The Hightower Report

Economic Indicators for Real People

How's our economy doing?

Most economists, media outlets, and politicos judge economic performance by such statistical indicators as the Dow Jones industrial average. Aren't there better indicators than stock prices?

Forbes.com has found several that it says could be more accurate – such as the size of restaurant garbage piles. The bigger the pile, the better, for more garbage indicates more customers, say Forbes analysts, who report that things are picking up from last year's severe downturn, with garbage now amassing to the telltale point that "this summer it was stinky ... again."

I think Forbes is onto something by using sociological observations to determine economic well-being, but its love-the-rich bias causes it to overlook even more telling indicators of how things are going for the unrich. For example, its stinky index would've been enhanced by a count of the number of people rummaging through those garbage bins to find something to eat.

Forbes also puts a lot of stock in the autumn sale of wines at Christie's, the tony auction house. Wine bidders, reports a Christie's official, are often speculators looking to buy low and sell high. At this year's autumn wine auction, sales nearly doubled last year's low volume – a clear sign of an improving economy, Forbes tells us. Well, maybe for the swells who are into wine speculation, but what about ordinary folks who buy wine to, you know ... drink? A good measure of their status might be in whether the buyers of Two Buck Chuck have moved up to some of the $5 wines.

The Forbes indicators are fun, but like the Dow Jones industrial average, they miss the economic realities experienced by the workaday American majority. That's why I think we need a Doug Jones average. Yeah, an index to tell us how Doug and Darlene are doing. Now that'd be economic information worth knowing.

Swine Flu? Shame on You.

Sometimes, being mean to people can turn around and bite you on the butt – even if you're a corporation and, physiologically speaking, you have no butt.

One of the meanest and stingiest workplace policies is the denial of paid sick days for employees – a reality faced by almost 40% of private sector workers. These people are mostly working lower-wage jobs and cannot afford to miss even a single day's pay. So the result of the corporate minginess is that tens of millions of coughing, wheezing, sneezing, vomiting employees are on the job rather than calling in sick and staying home. These include food handlers, health care workers, and others who deal directly with the public.

While this corporate approach saves money for employers, ill workers pay a heavy price – and their contagious illnesses can easily spread to co-workers and customers. This has always been a public health problem, but with a swine flu pandemic sweeping our country, it has become a national health threat.

In addition to workers who get no paid sick days, millions more are employed by such outfits as Wal-Mart, which aggressively discourages any use of the benefit. This retailing behemoth runs a points system – use one sick day, and you get one demerit; accumulate five or more, and you can be fired.

This strategy is now biting corporate butts. Because of swine flu, executives are demanding that ill employees stay home, yet workers get no pay or get demerits if they do stay home, so they don't. Instead, they're at work, greeting customers with, "Cough, cough ... may I ... cough-cough, help you?"

Meanwhile, these same companies are fighting a legislative requirement to provide a mere seven paid sick days a year. The new company slogan could be: "Wal-Mart – Spreading Swine Flu, One Customer at a Time."