“Jobs disappear and the markets cheer.” On Labor Day 30 years ago, I issued a warning the growing divide between workers and the super-rich. Watch. youtu.be/8rW1kkAV-gw
Replies
The Stock Market is nothing other than a measure of how badly owners are screwing labor.
aug 31, 2025, 8:38 pm • 38 1 • view
The Stock Market is also a measure of the make believe value of $25 trillion when there’s only $2 trillion in actual currency in circulation. Looks good on paper!
aug 31, 2025, 11:27 pm • 1 0 • view
Then there's the derivatives market where ppl speak in terms of quadrillion with a q
sep 1, 2025, 3:53 pm • 0 0 • view
Close but more accurately US labor by off-shoring jobs to low cost geographies. To add insult to injury not only did the off-shore jobs but also the dollars you spent on goods to fund the off-shored labor.
sep 1, 2025, 6:00 pm • 0 0 • view
That is the best explanation I’ve heard.
aug 31, 2025, 9:02 pm • 10 0 • view
My other observation is billionaires do nothing other than sit in a chair and think of ways to screw working people. It's not just that billionaires have no value they are a malignancy. They do not create jobs. If they didn't exist big box would be replaced by corner store.
sep 1, 2025, 1:57 am • 11 1 • view
They actually have companies doing that They are either think thank or consulting companies They actually design way of screwing people: - homeless -> hostile architecture - unions -> union busting - too much energy -> Bitcoin, AI, datacenter - housing -> HOA, zoning laws - education -> fucking it
sep 1, 2025, 9:52 am • 6 0 • view
You were right on target. I hope we finally listen, and get back on track towards an equitable society.
sep 1, 2025, 5:22 pm • 0 0 • view
Being ahead of your time turns out not to be a good thing. ☹️
aug 31, 2025, 8:50 pm • 1 0 • view
Prophetic from the sage, the economist oracle. Corporate didn't listen then, certainly not now. The US is smack in the midst of 3rd world countries. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum... This is our children and grandchildren's futures. A nationwide strike is necessary to bring this country to a halt.
sep 1, 2025, 1:39 pm • 0 0 • view
😢
sep 1, 2025, 12:22 am • 1 0 • view
The powers that be made it so. This government stopped listening to its constituents years ago. It's been intentional for 50 years. And there's not one rich person that ever stood up for us, fucking greedy bastards
aug 31, 2025, 10:57 pm • 7 0 • view
People see the suffering on the social media, they mostly choose their own perceived power over humanity. Folks will help once when they see suffering, but they rarely do follow-ups on those in harm’s way and ask, “how are you doing now?”.
sep 1, 2025, 12:13 am • 2 0 • view
Most people lie and say, “great” to avoid social stigmas. It’s who we truly are: we are no longer largely helpers, we are takers and it is acceptable.
sep 1, 2025, 12:15 am • 0 0 • view
Breaks my heart because I'm the exact opposite of that
sep 1, 2025, 12:57 am • 1 0 • view
Same. I brought myself a lot of harm by not understanding that the rules of what being a person now really means. It first showed up in my sister when she was given power over the family estate. I still didn’t see it as a human trend until many bitch-slaps later.
sep 1, 2025, 3:00 am • 0 0 • view
Now many of us all see the transition to the ugliness we currently have in society. Very few self-reflect on if they added to it when everyone of us should be pondering it.
sep 1, 2025, 3:03 am • 0 0 • view
I was a part of the 80’s hubris as it started to grow with my designer clothes and purses. That was as it happened in a big city, now hubris is a conscious choice, not just a passing phase.
sep 1, 2025, 3:05 am • 0 0 • view
📊🤔🇺🇸 This chart should make every American worker stop and think... bsky.app/profile/that...
sep 1, 2025, 5:52 pm • 1 1 • view
We talked about this exactly - and you specifically- in sociology of inequality class I took at Ohio state in 1996 and you were not wrong then or now!!!
aug 31, 2025, 10:27 pm • 3 0 • view
All Labor Is Honorable! A reminder on this Labor Day in the richest country in the history of the world. No one who gets up everyday to do their job(s) faithfully should struggle to get their basic needs of food, shelter, medical, and education fulfilled.
sep 1, 2025, 1:18 pm • 0 0 • view
Find your event for today Sept 1st. Visit 50501 website to find your event, there are many protest happening all over the country this Sept. 1st. events.pol-rev.com/search?searc...
sep 1, 2025, 2:46 pm • 0 0 • view
aug 31, 2025, 9:54 pm • 0 0 • view
Yep~ I remember those days🤬😡🤬!
aug 31, 2025, 8:48 pm • 0 0 • view
You need to look into federal contracts being awarded
sep 1, 2025, 1:13 am • 0 0 • view
This is going to sound harsher than intended but... so you saw it 30 years ago...what have you done, what DID you do, to try to turn things around...other than write a book or go on tv?
sep 1, 2025, 12:02 am • 0 0 • view
Yes he did
sep 1, 2025, 7:11 pm • 1 1 • view
It's like you're smart...or an expert or something.🤔
aug 31, 2025, 9:43 pm • 0 0 • view
I was 17 and life seemed to be slaving to keep my car running so politics wasn't my number one topic at the time! 😂
aug 31, 2025, 9:50 pm • 2 0 • view
I'm 20 years old and homeless. I have a degree and can't find a job that pays a livable wage in southern California. This shit sucks...
aug 31, 2025, 9:48 pm • 1 0 • view
AI and robotics are going to make it even worse.
aug 31, 2025, 8:41 pm • 4 0 • view
There are 2 ways automation ends: universal income or mass genocide. If you have the feeling the billionaire likes universal income more, let me know 😂
sep 1, 2025, 10:00 am • 1 0 • view
I remember this and it has stuck with me ever since.
aug 31, 2025, 11:21 pm • 2 0 • view
🙏
aug 31, 2025, 8:48 pm • 1 0 • view
Yes you did. No one was interested Now, everyone gets it
aug 31, 2025, 11:31 pm • 1 0 • view
They really don’t care what comes after.
aug 31, 2025, 9:08 pm • 0 0 • view
Although not formally or otherwise educated in this field, I have thought similarly, however I wondered if we would have a French Revolution type of turnover. The US is showing the modern slow burn version of that. In words from back then, the peasants just want to overthrow the rich, ruling class.
aug 31, 2025, 9:07 pm • 0 0 • view
Except I was hoping the outcome was more the French model. Not Trumpty Dumpty
aug 31, 2025, 11:12 pm • 2 0 • view
It's so clear how undone all the protections are and how necessary it is to rebuild. How do you build solidarity or even reach workers with those ideas today? I worry that unions would be so difficult to adapt to the modern grey market economy of 1099 contractors, gig work, and part time everything.
aug 31, 2025, 8:57 pm • 0 0 • view
Just as Al Gore was ignored about climate change, Professor, what were people thinking to ignore you? Oh, yes, they were thinking about the almighty dollar!
sep 1, 2025, 12:52 am • 0 0 • view
aug 31, 2025, 8:45 pm • 6 2 • view
My daddy sang this song to me when I was a child. He was an accountant so he knew too-White collar but a blue collar heart. ❤️ youtu.be/J2aqvKY6zLc?...
sep 1, 2025, 3:15 pm • 1 0 • view
Modern Times slavery. In the 3rd Millenium AC. Civilisation. Good idea! Should be put into practise.
aug 31, 2025, 9:30 pm • 2 0 • view
It’s shameful what greed has done
aug 31, 2025, 9:24 pm • 18 3 • view
💯
aug 31, 2025, 9:27 pm • 2 0 • view
Yes!! YES!!! YES!!!!! www.youtube.com/watch?
aug 31, 2025, 10:30 pm • 1 0 • view
bsky.app/profile/abdo... is why 22,000 children and 17,000 women were killed, and 158,000 had their legs or hands cut off.
aug 31, 2025, 10:51 pm • 1 0 • view
And it has gotten worse
aug 31, 2025, 8:48 pm • 0 0 • view
dems' fear mongering result: we the american ppl elected pres trump in a landslide, n gop took house n senate. to date, dems offer us nothing but fear mongering. we r better off now under pres trump: no skyhigh gas prices; rising wages; consumer confidence. www.yahoo.com/news/article...
sep 1, 2025, 8:26 pm • 0 0 • view
Also this. 👇👇👇
aug 31, 2025, 8:52 pm • 7 0 • view
It's why you should be wary of people taking your guns. They have been militarizing the police all around the world. They know what's coming. Soon they will vilify people protesting, which they are already are actually, and everything will get much worse.
sep 1, 2025, 9:58 am • 1 0 • view
I have no guns. I don't need guns. America on the other hand has a hangover from the wild West and feels the need to hoard them, sometimes in large numbers. Gonna stamp out tyranny... not.
sep 1, 2025, 10:02 am • 0 0 • view
The class war wins by making you think it's a race war, or drugs war, or religion war. Power speaks to power, and money talks. Always follow the money. Religion, food, race, drugs, land ownership, women's rights, freedom of speech: all tools to distract the poor from taking back what's been stolen.
sep 1, 2025, 1:58 am • 1 0 • view
Yep they're on the side of the rich , last few days is more proof
sep 1, 2025, 12:25 am • 0 0 • view
Spot on. Now only if the people would listen. Everyone is afraid of the truth to some degree. Change can be terrifying. Reform is mandatory. Respect is earned. Truth will win.
aug 31, 2025, 10:46 pm • 1 0 • view
Too bad you didn’t also issue the right policy approach to deal with it. You think BRICS in the 2000’s and Vietnam now has internal wealth to fund the CAPEX and OPEX needed for off-shored jobs? Of course not…. Instead you and others let American companies off-shore trillions in cash.
sep 1, 2025, 5:57 pm • 0 0 • view
It peaked under Obama when you were on the Obama Economic Advisory board. So in a very real sense you are directly responsible for the problem you rightly complain about.
sep 1, 2025, 5:57 pm • 0 0 • view
So the Democrats responded as they would want you to believe they are, right? By immediately trying to correct the problem? Right? Right?!
aug 31, 2025, 9:43 pm • 0 0 • view
I consider Robert Reich to be a contemporary prophet, his insights and understandings have always been on the mark. Thank you Robert.
aug 31, 2025, 9:01 pm • 1 0 • view
30 years.
aug 31, 2025, 9:59 pm • 0 0 • view
Hated seeing that as a young investor in the late 90s as large Fortune 500 companies laid off 10-30k jobs and the stock would go up! It seems like an omen of things to come in the wealth discrepancy between Main Street and Wall Street.
sep 1, 2025, 8:03 am • 1 0 • view
GOP have been dismantling the country and rights for decades, in our faces. GOP DE-Regulated Media Ownership..(ending truth in News in exchange for Corp greed and profits), They chip away at Voting Rights, allowing legislators to be paid, in donations to do Oil's dirty work, deregulate H2O safety.
aug 31, 2025, 9:14 pm • 24 4 • view
And, Ross Perot was right in the 92 debates, that giant sucking sound ‘was’ American jobs going over seas.
sep 1, 2025, 12:13 am • 1 0 • view
Sorry you seem to be to old, but I fully go with you!😜
aug 31, 2025, 10:09 pm • 3 0 • view
Holy sh*t, 1995 was THIRTY years ago.
aug 31, 2025, 9:28 pm • 7 0 • view
I know. It feels like last week.
aug 31, 2025, 9:45 pm • 0 0 • view
Tell me… I graduated in ‘91 doesn’t seem possible
sep 1, 2025, 12:05 am • 2 0 • view
This is not rocket science ... the American worker has been under "attack" from long before 1995.
sep 1, 2025, 1:31 am • 4 0 • view
This has happened throughout human history and it usually heralds a collapse in society or empire. This time around, it's unprecedented, in that it's global.
aug 31, 2025, 9:29 pm • 13 3 • view
this is from 1995, and you were labour secretary from 1993 to 1997 wasn't your job to *fix* the problem, rather than to talk about it? idk, perhaps you did a some good things, I'm not going to research every detail... but in the long term, weren't you one more contributor to the overall failure?
sep 1, 2025, 12:42 am • 1 0 • view
Layoffs enhance one firm's bottom line at the expense of the GDP's bottom line. The worker/consumer public should be seen as a commons, and mass layoffs should be seen as a sort of tragedy of the commons, akin to someone pissing in the well.
sep 1, 2025, 3:27 pm • 0 0 • view
Get his book. Celebrate labor day
aug 31, 2025, 10:25 pm • 0 0 • view
🥵
sep 1, 2025, 5:42 pm • 0 0 • view
blackoutthesystem.com
aug 31, 2025, 11:47 pm • 1 0 • view
I name-dropped you yesterday in response to some youngling telling me I was repeating right-wing propaganda about how the D Party turned backs on workers in the 90s, rather than listen. There's a sub-cult on the left, denying this fact. All too late now. Not just for American democracy, for Earth.
aug 31, 2025, 9:01 pm • 2 0 • view
Someone explain to me how a good man like Robert Reich and someone like Jd Vance (not his his real name) could both graduate from Yale Law school?
sep 1, 2025, 12:23 am • 0 0 • view
all that on the left is batteries for recycling.... yep getting wet snowed on etc....
aug 31, 2025, 10:25 pm • 0 0 • view
Puts the fork lifts right where the battery can be damaged even more.... genius move.
aug 31, 2025, 10:22 pm • 0 0 • view
Unfortunately, being right doesn’t automatically make people understand.
aug 31, 2025, 8:56 pm • 4 0 • view
“””TRUTH IS 185%%TRUTH”””
aug 31, 2025, 10:59 pm • 0 0 • view
Dear Dr. Reich - I was preaching a similar gospel about media consolidation in 1995 - but everyone was getting too rich to care. How do we stop other democracies from falling down the same rabbit-hole?
aug 31, 2025, 9:10 pm • 18 0 • view
Too late for Canada. Our media is owned by US oligarchs thanks to the Conservatives.
aug 31, 2025, 10:07 pm • 6 1 • view
Sounds to me like it's time to Pump Up the Volume. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pump_Up...
sep 1, 2025, 2:00 am • 0 0 • view
aug 31, 2025, 10:21 pm • 2 0 • view
Yes, he did.
sep 1, 2025, 2:41 pm • 0 0 • view
Cassandra Reich lives! I can’t imagine how frustrating it must be for you. I’d be bashing my head against a block wall every single day at this point…I’m sure it feels like that to you. Good GRIEF.
aug 31, 2025, 11:44 pm • 0 0 • view
You’ve been consistently providing the same message. I’m hoping people will finally listen now
sep 1, 2025, 4:56 pm • 1 0 • view
Again…history…lessons. (Are we there yet…)
sep 1, 2025, 4:31 am • 0 0 • view
So sad that every word is just as applicable today as 30 years ago. We did absolutely nothing to address any of the problems he mentioned, and instead they pushed the pedal to the floor on all of it until society began to unravel.
sep 1, 2025, 7:56 am • 0 0 • view
When Robert Reich served as US Secretary of Labour under Clinton in the 1990s, I was working in Tokyo then Singapore. He regularly appeared on TV news in JP and SG, not for interviews but because something he said in America *mattered*. Not only for American workers but most workers anywhere.
sep 1, 2025, 12:19 am • 3 0 • view
*Labor
sep 1, 2025, 12:19 am • 1 0 • view
Boy we sure did listen good.
aug 31, 2025, 9:05 pm • 1 0 • view
They see any spending that is one of their many houses or many yachts as a waste of money. They want the entirety of the production system to serve their needs, and only their needs. At some point, everybody will get vilified and Palestinianed. They already doing it, every time there is a protest
sep 1, 2025, 9:49 am • 0 0 • view
I predicted that when Reagan was elected.
sep 1, 2025, 12:04 am • 3 0 • view
Listen to Mr. Reich, I believe that when he was secretary of labour along with Mr. Clinton and others in his administration actually balanced a budget without a recession
aug 31, 2025, 9:45 pm • 0 0 • view
Was it 30 years ago, or was it 1995? Can't be both, because 1995 was only about 10 years ago. Geeze
aug 31, 2025, 9:46 pm • 4 0 • view
Aw, you were just a baby then.
aug 31, 2025, 9:13 pm • 0 0 • view
I've lived my entire adult life under Republican trickle-down, anti labor, government is bad, politics. I thought Republican voters would wake up after Reagan/Bush, but it only got worse. Newt, FOX, Rush, the Tea Party, Norquist, Facebook, SCOTUS, and Trump X2. I'm so tired of it.
sep 1, 2025, 4:15 pm • 2 0 • view
You and Bernie have been calling it for over 30 years.
aug 31, 2025, 9:34 pm • 7 0 • view
What's good for Wall Street is unrelated to what's good for Main Street.
sep 1, 2025, 12:08 am • 1 0 • view
Yes, he did. RR seldom makes a mistake.
aug 31, 2025, 8:59 pm • 1 0 • view
And look at how much Bill and Hillary are “worth.” The government is designed by and for this.
sep 1, 2025, 1:41 pm • 0 0 • view
Those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it 😢. We see it in 🏴🇬🇧🇪🇺 daily.
sep 1, 2025, 9:27 am • 0 0 • view
Too bad nobody has thought to fix that gross disparity.
sep 1, 2025, 1:51 am • 0 0 • view
Robert Reich 1995: “Jobs disappear and the markets cheer.” With the now over inflated AI bubble, as jobs are consumed the markets will roar.
sep 1, 2025, 12:04 am • 6 1 • view
If only it was so that everybody can have easier lives. The truth is that a lot of businesses will disappear because of AI. Some people on the right are thinking they will get richer, but AI is probably just going to make consolidation worse.
sep 1, 2025, 9:56 am • 0 0 • view
He's been saying this for literally decades.
aug 31, 2025, 10:53 pm • 4 0 • view
Yes, he has. It doesn’t change because of social shame. We shame people for failing by ignoring them or talking about the situation behind their backs as if it is ok to do that.
sep 1, 2025, 12:17 am • 0 0 • view
Robert Reich has been right about everything all his life.
aug 31, 2025, 10:38 pm • 1 0 • view
Don’t say you don’t warn us!!
sep 1, 2025, 4:34 am • 0 0 • view
Putin destabilizing the U.S. has a long history. washingtonspectator.org/project-russ...
sep 1, 2025, 3:01 am • 2 0 • view
Happens over and over! The rich elites have stepped all over the average Joe!
sep 1, 2025, 1:08 pm • 3 1 • view
1995 wasn’t caveman times… Not a whole lot is really different… Sure the tech has changed but my goodness… It was still just like that… jobs disappear and the markets cheer back in 1995 too
aug 31, 2025, 9:07 pm • 0 0 • view
Why do they cheer?
aug 31, 2025, 10:05 pm • 1 0 • view
I graduated in 1995 so that's resonating more and more strongly with me lately. I've done relatively well for someone from a middle class family, and I went to school for Computer Science and do IT Systems work now. The industry is making me sick though, and I'm surprisingly looking for other paths.
aug 31, 2025, 8:38 pm • 19 0 • view
Very similar experience as mine. I read 1984 for the first time in 2017, and realized that how Orwell described the "Highs, the Middles, and the Lows" perfectly encapsulates the tech industry: we are given just enough to believe we are aligned with the Highs, but not enough to join them
aug 31, 2025, 9:15 pm • 3 0 • view
I've also just turned 48, and I'm looking at the next 15 years of my career going into the...well, we will see if 62 is still the retirement age by the time I get there in 2040...and looking at the 2nd half of my career I can't help but think more about what I want these next 15 years to be.
aug 31, 2025, 8:42 pm • 13 0 • view
I completely understand this. Similar to you, last year I turned 48. I’m a nurse, and I did very well, trying to facilitate change in healthcare.
sep 1, 2025, 1:12 pm • 2 0 • view
I made it to executive nursing leadership positions, but it was clear that my values didn’t align with the goals of private healthcare corporations. So I left all of it behind.
sep 1, 2025, 1:12 pm • 3 0 • view
I want the rest of my career to be rewarding without sucking out my soul. So now I’m a school nurse. I love it. I’m learning from the Gen Z nurses about work/life balance. I’m telling you, GAME CHANGER.
sep 1, 2025, 1:14 pm • 1 0 • view
Find a way to do the parts of your trade that you LOVE, and do it in a completely different capacity. Every profession whether it’s nursing or computer science, has TONS of different applications and work settings. And just because you’re good at something, doesn’t mean you should do it forever.
sep 1, 2025, 1:20 pm • 1 0 • view
📌
aug 31, 2025, 10:16 pm • 0 0 • view
I remember my sociology professor in 1994 saying “if you’re not wealthy, you had better swim like hell,” since that divide was growing.
sep 1, 2025, 5:10 am • 0 0 • view
A tidbit here... Living in a metro area - in less than a 2 mile radius, over 22 businesses have closed including - Party City Joanns, Pier 1, Steinmart, Justice for Girls, JC Penney, Mens Warehouse, CVS, Cato, 99cent, Walgreens, and more
aug 31, 2025, 9:20 pm • 2 0 • view
👆Plus small businesses like -nail salons,restaurants5+, gyms, veterinarians, furniture stores, hair salons and more ...all truly limiting our options
aug 31, 2025, 9:22 pm • 0 0 • view
I remember about the same time being in JPM London's dealing room when NFP came in with a big downside miss the bank was positioned for. They were literally people dancing on their desks. Stuck me as being totally fucked up.
aug 31, 2025, 8:43 pm • 3 0 • view
Wasn’t a prediction, he could see what was happening in this country. And he was right
sep 1, 2025, 12:39 am • 0 0 • view
OMG. It seems like yesterday.
sep 1, 2025, 4:10 pm • 0 0 • view
Why don’t rich people understand that if they pay their fair share we can fix all the problems they complain about the country. But they only care about keeping their inheritance.
aug 31, 2025, 8:43 pm • 11 1 • view
greed is a progressive mental illness.
aug 31, 2025, 9:05 pm • 11 1 • view
"Greed is responsible for ALL the suffering in the world." Gautama Buddha.
aug 31, 2025, 9:27 pm • 6 0 • view
They don’t care. Just like trump.
aug 31, 2025, 11:40 pm • 0 0 • view