OUR STRUGGLING ECONOMY – AT 8:38 A.M. ET:   The AP, in a refreshingly direct story, points out that the American economy is still struggling, two and a half years into Obama's presidency.  Our national strength is based heavily on our historically strong economy.  Economic distress is sapping not only our physical strength, but our national will.  It is a dangerous, volatile situation:

WASHINGTON -- This is one anniversary few feel like celebrating.

Two years after economists say the Great Recession ended, the recovery has been the weakest and most lopsided of any since the 1930s.

After previous recessions, people in all income groups tended to benefit. This time, ordinary Americans are struggling with job insecurity, too much debt and pay raises that haven't kept up with prices at the grocery store and gas station. The economy's meager gains are going mostly to the wealthiest.

Workers' wages and benefits make up 57.5% of the economy, an all-time low. Until the mid-2000s, that figure had been remarkably stable -- about 64% through boom and bust alike.

Executive pay is included in this figure, but rank-and-file workers are far more dependent on regular wages and benefits. A big chunk of the economy's gains has gone to investors in the form of higher corporate profits.

"The spoils have really gone to capital, to the shareholders," says David Rosenberg, chief economist at Gluskin Sheff + Associates in Toronto.

Corporate profits are up by almost half since the recession ended in June 2009. In the first two years after the recessions of 1991 and 2001, profits rose 11% and 28%, respectively.

And an Associated Press analysis found that the typical CEO of a major company earned $9 million last year, up a fourth from 2009.

COMMENT:  I'm afraid that's correct.  We can call it "free enterprise," but a number of economic observers, many of them quite conservative, have another name for it:  crony capitalism.  Those who truly believe in free enterprise, and that includes me, must finally realize the enormous danger in the growing gap between rich and non-rich in America, and in the nest feathering that goes on in the executive suite.  Eventually, if the rising tide doesn't lift all boats, there can be great social instability, and the election of radical elements.  Think the 1960s, times ten. 

We see the riots that are taking place in European countries, especially Greece, as governments are forced into austerity because of economic recession.  That can happen here as well.  We must figure out a way for the average American to benefit from economic recovery, if in fact there's a recovery at all.  Obama has failed miserably in managing the economy.  Republicans don't seem to have any great ideas of their own.  "No new taxes" isn't much of a policy.

We are not in good economic shape.  And one senses a growing anger, that can easily boil over.  We're told that "the economy" will be the major issue in next year's election.  Add to that a national "rage."  Fail to recognize it, and 2011 might look like a picnic.

July 2, 2011