"Poverty Marks a New High In Ohio Over the Past Four Decades"

That's the line that struck me the strongest in Catherine Candisky's article in the Dispatch today. Can't say I'm entirely surprised though. While the GOP loves to shout about our "rising incomes" they always conveniently skip over the real inlation adjusted income. There's a reason - thier economic policies have been less than stellar in this real life guage of how folks are doing. Need local proof?

The median income in the Columbus school district in 2004, the last year for which an analysis was available, was $25,340, 7.8 percent less than in 1993, according to a report by the Cleveland-based Center for Community Solutions.

In fact, the average pay decreased for those living in almost a quarter of the 53 central Ohio school districts, including most of the largest ones: South-Western, Hilliard, Westerville, Pickerington, Worthington, Gahanna-Jefferson, Reynoldsburg and Newark.

How widespread are these falling real incomes? Well...

The report shows that income fell in all but 25 of Ohio's 612 school districts between 2000 and 2004. In Franklin County, it dropped everywhere but Bexley, New Albany and Canal Winchester.

And in case you didn't notice when you're driving around your town, or seeing folks struggle in general, Ohio's been hit with the brunt of the damage from these economic policies.

"Ohio has now broken the all-time record for most consecutive months in which our state's job growth has been slower than the national average. The current streak stands at 134 consecutive months, a period exceeding 11 years," he said.

The impact of all of this is that folks starting out on their own, or struggling to make it by each day, find that their essentials - food, transportation and shelter - take up a little more of their annual budget than it used to in America. That's a problem. 

The road to economic recovery is a curious one for folks in states like Ohio and elsewhere, and it deals with many different areas of our domestic and foreign policy. New energy policy will eventually lower shipping costs, and bring down the costs of stuff on the shelf (just look at how much a can of soup has gone up in price under President Bush's watch - a staple for some lower income families used to only cost 50 cents almost five years ago, today it's close to a dollar). Trade policies need to be put in place that favor middle America. It's not time for a return to protectionism, but we certainly do need to make an attempt to both decrease our dependence on Chinese lending, and rein their devalued currency in. The next Democratic president will also take a hard look at the types of bilateral agreements we've engaged in for the past decade, and I expect, for a major foundational change there. Finally, supporting health care and other programs will decrease the out of the pocket costs of the poor and middle income, and buying power will rise. NAFTA hurt Ohio bad, there's no denying that the problems in Ohio did not start with President Bush alone - but he's compounded them beyond belief and the road to recovery is around the corner.