The excuses have run out

John Quiggin writes:

• Average US household size has been increasing since 2005 and is now back to the 1990 level
• Changes following the Boskin Commission report of 1996 have mostly accounted for product quality improvements and substitution effects
• The EITC was last changed in 2001, and the effects were modest. It seems likely to be cut as part of the current move to austerity
• Access to health insurance has generally declined. Obama’s reforms will change this if they survive to 2014, but that’s far from being a certainty

Work backwards to figure out the context.