General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThey once inhabited a vast swath of North America but their numbers have been greatly reduced
Warpy
(111,367 posts)if the meat case at the local health food store is to be believed.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)A lot of people are not using their heads.
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)In 1970 the US population was about 200 million, and about 61% were middle class. That's about 122 million in the middle class.
In 2015 the US population was about 318 million, and about 50% were middle class. That's about 159 million people.
Contrary to what many people think, but just saying...
truebluegreen
(9,033 posts)passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)Guess what...the levels of poverty and the wealthy have increased too. It's the percentages that matter.
Poverty has gone up, middle class has gone down, and the upper crust has gone up. Guess where most of the income and wealth has gone?
Bucky
(54,087 posts)Elizabeth Warren gave this brilliant speech about the hows and whys of middle class anxiety. Essentially the dollar doesn't cover as much as it used to. Relative to income, huge fixed costs like housing, healthcare, auto ownership, and college for the kids have greatly expanded. These are necessities for the middle class lifestyle but they gobble up more and more of our annual income. So even though food, clothing, and entertainment cost much less--falling in cost in inflation-adjusted dollars, those gains are offset in the rise in real-price by the big ticket items. You feel squeezed because you are squeezed. That makes you vulnerable to right wing demagoguery.
geardaddy
(24,931 posts)arikara
(5,562 posts)Because it sure doesn't. Real food anyhow, food like substances may be cheaper but we prefer to avoid them so our grocery bill is higher.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)In my area food for one person is $300 a month. And I don't know if that is based on cheap processed foods, or healthy from scratch foods (which is what I buy).
Yes, real food has gone up. However, not everything I need to buy each month is food. Dog and cat items (food, treats, kitty litter, frontline, etc.), consumables like TP, tissues, detergents, cleaning items, replacing worn linens and throw rugs, garden hoses, other property maintenance things like gas and maintenance of tools, and things like that, that my "other" items are probably even more expensive each month than food totals, because all of those items have gone up too.
I was amazed when I saw this figure for food, but it made me feel a bit better to know it's not just my food bills that have gone up.
For anyone who wants to see living wage in your county, this link is where to go.
http://livingwage.mit.edu
llmart
(15,556 posts)I checked out my area and can't believe that the typical expense for a single person for housing is only a little over $6,000 per year. If you are a renter that would mean your rent is approximately $500 per month and there is nowhere I could find an apartment for $500 a month. Also, does the housing category even include necessary utilities? Nowhere is there a section for that. If the housing figure does include utilities than I think the figures are definitely flawed.
The heading only says "Typical Expenses" not "Typical Annual Expenses", so maybe they mean Monthly expenses? But that doesn't seem right also.
I've tried to limit my grocery budget to $200 per month a couple of times and was able to do it, but it wasn't healthy eating by any means and I eat very little. I can do well on the $300 a month figure for my area though.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)It checks out pretty solid for what I see for rental pricing around here. I thought our rental pricing was higher until I did some googling.
llmart
(15,556 posts)and it would work out to $500 per month for housing costs which, unless a single person rented an efficiency apartment or a room, there is no way in my area you'd find a one-bedroom apartment for $500. That still doesn't include utilities. Does medical include insurance? If so, the figure for my county would be correct but ONLY for insurance, not for medical care that isn't covered by insurance.
Phlem
(6,323 posts)I'm sure a few more years of rising cost of living increases will fix that. We used to be doing much better but it's just gone downhill and even further thanks to after NAFTA.
Fuck.
bvar22
(39,909 posts)CHARTS: The Amazing Wealth Surge For The Top 0.1 Percent
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/the-amazing-wealth-surge-for-the-top-0-1-percent
Korean Free Trade Deal devastating for US Workers
(Prototype for the TPP)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-cohen/koreaus-free-trade-agreem_b_4965492.html
Meet the TPP: Crony capitalism on a global scale
https://represent.us/action/tpp/
Obama selects former Monsanto lobbyist to be his TPP chief agriculture negotiator
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023662210
"Obama Admins TPP Trade Officials Received Hefty Bonuses From Big Banks"
http://billmoyers.com/2014/02/20/obama-admin%E2%80%99s-tpp-trade-officials-received-hefty-bonuses-from-big-banks/
Study: "Trade" Deal Would Mean a Pay Cut for 90% of U.S. Workers
http://citizen.typepad.com/eyesontrade/2013/09/the-verdict-is-in-the-trans-pacific-partnership-tpp-a-sweeping-free-trade-deal-under-negotiation-with-11-pacific-rim-coun.html
Retirement: A third have less than $1,000 put away
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/personalfinance/2014/03/18/retirement-confidence-survey-savings/6432241/
95 percent of the economys gains have gone to the top 1 percent
http://billmoyers.com/2014/01/10/why-conservatives-old-divide-and-conquer-strategy-%E2%80%94-setting-working-class-against-the-poor-%E2%80%94-is-backfiring/
Billionaire wealth doubles since financial crisis
http://www.upi.com/blog/2013/11/12/Billionaire-wealth-doubles-since-financial-crisis/5011384268135/?spt=hts&or=12
The Top .01 Percent Reach New Heights
http://www.demos.org/blog/9/13/13/top-01-percent-reach-new-heights
Obama Appoints Bain Capital Consultant Jeff Ziets to Top Post
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023662209
Obama appoints industry insider to head the FCC
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024521140
The Totally Unfair And Bitterly Uneven 'Recovery,' In 12 Charts HuffPo
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023662029
Larry Summers Gets 'Full-Throated Defense' From Obama In Capitol Hill Meeting
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014553343#post1
Wall Street will get away with massive wave of criminality of 2008 - Statute of Limitations
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/business-economy-financial-crisis/untouchables/supreme-court-ruling-a-blow-for-future-financial-crisis-cases/
Income gap widest ever: 95 Percent of Recovery Income Gains Have Gone to the Top 1 Percent
http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2013/09/10/one_percent_recovery_95_percent_of_gains_have_gone_to_the_top_one_percent.html
Older Workers:.Set Back by Recession, and Shut Out of Rebound
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/27/booming/for-laid-off-older-workers-age-bias-is-pervasive.html?smid=tw-share&_r=3&
Right now, forty percent of Americans make less than the minimum wage from 1968.
http://pac.petitions.moveon.org/sign/raise-the-minimum-wage-19/?source=search
Daily CEO Pay Now Exceeds the Average Worker's Annual Salary
http://thecontributor.com/daily-ceo-pay-now-exceeds-us-workers-annual-salary
New Rule (Passed by Congress and signed by President Obama) signals Kiss of Death for Pensions
http://www.cnbc.com/id/100694955
Wealthy win lion's share of major tax breaks
http://www.boston.com/business/news/2013/05/29/wealthy-win-lion-share-major-tax-breaks/Ua0UyYle21EUXub7g1suCI/story.html
Wealth gap widens as labor's share of income falls
http://www.nbcnews.com/business/wealth-gap-widens-labors-share-income-falls-1B6097385
Corporate Profits Hit Record High While Worker Wages Hit Record Low
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2012/12/03/1270541/corporate-profits-wages-record/?mobile=nc
Why do we need real change in the Democratic Party?
Because THIS ^ does NOT happen by accident.
It is the result of Economic Policy designed to produce the above results,
and sold to a gullible American public.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)appalachiablue
(41,182 posts)disillusioned73
(2,872 posts)I was like huh..
fuzzy math.. or Reaganomics - aka same-ole, same-ole..
MiniMe
(21,719 posts)And where that missing eleven percent went is most likely down rather than up
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)of the 11% "lost" to the middle class, 7% exited upward to the upper class, while 4% exited to the lower class. All numbers of course are bulk counts, and don't necessarily reflect the paths of individuals (immigration and emigration being two unaccounted for factors).
In any case, if the largest losses in the middle class since 1970 are due to people becoming wealthy, its hard to make a social commentary cartoon out of that.
Phlem
(6,323 posts)That's just fucking rich.
Yea that's it! That's exactly why Bernie's doing so well, because most of the middle class have moved up.
What a full fucking mouth full of bullshit.
Jeezus fuck, do you all think everyone is that dense?
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)Relying on the census bureau and the BLS.
Phlem
(6,323 posts)Hint: a 2 fer 1 isn't any better when trying to unload your first sack of crap.
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)You may not believe it, but I am always ready to admit I am wrong; I adopted the perspective long ago that being found wrong was a learning opportunity, and its always good to become more aware.
Going back to my original statement (and my only real point) in this thread: Census numbers say there were 200 million people in the US in 1970, and an estimated 318 million in the US in 2015. Using the standard definition of middle class, "those with incomes between 66% and 200% of the median", applied to census and BLS numbers, the Pew Research Center estimates that the middle class represented 61% of the population in 1970, and 50% of the population in 2015. 61% of 200 million is 122 million, and 50% of 318 million is 159 million. Therefore, the middle class increased by about 37 million from 1970 to 2015. What that means is another thing, and whether there are more important measures is yet another.
If any of this is wrong, please let me know. You can call it a sack of crap, or my sack of crap if you like, but without any alternative numbers I have nothing to dispute it.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)Nice, huh?
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)For US population: https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8&client=ubuntu#q=us%20population
and for the percentage of US households in the middle class: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/most-americans-arent-middle-class-anymore/
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)The problem is you don't care that statistically the middle class is shrinking while the upper class and poverty class are growing. You only care about actual numbers...not statistical trends.
You lose. The population is always growing...that does not mean it's growing in the right direction for the well being of our country or it's people.
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)Facts are one thing, interpreting them is another - but both are important. If you don't start with facts, the interpretation isn't worth much.
So if the populations of all three classes grew over time, but the upper and lower classes grew faster than the middle, the result is an increase in income inequality.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)Nobody has ever questioned the fact that the population "overall" is growing. That is a given, almost an exponential given.
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)...and just trying to respond to questions after that. It is an area of discussion "thick with agenda" one might say, so the data itself is not well known by many people. As I've said before, its important to know the facts in order to interpret the facts. The data I have been going over I mostly know from using them to counter right wing arguments.
arikara
(5,562 posts)that population increased by 118 million during the dates you selected, and of those only 37 million are in the middle class. If you look at the percentages, which you also supplied, the middle class shrunk by 11% during that time.
You can't compare the numbers to percentages here and make it work, it is comparing apples to fish. They are 2 totally different things. Maybe your number crunching works if your right wingers are mathematically challenged, but it's not cutting it here.
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)/ignore.
NickB79
(19,274 posts)bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)...the economic recovery has put 10 million or so people back to work, but that's not nearly enough to make a dent in poverty.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)Please give us some links to your data or .
Sorry, but without a source to back up your preposterous assumptions, you are becoming extremely annoying.
DO NOT GIVE US DATA WITHOUT LINKS TO BACK IT UP. THANK YOU!
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)based on the same graphic posted several times (or at this link, with good information http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/most-americans-arent-middle-class-anymore/ ) the lower class had 50 million members in 1970, versus 92 million now. That is defined as those with household incomes less that 66% of the median, so its slightly different than an official poverty level statistic.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)Without a link to back up your numbers, you have no argument.
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)For the US population: https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8&client=ubuntu#q=us%20population
For the relative percentages of the different classes over time: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/most-americans-arent-middle-class-anymore/
The 538 article breaks down the class divisions a little different than what I was looking at originally, but it is more informative. Instead of a simple "upper" class it lists "upper middle" and "highest". If you combine those two you arrive at the increase of 7% from 1970 to 2015. If you apply that to the population numbers, you arrive at an increase of 38 million people in the upper income classes, as I stated.
And its not really an argument, just a listing of a fact, assuming the data is accurate.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)angstlessk
(11,862 posts)basically the middle class was reduced from 61% to 50%...where did they go?? UP or DOWN? Betcha DOWN!
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)contrary to the cartoon in the OP. I suppose editorial accuracy in a cartoon isn't really a big priority, but the factual error is a common one.
angstlessk
(11,862 posts)just have 3,000 purple eyed people who die at age two but it's 100% all is good? Even if 100% are dying?????????
It's the percentage stu**d
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)and its good that we have added 38 million to the upper income class since 1970 (depending on how one feels about wealth - most people work toward that, and that some have gotten it is ok with me).
Where the problem really lies is that the lower income class has grown from 50 million in 1970 to 92 million in 2015. That's not good, and a more progressive government should do better. If there is enough wealth in the US to so grow the upper classes, there is enough to do better for those that have less.
I've teetered on the lower end of the middle class most of my life, and currently am doing fairly well. My problems have been making enough money to keep my house in order and save for retirement - middle class problems. Lower income problems are having enough food to eat, affording a place to live, keeping a vehicle running to be able to get to work, buying clothes and school things for kids. Those are problems I'd rather see focused on.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)but not by the percentage the middle class is shrinking.
again, please provide some links to prove your numbers...thanks.
Downwinder
(12,869 posts)moved up.
whatthehey
(3,660 posts)ornotna
(10,807 posts)that you would attempt to put a positive spin to the OP. And come back to justify your sad reply.
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)I agree with the president that income inequality is one of the most important issues needing serious solution, but any problem is best approached by understanding the problem. Looking at and understanding the demographic changes is worthwhile.
ornotna
(10,807 posts)You're picking nits.
angstlessk
(11,862 posts)Ohio jobs are not competing with South Carolina...it's with the poorest countries in the world...Africa and Asia...WE LOSE by we, it is the American Dream, and the lifestyle to which we have become accustomed...WE FUCKING NEED A DIVORCE LAWYER!
Response to bhikkhu (Reply #12)
Phlem This message was self-deleted by its author.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)Yet you are happy to just slap this stuff out here without any links to back up what you are saying. I can't believe this thread has gone on this long without questioning the authenticity you post with.
zeemike
(18,998 posts)Most of what you call middle class have at least 2 people working to make it middle class instead of one in 1970.
And most of them don't own their home and could not afford it if it were not for easy credit.
And back in the 70s I worked a factory job that had health care and 3 weeks of paid vacation a year and had enough money to buy a home and a car...on one paycheck.
Not many have that today.
What we have today is illusion.
appalachiablue
(41,182 posts)"The MIDDLE CLASS is Shrinking Just about Everywhere in America", New Pew Research Data, Wash. Post, May 11, 2016.
The great shrinking of the middle class that has captured the attention of the nation is not only playing out in troubled regions like the Rust Belt, Appalachia and the Deep South, but in just about every metropolitan area in America, according to a major new analysis by the Pew Research Center. Pew reported in December that a clear majority of American adults no longer live in the middle class, a demographic reality shaped by decades of widening inequality, declining industry and the erosion of financial stability and family-wage jobs.
>But while much of the attention has focused on communities hardest hit by economic declines, the new Pew data, based on metro-level income data since 2000, show that middle-class stagnation is a far broader phenomenon.
The share of adults living in middle-income households has also dwindled in Washington, New York, San Francisco, Atlanta and Denver. It's fallen in smaller Midwestern metros where the middle class has long made up an overwhelming majority of the population. It's withering in coastal tech hubs, in military towns, in college communities, in Sun Belt cities.
The decline of the American middle class is "a pervasive local phenomenon," according to Pew, which analyzed census and American Community Survey data in 229 metros across the country, encompassing about three-quarters of the U.S. population. In 203 of those metros, the share of adults in middle-income households fell from 2000 to 2014.
Pew defines middle-income households here as those making between two-thirds and twice the national median household income. For a three-person household in 2014, that means an income between about $42,000 and $125,000. The fact that median incomes have declined over this same time frame also means that the bar to get into the middle class is actually lower now than it was in 2000. Pew's metro-level data are also adjusted for household size and local cost of living.
The shrinking middle class is in part a reflection of rising income inequality in America, and of the same underlying and uneven economic forces that have fueled the rise of Donald Trump. And as the middle class has been shrinking, median incomes have fallen, too. In 190 of these 229 metros, the median income dropped over this same time.
As the middle class has shrunk, Pew points out, the lower and upper classes in America have grown in size and significance. In some metros, the middle class is dwindling primarily because families are falling out of it and into the lower class. The share of households in this bottom tier has skyrocketed since 2000, for instance, in Goldbsoro, North Carolina, a railroad junction with an Air Force base.
..In only about a quarter of all of these metros does the middle class make up less than a majority of the adult population today. But the largest metros in the country fall into this group, including New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston and Washington. In each of these metros, the middle class is relatively small because the upper-class share of the population is larger than average. These same metros also tend to have wider income inequality, reflecting the broad spectrum of jobs in industries from the low-paying service sector to finance and biotech. As a result, not surprisingly, Pew's data shows that metros with greater income inequality tend to have smaller middle classes. When the income distribution is narrower, on the other hand, more people are likely to be clustered in that middle tier between $42,000 and $125,000. Continued.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/05/11/the-middle-class-is-shrinking-just-about-everywhere-in-america/ *Includes Video.
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)just saying again, for accuracy.
A better way to phrase "the problem" would be to focus on the growing lower income class.
appalachiablue
(41,182 posts)bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)This graphic is from the Pew research center, but agrees largely with Census Bureau and BLS data.
So you just need to know US population numbers for 1970 and 2015, which were 200 million and 318 million, respectively, and then do a little math. The graphic heading is "the middle class is shrinking", a statement accurate according when referring to percentages. More shrinkage is due to people bumping up to the upper classes, but the 4% dropping down to the lower income classes is the real concern.
The income numbers looked at are here:
Angel Martin
(942 posts)and claim the middle class is increasing.
She will sweep the country !
whatthehey
(3,660 posts)It's just staggering how many people assume 11% fewer in the middle class is all bad, when it's actually 64% positive.
Angel Martin
(942 posts)Obama got 66 million votes in 2012.
If Hillary gets 67 million, the Democratic vote "went up", even if Trump gets 80 million votes and wins the election by a landslide !
appalachiablue
(41,182 posts)passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)That's a given...That's not the issue. The issue is the percentage of the population each segment represents.
disillusioned73
(2,872 posts)thanks for posting, great information..
appalachiablue
(41,182 posts)The nos. are shocking and the pain felt widely across the country. Unless, that is, we accept MC decline and ever lower standards of living as part of the ongoing 'leveling' and escalating 'race to the bottom.'
geardaddy
(24,931 posts)TexasMommaWithAHat
(3,212 posts)nt
jtuck004
(15,882 posts)Income, savings and life expectancy are in decline for broad swathes of society.
Income among the middle class is plummeting
...
According to Pew Research, in 1970 $3 of every $10 in income went to upper-income households. Now $5 of every $10 goes to them. The Social Security Administration reports that over half of Americans make less than $30,000 per year. That's less than an appropriate average living wage of $16.87 per hour, as calculated by Alliance for a Just Society.
...
A new study finds nearly a 15-year difference in life expectancy between 40-year-old men among the richest 1 percent and the poorest 1 percent. The gap is 10 years for women. Much of the disparity has arisen in just the past 15 years.
...
In fact, it could be even more than half. The Wall Street Journal recently reported on a JP Morgan study's conclusion that "the bottom 80% of households by income lack sufficient savings to cover the type of volatility observed in income and spending." Fewer than one in three 25- to 34-year-olds live in their own homes, a 20 percent drop in just the past 15 years.
Renters are faring even worse. The number of families spending more than half their incomes on rentthe 'severely' cost-burdened rentershas increased by a stunning 50 percent in just ten years. Billionaire Steve Schwarzman, whose company Blackstone has been buying up tens of thousands of homes at rock-bottom prices and then renting them out at exorbitant rates while waiting out the housing market, recently said he finds the growing anger among voters "astonishing."
...
http://www.alternet.org/economy/once-middle-class-millions-are-joining-ranks-disposable-americans
The hurting economy still exists. Perhaps the most telling sign that the U.S. isn't back to normal is the 44.7 million Americans on food stamps. Joe is one of them, something else he never envisioned in his life.
Before the financial crisis there were only 26.3 million people on food stamps"
http://money.cnn.com/2016/04/26/news/economy/middle-class-to-homeless/index.html?sr=cnnmoneybin043016middle-class-to-homeless0900vodtop
---
Well, perhaps they can eat the pap that people are trying to feed them about how great things are.
appalachiablue
(41,182 posts)rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)This article doesn't agree with you at all. Why are to pretending that the middle class remains healthy? What's your agenda?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/20/middle-class-charts_n_6507506.html
This is a particularly interesting graph:
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)where 61% of a population of 200 million is a smaller number than 50% of 318 million. That's the change in middle class numbers from 1970 to 2015, showing an increase of about 38 million to the middle class in the US. That's all I was saying - there has been an increase in number, rather than a decline in number.
You could also look at this:
...and ask what the graphic you posted really means - while the percentage of wealth held by the middle class dropped, the net wealth increased significantly, so did middle class households gain or lose money? I can't tell from either graphic. My neighbor has about the same wealth as me, so we'd be about 50/50 on a percentage graph. If he won the lottery, my percentage share would go way down, but that doesn't say a thing about my actual wealth. A different set of data would be needed if you wanted to know how most people are actually doing.
Not to be too pedantic (though I probably am), but its always important when reading graphs and statistics to understand what you are looking at; these things are manipulated easily to make you think you know something that you don't. I don't mean to beat well intentioned people up here, but my approach is more informed by the RW town I live in, and many arguments with wingers who misunderstand and distort statistics, and erect nonsensical positions on half-baked analysis. Relying on facts is a survival tool.
A Simple Game
(9,214 posts)and 90% of Swedes, about 8 million, are middle class then that is proof that Americans are 20 times more likely to be middle class than Swedes.
That's how your reasoning works and it's now all clear as mud.
Android3.14
(5,402 posts)More proof we need to overhaul our school systems. When someone is incapable of understanding 4th grade math...
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)And we are all falling for it.
Android3.14
(5,402 posts)No doubt about it. I'm a sucker.
It is frustrating.
FairWinds
(1,717 posts)but they are wrong.
". . about 63 percent of Americans say they're unable to handle a $500 car repair or a $1,000 emergency room bill, according to a new survey from Bankrate.com."
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/most-americans-cant-handle-a-500-surprise-bill/
If you cannot come up with $ 500, you are not middle class.
Or are your sources the sort that claim, "But we're so much better off than the middle ages!!"
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)They did a big piece not long ago about the shrinking middle class. Middle class is defined as those households having an income from 66% to 200% of a median income. As the median income is a measure that can go up or down with the overall health of the economy, "middle class" is a moving target, but still representative of position within an economic population.
I did read that bankrate article the other day, along with one by the guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/dec/25/wealthy-americans-living-paycheck-to-paycheck-income-paying-bills , summarized as "people in the US live paycheck to paycheck, even those making over 100k a year". I don't know what to make of that, but I'm all for any measure building a better safety net or increasing opportunity for the 92 million lower income people in the US.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)I'm guess I'm getting lost here.
Rex
(65,616 posts)class.
Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)Last edited Mon Jun 6, 2016, 08:10 PM - Edit history (1)
but I had this argument with a right wing nut a week or two ago in town so the numbers were fresh in my memory. The point there was that Obama had destroyed the middle class, and most pointedly that the middle class was vanishing breed because of liberal policies. I looked up the numbers to show that, according to the BLS, the Census Bureau, and the Pew Research Center, the actual number of people in the US in the middle class has been steadily increasing. At which point the conversation veered predictably from facts to anecdotes and character attack (that's where I leave).
Other metrics are less encouraging of course (notably the overall measures of income inequality), but the only point I wanted to make was that the middle class, by the numbers, has grown. I thought it was a simple point, and believe that a reliance on facts is fundamental to making any argument or intention useful.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)...if the pun was intended.
And I take it you agree with me on the shutting up part. Done for now.
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)You should not provide statistics without a link to back it up. Just sayin.
Yupster
(14,308 posts)My problem is identifying the classes by their percentage of the mean income.
For example, let's say there is a horrible plague in America and the whole society collapses other than government statisticians. The government stats might say that the percentage of people below 66 % of the mean income remains unchanged even as everyone in the country starves. In the same way, if the mean income went from $ 50,000 to $ 125 during the plague, the person making $ 400 a year would still be considered upper class while his children starve.
Oppositely, if America, and only America was rained on by a rare metal costing a Billion an ounce, everyone in America might overnight be making a billion a year and live like a king. However if the mean wage moved up to $ 150 million a year, the person making $ 50 million would be considered lower class by the statistics even while they live like kings.
Somehow poverty needs to be measured on buying power and living conditions rather than just percentage of mean or median income.
My statistical rant for the day.
bhikkhu
(10,725 posts)The median income decreased during the recession, so the standard for qualifying as "middle class" also decreased. A middle class individual making the median income in 2010 was worse off than an individual making the median income in 2007. Similarly, when everyone is doing well, it also skews the numbers. If the bulk of the population moves to a higher income the median increases, and people who were formerly middle class might drop to the lower income class, even though their circumstances haven't changed.
But the federal government doesn't use median income statistics to determine poverty levels, nor do most states (as far as I know); they do look at actual costs of living versus income to establish a variety of poverty thresholds for a variety of circumstances.
One good use of the statistical chart for upper, lower and middle classes is to see how income inequality changes over time. Regardless of the position of the middle, the measure of income inequality says a great deal about the amount of opportunity in a society, and how it is composed. From the chart I got the numbers from, the simple statement could be made: while all three classes increased in size over time, the upper and lower classes increased at a greater rate than the middle class. That indicates an increase in income inequality, which changes the character of society in a bad direction.
(on edit: link http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/02/04/americas-middle-holds-its-ground-after-the-great-recession/ , as I didn't post it as the source of data originally)
passiveporcupine
(8,175 posts)Omaha Steve
(99,760 posts)K&R!
OS
elmac
(4,642 posts)& unfettered capitalism or what the Pope likes to call the dung of the devil.
lpbk2713
(42,769 posts)Soon to be a footnote in history books.
LuckyLib
(6,821 posts)RoccoR5955
(12,471 posts)if the election comes down to Hilliary or Drumpf.
DissidentVoice
(813 posts)"North America" means the continent - including Canada, Mexico and the other Latin "Central" American countries.
Canada has a much stronger middle class, due in no small part to the fact that their citizens don't face being bankrupted just for being sick.
Mexico is so anarchic because of the drug cartels that it seems that there are those at the very top (drug lords and politicians on the take), with almost everyone else WAAAYYYY down the food chain.
Of the countries further south I don't know much, except that those which would be likely to have a defined middle class would probably be Costa Rica and Belize (a Commonwealth Dominion).
Now the USA? Middle class fast going the way of the dodo.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)HuckleB
(35,773 posts)How the hell will the next generation afford anywhere to live, when people in their 20s have to go back to their parents' homes now.
And on and on...
Fumesucker
(45,851 posts)So yeah, we're getting squeezed both ends.
Unfortunately the really frugal ways of living are rapidly being zoned out of existence, gentrification and stagnating wages at the same time are going to choke us out. I've researched dry camping quite a bit and am gradually building up to that capability when I come across a real bargain that gets me closer to the goal.
Change is the only constant and as the Boy Scouts say Be Prepared!
HuckleB
(35,773 posts)We shall see how long my parents hold out, too!
Gothmog
(145,631 posts)Norman Conch Quest
(64 posts)I thought it was gonna be moderate Republicans!
Gabi Hayes
(28,795 posts)Gabi Hayes
(28,795 posts)if this is true.....what can one possibly say?