Gloomy economic numbers are the news of the day. While the economists say we have not slipped back into recession most of us really can't tell that we ever got out of it. The major costs to the middle class these days are food and fuel, both of which are consuming an ever increasing portion of the available income. It is obvious to most that there is no rational reason for the increase in fuel prices. Demand is down, supply is up and our refineries are not operating at full capacity. Even the Saudis, who supply much of our oil, are fearful that the high costs will drive demand even lower. Why are fuel prices so high? Ask your friendly Wall Street Banker who has truckloads of dollars ever searching for the highest possible return on investment. That's the American way isn't it? Good old free market capitalism. The worst system in the world except for the others.
Ronald Brownstein, who writes for the National Journal, wrote recently of the pessimism that is abundant in the white middle class workers without a college education as compared to the same education level in the minorities. What he sees is the white worker having to come to grips with competing on the same level as the minorities. The minorities actually see a rosier picture in the future than the white workers because they see it as improved possibilities.
It is a better picture for the minorities but it is still not a good one. It is a bad picture for the white workers but, in many ways, one that is a result of their own actions. The former high wage, low education jobs that were once plentiful in manufacturing have left these shores or moved to the Southern tier of states. What made those high paying jobs possible were the benefits of union organizing. The individual worker has little power but joined with thousands of other workers the power is increased exponentially.
Many manufacturing plants have moved to the South where unions have been traditionally looked upon with suspicion. They allied themselves with friendly state governments that pushed the euphemistically named “Right To Work” laws. The effect of this was to create a hostile atmosphere for union organizing while claiming they could not afford to make a product with labor costs that paid a living wage. State governments that were starving for jobs for a largely uneducated work force were only too glad to take credit for bringing those jobs to their people while, at the same time, making them believe that manna had fallen from heaven. Those anti-union forces joined forces with social conservatives which allowed the anti-union philosophy to be fostered without actually mentioning it in electoral campaigns.
I have always seen the benefits of union organizing to achieve better working conditions and a living wage but that is not actually what I want to focus on here. What I want to elucidate is the alliance that creates a seemingly contradictory situation in which the middle class is induced to vote against its own best economic interests. This is where the white, uneducated worker comes in. This demographic group tends to vote more conservatively on social issues. Traditionally this has been a group that is hard working and only wants to be able to go to work, do a good job and, in return, receive enough in wages to allow him or her to be able to raise a family and create a better life for his children. That aspiration is in desperate danger and that demographic group is in danger of losing the one thing that made the sacrifice possible. The living wage and medical benefits.
For thirty years now we have listened to the mantra of lower taxes leading to job creation and now, after two disastrous tax cuts, we find ourselves at 9% unemployment with the old canard being used again. What we have seen is a monumental transfer of wealth from the middle class to the upper 5% of our population. When we talk about policies that will allow wealth to be distributed more evenly the upper crust starts up a huge cry of SOCIALISM. That is often enough to get the average worker to vote against his best interests. If that doesn't work then they can create a tumult about gay rights or abortion. Voters are seemingly unaware that the people they vote for to defeat these practices are also the ones who are responsible for driving them into the poorhouse. Nothing changes about gay rights or abortion but there is definitely a change in the welfare of the middle class.
The whole point is this. Everyone knows that we are not going to pull out of this economic morass without the American consumer consuming more. The problem is that the middle class has nothing with which to consume. Growing economies are built on the bedrock of increasing markets but what happens when we are consuming with all we have? How can that increase without more resources with which to consume? We saw how the consumer could be induced to spend past the point of sanity in the mortgage crash and we chose to ignore all the signs. And how can the consumer get more resources unless there are policies that encourage the wealth that has gravitated to the upper crust to be more available to the middle class? It is the middle class that has made America great and without that asset our future is dimmed.
So, everyone is shouting about the debt and deficit and rightly so. But one should ask the question how did it happen? For starters look at two huge tax cuts for the rich and two wars fought on the credit card. How patriotic is that?
My take on the future of the middle class. Perhaps not a popular one but one that deserves some thought.
No comments:
Post a Comment