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Given the state of wage stagnation, skyrocketing healthcare costs, property taxes, tuition for public university coupled with an increasingly 'business-friendly' climate in Washington, quality of life for the American middle class is rapidly declining. You can attempt to claw yourself into the upper-middle class, an increasingly difficult task these days given that education is also being held hostage by corporate interests. We dump six figures of debt on American public college graduates and then ask them to compete for the same wages as graduates from other developed countries who have a much more robust public education system and no debt burden, then deride them as 'snoflakes' for speaking up about it. 'Pull yourself up by your bootstraps' has become the tone-deaf rallying cry of an increasingly out-of-touch Washington, more interested in preserving corporate interests and campaign donations than the education or well being of the citizens.
Most Americans are a single chronic illness away from bankruptcy. Conversely, treatment for that same illness in every other developed country carries no such risk. Millennials are derided for having fewer or no children, but no one wants to talk about how it costs 10s of thousands of dollars out of pocket in hospital fees for an uncomplicated childbirth, a problem no other Western nation faces. Our failure is that most people waste time blaming the individual, while turning a blind eye to the system that propagates these injustices.
At the end of the day, what defines developed country? A large military, abundance of corporate headquarters? Presence of wealthy private landowners? Then congratulations, America is developed. If, however, the measure of development is the rate of economic mobility, access to affordable education, healthcare, social services, ability to 'survive' in the middle class, then not only do we fail, we fall below the level of even many third-world nations. Unfortunately, the past few decades have shown that our own Nationalistic arrogance will continually prevent us from advancing, until it becomes our undoing.
Low unemployment puts upward pressure on wages. Business friendly practices lower unemployment. European countries charge much less for their corporate tax rate than Americans do. The average American citizen could make better choices when it comes to excessive student debt (e.i. don’t finance a liberal arts degree), and family planning (having 3 kids from 3 different guys by 21 not such a good idea). We can also tighten up on illegal immigration.
Low unemployment puts upward pressure on wages. Business friendly practices lower unemployment. European countries charge much less for their corporate tax rate than Americans do. The average American citizen could make better choices when it comes to excessive student debt (e.i. don’t finance a liberal arts degree), and family planning (having 3 kids from 3 different guys by 21 not such a good idea). We can also tighten up on illegal immigration.
Your article was referring to the month of January 2018. In that month, wages went up 3%. Nearly every month since January 2015 has been at 3% or higher, with some months being near 4%. Yes, wages are going up. But they have been since Obama's last two years. In fact, as you can see in the chart, they have been going up at a slower pace in the last six months than they have been over the last few years.
Until the income disparity is enough to stop immigrants all over the country (legal and illegal) from choosing the U.S. as their place of destination this anti-American anti-capitalism rhetoric is all semantics.
America is still so big, rich, and diverse that immigrants literally laugh at these negative American statistics as they fill out their visa and green cards to move here permanently. And have babies by the millions so their children can have birthright citizenship then grow up to sponsor their foreign parents for green cards.
If anyone expects any country on earth as big and diverse as America be a socialist utopia paradise, let alone America, then I have some bad news for you.
As Americans, shame on us for whining over the petty shortcomings of the world's greatest country on the planet while folks south of us risk life and limb just to make it on this side of the border.
I think you are making some significant errors here. A larger population also increases demand for goods and services, thus creating a need for more jobs. It isn't as though there is a fixed number of jobs in the world, and if we make too many babies, we will have a lot of unemployment.
Counter argument: A large population creates demand for good and services only if people have the money to pay for them. If people are barely surviving or are living on govt dole, they won't have enough money to buy goods and services.
Also, some people talk about "demographic dividend", i.e., higher the population, more the economic output, higher the tax base and more are the tax receipts.
The flaw in this theory is that you need to spend money and efforts to develop a population that contributes positively to economy. An unskilled, uneducated and lazy population will either snatch from others (crime), beg from others (nuisance) or survive on govt money (negative contribution to the society)
Our rulers say there is no problem with that. Surely cream rises to the top?
When I consider the general standard of living and quality of life in northern European nations, it does get my attention.
I have no problem with accumulating half a billion dollars or so. Half a billion dollars is the subject of scorn in todays world of the 10 billion plus in assets.
Sometimes I think we got carried away with catering to the rich. The wealth has failed to trickle down, it has been trickling up for at least 40 years.
I came across this global statistic when it comes to wage stagnation
We're not alone. Aside from Russia's massive wage growth, the US is a distant #2, German and France are doing worse than us and the UK is going backward. Asia on the other hand is skyrocketing. Japan is at the bottom of the Asian market, yet is still almost double the US.
The US does have high income disparity, but we have everything from multibillionaires to homeless which really skews the average. The only place I see this being a problem is where all the wealthy co locate in one city and drive up cost of living for everyone else.
What's more important than income disparity in my opinion is upward mobility. Most 3rd world countries with high income disparity have distinct social classes and wealth is largely inherited and the poor rarely are afforded the opportunity to ascend into a higher social class. In this area we do very well, but we could improve https://www.epi.org/publication/usa-...ries-mobility/
Note the Scandinavian countries don't seem to afford much upward mobility. Slovenia is the leader, but it's not really surprising given the previous generation were communist, and there was essentially nowhere to go but up.
Counter argument: A large population creates demand for good and services only if people have the money to pay for them. If people are barely surviving or are living on govt dole, they won't have enough money to buy goods and services.
Also, some people talk about "demographic dividend", i.e., higher the population, more the economic output, higher the tax base and more are the tax receipts.
The flaw in this theory is that you need to spend money and efforts to develop a population that contributes positively to economy. An unskilled, uneducated and lazy population will either snatch from others (crime), beg from others (nuisance) or survive on govt money (negative contribution to the society)
Well said.
If given a choice, take middle and upper class immigrants over unskilled lower classes for maximum economic payback. That's how other developed countries typically run their immigration programs.
This government is. I don't see the governments of Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Belgium, Netherlands, Canada, or even Germany in that way.
There is a backlash coming I think. The Millenials are quite fond of socialism, a very large percentage harbor a venomous hatred for capitalism. They will be voting for awhile. They almost elected one of the more unelectable candidates we have ran in some time. Actually Sanders would likely be our president if the DNC didn't corrupt the process.
The problem we have in America is misidentified in the first place. Our core problem is corruption--in both government and business. Going back and forth between pro-business and pro-government policies is a joke. Both are utterly corrupt. And at the highest levels there are a few people pulling the strings of both the corporations and governments. Those people typically don't get their names in the headlines of the mainstream news media (other than, perhaps, George Soros), which is itself a corrupt cartel.
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