Two-income, middle class families are breaking
Politicians are going to start feeling unbearable pressure on trade, immigration, and income inequality. Unbearable.
PBS/NOW: 10 Reasons America’s Two-Income Families Aren’t What You Think
(According to Harvard Law professor and bankruptcy expert Elizabeth Warren)
Two-income families today make 75% more in inflation-adjusted dollars, but have less money to spend than one-income families did 30 years ago.
Two-income families today spend: 21% less on clothing, 22% less on food, and 44% less on appliances compared to one-income families a generation ago.
Every 15 seconds an American family files for bankruptcy.
This year, more kids will live through their parents’ bankruptcy, than through their parents’ divorce.
1.6 million families will file for bankruptcy this year, 9 million more are already in credit counseling.
Home mortgage foreclosures are up more than three-fold over the last generation and car foreclosures have hit record levels.
More than 62% of families say that they worry about making ends meet.
The average family spends 69% more in inflation-adjusted dollars on their home mortgage than their parents spent a generation ago.
The average family spends 61% more on health insurance, than their parents spent a generation ago.
Credit card default rates are at a record high.
Bad money management is coming around to bite these people in the butt. Sorry Lefty, I don’t feel sorry for them – if I can manage to be financially responsible, anyone can.
Some of these folks worry too much about “keeping up with the Joneses”. And the next thing you know they’re “standing in the bread line”. And subliminal advertising on a big screen TV is like mainlining for the heroine addict. It goes directly to the “get more stuff” section of the brain.
I agree Aubrey. This isn’t the fault of government. In fact the people who are creating this problem for themselves are also those demanding more and more be given them by government and electing people who will give them more government spending for their votes.
You have a government torn between the elite who control the party leaders and the voters the have to try an manipulate to get elected. Often they are successful and often they aren’t in that manipulation. If they fail, they back off, brainwash some more and try again. If they fail again, they don’t give up, just use new tactics.
If they can get people to give up more and more power to government for any reason, they win in the long run. Then some day, they “slam the gate” on all the people when they have enough power.
The problem with your outlook Aubrey is that when rich folk (Wall St.) practice “bad money management” it causes nationwide economic crises, and they are bailed out.
When poor folk manage their money poorly they are called irresponsible.
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that Republicans worship at the alter of corporate dominance.
BTW, isn’t the Bush stimulus package simply calling for bad money management? “Here’s some money from the government, now go spend it.”
Capt-menace, both parties are guilty. Both parties are supported by corporate sponsors and campaign donations. Both parties are obligated to the international elite that control the corporations and the parties.
Who said anything about “poor folk?” This debt and credit problem is affecting all income levels with the poor affected the least.
The poor rent, don’t have credit cards (most), don’t overspend because they can’t borrow. They get their welfare check and live on it. the low wage worker lives on his paycheck.
It is the middle class and higher income people living beyond their means that are in trouble.
The same people that control corporations control both parties. But, they have to get elected so there is always a struggle for the voters and to get those votes you have to give them something they want bad enough to vote for you.
Thus, like immigration, they say they will secure the border to get the vote and then try to pass legislation the voter will put up with that allows the illegals to stay or keep coming.
Every issue the “voters want,” is considered and evaluated and prioritized. Those that don’t throw the election to the other party are ignored. But, always, in both parties, after the election is “satisfy the elite” who fund elections without losing re-election chances.
Captain_Menace you have to realize the neither party is going to keep America from becoming a pawn of the “one world shadow government.” One may get it there faster than the other but, they will both get it there and you can’t stop it because that requires the majority of voters to side with you. Most don’t even know what is going on and has been since 1913.
Jan, I was addressing Aubrey’s view that the situation of middle-class Americans is due simply to their “bad money management”.
He appears to believe that the middle-class are solely responsible for the state of the economy. This is a ridiculous view.
I understand that the two parties are simply flip sides of the same coin, but it’s patently Republican to despise the working class while kissing the toes of the dominant corporate structure.
The democrats are just as anti middle class. They are WTO, NAFTA, welfare supporting elite that use the middle class to reach their goals by getting them to believe they should vote for them just like the GOP does only using different strategies.
There is no party that represents the Middle class.
The middle class can’t survive under either party. One will reduce all to and equal level of misery while the other will create a two class system of employer and employee.
However, that isn’t to say that both won’t have their “upper class” that are immune from the problems the majority face. Just as in Russia and China, the “elite” had state owned yachts, summer homes, resorts, servants, etc, both parties will have its “wealthy” ruling class.
If they don’t, the wealthy will simply leave for nations that do cater to them. They can afford to leave while the majority can’t.
Until people realize that the risks of centralized government whether it is “right” or “left” destroys the ability of people for self-government, this nation will continue its decline. Until the people understand that democracy controlled by the majority, whether “right” or “left” ends up destroying many of the rights of the people, we will continue this trend that destroys democracies.
quote:
WND Exclusive Will secret clubs pick next prez?
CFR, Bilderbergers, Trilateral Commission insiders usually run for, win White House, shows new book
Posted: November 1, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2007 WorldNetDaily.com
WASHINGTON – It started in 1952.
Nearly every person elected as president of the United States since then – and nearly every opponent – has belonged to a secretive, globalism-oriented organization known as the Council on Foreign Relations.
Some presidents and their challengers have belonged to additional clubs of internationalists – the Bilderberg Group and the Trilateral Commission. Running mates, too, more often than not have had ties to the groups.
snip———————
In 1960, both John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon were members.
In 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson was not a member. Neither was his opponent, Barry Goldwater. But Johnson had already staffed his administration with plenty of insiders.
In 1968, it was Nixon versus club member Hubert H. Humphrey.
In 1972, it was Nixon again against Democratic Party CFR member George McGovern.
In 1976, it was CFR Republican Gerald Ford losing to CFR Democrat Jimmy Carter.
In 1980, Ronald Reagan was not a member, but his running mate, George H.W. Bush, was. So were both of his opponents – Carter and independent John Anderson. Assuming office, however, Reagan quickly named 313 CFR members to his team.
In 1984, another CFR member, Walter Mondale, was nominated by the Democratic Party to challenge Reagan.
In 1988, CFR member Bush took on CFR member Michael Dukakis.
In 1992, Bush was challenged by an obscure governor from Arkansas, Bill Clinton, who won the “trifecta” by being a member of the CFR, Trlateral Commission and Bilderberg Group. He was also a Rhodes scholar – another favored credential of the worldwide elite.
In 1996, Clinton was challenged by CFR member Bob Dole.
In 2000, CFR member Al Gore ran against non-member George W. Bush, but his running mate, Dick Cheney, was.
In 2004, Bush was challenged by CFR member John Kerry.
“David Rockefeller, whose family financed the CFR, is a common denominator among these parallel groups,” writes Estulin. “Not only is he the CFR chairman emeritus, but he also continues to provide financial and personal support to the TC, CFR and Bilderberg Group.”
What is the agenda behind these groups, which Estulin says are comprised of “self-interested elitists protecting their wealth and the investments of multinational banks and corporations in the growing world economy at the expense of developing nations and Third World countries”?
“The policies they develop,” he writes, “benefit them as well as move us towards a one-world government.”
Source
Until people realize the Democratic party is just as bad, but different, than the GOP in that both believe they are the solution to America’s problems, based on the advice of these elite, we will continue our decline.
There will be periods that seem to indicate all is going well under each party and times when both seem bad. However, in all of it is the every unstoppable move toward “one world shadow government.”
Whether is ends up being a “one world” under democrats or republicans won’t matter because they aren’t who controls what will happen at that point.
http://tinyurl.com/38e9cr
Link for above article
quote:
Invited as speakers, Bill Clinton and Tony Blair were groomed at Bilderberg meetings before rising to fame as U.S. President and British Prime Minister respectively.
EU Commission President Romano Prodi, NATO Secretary-General George Robertson and European Central Bank Governor Wim Duisenberg all have a past as Bilderbergers.
SHAPING CAPITALISM
“Even though no formal decisions are made…this group, together with many others, has contributed to shaping the kind of capitalism we have today and cemented the world’s leading business elites together,” Goran Greider, editor-in-chief of Dala-Demokraten, a regional Swedish daily, said in a live studio debate on Sweden’s TV4 television.
Bilderberg participants abide by the so-called Chatham House rule, which forbids everyone present from disclosing what anybody else has said.
“The secrecy is regarded as very provocative. Men in power talk towards consensus behind closed doors on timely issues on the political agenda,” Ulf Bjereld, a political science professor at Gothenburg University, said.
Bilderberg members include former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, U.S. Senators Christopher Dodd, John Kerry and Chuck Hagel, World Bank chief James Wolfensohn, France’s central bank governor Jean-Claude Trichet and former IMF heads Michel Camdessus and Stanley Fischer.
Also listed are the chairmen of car makers Fiat, Giovanni Agnelli, and DaimlerChrysler, Juergen Schrempp, former British finance minister Kenneth Clarke, Dutch Queen Beatrix and Xerox Corp CEO Paul Allaire.
Source
Notice that groups like the Bilderbergs, CFR, and others often have some of the same people and corporations in them but, it isn’t the corporations in control but the people in control of the corporations that are the key. It is the elite, not corporations, political parties or even governments that are in control of much of what goes on.
http://tinyurl.com/2en6p5
Bilderberg article
Bilderberg is an extremely influential lobbying group. That’s not to say though that the organisers don’t have a hidden agenda, they do, namely accumulation of wealth and power into their own hands whilst explaining to the participants that globalisation is for the good of all. It is also a very good forum for ‘interviewing’ potential future political figures such as Clinton (1991) and Blair (1993). [see above for more on this]
Source
This is why many say Hillary and Bush are not “enemies.” They both serve the same masters.
Yes, their tactics of getting votes are different. Yes, they advocate different policies but, in the long run, both lead to the same place. The votes are just something needed to get the office and keep it. If they could do it without votes, it would be obvious there was not difference.
Thus, voters have a lot of power but, if they are “uneducated,” they don’t use that power properly.
quote:
1999 PARTICIPANTS
Prominent U.S. citizens attended the 1999 meeting. Government officials who attended include
Senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska Senator Chris Dodd of Connecticut Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana UN ambassador designate Richard Holbrooke and Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson.
Private citizens who attended include
Paul Allaire, chairman of Xerox Richard Thoman, president and CEO of Xerox Charles G. Boyd, executive director of the National Security Study Group Jon S. Corzine, senior partner at Goldman Sachs Donald Graham, publisher of the Washington Post Vernon Jordan, Bill Clinton’s friend and practicing attorney and Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of State and chairman of Kissinger Associates, Inc.
snip———————
Bilderberg member Vernon Jordan introduced Bill Clinton to the other members at the 1991 conference. At that meeting, then-Governor Clinton met those who would become his staunchest supporters and biggest contributors. Thanks to the efforts of Jordan, who sits on the boards of eleven U.S. corporations, Clinton gained the status and the allies that helped him win the presidency.
Source
That is why you see so many corporations, today, supporting Hillary’s campaign. You will also see donations going to the GOP from the same corporations. There is no difference in the leadership’s partnership to that group of international elite, only in the strategies of how to stay in office by promising the voters more and more and more to get their votes even though more government will destroy their rights and freedoms.
I think our standard of living and expectation are responsible for part of the problem of families, and the decline of our society and civilization are the result of two parents working. In the 70’s when I was raising my children, we had a bath and a half, small house by today’s standard, and I was the only one in my neighborhood with a car. We all piled in and went to the store. I had a car only because it was paid for before my children came and it was “cheaper to keep her” at that point. Our livestyles were so much more simpler and modest. I worked two jobs to put my husband through school, something not possible to do today and catch up with the cost of living.
But government programs were much less in scope – people took care of their own grandmas and did not expect Medicaid to do it. When a child with cerebral palsy needed therapy, we all signed up and “volunteered” our time to do the exercises, now the state pays therapists to do it and actually has them in schools, charging by the hour for therapy parents, friends, relatives, neighbors and church members used to do. And I never heard of drug addicts in our neighborhoods. Our healthcare policies did not include our drugs – we paid our own as well as our doctor’s bills for visits. All that was covered was 80% of hospitalization – it was called major medical.
Now we have a cradle to grave mentality and and this is expensive. I remember when Medicare was first enacted, this obviously well to do lady who parked her brand new Cadillac and was wearing a mink coat went in ahead of me to the eye doctor. She was waiting for Medicare to go into effect before having her cataract surgery, dripping in diamonds too. There I was in my Ford Falcon (old), cloth coat, no jewelery, with an eye abrasion and paying my own way. I still feel that way.
Jan Paul,
The democrats are just as anti middle class. They are WTO, NAFTA, welfare supporting . . .
Are you really trying to jack up prices while slashing benefits?
= = = = = =
Greetings from beautiful New Zealand’s Mount Cook . . . google it.
Nope. WTO and NAFTA and CAFTA are more treaties than trade agreements.
You can have good trade agreements without surrenderning sovereignty.
If it wasn’t for the imports form Asia and other places, Seniors on fixed income social security couldn’t get by.
We have to have the low prices imports if we are to conserve buying power but, the “treaties” aren’t necessary, just good trade agreements.
As you know, the “NAU” and Super Corridors, and S.P.P were all part of NAFTA and when you read that trade agreement you see how much more was authorized than trade improvements.
Many in Congress don’t even know what all is in that bill anymore than they knew what was in the authorization of military action in Iraq.
We need good trade but even more we need reform of our tax code, compliance system, business regulations, and overall ability for business to compete.
The nations in those trade agreements aren’t the problem as much as our own government which “we the people” created over the last 100 years.
David, as you know, even Chinese Banks are feeling the impact of our policies in banking and lending and derivatives.
However, this goes way beyond banking and has to do with a people, not just a government, addicted to deficit spending.
Capt’n,
I’m referring to our personal lives and personal finances here. If Bill Gates goes out and charges $9 grand on a new 72 in. plasma screen, he’s not making a bad decision because he can afford the expendature. If Tim and Sally Schmuckatelli go charge the television to their credit card, they are making a bad decision. My ex-wife is in the military and has a fairly high rank. Her life is very, very comfortable; yet, she has multiple credit cards maxed out, the largest being well over $30 grand. She also has a new truck that is fully loaded and stickered at something like $45 grand. Like so many others, she also just bought a new house for close to $200 grand. Not to mention that she spends around $150 at her time-honored, weekly tradition of slurge-shopping at Target. That’s at least $150/wk! When you throw in dinners at restaurants for at least half of her meals (seriously), the largest cable-t.v. pakcages, a tobacco habit, keeping herself in the most expensive liquers, the most expensive cellular phone with the most expensive plan…now keep in mind that she spends nearly as much on my daughter, too.
This is the irresponsibility that I refuse to feel sorry for. When her debts come around to bite her in the butt, are you going to encourage the gov’t to bail her out because you feel sorry for her, especially now that you have an idea of how she manages her money? I imagine, Captain Menace, that most people who fall into the statistics that are talked about in this article will have similar stories as my ex. Do you only feel sorry for them because you don’t know WHY they are “breaking?” Is ignorance bliss, for you?
David
The part time Walmart job with no heathcare is not cutting it!
John
There are these things called college loans. With these loans, one can attend a college or university and earn a degree. With such a degree, that person may then gain employment that has a much greater level of responsibility; and, with greater responsibility comes greater pay. It’s called the American Dream and one example of how it works.
Then again, there are scholarships. I knew a guy who recieved college money for having brown eyes. No kidding. In today’s world, there are NO excuses.
John,
Who else offers $4 prescription drugs?
http://i.walmart.com/i/if/hmp/fusion/four_dollar_drug_list.pdf
hoads
Wages are faling faster than any price gain.
Why are things worse than reported? Check out the charts on Shadow Stats
ShadowStats.com
Quote:
The CPI on the Alternate Data Series tab here, reflects the CPI as if it were calculated using the methodologies in place in 1980.
——————–
Third Chart down for inflation
But, look at the others. GDP when adjusted by “real inflation,” is revealing. This has been going on ever since they changed the way they report inflation.
No wonder the GAO says they don’t know the real condition of the U.S. How can you have a true picture when everything gets distorted, like inflation adjusted GDP, wages, Social Security, etc.
We have lost our buying power for another reason, too, besides inflation. We have increased our debt as individuals. Thus, each month, many people payout 20% and more in interest for loans and minimum credit card payments. They pay 35% in hidden taxes and compliance costs in goods. Thus, they live on less than 45% of what they earn for actual purchases of goods and services.
Last night, Mitt Romney said, we are in more than a “normal” slowdown. He said he doesn’t know who the next world power will be but, we will be a 2nd class world power if current trends continue. So, now he has joined Ron Paul and “telling it like it is.” He has joined hundreds of international economists that say we have a serious problem. He has joined the Comptroller General of the GAO in telling us we have a serious problem that will cost us dearly if not changed.