The
most important website this weekend and in weeks to come -- on which
the hopes and fears of countless Americans are focused (and the
President's poll-ratings depend) -- isn't HealthCare.gov. It's
Amazon.com. Even if HealthCare.gov works perfectly, only 5 percent of
Americans are in the private health-insurance market to begin with. But
almost half of the 140 million Americans now shopping for holiday deals
are doing so online, up 20 percent from last year.
The irony
is most of what's being sold this holiday season is coming from Asia,
which leaves retail jobs as the largest and fastest-growing segment of
the U.S. workforce. Yet as online shopping takes over, where will
Americans find jobs in the future? The biggest reason holiday
deal-shopping is especially frenzied is so many Americans are already
stretched to the breaking point (65 percent are now living
paycheck-to-paycheck, up from 61 percent last year) that they're more
desperate than ever for bargains. And the main reason the President's
poll-ratings are falling isn't because of HealthCare.gov. It's because
the economy remains lousy for most people. It will likely remain that
way: As technology and globalization take over the economy, the U.S. has
no national strategy for creating more good jobs in America.