"For the recovery to be sustainable and as strong as possible, it has to be based on a different composition of spending in the world. Before the crisis, the U.S. consumer - the over-extended U.S. consumer - was the kind of source for demand for a large chunk of the rest of the world. Chinese exported to us.

"Now, the U.S. consumer is not going to play that role in the future. There's been a huge loss of wealth in the country. People are not going to spend as they used to spend. So in order for the global economy to grow - even moderately - we have to find different sources of spending.

"And that's what this 'rebalancing' means. It means rebalancing away from reliance upon the U.S. consumer toward, for example, greater reliance on China so Chinese spend more at home..."

Zanny Minton Beddoes, U.S. economics editor at The Economist magazine. Quoted from the NPR syndicated program “On Point” at WBEZ-Boston on the eve of the G20 Economic Summit in Pittsburgh. September 23, 2009.

Harley-Davidson just put a gun to the head of its Union employees to force a seven year contract that "freezes employees' pay, slashes hundreds of production jobs and assigns large volumes of work to part-time workers." As reported in the business media, this was great news as investors "hit the throttle" on Harley Davidson shares following the announcement. BusinessWeek, WSJ and the rest, however, have yet to offer any word from those who sit around the kitchen tables in Milwaukee at those households where people used to rely upon Harley Davidson to earn a living wage.

The same style of "first-degree assault" was leveled against the Union workers at Mercury Marine in Fond du Lac just last year.

It was also announced this week that Harley Davidson would receive $25 million in tax cuts from the State of Wisconsin. This is considered a bargain in taxpayer contributions targeted at "retaining jobs," never mind the fact that the wages and benefits are gone. After all, Mercury Marine secured over $70 million in tax credits last year following their successful attempt at extortion, and their jobs - like those now offered at Harley Davidson - also offer little more than something to do with your time in place of what was formerly family-supporting employment.

 Jim Haney, President of Wisconsin Manufacturer's and Commerce, says: 

“It’s more a long term symptom of the fact that we are in a global marketplace. Competition isn’t among the states as much as it is among countries these days. And whether we like it or not, you can always find people who will work hard for less money than in the United States.” 

"Whether we like it or not?"

Gee, Mr. Haney and Ms. Beddoes. Not to be a bother here, but are you saying this "global marketplace" is a good thing? At some point, doesn't this consumer economy have to work for all of us to be sustainable? Ultimately, how many Harley motorcycles will Malaysian prison laborers purchase to ease the trip back and forth to the prison commissary? How many Jordanian refugees will be lining up to purchase Mercury Outboards to power their bass boats on their weekend fishing trips?

Economics is an extremely complicated science. I can't pretend to understand how it all works. But I'm beginning to understand that--as practiced--this version of a consumer economy is founded upon quicksand. Indeed, for the workers among us who simply try to earn a living, like those at Harley Davidson and Mercury Marine, there seems to be only one simple rule to abide:

"Don't go for help, no one will heed you!"

The American economy is dead in the water with no wind at its back. Meanwhile, the solution offered by the Captains of Industry is for us workers to all get out and push, with nothing more than a promise that they'll meet us on the other side.

- Cross-posted at SleepinJeezus