The biggest recipients of welfare in this country are corporations. A person makes decisions that lead them to poverty, too bad for them. Bear Sterns makes bad decisions, government orchestrates to bail them out and if it goes to hell the tax payers make up the difference. The American people's productivity rate has only ever skyrocketed, whilst their wages stagnate. CEOs who fail get severance packages worth millions. We compensate, protect and use tax dollars to aid the rich and pwerful and we blame and stereotype the poor and working class. Screw all the economist definitions of a recession. The price of gas/ healthcare/ food has gone up dramatically and people with MBAs and 35 years experience are getting downsized. The only people who can fool themselves into thinking that America is doing just fine are the ones profiting from the subjugation of the working class and those who want to figure out how to use subjugation to become part of the upper class.