Posted on 02/28/2008 9:57:42 AM PST by KingofZion
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton declares, "The economy is not working for middle-class and working families," noting the typical American family earns less now than it did seven years ago. Citing the same trend, her Democratic presidential rival, Sen. Barack Obama, promises "to put America back on the path to prosperity." Sen. John McCain, the likely Republican nominee, says, "It is harder for families to weather hard economic times."
The candidates' pitches are aimed at wooing the vast majority of Americans who consider themselves middle class. Those people tell pollsters that they are increasingly anxious about their financial security, a feeling that has intensified in recent years because of flattening wages, rising income inequality, increasing consumer debt, soaring health-care costs, spiraling energy prices and, now, declining home values.
But as Americans' wage growth has slowed, their rate of consumption has accelerated, leaving some economists dubious about claims that the middle class is worse off than before.
"There are clearly some challenges out there, and it is easy to worry. But it is a mixed picture," said Stephen Rose, a Washington economist who is writing a book about the middle class. *** Rose says that if total compensation -- which includes the increasing cost of health and other benefits -- is included, American workers have done better than census numbers would indicate. Also, he said, upward mobility allowed 13 percent more Americans to earn inflation-adjusted salaries of $100,000 in 2004 than in 1979.
*** Items once considered luxuries -- dishwashers, central air conditioning, video cameras -- are now common. The average size of new homes has increased 40 percent in the past generation. And as many consumer items cost less, Americans are shopping more. In 1991 the average American bought 33.7 pieces of apparel; by 2002 he or she bought 48 ***
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
If you measure the standard of living by consumer goods, you are correct. Most of this, however, is a result of extremely cheap consumer goods imported mostly from china. If we made the money we do today and had to buy consumer products built in this Country, which was once possible not that long ago, the average family would not be able to buy the products we now point to to show our higher standard of living.
Still buying lotto tickets and going to casinos tho.
Even if so, could it be.... taxes? .... and inflation? How are increased government programs going to improve the lot of those who pay the freight?
To the Leftists: Economies go up and down like sine waves. Get over it, people. Welcome to the Circle of Life.
Putin will run rings around him before he can get a word out...
This is a nation of opportunity. As such, it matters little what the median income of the bottom quintile is today versus 5, 10 or 20 years ago. What matters is how many households have moved up from the 5th quintile to the 4th; the 4th to the 3rd. All the rest is bull$h_t!
Idiots. The government usually destroys whatever the private sector has built. The government can not lift us up to prosperity; it can only provide an environment in which the private sector can create value.
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