Young people are realizing that they are less likely than their parents to reach middle class.
Personally, I don't really care how many people consider themselves "middle class," "upper middle class," etc. There has to be some objective way of measuring this, and a self-assessment is probably the least reliable mechanism for this. The average person rioting on the street in Charlotte last night has a standard of living that would have made Andre Carnegie, J.P. Morgan, and even Sam Walton envious.
There’s a lot more than just those 25 million that are “invisible” in the 4.9% unemployment rate. The headliner “unemployment rate” that the media uses has been so tortured and manipulated that it really has no relevancy to the facts on the ground anymore. It makes for a great soundbite, and is very useful for portraying the state of the economy as rosy, due to its official-sounding nature. The problem is that people are starting to really grasp the disparity between what the mainstream media is saying and what is really happening, particularly with reference to their job.
I wish someone would dredge up Pelosi’s comment back during the Bush terms, where she points to a sub-5% unemployment rate and labels it the “worst economy”. If it was bad then, it’s just as bad now (actually worse, because the number now is even less accurate).
I think a lot of people that think they are in the middle-class, actually are in the lower-class. They just don’t want to admit it.
The government’s unemployment figures are always much lower than what Gallop hears from real people they poll. I think Clifton’s comments are an attempt to explain why so many are fed up with the government and its media propaganda wing. The game is rigged to enrich and perpetuate the 1%, in and out of government. Clifton knows it. We know it. Things will not change without drastic action.
What irritates me is how the gov’t “redefines” things to their own benefit. For example, the cost of distillate fuels is no longer figured into the Cost of Living. Of course, my SS check depends on that statistic. Since this clown took office in 2008, I’ve had a 0.2% increase in my SS check. Am I really supposed to believe that CoL costs have only increased by two-tenths of one percent since Obozo took office? Yet, transfer payments (e.g., welfare, ADC, food stamps, etc.) have risen 31% during the same time. When I retired I figured out that I needed to live to 137 to breakeven on SS. Now it’s more like 150 years old. Now he want to give even more to a bunch of illegals. This crap has got to stop.
“economic recovery”
The economy is changing.
Detroit is never going to get a large percentage of its lost jobs back.
The building trades at the low-end have mainly been taken over by immigrants.
China is now the manufacturing colossus of the world.
Being middle class certainly doesn't feel like middle class anymore, that's for sure.