Words from a Reader

The “Writing Life Stories” e-mails I receive are such treasures. As soon as I see there is one in my inbox, I read it immediately. I look forward to them and never know how they will touch me. They can be interesting, informative, humorous, and/or touching.

Wednesday, January 30, 2019

Middle Class - what is happening to us?

In a study a family earning between $30,000 and $50,000 was considered lower-middle class. For high earners, a three-person family needed an income between $100,000 and $350,000 to be considered upper-middle class.. Those who earn more than $350,000 are rich.Jul 17, 2018


 A trucker who says trucking was once a good middle class job, now says it is no longer middle class in salary. Back years ago when the unions and corporations worked together to get good wages for the workers, trucking was a good job. A man could afford to raise a family and buy a decent home for them. But everything changed in the seventies. 


In order to bring prices down for the consumer, wages were deregulated. Workers were not guaranteed a living wage, but consumers found that products became very cheap.

The trucker said, And this is the question. This is the question that everybody needs to ask as a citizen of any place, which is, how much money do you want to save, at the expense of good jobs, community character?
You know, we all have our $9 sneakers from Wal-Mart now. That's great. But in order to get those $9 sneakers, we had to export all of our manufacturing. So now we don't have good jobs, but we have $9 sneakers. Is that a good tradeoff? In my opinion, no.

Americans are known for buying tons of items they don't need. They rent storage units to hold all their stuff. Homes and garages are filled with boxes of  stuff. Those who have disposable income throw it away on junk. We all know of someone who passed away and in her closet were hanging clothes with the tags on them, things she bought and never wore. But there are families that can't afford to take their children to McDonald's once in a while. 

Our disparity between those with high incomes and those with low has been going on for some years.

Most American households did slightly better economically in 2015 than 2014, according to a recent survey by the Federal Reserve; 69 percent said they were living comfortably or doing OK, up from 65 percent. 


But 31 percent said they were either struggling to get by or just getting by, a figure that includes millions of middle-class Americans.
In a survey, the question was asked. "Could you come up with $2,000 in 30 days if you had to?"  Forty percent or more of American families can’t, despite the improving economy we keep hearing about.  

In Hayesville, NC while helping an evicted single mother, I learned the renter must come up with two to three thousand to get approved to rent a decent place and some are not so decent. The people who need to rent apartments to keep their children from being homeless, are the ones who don't have the money to pay the deposit, first and last month's rent. A woman who makes 10 - 12 dollars an hour, cannot save thousands of dollars. As we heard often on the news recently, most people are living pay check to pay check.


A man who has lived year round in The Hamptons for many years, Neal Gabler, has a good job, but has no savings. He raised a family, sent children to college, but he could not come up with $400 in an emergency. He says he is typical of people who used to have a good income, but the income has not grown to meet the costs of living in this country. 
Hear his interview with Judy Woodruff on PBS.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/why-so-many-americans-in-the-middle-class-have-no-savings


When asked why he didn't move from The Hamptons to a less expensive place to live he said he had thought about it. "And we have talked about that. But here's the catch-22 of that. If we were — once the recession hit, the house lost its value, as it did for most Americans.
So, now the house is deteriorating, it's lost its value. So if I had the resources to fix up the house to sell it, I wouldn't need to sell it. That's the catch-22."

I relate to Mr. Gabler as I have a nice house, but with prices so low, I would lose money if I sold my house because I would have to pay more to get something adequate for my needs. I don't want to go down in my standard of living at my age, so I just keep putting more and more into my house to keep it up. Just the past few months I have replaced a hot water heater and paid for repairs on my well. All of that came out of my savings that I am grateful to have. But many people have no savings. 

I have wealthy friends who have pensions. Yes, they are older folks who worked for major corporations and are among those who have great incomes in their seventies. They want to sell their big house in the mountains and move to a Fifty-Plus community. Age and health issues force people to go where they have help with physical tasks and are near hospital facilities.

But my friends have had their house on the market for over a year and it hasn't sold. They have put much money into their house to make it the perfect place. No one wants to pay what the house is listed for, but they have a certain amount they need to get out of their home so they can purchase the home in the retirement community.

I notice the cost of living has soared in the past ten years, but the income of most working people has not risen. With all the blustering and government  shutdown, thousands of low middle class families suffered and now live in fear that there will be another shutdown in three weeks. It seems our government is doing more to hurt citizens than to help them. 

With the stock market falling as it has done lately, those retired people who had money invested for their future are worried now. So, how is our economy so much better? I don't see it. We hear that more people have gone to work, but they are not making living wages. The lower middle class, those who make thirty - forty thousand dollars a year, is now more dependent on food stamps, medicaid and such federal programs that our elected officials in Washington want to do away with. How far can these people be pushed?  

I hate to hear people who have never had to resort to signing up for government aid complain that "those people are playing the system."  The system is complicated and food stamps can be cut back to practically nothing because of a small raise in income, even though the income is too low to provide rent, car insurance, gas for a car, and medical needs. 

I was told recently that my home town in south Georgia has become a major crime city. When I asked why, I was told that after the big flood in 93, the lower income housing was razed and new government housing was built. People in the rural areas moved into town and there are not enough jobs that pay a living wage. Poverty and easy access to drugs provide the perfect setting for the criminal element to take over.

I know this post sounds like a downer, but sometimes I feel I must share what I know, what I have learned about the state of affairs in our country. We still have those with blinders on who feel that anyone can make it in the United States. But I am not sure that it is as easy as it was for my generation to just work hard and be frugal with your money and you will be successful. I see so many young people today floundering, depending on family to help them out as they try to get an education with exorbitant loan interest and work at the same time. With everything so expensive, it takes lots of discipline to make ends meet and often it takes loving parents to cushion those sons and daughters until they get their wings.

I lived at home after college one year until I married. No one thought that was unusual at that time. My father gave us land to build a house on and we lived there for thirty years. Because I had loving support from family, I have always been glad when I could help someone who was in need. There but for the grace of God go I. 

I hope you, my readers are not struggling, but have safe, warm homes if you live in a cold area as I do right now. I hope you are in good health and that you are grateful every day for what you do have and don't despair over what you don't have. Tonight I am thankful that gas was delivered to my house this morning. I am very grateful that Miller Well Service sent some nice men to my house early. They worked in the sleet and snow to repair a broken pipe in the pump for my well. Tonight I have heat and running water. I know there are some who have neither. 




9 comments:

  1. Sadly that disparity between the haves and the have nots seems to be growing rapidly in most Western societies. And with the growing gap a diminishing empathy is appearing.
    Some times I despair.

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  2. I agree, Glenda. The monthly income of many people has shrunk as everything becomes more expensive. I live in a rented apartment and am warm and safe. Our Social Security and annuities are just enough to make ends meet without straining, but if I didn't have the annuities from having worked thirty years and contributed to them during that time, I would be in bad shape trying to make it just on my SS. I would be working somewhere myself, even at my age. Things are not easy for so many people these days.:-(

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  3. ED, yes this wave of nationalism throughout the world has changed many countries. It hurts me to hear this kind of thing. "He owns large outdoor wear company. His yacht is 240 feet, but he plans to get a bigger one so he can land a helicopter on it." If this billionaire is like Warren Buffet and gives much of his fortune to institutions that help the poor, I don't feel he is just a greedy man. But I don't think we have many like Warren Buffet and Bill Gates who use their fortune to help poor in third world countries. Part of the reason billionaires like the president get so rich is they inherit fortunes and they can afford to hire attorneys who find all the loopholes so they don't pay taxes.
    Some of the wealthiest people don't use banks. They deal in cash. It is likely they don't pay taxes on that cash.
    I wonder and fear what the future holds for young people today.

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  4. Like you, DJan, people who invested for their future have a safety net. That is why I am concerned about those who live pay check to pay check and have no money to invest in annuities or build a savings account. I think it should be mandatory that all high school students take classes in finances, how to save and invest. I was fortunate that my older brother gave me good advice. I can hear him now. "Don't touch your principle. Only spend your earnings, your interest. Good advice that everyone needs to know. If you have money invested, it won't make money for you if you spend it.
    We are fortunate. But I know some young people who have no idea about what to do to invest in their future.

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  5. Sorry, Elephant's Child. I called you ED instead of EC.

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  6. NOT a problem. I have been called much worse.

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  7. First, thank you for coming to my blog when I was unable to visit blogs. In the last two days I have tried to return to visiting blogs. Yesterday was my late husband’s birthday and I wanted to stay occupied, visiting my friends’ blogs help. Here in Nashville I know no one yet, and I do not have sisters or brothers to call. My daughter is very busy so I don’t see her often. She tells me I need to socialize, but I am not ready. Also I am busy traveling back and forth to GA. We did not accumulate many possessions, we accumulated mostly books, and I am trying to go through them. I did look at some of your back posts, such as the one you wrote on October 8, 2017, written one year to the day of my husband passing. It was called Learning to Live after the Pain of Loss. You mentioned a book in it called On Our Own: widowhood for smarties and I sent for it.

    As you mention in your current post, life is not easy in the US. I felt terrible for all the government employees who had to work without pay. I did not know that only in the US the government can be shut down and that it is not done in other countries. I wonder why it is so here. It does not sound fair to keep people from working when a president does not get what he wants.

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  8. Vagabonde, I know you are going through a difficult time. The first year is really rugged, but it isn't over. Moving and downsizing is so, so hard after the death of your spouse. Don't let anyone push you into doing things you are not ready for. The best advice I got when Barry died is: Don't go anywhere you can't leave when you want to. Sometimes we can be in a room full of people and suddenly the loneliness comes over us and we just want to go. I have a close friend who has passed the first year but now she is very depressed, lethargic and has to force herself to do things she would normally enjoy. Grief is often long and always difficult.
    Thanks so much for reading my blog and leaving a comment. Keep well.

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  9. Today I watched Senator Warren announce her candidacy for president. Although her personality grinds on my senses, I really was impressed with her speech, her understanding of the direction our country has been going and how we can turn it around. She makes more sense in her plans than most I have heard. She came from the middle class. Her father was a janitor and her mother had to go to work for minimum wage when her father had a heart attack. She was persistent in her goal to improve her status, but more important she has been persistent in trying to make our country a better place for working people. I like that she did not attack anyone, but pointed out what she knows she can do.

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I really appreciate your comments, and I love reading what you say.