Right, the fix would be some form of govt regulation to break the bifurcation or maybe more social net support.

it was the government that caused this in the first place. I always wonder why people suggest this, when the "cure" to the ailment is more of the disease.

How does the government cause downturns?

By doing stuff like "guaranteeing" student loans, encouraging policies of buying homes with high credit, getting the Fed to lower interest rests too much (making credit so cheap and easy companies don't even use their profits to buy/invest in stuff anymore; they even use credit to buy back their stock. Insanity), etc

All of that distorts the market and makes everyone spend money they don't actually have. Eventually all of this catches up with everyone, on a country-wide scale.

==makes everyone spend money they don't actually have.==

So much for all that personal responsibility we used to hear so much about. Far easier to blame the government for everything.

Companies use credit to buy back stock because we deregulated that activity. It used to be that the government didn’t allow it. This point is actually a counter-point to your theory.

By trying to fix the economy in one area and ignoring the effects of the fix in a bunch of other areas.

Oh right, the free market should fix this!

/s

who knows more - a large number of people who have no idea what they're doing or a small number of people who have no idea what they're doing?

Let's pick EPA for a second here. It's a bit rich to claim they have no idea what they are doing and should be abolished because the free market would fix the world around it.

For example, let's cherry-pick the Clean Air Act and its effects: "In addition, because air quality across the United States improved; it is estimated 205,000 premature deaths and millions of other respiratory complications were prevented which resulted in an economic savings of $50 trillion versus the $523 billion invested to meet the Clean Air Act standard."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_Air_Act_(United_States)#...

Randian economics is not a solution.

All this "growth" is largely driven by the debt and grand wisdom of the Fed's monetary policy. Those closest to the money printing press get undiluted gains and by the time that money circulates back down to the general population, they are robbed from their wealth by devaluing the currency. Furthermore, looking at the money supply, the banks aren't actually distributing and lending out that capital like they should. Long story short this is a direct causation of government policy.

Huh? The homeless rate has been going down across the country over the past few years. Maybe you're just in one of the few states where it has been increasing, like New York, California, or Massachusetts.

https://www.usich.gov/tools-for-action/map/

Totally depends on definition of "homeless". Some use a definition based on whether someone has a roof over their head most nights, the narrowest definition possible. I prefer a definition based on legal rights: Does the person have property rights (owners/renters/housing benefits etc) in a stable domicile. That means those couch surfing, in shelters and illegal residences are counted as homeless alongside the people literally sleeping in the open air.

Few would doubt the rise of the "working homeless" across the western world. The concept of someone having a fulltime job and still not able to afford rent is new. It is today's sharecropping imho.

And then there is the other modern phenomena: the legally mandated homeless. Every large city in the US now seems to have a bridge or overpass filled with people who are not legally allowed to live anywhere else. Stringent limitations on where certain convicts may live is also new.

>The concept of someone having a fulltime job and still not able to afford rent is new

Does that happen anywhere outside of San Francisco?

I'm nowhere near SF and the cheapest rent in town is 1400/month. That's a one-room basement, quasi-legal, basement suite under a house beside the airport. So ... ya.

By that same logic, you might also argue it's not possible to stifle success. The very formation of the central bank was (besides self enrichment) made to stabilize the economy. So in that sense you're quite wrong.