Letters to the Editor
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Whose parents are we talking about?
I guess I am confused. Are we talking about parents in the age of 70-85 or are talking about parents in the 50-70 range, the baby boomers? I think that matters too. The older bunch lived pretty hard and pretty modest and I believe they deserved any retirement or great things they got later in life (hoping that they did get it). But what about those baby boomers?
Perhaps there is going to be a generation (a large one at that) that is going to be able to take advantage of some pretty good hand outs that were intended and promised to those that came before them and lived through some pretty rough times. This same generation that grew up with those that had it rough and learned what it meant to save money and to live in the same house for 50 years.
Maybe my generation is going to have to suffer through understanding that we need to pull our hand back but maybe also to stop the exuberance or not stopping it, but understanding the consequences. I mean, there is no doubt the government is to blame here as well, but I sure don't want to go back to them to help them correct something they are obviously incompetent to do in the first place.
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The Middle Class Revolution? Not likely.
There are many social problems in this world, but the plight of the middle class in the USA is not one of them. The people Mooney writes about are good people, but very, very lucky people, and they have not fallen behind their parents. Rather, their aspirations have risen to meet and exceed their possibilities.
In the normal course of a middle class life, people are debtors until their mid-fifies, when their house is paid for and their children educated and forming their own families. What's the big deal?
People making $70000 are hard pressed. People making $100000 are hard pressed. People making $150000 are hard pressed. There is something unreal about this. To understand it, read Tom Wolfe's Bonfire of the Vanities.
All this narcissism is a bit hard to take. We might do well to thank God for our blessings.
As for taking more from the rich---go to it. It won't change a thing.
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Here is the solution
Okay, first off: Recognise that we can't blame our parents for this on a "Me" level. That is what got us into this mess.
We need to cut needless expenses. What this means:
Less military spending. A massive amount of money is getting wasted by the Pentagon. This is not money that is going into buying armour for the troops, this is money going into plane rides to nowhere and trucks driving across the desert to deliver nothing. This empty expenditure needs serious looking into.
Less spending on graft. What this means is that a lot of the no-bid contracts need to be cancelled and put up to a bidding process. This is in part a problem from the Clinton administration, but that doesn't mean it doesn't need tackling.
Socialise the military. The amount that is being spent subcontracting military functions is proving once and for all that a private military is more expensive than actually having the massively ineffecient military industrial complex doing it itself - something of an achievement really.
Get out of Iraq and focus America's military might on winning the war in Afghanistan - where winning means that the Taliban is no longer a threat to America's allies in neighbouring countries.
Raise taxes on the richest segment of America's population, and introduce legislation to improve environmental standards in America's industry - this is not to make the country "Greener" this is to make the country able to compete in markets where those minimum standards are already in force.
Make corporate welfare contingent on corporations replacing their CEOs with someone competent - and not giving those CEOs a golden parachute. Loss making companies, whatever their size, don't pay taxes.
Introduce stricter admissions standards for imported goods - in other words lets not let the Chinese poison our pets again.
Up social spending on roads and maintanance, the more that degrades the harder and more expensive it is going to be to fix it, but don't spend the money on hiring someone's nephew to oversee the funds, spend it on actually fixing things.
Finally, once the debt starts coming down, once the books are balanced:
Introduce a plan where America's government buys up the debts of those who are really struggling and negotiates terms for which that debt can feasibly be paid off. It should be something where it isn't a first resort, but comes before bankruptcy - a situation where everyone loses.
Increase spending on lowering the costs of college admissions, reducing the debt burden on people as they start out. Police business more stringently with regards to illegal labour. Actively regulate business to avoid catastrophic crashes.
Build up wealth, because the main issue hurting everyone's hope of retirement is debt and it is only through wealth that this issue can be solved.
We must not consign our older generation to catfood. To do that is to slap our parents in the face, but we must build up the economy to the point where government supplements retirement, it doesn't fund it.
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Thanks for noticing
Good analysis of a long-standing problem. Too bad most of it's in the letters column.
Is it any coincidence that this pattern started in the early 70s, when some Americans had begun to think for themselves on matters of race, war, economics and lifestyle, and push for change? That "a college degree becoming the new high school diploma" coincided with the catastrophic rise in college tuition? That massive layoffs of people over forty making reasonable salaries and their replacement by twenty-somethings making ten to twenty thousand dollars less coincided with the seizing of power (we know "election" isn't the right word) by the present administration?
To answer a question asked by one writer: yes, this does affect people in their fifties and sixties, some of whom, at least, worked hard to mold a world free of race, class and jingoism, a world that makes possible the election of a Barack Obama, who seems not to reallize it. Classism came roaring back with the Reagan reactionaries. So, yes, some of us do deserve better.