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January 4, 2010

Report: The 00s Was a Lost Decade for American Workers
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The Washington Post reports the past decade was the worst for the US
economy in modern times. There has been zero net job creation since
December 1999. No previous decade going back to the 1940s had job growth
of less than 20 percent. Middle-income households made less in 2008,
when adjusted for inflation, than they did in 1999. And the net worth of
American households has also declined when adjusted for inflation. This
compares with sharp gains in every previous decade since data were
initially collected in the 1950s. Wall Street also registered its
first-ever negative decade on a total return basis. Sam Stovall, chief
investment strategist at Standard & Poor’s Equity Research, said the
benchmark S&P 500 is down about ten percent over the last ten years.

Sam Stovall: "It’s a dismal decade because, whether you go back to 1900,
this is the first decade in which the S&P 500 lost money when you
include dividends reinvested. Even in the 1930s, we were able to eke out
a ten percent total return, because we had dividend yields that ranged
anywhere from five to ten percent during that ten-year period.”



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