RUSH: We’ll move on to the economic news because, man, that is just unparalleled. It’s incredible, 29,000 at the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Are you ready for this statistic? One-third of the gain from 28,000 to 29,000, Dow Jones Industrial Average, is due to people buying Apple stock, and of course Apple products. One company. One-third of the gain, 333 points of that 1,000 is Apple. Apple, the company, now worth $1.4 trillion.
Other companies that have driven up the market are McDonald’s, Microsoft, American Express, Johnson & Johnson, American classic companies. The unemployment news is great, and particularly the wage gains are all happening in the bottom two quintiles. Okay, yeah, quintile, like we have five different categories of income. And the bottom two, the lowest, you know, five categories, so quintuplets, quintiles, the bottom two quintiles where people are earning the least is where wage growth is the fastest, which is exactly what you want.
There is no way, there is no way to oppose it, there is no way to cast aspersions on it, but leave it to the Democrats to try to find ways, and they are.
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RUSH: To the economic news, and it’s mind-boggling. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is at 29,000. It is up 11 — what was it, 11,000 since Trump took office? It’s just unprecedented. Now, some in the media are saying, “Well, this is not any big deal because the average American is not in the stock market. It’s for the rich.” Some infobabe on CNN actually said, “Well, this isn’t any big deal because half the American people are not in the stock market.”
That is a crock. If anybody has any kind of a retirement plan at work, you are in the market. If you have a 401(k), if you have a SEP-IRA, if you have a SEP Keogh you are in the market. There’s any number of ways average Americans are in the market, may not even know it. But still, what’s the point? Got great economic news and you want to pee on it. You want to pee on, you’re trying to tell people, “Well, it’s not gonna affect you. Doesn’t mean anything for you.”
In the meantime, 145,000 new jobs were added in an economy already featuring full employment. There were 256,000 jobs added in November, 145,000 jobs last month. Unemployment holding steady three and a half percent. It’s the lowest in decades, like five decades. Wages are up 2.9% year over year, but the important thing, again, about the wage increases is where they are happening. They are happening at the lower end of the pay or wage scale. It’s exactly where you would want to see wages going up.
In fact, if you want to talk about negatives or problems related to these economic numbers, here’s one for you. There aren’t enough skilled workers to fill the jobs that are open now that feature nonwhite-collar or college degree-requirement work. There are all kinds of jobs available out there, and the number of skilled people to fill them is not sufficient.
So the market’s up. It’s, again, over 29,000. That’s an 11,000-point gain since Trump took office. (sniveling) “Well, Rush, that doesn’t mean anything! That w-w-w-wouldn’t matter! It could have gone up with any president.” Well, no, because it didn’t go up 11,000 with any other president. This is not an accident. It’s not a confluence of events that are coincidental. This is the result of specific policy, and we conservatives have been beating our chests over this for as long as we’ve been alive.
Conservative economic policy works. Here’s the proof. It’s in the pudding: 11,000 points in three years added to the DJI. That’s a record. That might never be touched. In addition to that, there is no… There’s always inflation, but there isn’t any killer inflation. There’s not even any really detectable inflation — and there is no recession. There is no recession despite the best efforts of the Drive-By Media to talk everybody into thinking that there is.
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RUSH: Lafayette, Indiana, next. This is Dennis. You’re up on Open Line Friday. Hi.
CALLER: Hey, Rush. Long-time fan and first-time caller, but I have a couple comments here for you. You talked about the 11,000-point gain in the stock market. (silence) You there?
RUSH: Yep, 11,000 in three years.
CALLER: Yeah. The stock market runs on emotions, and so that demonstrates confidence in the economy. If you look at it, that means we went from 28,000 more or less to 29,000 in three years. That’s a 60% gain in the stock market, and I don’t care… With the confidence that that shows investors have, I don’t care if you’re working at a minimum wage job, you’re benefiting from the rise in the stock market because that puts people to work.
RUSH: And it is putting people to work. We’re at full employment, still creating jobs. Wage increases in the bottom two quintiles. And, you know, we’ve had a thousand-point gain in just the last… Hell, it is a few months, 1,000 points, from 28,000 to 29,000. One-third of that has come from people buying Apple stock. Apple stock has been anywhere from $250 now to $300 a share. But people are living this — and in the midst of all this, Dennis, you’ve had the Democrats and the media periodically trying to tell people we’re in a recession.
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: Uh, it doesn’t wash.
CALLER: Right. No. But people besides those that are invested in the stock market with 401(k)s and stocks and bonds and everything else, they’re benefiting from it because it’s creating jobs. That’s where I was going with it.
RUSH: Well, it’s undeniable. It’s in the job data. We’ve got more jobs open than there are people to fill them. The problem that we have, if you want to… I don’t mean this in a negative sense. It’s a challenge kind of problem. The problem we’ve got is that we have a deficiency in qualified people in areas that are not white-collar or college degree-required jobs.
And it is in those areas that wages are increasing the most. Everybody’s wages are going up. I think there’s one quintile where wages are dropping. It’s the very top, which — and it’s infinitesimal. The wage growth is in the bottom, which is exactly what you want. No, you’re absolutely right. I’m glad you called.
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RUSH: By the way, folks, the minimum wage has nothing to do with wages in the bottom two quintiles going up. The wage increases that are being recorded here by employment figures, labor department figures so outpace whatever increase there has been in the minimum wage, it’s not even close. The minimum wage isn’t a factor. The government’s not determining which group’s wages are going up! It just happens to be what’s happening.
There’s free market economics going on. The reason wages are rising is because it’s hard to find good people. There are more jobs open than there are people to fill them. Wages are going up ’cause productivity is up. That’s the main way wage increases happen is more productivity. The productivity is up because of the necessity of fulfilling the economic activity and the demands that are being placed on the American economy.
It’s supply and demand. The demand is way up. It takes productivity to fulfill it. Wage increases go up. It has nothing to do with the minimum wage. Who in the world thinks that? (interruption) Who thinks the minimum wage has been…? That’s a bunch of crap leftism. (interruption) Well, screw them! The Washington Post and the LA Times are trying to claim that the minimum wage is why wage increases in the lower two quintiles are up?
That’s a crock. The minimum wage cannot keep up with the rate of wage increase that’s recorded out there. What an asinine thing to say. You know, it’s just typical. It’s just typical. They spend all this time saying, “The economy’s going south, our best days are behind us, Obama’s era of decline is the way it should have been.” Now wages are skyrocketed and now they want to come in and try to claim credit, and claim it’s their precious minimum wage that’s responsible for it?
What an absolute insane premise.