The Middle Class

20 Super Wealthy Individuals Have More Money Than The Poorest 152 Million Americans Combined

Wealthy - Public DomainDo we need any more evidence before we will finally admit that the middle class in America is being systematically destroyed? As you will see below, when you add together all of the wealth of the poorest 152 million Americans, it still falls short of the combined net worth of the 20 wealthiest Americans. This is a list that includes Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Mark Zuckerberg. To many, the core of the problem is that people like Gates and Buffett are making too much money. But I disagree. There is nothing wrong with working hard, building a company and making lots of money. The real problem is the fact that the bottom half of the country is steadily getting poorer. Once upon a time, this nation had the healthiest and most vibrant middle class in the history of the world, but now that middle class is dying. If we don’t do something about this, soon we may not have much of a middle class left. (Read More...)

Pocketbook Pain: The Rapidly Rising Cost Of Living Is Absolutely Killing The Middle Class In America

Pain In The WalletAll over America, the middle class is dying and poverty is on the rise.  One of the primary reasons for this is the rapidly rising cost of living in the United States.  The cost of just about everything that average families shell out money for on a regular basis – food, rent, health insurance, etc. – is rising much faster than wages are.  In a previous article I noted that the federal poverty level for a family of five is $28,410, but 51 percent of all American workers are making less than $30,000 a year at this point.  We have seen an explosion in the number of people in this country that are considered to be “the working poor” and it gets worse with each passing year. (Read More...)

Goodbye Middle Class: 51 Percent Of All American Workers Make Less Than 30,000 Dollars A Year

The Middle Class - Public DomainWe just got more evidence that the middle class in America is dying.  According to brand new numbers that were just released by the Social Security Administration, 51 percent of all workers in the United States make less than $30,000 a year.  Let that number sink in for a moment.  You can’t support a middle class family in America today on just $2,500 a month – especially after taxes are taken out.  And yet more than half of all workers in this country make less than that each month.  In order to have a thriving middle class, you have got to have an economy that produces lots of middle class jobs, and that simply is not happening in America today. (Read More...)

If The American Dream Is To Own A Home, Then It Hasn’t Been In Worse Shape Since 1967

Home House For Sale Mortgage MortgagesThanks to the “Obama recovery”, the rate of homeownership in the United States has fallen to the lowest level in 48 years.  The percentage of Americans that own a home is widely considered to be a key indicator of the health of the middle class, and we have just learned that during the second quarter of 2015 that number dropped from 63.7 percent to 63.4 percent.  It is now the lowest that it has been since 1967.  Unlike a lot of other government economic statistics, this one is fairly difficult to manipulate.  Either someone owns a home or they do not.  And what the homeownership rate is telling us is that the percentage of Americans that can qualify for a mortgage has been falling dramatically.  Just take a look at the following chart.  This is not just a decline – this is a complete and utter collapse… (Read More...)

The Death Of The American Dream In 22 Numbers

Abandoned HomeWe are the generation that gets to witness the end of the American Dream.  The numbers that you are about to see tell a story.  They tell a story of a once mighty economy that is dying.  For decades, the rest of the planet has regarded the United States as “the land of opportunity” where almost anyone can be successful if they are willing to work hard.  And when I was growing up, it seemed like almost everyone was living the American Dream.  I lived on a “middle class” street and I went to a school where it seemed like almost everyone was middle class.  When I was in high school, it was very rare to ever hear of a parent that was unemployed, and virtually every family that I knew had a comfortable home and more than one nice vehicle.  But now that has all changed.  The “American Dream” has been transformed into a very twisted game of musical chairs.  With each passing year, more people are falling out of the middle class, and most of the rest of us are scrambling really hard to keep our own places.  Something has gone horribly wrong, and yet Americans are very deeply divided when it comes to finding answers to our problems.  We love to point fingers and argue with one another, and meanwhile things just continue to get even worse.  The following are 22 numbers that are very strong evidence of the death of the American Dream… (Read More...)

19 Reasons Why You Can Laugh When Anyone Tells You That The Economy Is In Good Shape

Laughing Woman - Photo by Peter van der SluijsHave you heard the one about the “economic recovery” in the United States?  It’s quite funny, but it is not actually true.  Every day, the establishment media points to the fact that global stock markets have soared to unprecedented heights as evidence that the economy is improving.  But just because a bunch of wealthy people have gotten temporarily even richer on paper does not mean that the real economy is in good shape.  In fact, as you will see below, things just continue to get even tougher for the poor and the middle class.  Retail stores are closing at the fastest pace since the fall of Lehman Brothers, the rate of homeownership in this country is the lowest that it has been in 19 years, one out of every five families do not have a single member that is employed, and one out of every five children is living in poverty.  We are working harder, earning less and going into more debt.  With each passing day, the middle class gets a little bit smaller and the ranks of the poor get a little bit larger.  But at least the stock market is doing great, eh? (Read More...)

45 Signs That America Will Soon Be A Nation With A Very Tiny Elite And The Rest Of Us Will Be Poor

The middle class is being systematically wiped out of existence in the United States today.  America is a nation with a very tiny elite that is rapidly becoming increasingly wealthy while everyone else is becoming poorer.  So why is this happening?  Well, it is actually very simple.  Our institutions are designed to concentrate wealth in the hands of a very limited number of people.  Throughout human history, almost all societies that have had a big centralized government have also had a very high concentration of wealth in the hands of the elite.  Throughout human history, almost all societies that have allowed big business or big corporations to dominate the economy have also had a very high concentration of wealth in the hands of the elite.  Well, the United States has allowed both big government and big corporations to grow wildly out of control.  Those were huge mistakes.  Our founding fathers attempted to establish a nation where the federal government would be greatly limited and where corporations would be greatly restricted.  Unfortunately, we have turned our backs on those principles and now we are paying the price. (Read More...)