The Middle Class Blames every one but themselves

Nope but there is talk about punishing the greedy rich people to help the poor, that usually sounds like punishing them to make the world fair.

That is were the liberal economic platform loses me. I am cool with social programs if we all make sacrifices to pay for them, I am also cool with making laws that stop wealthy people from exploiting the masses (hard to do since they have the influence that both parties need $$$).

 

Love these "up from their bootstraps" stories:

"I don't know about you, but when I was growing up, when I was flipping burgers at McDonald's, when I was standing in front of that big Hobart machine washing dishes, or waiting tables, I never thought of myself as stuck in some station in life," Ryan recently told a crowd at a high school in suburban Denver. "I thought to myself, I'm the American dream on the path or journey so that I can find happiness however I define it myself."

It drew big applause.

And yet Ryan, 42, was born into one of the most prominent families in Janesville, Wis., the son of a successful attorney and the grandson of the top federal prosecutor for the western region of the state.Ryan grew up in a big Colonial house on a wooded lot, and his extended clan includes investment managers, corporate executives and owners of major construction companies.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-ryan-assets-20120826,0,3026282.story

 

There's talk of punishing those who committed fraud and whose actions helped bring down our economy. I've got a news flash for anyone who actually takes that talk seriously whether it delights them or, in your case, frightens them - it ain't gonna happen. The concentration of economic and therefore political power means that all but the small fries will get away scot free. This was, after all, one of the big goals of right wing economics.

Any other talk of "punishing success" is just cynical whining from people who have benefited from the punishment of hard work by our middle and working classes.

 

Get rid of the mortgage interest income credit, I would agree with that.

And then you have C Pizzeria saying middle income families with credit card debt working 3 shifts to pay their bills. Well yes, they were sold on a life they could not afford took out credit card debt to keep up the appearances of that life and not they (we) can't pay our debt.

But yes educating the masses is hard to do when Companies selling us shit have more money and to sell their shit on the people.

You see it with food for children, all the shitty stuff we eat they have huge marketing budgets when the department of health has a tiny fraction of that budget. I can agree with you all in the sense that it is not a safe fight.

How to fix the issue, make marketing to kids illegal, making the food illegal, taxing more to increase the health department, leaving people to fend for them selves, is not an easy answer.

 

What are you, some kind pinko Communist?

The steps you've proposed won't by themselves make any dent in our current social and economic imbalances and injustices last alone any lasting change. They won't bring us one iota closer to being a meritocracy.

 

Not really how many people making over 250K committed fraud so they will be have their taxes increase as punishment?

I support the elimination of the Bush-Obama tax cuts, I just want all of them to be eliminated not just the populist part of for the rich. Also higher Capital gains tax and an inheritance tax of 50%.

The capital gains increase and Inheritance tax increases would be fights that I wish the Democrats would fight more, I support them on that, but unfortunately those positions do not win votes unless you put high floors on them.

 

They committed fraud because they knew they'd get away with it. They knew and still know full well that the personal profit they reaped will far outstrip any increase in taxes they'd face as a result. And they've got one half of the political system and it's useful idiots on a full out press to actually LOWER their taxes. It boggles the mind.

Let's just face reality, we'll never get a meritocracy in this country because the 0.01% don't want it even while they bleat loudly that they've earned their riches single-handedly and solely due to their own hard work and undoubted genius.

 

Somewhere along the line the rules changed and the vast majority of Americans are trying to figure out how to play the new "game." Do I take out $50K in loans for my kid's school or do I tell him to become a plumber? When peoples' standard of living is worse than their parents, it's a big deal in "the richest country in the world."

I think it's instructive to look at the root causes since Reagan's revolution as to why the middle class is getting shafted and not to simply say "stop buying flat screens and having the temerity to take an annual vacation, selfish idiots!" We're a paranoid, overworked country as it is. The elites tend to like it that way. Can't ask too many questions when you're too busy working.

 

The elites have used the "boiling frog" tactic on the middle class, knocking out its props one by one slowly so the middle class wouldn't jump out of the pot. That's one reason it's difficult for them to get a handle on what has been done to them while they were keeping their heads down and working frantically to try to build a decent life for themselves. This also, of course, just makes it that much easier for right wing snake oil salespeople to keep selling people like ceezmad the false goods.

 

As the OP points out, much easier to tell them that they have done nothing wrong, yes they deserved that McMancion, yes send you kids to private colleges and take on debt is ok. It is all the fault of the rich evil people keeping us down. Hey why not add the gold standard thing, some people eat that shit up.

And yes me wanting the inheritance tax at 50% is right wing snake oil for sure.

 

No worries, the journalists will continue to marvel at Ryan's sincerity.

 

I know. Ryan had no options just like the 35 yr. old single mom working a dead-end job.

 

What busload of bullcrap!!!!

My job has been outsourced, my 401k tanked, my house is worth 50% of I paid for it... Boy I should have thought about it before working at a plant that was there for 50 years, for listenning to the banks and realtors that said that houses in the area would increase its value. Better yet I should have ignored the "experts" praising the post-industrial economy and I should have told my broker not to invest in derivatives or to sell my lehman stocks in2007.

Yep, i have no one but myself ti blame for it...

 

Where did you work? Where do you live where your house lost that much value? What plant was this?

 

I'm speaking as a generical middle class member.

However my personal situation is not mich better. Although my job has not been outsourced yet and I still can pay my mortgage, most of the rest is still true... I'm underwater, my pay has been slashed and my retirement funds lost plenty of value. What difference does it make where do I live?

 

It's all your fault, dude. Now pay off some credit cards and say 10 Hail Marys.

 

The same place other people said that it's all because the middle class voted Republican.

If you get to make crappy straw men, so do I.

Not judging from your posting history, you don't.

Not if you voted for the same policies that caused you to lose your job.

And this is a statistical argument. Anyone stupid enough to not be able to figure out that any such arguments imply "some but not all" or who tries to use only anecdotal snippets in a statistical argument should not be taken seriously.

You've failed to ask yourself why people in the 99.9% are forced to "reinvent themselves on their own". You just assume that we are all subjects and not citizens and therefore we should all just bend over for the overlords without asking why.

Why is having a decent life not possible? What is wrong with capitalism that it cannot deliver a decent life for even less than half of the population?

Why is it ridiculous to support policies or parties known to benefit the middle class over those known to undermine it? The rich certainly know how to support policies and parties that strengthen their grip on economic and political power.

And not taxing the rich and moving all jobs to China and India are magic bullets that will save us exactly how? Putting our economy into the hands of a casino and putting all economic and political power into the hands of the top 0.01% will save us exactly how? If you want "ridiculous", look at the Romney/Ryan class warfare policies.

Who is making that argument? Globalization should build middle classes in places that don't have them while not also beggaring the middles classes that do exist. Policies you support directly attack the existing middle classes while assisting one of the least free societies on earth.

So you chose the path of least resistance. There is nothing wrong with that at an individual level but I'd rather fight to maintain living standards here than just give up, kowtow to the overlords and learn Mandarin.

So much for your claim to have a problem painting people with broad brushes.

East Asia got where it is because they followed the opposite of policies you seem to endorse. Rather than trying to practice laissez-faire, they enacted government-led plans that deliberately built and continue to nurture middle classes as part of their strategy. Their CEOs still don't make as high a percentage of their base worker pay than US CEOs. they haven't completely casino-ized their financial markets. They're not perfect societies or economies but they have a lot to teach us and also our elites about the proper balances a society needs to be successful. They also have a lot to teach other developing countries that have failed because they've locked themselves into the American imperial model of exporting their natural resources for the benefit of only their top 0.01%.

A completely unsustainable situation, as China is increasingly showing us - and as much as I would not want to live in China, they've done a lot more right economically in a few short years than, say, Russia has done in about the same time frame or that Latin America did for decades. Meanwhile, Americans have been sold a bunch of lies about the "New Economy" and "ownership society" and other nonsense and as the Romney/Ryan campaign shows, we're still being showered in bullshit.

Then thank Reagan and the American Right for bamboozling Americans into believing they could borrow their way to a decent life in order to make up for the attacks on their real prosperity made by the American Right.

Bad policy is bad policy even if has an accidental short-term effect. To be worthy of self-congratulations, we'd have had to find a way to build middle classes abroad without screwing over the one right here. Too bad the American Right made sure that didn't happen.

 

It is always easier to tell people what they want to hear. Telling them "Well, voting for Reagan and both Bushes, buying the right-wing economic snake oil and failing to look after your own interests for 40 years may not have been the best course of action you could have followed." is not a message that can be expected to gain wide spread acceptance by the target audience.

Of course, as I've made no small effort to make clear, the failure of the middle class to act in its own interests is not the entire story. The problem is that in your desire to avoid putting much (but not all) of the blame on our plutocracy where it squarely belongs, you lock yourself into absurd arguments but at this point I can't help you with that. If you like the taste of snake oil, bottoms up and good luck to you.

By the way, it's "McMansion".

At least you admit it.

 

What ever happened to the notion that a rising tide floats all boats. We are about to go off an economic cliff in January.

 

Yep, I know this guy is right... In one sense at least...

 

Do those two sentences have anything whatsoever to do with each other?

 

Think of them as bumperstickers next to each other on the back bumper of a pick-up truck.

 

Reminds me of this:

 

Have you taken a look at at the CBO projections if our "Dear Leaders" plan to take no action and let Taxarmageddon effect will have? This isn't TeaParty projections, it is CBO estimates.