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The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

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Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#81

Post by anigbrowl »

jeffdavis wrote: post #74
acabal wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've said for a long time the basic problem in the States isn't capitalism vs. socialism or rich vs. poor, but rather educated vs. uneducated. I think I'm not being out of line to claim that on the average an American's high-school-level education is pretty poor. People who are victims of poor education don't know history (which is rich in examples of past policy), can't think critically or reason about potential out…

"Those kinds of people will never be able to vote in their best interests" What happened to voting in the interests of the entire population?

Nobody knows for certain what the interests of the entire population are; voting is a mechanism for groping towards identifying those interests.

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#82

Post by sliverstorm »

maratd wrote: post #68
rdtsc wrote: post #52

> The expectation of rising real incomes was built into the American culture Ah that's the classic propaganda line: "I am not poor, I am just pre-wealthy." ...So I sure don't want to vote for anything that would jeopardize my wealthy position when I get there. The key in all of this is ability to manipulate the people into believing and voting in a particular way. US has no shortage of zombies who don't think on thei…

> US has no shortage of zombies who don't think on their won. A human being is at the most juvenile when he encounters a view contrary to his own and ascribes it to stupidity. If only everyone was as enlightened, as educated, as brilliant as he ... then everyone would understand. No. Grow up. I will never be wealthy and I will still continue to vote for a fair tax system. A flat tax system. Because everyone should pa…

I will never be wealthy and I will still continue to vote for a fair tax system. A flat tax system. Because everyone should pay the same, regardless of status or income.

Trouble with a flat tax system is the poor can't afford the tax rates the nation's current expenditure would require. It would work O.K. if the expenditure was much lower, but I see no way to get from here to there.

Aside from that, I've come to believe that a flat tax system isn't actually fair. The less income someone has, the more taxes cut into basic living expenses (because a greater portion of that person's income is spent on basic needs). On the other hand, someone with large incomes sees no tightening of basic living expenses because they make enough that the money lost to taxes falls solidly into the "extra income" region.

I'm not very good at describing this idea yet, but I tie it back to the idea I have happened upon that (for example) a 25% raise to a person making $40k is in terms of spending power much more than a 25% raise. This is because discretionary income is much smaller than $40k. The new $10k can be considered added discretionary income (assuming the person was meeting basic needs before) thus making it in effect much larger than a 25% bump.

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#83

Post by vor_ »

rdtsc wrote: post #52

> The expectation of rising real incomes was built into the American culture Ah that's the classic propaganda line: "I am not poor, I am just pre-wealthy." ...So I sure don't want to vote for anything that would jeopardize my wealthy position when I get there. The key in all of this is ability to manipulate the people into believing and voting in a particular way. US has no shortage of zombies who don't think on thei…

Calling people names because they disagree with a progressive tax structure or mandated health insurance isn't a convincing argument for your side. There are arguments to be made for and against these policies.

In fact, it would be helpful for you to recognize that you are simply one side of a two-sided issue, each side of which believes they are obviously correct and that the other side is too uneducated to know how wrong they are.

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#84

Post by scarmig »

maratd wrote: post #68
rdtsc wrote: post #52

> The expectation of rising real incomes was built into the American culture Ah that's the classic propaganda line: "I am not poor, I am just pre-wealthy." ...So I sure don't want to vote for anything that would jeopardize my wealthy position when I get there. The key in all of this is ability to manipulate the people into believing and voting in a particular way. US has no shortage of zombies who don't think on thei…

> US has no shortage of zombies who don't think on their won. A human being is at the most juvenile when he encounters a view contrary to his own and ascribes it to stupidity. If only everyone was as enlightened, as educated, as brilliant as he ... then everyone would understand. No. Grow up. I will never be wealthy and I will still continue to vote for a fair tax system. A flat tax system. Because everyone should pa…

A flat tax? That's a bit too socialist for my tastes... should a man making $100k per year really be forced to pay twice as much as a man making $50k per year, just for being more productive? Wouldn't a head tax be better, since everyone would then pay equally? Plus you would not have the disincentive effect on marginal labor of your "make twice as much, pay twice as much" scheme.

Also, why should I be forced to pay for your military and your police force? Shouldn't it be my choice to consume what I want?

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#85

Post by acabal »

jeffdavis wrote: post #74
acabal wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've said for a long time the basic problem in the States isn't capitalism vs. socialism or rich vs. poor, but rather educated vs. uneducated. I think I'm not being out of line to claim that on the average an American's high-school-level education is pretty poor. People who are victims of poor education don't know history (which is rich in examples of past policy), can't think critically or reason about potential out…

"Those kinds of people will never be able to vote in their best interests" What happened to voting in the interests of the entire population?

I think a person's best interest is often (not always!) the same as the general interest. Education comes in to play when a person is educated enough to be able to rationally reason that case. For example, "I have a perfectly good well on my property, but I understand that contributing to a public water supply system may benefit me in the long run, because maybe my well will go dry." Or maybe, "I have a well, but contributing to a public water system will increase commerce in the area which will directly benefit me."

Obviously that's not always going to be the case, and people can and will reason incorrectly, but the important part is that a person is capable of applying some modicum of thought instead of just "The rent is too damn high" or "Obama is a communist, hang him for treason."

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#86

Post by bhntr3 »

jeffdavis wrote: post #64
bhntr3 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an interesting argument that I've heard many times in different ways. I'm inclined to think there's some truth to it. But when you look at trends, income is stagnant, wages are stagnant AND measures of social mobility are low as well as studies that show a lack of evidence for second and third generation immigrants being significantly better off. That plus the (admittedly anecdotal) evidence that single earner l…

"It's an interesting argument that I've heard many times in different ways." I wasn't making an argument; merely asking for numbers and explaining why the existing numbers may be deceptive. "a lack of evidence for second and third generation immigrants being significantly better off." Do you have some numbers to back that up? I'd like to see them broken down by country of origin, if possible.

I guess I was inferring a counter argument to "the middle class is declining" which goes something like "the middle class is changing and not the same types of people now that it was then." Young people studying longer, settling down later, more immigration, etc.

I went on a quest to find the numbers years ago and those were the conclusions I came back with. The numbers are messy. I wish I had them or remembered what I read to form those conclusions. I'm actually drawn to this question because I thought of trying to make a website that drew together the data with visualization and statistical analysis.

If you find the data please being it back and share it.

EDIT: Actually the Wikipedia article on social mobility in the US is a pretty good start. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socio-economic_mobility_in_the_...

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#87

Post by pvdm »

CleanedStar wrote: post #3

When Karl Marx wrote Capital in 1867, he said capitalism would never be able to get rid of credit bubbles, financial crises, high unemployment etc. He said that over time the problems would get worse and worse with greater and greater financial crises. Here we are about a century and a half later and you just have to look at the housing bubble, the bank crisis, TARP and the government bailout, unemployment in the US…

Marx did not mention the destruction of the environment, which is a natural outcome of capitalism. I agree with everything else he said.

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#88

Post by ucee054 »

If we move to a system where half of the country is either stagnant or losing ground while the other half is surging, the social fabric of the United States is at risk, and with it the massive global power the United States has accumulated.

Translation: If half the US citizenry is utterly suffering, we won't be able to keep drone-bombing Yemeni infants, Oh the horrors!

You'd think that preventing the suffering of half of the USA might be an aim in itself.

Also, what's wrong with leaving the Yemeni children alone? Oh, I forgot, we want to provoke more terrorism. Maybe even hit the jackpot and start World War 3.

What a stupid article.

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#89

Post by mathieuh »

martinced wrote: post #26
CleanedStar wrote: post #3

When Karl Marx wrote Capital in 1867, he said capitalism would never be able to get rid of credit bubbles, financial crises, high unemployment etc. He said that over time the problems would get worse and worse with greater and greater financial crises. Here we are about a century and a half later and you just have to look at the housing bubble, the bank crisis, TARP and the government bailout, unemployment in the US…

Because socialism or communism works so much better right? People are especially envious of the great freedom people in North Korea are enjoying? Same as Cuba? Venezuela? Argentina? (wanna change your currency to another one in Argentina to hedge yourself against a very strong inflation? you can't, because the socialist state won't let you do that) What's next after Karl Marx? That the homophobic racist murderer that…

Your comparison of North Korea with Marx shows unequivocally that you don't have any clue what you're talking about. It is actually laughable how wrong you are. Maybe you should read some Marx before dismissing something you don't know the first thing about.

Re: The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power

#90

Post by pvdm »

silentmars wrote: post #2

Decent basic points, but superficial and often missing the real underlying trends. For better analysis on the same general ideas, I recommend: http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2011/12/08/acting-dead-trading-up-... http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2011/06/08/a-brief-history-of-the-... (ribbonfarm is my favorite blog)

The ideas are ok but the writing is too dense, too verbose. Not my cup of tea.
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