Goodbye Middle Class, 2014 SSA wage info.

a reply to: smirkley

It works about as well as capitalism, in other words, by itself, not at all. Capitalism is far, far, FAAAAR from being the success you all pretend it is. You just ignore it's problems and yell at people to adapt to it's failings rather than address them and try to fix them.

originally posted by: darkbake
The middle class really is losing right now. Thanks for the great data. Civil unrest is better than losing the middle class entirely. Right now, you have to have a masters or doctorate to get into the middle class.

No you don't.
I am what is considered 'upper middle class' (key word is considered here) and no masters or doctorate here.

People discount trade schools, but if a person is wise enough, and not fall into the liberal arts majors, a rather comfortable life can be had.

originally posted by: Aazadan

originally posted by: NewzNose
a reply to: Puppylove

My Dad had 3 jobs to raise his children and did so until he increased his value at job #1 to get higher paid management position. This was in 1966 - 1974.

I started working as a junior in high school, then worked 2 jobs from 1978 to 1985. I was hired by a new employer making 5 cents more an hour. I was making $10 an hour in 1996 when I went and started my own business. I am still there!

If job #1 isn't paying your bills, get a second job!

If you work multiple jobs, you will never get an actual education and you will usually just be working no skill jobs where you aren't getting any valuable on the job experience either. That is not a recipe for getting ahead.

Oh such a young one you are. If you were were actually all growed up, you would realize that sometimes you do what you have to do. PERIOD.

The point you are missing here.. okay the biggest point you are missing here.. each job was a step towards a better one, each experience lead up to being able to start their own business.

Explain to me how "valuable on the job experience' didn't happen?

a reply to: Aazadan
Yeah, I hear ya, Aazadan. I’m a software engineer/analyst myself, and I know my skills will be in jeopardy before retirement age. You don’t hear/read a lot about it, but a great deal of progress is being made in the area of software generated software solutions (automated programmers). It won’t be that far in the future before you’ll be able to basically describe to a machine via voice commands a problem needing resolution, along with a set of specifications and requirements, and it will design and code the solution on it’s own. And in most cases it will do it better than a human programmer.

Also, white collar jobs are generally less physically demanding, and require less physical dexterity, than blue collar jobs. Thus making white collar jobs more natural for machine intelligence. I imagine jobs like accounting clerks, low level department supervisors, helpline assistance, and the like will fall first. Mid-level management may soon follow that.

In any case, our days are numbered in the job market. It concerns me a little when I think of it. I suspect there will be some uncomfortable times ahead as we transition into a machine dominated workforce. I keep picturing the Elois and Morlocks in the movie ‘The Time Machine’.

Bummer...

a reply to: sociolpath

Get two 29 hour a week jobs and you are flush with cash at that rate of expense.

Burned out? Heck yes. Doing the right thing? Certainly. That kind of ethic will get you noticed and a 40 hour week at one job in the country I live in.

Oh thats right, I live in a country where everyonw gets a trophy now in school. No matter how slack you are.

originally posted by: Justaposter

originally posted by: darkbake
The middle class really is losing right now. Thanks for the great data. Civil unrest is better than losing the middle class entirely. Right now, you have to have a masters or doctorate to get into the middle class.

No you don't.
I am what is considered 'upper middle class' (key word is considered here) and no masters or doctorate here.

People discount trade schools, but if a person is wise enough, and not fall into the liberal arts majors, a rather comfortable life can be had.

You sir have nailed it. Thank you.

And yes, I guess being a machinist or a welder isnt as cool as being something with a pretty parchment on the wall. But you will never ever be out of work.

a reply to: smirkley
I agree with you, Smirkly, as far as people needing to be able to adapt to changing times, and being open to retraining when their job skills are no longer in demand. This is true. You gotta do what you gotta do.

I just think that capitalism, as well as socialism, has it’s dangers when taken to the extreme/exploited. The problem with capitalism arises when greed goes unchecked. When profit becomes the sole purpose for existence as a company, and no amount of money is ever enough, the worker often loses. Take Walmart, for instance. When you have fulltime employees on foodstamps because management won’t pay a living wage, that’s a problem.

I wish I had all the answers, but I don’t. I do, however, know there is a problem. And it’s not just due to lazy socialists refusing to work. It runs much deeper than that...

Peace

I do not disagree there is a problem.

Part of it may be the untold hoards of cash corporations stash overseas instead of reinvesting in America. Apple is a great example.

1985.

I graduated high school.

Got myself a fulltime minimum wage job and moved out of my parents house with nothing but a duffle bag full of clothes.

Rented a one-bedroom apartment for myself and bought a small 'beater' car for a couple hundred bucks. Over the course of the following few months, I slowly filled my apartment with furniture and all the necessities to make a little nest for myself (dishes, pots and pans, towels, can opener, etc).

Within a year and a half, I was able to save up enough money to start my first year of university. I continued to work my fulltime minimum wage job during the day and went to school at night for the following 5 years until I obtained my degree in accounting.

Not only could I keep a roof over my head, feed myself, own and operate a vehicle, and go to school in the evenings on minimum wage... I was even able to afford a case of beer on a Friday night to go out partying with my pals.

No handouts from mom and dad, no loans, no credit cards, no food stamps, no soup lines.

THAT is a livable wage folks.

End of story.

a reply to: Puppylove

Capitalism works so long as there is no futzing with it, though. You have to recognize that things like TARP and subsidization of rent, utilities, food, etc at both ends of the spectrum are what failed here. Not everyone should own a house... that's very much capitalism in action. Offering subprime mortgages to folks making minimum wage for a house they can't afford, then backing it with taxpayer money is NOT capitalism and screws up the laws of supply and demand. The ideology that "everyone should go to college" and offering loans for crap, worthless degrees in non-money fields is NOT capitalism, it's a total sham that also screws with supply and demand. 30 years ago college graduates weren't a dime a dozen and even those currently worthless degrees equated to jobs, now that we're sending anyone who is willing to sign on for $50k+ in long term debt to college to learn art critique or early American lit, the capitalism of the university system is non existent. If there were no handouts, subsidies, and the like, a minimum wage job would provide what was required for rent, food, a car, the same way it did in the 50s and 60s. Instead we have a system which has artificial components applied to it and, for some baffling reason, capitalism is blamed...

If you zoom out and look at the bigger picture -- "survival of the fittest" doesn't apply to mankind anymore. Humans have removed themselves from the equation of natural selection, we've sidestepped nature. We're avoiding natural plagues that would normally decimate our populations, and live in areas that aren't hospitable and conducive to human life.

When a species can manipulate its own DNA, it has in a sense "cheated nature" and broken the system of natural selection that governs all other species on Earth. We've found ways to thrive and skirt the laws of nature, and are now evolving along a path of our choosing -- not nature's.

a reply to: burdman30ott6

Wrong, basic math says otherwise. The fact that our population is so large makes a pure capitalistic system auto-corrupt. Why? Because the population is too large and disjointed to be able to vote with their wallet or their boots, both powers that need to exist in the hands of the people for capitalism to work.

Same as the power of the vote needs to exist for democracy to work. Again a thing destroyed by an overly large and disjointed populace.

The greater the populace in number, the harder it is for them to stand together. Both democracy and capitalism requires an organized populace to work.

a reply to: netbound
The medical field is one of the first of the intellectual and skilled professions that is now feeling the bite of forced technology and robots.

We are being corralled and people refuse to see it. It is evident all around us. The criminalization of cash. The removal of parental control over the schools and their children. Forced community developments with more residents than can be sustained or managed, ensuring a societal breakdown and chaos.

The handwriting has filled the walls and has spilled over to the sky and now is filling the streets. We are already trapped, our fear, greed and complacency has sealed our fate. The only choice we have left is what level slave we will be chosen to be. They already have all the overseers they need, so it is house or field.

We wanted equality and we have it. We are all negatives now.

a reply to: smirkley

yes sure, but corruption,cronyism,abuse of political power,selective adherence to the rule of law (the list could go on) is obliterating the golden goose the middle class.A fact.

a reply to: Zngland

Those things readily happen with capitalism,....


... communism, socialism, and every single ism any government chooses to run under.

It is not exclusive to any one group.

Does anyone here think if McDonald's raised their wage by choice or law, to lets say $15 bucks an hour that the food jammed in a bag and shoved out the window will taste any better? Look better? Be any more healthy?

You know that isnt the case.

But the Big Mac will be alot more expensive. And that general inflation would reduce sales. Meaning workers will be laid off. (note that McDonalds is not in great shape anymore and franchises are closing down.)

You want a fair living wage entitlement? Get it and in short order, your buying power will be exactly right where it is now.

Wake up America. Get off your asses and change your life if you wish to. Just dont expect me to help pay for your demanded lifestyle. The internet or Facebook wont collapse without you if you take a second job or improve your first.

Its the old addage, give a man a fish, or teach a man to fish. Etc.

Someone gives you something, like more wage for the same work, then it will be expected as a right from then on.

And it isnt.

originally posted by: burdman30ott6
a reply to: Puppylove

Capitalism works so long as there is no futzing with it, though. You have to recognize that things like TARP and subsidization of rent, utilities, food, etc at both ends of the spectrum are what failed here. Not everyone should own a house... that's very much capitalism in action. Offering subprime mortgages to folks making minimum wage for a house they can't afford, then backing it with taxpayer money is NOT capitalism and screws up the laws of supply and demand. The ideology that "everyone should go to college" and offering loans for crap, worthless degrees in non-money fields is NOT capitalism, it's a total sham that also screws with supply and demand. 30 years ago college graduates weren't a dime a dozen and even those currently worthless degrees equated to jobs, now that we're sending anyone who is willing to sign on for $50k+ in long term debt to college to learn art critique or early American lit, the capitalism of the university system is non existent. If there were no handouts, subsidies, and the like, a minimum wage job would provide what was required for rent, food, a car, the same way it did in the 50s and 60s. Instead we have a system which has artificial components applied to it and, for some baffling reason, capitalism is blamed...

Capitalism stopped working during the late 1800s early 1900s when the robber barons - aka Carnegie, Rockefeller, Morgan, DuPont, etc. merged their business ventures with politics.

I'd argue even go so far to say that capitalism has never really worked unless you consider hiring thugs to beat workers into submission a necessary part of the capitalist system and using child labor.

The American economy was built on the backs of slaves, cheap labor, child labor, and absolute abuse of workers. To suggest that this is what capitalism is and should be is blind ignorance.

I challenge anyone to read Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith in it's entirety and not just the quotes that agree with your current worldview. The book is still relevant today. Smith wrote a very objective critique of the good, bad, and ugly from the view of both owners and workers. Even going so far as to suggest that unions were a necessary evil because of the collusion of owners to keep wages low.

Of course, this was seen recently with the tech companies in Silicon Valley colluding to keep salaries low by willingly not hiring each others workers.

MysticMushroom is also right - we have removed themselves from "survival of the fittest." However, we still haven't removed ourselves from our other douche bag behaviors - like excessive greed and the willingness to destroy the lives of others for the sake of that greed. Greed that continues to push us into war with other nations over resources (oil, gold, drugs, etc) while the poor people pay the price in blood for the benefit of the wealthy.

Think about that a second - the poor and lower class pay the price in blood for the benefit of the wealthy. That's not capitalism, that's feudalism. And by 2016 the richest 1% will own more than 50% of the world's wealth (if it doesn't already).

I run into people every single day spouting that...I worked for everything I have...

If you took out a loan to buy it, you are a liar because you only promised to work for it, ignorantly giving your future away for stuff that depreciates the minute you drive it off the lot or take it out of the package.

Most of us have very little control of any aspect of our lives in reality.

It's the banks. Those institutions so many have come to rely on for credit.

Credit is NOT wealth, any more than Health Insurance is actual health care.

The rest of the world views Americans the same way Jews in Israel view Christians tourists there and spit upon them.

Work all you want, chances are you'll just work yourself to death for what equates to little or nothing.

Rise, or just dig your nose into that grind-stone and pretend everything is Okey Dokey.

Quiet desparation...........

a reply to: WCmutant

Nice to see there is at least one here who has an understanding that there is nothing new happening here.

The New World Order Hoo Hah is just some externalization tactic to keep people from realizing that nothing ever really did change.

originally posted by: smirkley
a reply to: Zngland

Those things readily happen with capitalism,....


... communism, socialism, and every single ism any government chooses to run under.

It is not exclusive to any one group.

Does anyone here think if McDonald's raised their wage by choice or law, to lets say $15 bucks an hour that the food jammed in a bag and shoved out the window will taste any better? Look better? Be any more healthy?

You know that isnt the case.

McDonald's could also stop spending lots of money on R&D bulls#!t ideas like trying to engineer broccoli to taste like bubble gum in hopes that kids will "eat healthy" in their restaurants.

Their food is already cheap. Their profits are exceedingly high. I have no doubt their CEOs are paid WAY too much for what they offer in the marketplace.

I bet if any of us got a hold of the balance sheets and budget allocations we could create a better McDonald's that offered better food and found a way to pay it's workers more. Maybe not $15/hr to start but something better than their current wage.

You might actually see profits increase.

Why do I say this? Because doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result = insanity. McDonald's is insanity. They don't change. Their newest gimmick to increase revenue is to offer breakfast all day long.

1. If you offered better food, more people would eat there
2. If you paid your workers better you'd get more people applying and have a better applicant pool
3. A larger applicant pool should lead to better and happier workers
4. A chance to see profits increase

However, staying on the same path is rather futile.

a reply to: MystikMushroom

You keep posting that, almost as if you're trying to convince yourself of it, too. I'm not buying it.