothing but selfish fools.
·
xlovenuggetx 3 days ago
except for grammar, of course.
· 3 in reply to RulerL0rd (Show the comment)
XDragonsXCryX 3 days ago
Steal it from the sun, wouldn't that make sense to go from planetary to interstellar.
·in reply to Mooseracks (Show the comment)
XDragonsXCryX 3 days ago
I believe that with the progression of the human intellect, these walls put up will eventually be taken down. With the expansion of global peace, it will happen. Look at Russia, they are tryin to edge the world towards the right direction, the UN is also doing the same thing. Change takes time, isn't that what obama said?
·in reply to CampQwitchaBitchin (Show the comment)
XDragonsXCryX 3 days ago
Our planet literally have the chemicals that power up the sun.
·

CuffedCobra 3 days ago
Brilliant.
·
CampQwitchaBitchin 3 days ago
Like this is really going to happen? Like BBC's corporate, fascist sponsors and government will let them support this? Anybody that has come up with similar technology before either took a huge payoff from the oil empire to shut-up, saw their lives destroyed or.....died a very strange death. What freedom that could be! Self sufficient off a couple gallons of water a day! Its a fact that a car and most engines can run solely off hydrogen. They'll never allow it. Shame.
·
dreakheart 3 days ago
02:16 , this is the kind of face i wanna explode my fist in , a dumb fucking look a smile that disgusts me , grrr
·
MrTank116 3 days ago
except for better spelling
·in reply to RulerL0rd (Show the comment)
Rev. Jay Goldstein 3 days ago
Interesting tech but it needs water, which takes energy to pump and is scarce in much of the world. Solar power doesn't need that infrastructure and with modern batteries there is no energy lag while the Sun is not out. In 5 years, this whole experiment may be nothing but a charming way for kids to win science fairs.
·
Comment removed
Author withheld
·
jungle milf 3 days ago
if i got to that country one day i will deffinitily visit the museum thnks for the info buddy
·in reply to derbigpr500 (Show the comment)
TheWarFuel 3 days ago
America.
·
elevengiant 3 days ago
middle east will be revolutionised - get a job
·
robviolin1 3 days ago
This is an old idea. The people who own the oil/gas is not going to let anyone put them out of business. They simple are much too greedy.
·

superjfbm 4 days ago
wasn't there an inventor of an alternative energy source, and was recently murdered for having done that?
·
moxigen 4 days ago
as i said we don´t use all capabilities at the moment in the right way and there is see the necessity.
we still have to find a way for a global society which doesn´t favors few, but make it possible for preferably many and not only humans.
maybe the bigges challenge of life on erth ever.
i hope we are able to burst our natural bonds and use the technology itself to the benefit of all.
·in reply to colddrake80 (Show the comment)
Rubenz343 4 days ago
Because you're a thumb.
·in reply to Botond Kis Kovacs (Show the comment)
ThePleb87 4 days ago
These scientists are like wizards lol
·
Angel Rincon 4 days ago
The future of technology goes against the current monetary paradigm and that I love. Science is so liberating. <3
·
Comment removed
Author withheld
·
RulerL0rd 4 days ago
Evrything is achievebale through science.
· 30
Comment removed
Author withheld
r3g3n3s1s 4 days ago
This has been flagged as spamshow• Not Spam
derbigpr500 4 days ago
Yea, US government stole pretty much everything he did when he lived in USA. He died alone and very poor in inhumane conditions, because the government realize how dangerous his technology would be for their profits, and they had to get rid of him. But lots of his work was left back at his home country, and you can see that work today.
·in reply to jungle milf (Show the comment)

jungle milf 4 days ago
wow that must be lovely to see all his work there, dont understand why he is generaly not known for his work, to me he is the biggest name in science rather than einstein, but anyway isnt it true that the us government stole a lot of his work ?
·in reply to derbigpr500 (Show the comment)
Fearghal Joyce 4 days ago
One of the worst effects of capitalism is the way it does not allow for any human progress that is not profitable.
· 2
moxigen 4 days ago
technology causes many problems, but just becuase we still don´t use all its capabilities in the right ways.
necessity is the mother of invention.
·
colddrake80 4 days ago
That isn't entirely true. Technology - along with all things - solves and generates problems. The trick is to find a balance between the two poles. Right now our SOCIETY has hit a wall with our existing tech. In order to make the tech changes that would help us we would have to reorganize parts of society. That will upset some very rich people and they get kill happy when that happens.
I do agree we aren't utilizing even existing tech that well.
·in reply to moxigen (Show the comment)
Mooseracks 4 days ago
Pretty cool stuff... So, what are the options when there is a shortage of pure clean water...OR can this idea work with ANY type of water; eg. waste-water, salt-water, un-distilled water... Is it possible to collect moisture from the atmosphere..just a few thoughts...
· 18
LegoTrainAddict 4 days ago
If there's an energy problem make things more efficient!
·
Alvin Lee 4 days ago
People still go for digging for gas for the sole reason that it is easily monetized, innovation has always been bad for business
·
Del Bradley 4 days ago
Excellent ! Lets hope this doesn't get supressed/shelved by the greedy powers that be.
·
xxxrossomaticxxx 4 days ago
why alaready make them in motherCPUs for a computer
·in reply to TomMarksman (Show the comment)
Jake Logan 4 days ago
Either way they'll be forced to use stuff like this when they run out of fossil fuels. Good.
·

Jake Logan 4 days ago
They
·
TomMarksman 4 days ago
The only question is, who would make these leafs on a mass manufacturing scale?
·
Botond Kis Kovacs 4 days ago
This is very exciting but I'd like if someone wrote about it's efficiency/cost compared to photovoltaic cells and about hydrogen storage. I've seen this in a few articles webwide but nobody goes into the detail I am interested in.
·
derbigpr500 4 days ago
Yea I know. And its the weirdest thing in my country, because, Nikola Tesla was born here, he lived like 40 km's away from where I was born. And if you go to the national technical museum in my capital city, you can find patents on Nikola Tesla there, working, they're doing demonstations of amazing stuff even today you have a hard time believing is not illusion. Yet, our government does nothing with it...they still dig into the sea for gas oil...
·in reply to jungle milf (Show the comment)
thbr23 4 days ago
If this was made OpenSource, we'd have the revolution tomorrow morning.
·
kasra mirzarezaie 4 days ago
isnt that just algea?? i remember in school we put some plants in water and pointed light at it and bubbles came out of it???
·
2uwar 4 days ago
wait wait wait... WHAT? There is no electricity in plants. Chorophyll is a pigment that traps light and the light then catalyses the reaction between Carbon Dioxide and Hydrogen Hydroxide (Water). Or atleast, so I thought. Is this wrong?
I would never have thought it possible for a plant to use electrolysis for the separation of water because the water it absorbs is dilute and does NOT conduct electricity. It has nothing to conduct electricity apart from the phloem, but that could kill the plant
·
Comment removed
Author withheld
·in reply to 2uwar (Show the comment)
Avadraken 4 days ago
If you note in the video at about 3:20, Daniel makes a point that all plants have electricity but there is no actual current because there is nothing there to conduct said electricity. Despite that, it's still present.
·in reply to 2uwar (Show the comment)
BSEmadcow . 4 days ago
Cant see the major fuel companies letting this hit the market.
·

beachcomber2008 4 days ago
The difference between this and plants is that plants construct themselves and move actively towards the light. They are also beautiful.
How sensible is it to strip the earth's surface of living beings to replace them with something inert, lifeless, and ugly?
The earth needs redesigning with life and living beings. Real leaves, real fish, real coral, real living photosynthesizing EXPERTS.
·
derbigpr500 4 days ago
Highs engineering costs my ass. What engineering? This is not engineering, this is on a technical level of a collage project. There's nothing complicated in this system that would be expensive to produce. We buy PC's for 500 dollars, which are literally light years ahead of this technology, and are uncomparably more difficult to engineer and produce, yet, we do it on a massive scale and sell them on every corner of the street. The only reason these energy deviced dont get produced is oil.
· 2
jungle milf 4 days ago
uhu the oilindustry is immens, what would happen if the oil industry stopped? plus the transition would take a long time cause how many billion people are using it. nikola tesla said almost a century ago then we dont need to fuck up our natural sources, cause the technology is already there. but as long as there is interest, money and stupid politicians around not much will change for a long time ;p
·in reply to derbigpr500 (Show the comment)
Hamguy 4 days ago
Fuck the cost, just make it a government mandatory part of all buildings and pay it with tax money. talks like cost is what keeps our world underdeveloped and in the dark of technology. That is a crime!
·
derbigpr500 4 days ago
Good luck with that while all the world governments are getting payed and pressed by oil industry.
·in reply to Hamguy (Show the comment)
ddrz09 4 days ago
MY GOD! THANK YOU FOR UTILIZING WATER. #AMEN
·
DrAg0n3250 4 days ago
Why is this posted on June 17 of the year 2013 and there is snow outside?!?
·
Daggeira 4 days ago
The video was probably shot and edited some time before its release.
·in reply to DrAg0n3250 (Show the comment)

derbigpr500 4 days ago
Highs engineering costs my ass. What engineering? This is not engineering, this is on a technical level of a collage project. There's nothing complicated in this system that would be expensive to produce. We buy PC's for 500 dollars, which are literally light years ahead of this technology, and are uncomparably more difficult to engineer and produce, yet, we do it on a massive scale and sell them on every corner of the street. The only reason these energy deviced dont get produced is oil.
· 2
Hamguy 4 days ago
Fuck the cost, just make it a government mandatory part of all buildings and pay it with tax money. talks like cost is what keeps our world underdeveloped and in the dark of technology. That is a crime!
·
derbigpr500 4 days ago
Good luck with that while all the world governments are getting payed and pressed by oil industry.
·in reply to Hamguy (Show the comment)
ddrz09 4 days ago
MY GOD! THANK YOU FOR UTILIZING WATER. #AMEN
·
DrAg0n3250 4 days ago
Why is this posted on June 17 of the year 2013 and there is snow outside?!?

...and I am Sid Harth
·

Welfare Statistics
Total number of Americans on welfare	4,300,000
Total number of Americans on food stamps	46,700,000
Total number of Americans on unemployment insurance	5,600,000
Percent of the US population on welfare	4.1 %
Total government spending on welfare annually (not including food stamps or unemployment)	$131.9 billion
Welfare Demographics
Percent of recipients who are white	38.8 %
Percent of recipients who are black	39.8 %
Percent of recipients who are Hispanic	15.7 %
Percent of recipients who are Asian	2.4 %
Percent of recipients who are Other	3.3 %
Welfare Statistics
Total amount of money you can make monthly and still receive Welfare	$1000
Total Number of U.S. States where Welfare pays more than an $8 per hour job	40
Number of U.S. States where Welfare pays more than a $12 per hour job	7
Number of U.S. States where Welfare pays more than the average salary of a U.S. Teacher	9
Average Time on AFCD (Aid to Families with Dependent Children)
Time on AFDC	Percent of Recipients
Less than 7 months	19%
7 to 12 months	15.2%
1 to 2 years	19.3%
2 to 5 years	26.9%
Over 5 years	19.6%
Top 10 Hourly Wage Equivalent Welfare States in U.S.
State	Hourly Wage Equivalent
Hawaii	$17.50
Alaska	$15.48
Massachusetts	$14.66
Connecticut	$14.23
Washington, D.C.	$13.99
New York	$13.13
New Jersey	$12.55
Rhode Island	$12.55
California	$11.59
Virginia	$11.11

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	Fireside Chat 1 On the Banking Crisis Menu 0:00 Roosevelt's first Fireside Chat on the Banking Crisis (March 12, 1933)
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