more than a decade. the economy has added jobs. that's the most important thing, for 17 straight months. more than two million jobs in the last year alone. so there are real signs the economy is improving, but gas prices have been soaring. the cost of living rising. the most in more than ten months. some americans may be feeling left out of this economy. diane swonk, diane, as gas prices have increased, the president's approval rating has decreased. i'm not one to make direct correlations, but there's been really nothing else that might have caused this. there's a clear breakdown based on where americans fall in the economy. your thoughts -- let me show you a poll first. a cbs/new york times poll shows among those making more than $100,000 a year, the president's approval rating has replamained relatively flat. meanwhile the approval rating for those making 30 to 50,000 a year dropped by 16 points. diane, is this a clear illustration that we've got two americas on two very different recovery tracks? >> i think we've got at least two americas on two different recovery tracks. i do think there is a different -- a very big difference between those at the very high income strata and what they feel they're very insensitive to gasoline prices. where those at the lower end of the income strata are not only having to deal with gas prices every week, day in and day out, most of them don't have the alternative of mass transit, most major cities don't have that as an alternative. in fact i've known people who have had to turn down a job when they needed a job because the cost of the gasoline alone was more than they would earn in that job. >> will cane is a cnn contributor. we are only ending up with one president. how does this divide play out in the elections? should people be holding the president responsible? should his approval rating go down by 16 points because gas prices went up? i think you agree there's nothing else that happened in the month that was likely to affect the president's ratings. >> right. no, there are legitimate reasons to bedprgrudge this president. you could talk about the length of the recession and how quickly it's recovered. that being said it's virtually certain and obvious the numbers are pointing up over the past month. not just commercial and industrial loans, there's so many factors. vehicle sales that are pointing up. yet, some people don't feel good about the economy. and in short term poll, it suggests that. just over the last month his numbers have gone down. how is that possible? gas prize. should people hold the president responsible for gas prices? no. this short-term stuff is nonsense. >> roland martin is a cnn contributor. roland, it's not just in the wake of the financial crisis that people get left behind. there are counties in america that have faced persistent poverty levels for decades. they get -- they have been hit worse off in this recession. but we want to talk about solutions. you recently spoke to representative james clyburn about something called the clyburn amendment in the stimulus plan which he thinks could be implemented in other programs in help reduce chronic poverty. let's listen to this. >> it was called the clyburn amendment. 10, 20, 30. i believe that all of these resources coming out of these programs, at least 10% of it ought to be directed into these communities where 20% or more of the population has been stuck below the poverty level for the last 30 years. >> so if we're talking about two americas or more, this idea, this is james clyburn's idea to try and at least give the worst off in america a leg up. what do you think of this idea? >> first of all, i love the idea and i was a little upset that when he told me on my show on sunday that i hadn't heard about it the last three years. he said it was part of the stimulus bill that was put into effect in 2009. here's what's also amazing. we talk about poverty, we have to be honest. a lot of people think about african-americans and hispanics. but the reality is according to their research, there are 474 of those counties. two-thirds of them are republican counties, largely white. one-third democrats. so when people hear poverty, help the less fortunate, they always think in terms of it's a republican thing. we're saying there are people who are poor white, who are poor black, hispanic, who are native americans, and so what he's saying is let's target them with the resources. and i think what should happen, president barack obama should be sounding this and saying we should make this a part of all our appropriations when it comes to grants, when it comes to the cabinet departments as well because we can't keep saying rising tide lift all boats if the people in these poor counties are always left behind. >> this is back full circle to the beginning of our conversation, diane. there is very clearly a rising tide in america. we have seen that for several months now on a whole lot of economic indicators, and it is very clearly not lifting all boats. is there an effective way as an economist that you see that we can disproportionately lift the smallest, the poorest boats so that we share this recovery a little bit more evenly and people feel better? >> it's one of the most difficult things to do. you know, certainly a compassionate thing to do and something that i understand. that said, you know, over the long haul, the only way to fundamentally change the poverty situation relative to the rest of the economy is education, and education is critical. funding for education takes time. it does also mean funding for chipper who are being educated to have preschool education, to have food before they go to school and at school. so all these things are important. there's a lot of different aspects of poverty that need to be dealt with in order to deal with the whole poverty problem in general. i think that's something not many people pay much attention to. although we noted earlier this these may be mostly white americans and many of them republicans at that, a lot of them still don't vote because frankly they don't even have the time to do that given the time they're trying -- >> you're very connected to the idea of who votes and who doesn't. so we're talking about education. diane is talking about education because obviously education leads to better unemployment or lower unemployment and the suggestion that james clyburn has got. hold on all three of you, diane, roland and will. we want to continue this conversation. we also just learned this week how secure your bank would be in the event of another downturn. we want to find out whether the financial system is more secure than it was three years ago. we'll continue this conversation and look at the banking system next on "your money." 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[ female announcer ] discover what's next in your life. get this free travel bag when you join at aarp.org/jointoday. the priceline negotiator went down in that fiery bus crash. yes i was. we lost a beautiful man that day. but we gained the knowledge that priceline has thousands and thousands of hotels on sale every day. so i can choose the perfect one for me without bidding. is it hard for you to think back to that day? oh my, this one has an infinity pool. i love those they just... and then drop off, kinda like the negotiator. take the privileged investing tools of wall street and make them simple, intuitive, and available to all. distill all that data. make information instinctual, visual. introducing trade architect, td ameritrade's empowering web-based trading platform. take control of your portfolio today. trade commission-free for 60 days, and we'll throw in up to $600 when you open an account. roland, diane and will, we're having a conversation about how to lift those in america who are not feeling the effects of this recovery right now, often the poorest in america. roland, i know you are chomping at the bit to get in here, but i'm going to make you squirm just a little bit more because will has something to say about this whole idea. how do we lift people out of poverty effectively. >> i'm going to reject his premise. he said that the rising tide does not lift all boats. the american experience suggests otherwise. the very, very long-term view is that our whole economy is based on that concept and it has worked. now, over the medium term, the last 40 years or so, diane has a very interesting point because people have been left behind. charles murray has written about this. education i agree has to be the answer to that. finally in the very short term, i'm really curious as we see an economy possibly on the road to recovery, but some people are not catching up to it, is that just how recoveries work? they manifest first at the top income spectrums and later low income spectrums. >> diane, is that the experience? >> actually it's not. it's the experience of this particular recovery. and it's dramatically different during this particular recovery than other recoveries. the recovery of the 1980s did go on to take a very long time to get below 8% on the unemployment rate. once we did, there were cumulative effects that we felt for decades afterwards, where even college graduates had lower earnings potential once they got out, if they got a job while the unemployment rate was still above 8%. so we do know that recoveries are different. that said, the recovery of the 1980s had jobs, 500, 600,000, 700,000 jobs, a month being generated and the unemployment rate was falling rapidly quickly after a contraction. and i think that's very important is we had a very long contraction and a very slow recovery. that's what makes it so much different. you have a very different dynamic of the long-term unemployed, the impoverished and those being marginalized for a much longer period of time. maybe the cumulative effects we can only guess them but it looks like they could be much greater. >> roland, we've talked about this. we've talked about how you try and bring these two americas or however many americas we have closer together. how you help the worst of the worst out, those who are really suffering and not participating in this recovery and those who are getting hurt the hardest by these increasing gas prices. your thoughts. >> i think the point to the clyburn amendment speaks to resources. and i totally agree. look, i'm a huge education advocate. i believe in charter schools, vouchers, public, private, online, i don't care, you name it. but that is really an 18, 22, 25-year process from the moment a kid is in kindergarten to the time they finish high school or finish college. i think the point here is you're targeting resources. what do we know? that is the poor, they don't have lobbyists in washington, d.c. so when you talk about the ability to be able to provide water treatment facilities, when it comes to school lunches and those type of things, this is a perfect example where you're targeting 10% of the resources and it's making sure they are not left out. that to me is the problem. to will's point, look who has been earning the money and income gap the past 30 years. i think we have to earn up to the fact that poor people have no voice in this country. i believe the president should stand up and say this is the kind of effort that's not race based, not politically based, it is income and need based that can at least affect people and make some substantive change in their lives every day. >> i like the fact that you came armed with a solution to the show, roland. let me change topics for a second to the banking situation because we've been watching the banks through this recovery. the economy may feel a little better for, as we've discussed, some people out there. what if the following happened. what if unemployment soared back to 13%, higher than what we ever got to in this recession? what if stock prices, we've been talking about these record highs, what if they were cut in half? what if housing prices fell another 20%? not something that most people think is likely to happen, but that is the scenario that the federal reserve used this past week as a stress test for 19 of the country's largest banks. those that are called systemically important banks. the kind that if they failed would cause massive problems in the economy. the fed said 15 of the 19 largest financial firms are prepared for that situation. roland and will, i want your take on this. does this give you confidence that we're better off today than we were before the financial crisis? because some of them didn't pass that test. although others say that test is too onnerous. we had 200 regulators inside of fanny and freddie and they got nothing. how good are we looking into the future and seeing potential problems? i don't know the answer to that. i do know that's why some people on all sides of the political spectrum from the left to the right said if you're too big to fail, you're too big to exist. i just don't know where we stand today. >> roland. >> i do not trust is completely because i still think the problem is when you have commercial banks that are also investment banks. i mean look, when you saw all of the discussion this week over this goldman sachs executive talking about how profit and making money is still more important than the clients' interests, i still think we have to roll some things back. i do not believe that the systemic change that was needed to repair wall street has taken place and as long as they still are able to do what they did beforehand, we're going to come back to this problem and so i say separate them and i'm sorry, but you want to make more money, look, there's a way to do it, but you cannot continue to have commercial banks and investment banks because they're always going to be clashing there when it comes to the interest of the consumers. >> a lot of people share that view. diane, your thought on the stress tests and what they mean. >> well, they certainly were stressful and stressful to the banks. i do think they do actually exhibit that the banks are in better shape now than they were and they're in better shape because we helped them to get in better shape. that was called a t.a.r.p., interesting four-letter word here in the united states but it did help the banks get back on track. i also think what's very important is the banks are in better financial shape to endure what could be a secondary crisis in europe, which is one of the reasons we wanted to have these stress tests now. the other issue is we don't have a shadow banking system where many consumers, most consumers got all of their credit from, particularly their mortgages. even though the banks are in better shape than they once were, it doesn't mean they're providing credit to as many consumers. for good reason they're not doing so. it's much harder for people to get a mortgage even when they're credit worthy. in fact mortgage capacity has been cut back among the banks. they got penalized so they're doing even less of it. so now we see less mortgage capacity. we really worry about that as we look to see the housing market recover. it's hard to do that -- >> can't do that if there isn't that capital. you're right. what a great conversation always with the three of you. roland martin, pleasure to see you back on the show. will cain, as always and diane swonk, thanks for joining us. the growth of business in this country is directly tied to the success of the recovery, and just what has the obama administration done or not done for business in this country? we'll get down to it. is this an anti or pro-business president next on "your money." helping millions of americans retire on their terms. when they want. where they want. doing what they want. ameriprise. the strength of a leader in retirement planning. the heart of 10,000 advisors working with you one-to-one. together for your future. ♪ i like yoplait. it is yoplait. but you said it was greek. mmhmm. so is it greek or is it yoplait? exactly. okay... 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(announcer) starts working on contact and at the nerve level. to block pain for hours. new capzasin, takes the pain out of arthritis. this election is about the economy and jobs and the businesses that create those jobs. vice president biden campaigning in ohio made the case that the president supports business. >> our philosophy, ours is one that values the workers and the success of a business. it values the middle class and the success of our economy. simply stated, we're about promoting the private sector. they're about protecting the privileged sector. >> will cain is a cnn contributor, nick is an author. his most recent book "presidential leadership, 15 decisions that changed the nation." nick, as you have looked back at other presidents, how does president obama, notwithstanding all of the criticism he gets right now and will get from will cain sitting next to you, how does he rank in terms of being pro and anti-business and how has that played in presidencies in the past. >> two things. one is, and we tend to overlook this, presidents really don't have that much control over the economic cycle. we like to think they do. over long periods of time like franklin roos veld they do. but for the most part presidents of hostages to economic cycles. >> or beneficiaries. >> right. the second point is we look at pro, con, left, right. teddy roosevelt, a republican, one could argue was anti-business. john kennedy, a democrat, was pro business, tax cuts. eisenhower was more about balanced business than tax cuts. so it's not as easy as left, right, growth versus fairness. there's some misconcep