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The Oligarch Recovery: Low Income Americans Can't Afford To Live In Any Metro Area
Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,
We were told we needed to bail out Wall Street in order to save Main Street. Well the results are in…
Wall Street has never done better, and Main Street has never done worse.
From the Huffington Post:
Low-income workers and their families do not earn enough to live in even the least expensive metropolitan American communities, according to a new analysis of families’ living costs published Wednesday.
The analysis, released by the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, is an annual update of the think tank’s Family Budget Calculator that reflects new 2014 data. The Family Budget Calculator is a formula designed to determine the income “required for families to attain a secure yet modest standard of living” in 618 different communities across the country that the U.S. Census Bureau defines as metropolitan areas. The formula uses data collected by the government and some nonprofit groups to measure costs of housing, food, child care, transportation, health care, “other necessities” like clothing, and taxes for families of 10 different compositions in these specific locales.
The updated Family Budget Calculator shows that even the most affordable metropolitan areas in the country are beyond the reach of millions of American families with incomes above the official federal poverty level. The official federal poverty level for a family of two parents and two children in 2014 was $24,008, according to the EPI. But the least expensive metropolitan area in the country for this family type is Morristown, Tennessee, where a family needs an income of $49,114, according to the Economic Policy Institute’s budget calculator.
The Economic Policy Institute also estimates that minimum-wage workers — who almost universally earn less than the federal poverty level — lack the income needed to make an adequate living in any of the communities surveyed, even if they are single and childless. The think tank notes that this includes minimum-wage workers living in cities or states with a higher minimum wage than the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour, or $15,080 a year for a full-time worker.
Even families with incomes closer to the middle of the earnings spectrum lack the means to maintain an adequate standard of living. The nation’s median household income was $51,939 in 2013 — the most recent year in which data were available — not much higher than the cost of living in the relatively inexpensive Morristown.
Where’s our hero when you need him?
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" The Oligarch Recovery: Low Income Americans Can't Afford To Live In Any Metro Area"
he means working people not on the dole
Ben Bernanke is responsible for more wealth destruction of the average person than any other human in all of time. It will be fun to watch when they drag his hubris ass around the city behind a pick up truck. He will get his in due time, I am sure of it.
the confirmation bias on those huffpo comments is laughable... of course they would say the same thing here :)
We need a new Ronald Reagan.
http://www.planbeconomics.com/2015/08/a-time-for-choosing-1964-speech-by...
We don't need a new Ronald Reagan. Reagan and Nixon were the ones who set off the roots of the problem that we find ourselves in now: bringing to prominence of the debt-backed money system, creating a stock market and real estate bubble, reducing the labor share of national income from a high of 70% to its current 52%. Of course, the Democrats have been no slouches in ensuring the decline of our working people in favor of the rentier 0.01%.
All you have to do is look at the cover of that magazine and all its headlines to know that it's pure poison
the authors names are a bit of a tipoff too.
hint: that greatest living novelist? phillip roth
Everybody knows the working poor don't earn enough money to live. The question is what is the right thing to do about it and we know what the left will say.
I suspect the cost of living in inner cities is high at least partly because of the amount of money which non working poor are given freely to spend. If one would ask oneself "why is the cost of college so high?" "do Pell grants and student loans have anything to do with it?" ...of course they do. The welfare report from Pennsylvania that was posted here on zerohedge not long ago showed that a single mother of two receives benefits equal to nearly $50,000 a year. Thus, that is what it costs to live in a city. That is the base and it's established by the government, not by the market.
It's priorities, man! How can the leader of the free world be troubled by "insignificant" news like this when a mountain needs to be renamed away from an assasinated president to a more "African" sounding name? Priorities, I tell you, priorities! /sarc
2015-1988= 27 fuckin' years...quit blaming somebody that has been gone for three decades. If I have a problem, it is my fault.
Really? Even if your parents cut off your arms and legs when you were a baby?
Because that is the Keynesian method for raising a rich and successful child.
Some problems that are created can be created in a short period of time but take many decades to resolve.
If you were saddled with your parents debt from forty years ago and make enough to pay your bills but not enough to get out from under the debt, not only would your debt grow and then get passed to your children, but it would continue to negatively impact your ability to function independently and improve. It may reduce your ability to acquire capital to stay a business and could limit the very jobs that are offered as well. So you can neither work for yourself effectively not anyone else.
If your parents cut all the hardwoods in the land down, then it will take far more than three decades to replenish the hardwoods, even if you spend twenty hours a day every day of your life.
There are as a plethora of things that take moments to cause and lifetimes to fix
"There are as a plethora of things that take moments to cause and lifetimes to fix"
Like, for example, marriage.
We don't need a new Reagan we need the old one.
Reagan proved deficits don't matter.
That was a huge accomplishment
just ask david stockman.
reagan was a talking head puppet controlled by bush one and pat buchanan. i remember and watching the guardians of the republic and the conservators of the constitution, turn into religious nuts and limberger heads this was the most disappointing time in politics, the worst were the clintons disgusting reign.
Getting shot with a .22 hurts and can change your mind on a host of policies rather quickly!
The old Reagan = the one that existed before Bush had him shot and placed under this thumb.
Last time I checked, Reagan robbed mental health funding in order to fund the prison industrial complex.
That action didn't work out very well.
Robbed, as in shut down the lunatic asylums where patients were lobotomized for decades? Sort of like the Athens and Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylums?
C'mon, man. .Gov can pervert the noblest of concepts into systemic, institutionalized murder and torture.
Reagan also turned the University of California away from being the premier educational institution on the planet toward its current sorry state of pandering to corporate money.
Today at UC Berkeley they are researching how to gene splice heroin into food products.
No, we need a new Woodrow Wilson.
The Harvard-educated failure who allowed JPM to run wild and financially broker WWI in gross violation of the Neutrality Act?
~"We need a new Ronald Reagan."~
Reagan was the first of the "amnestiers". The working poor are so today due to the corruptiuon of wage scales caused by unchecked illegal immigration by undocumented foreign nationals. Period. The middle class are today's new "working poor". The poor, those at the very bottom of the social rungs, are now slaves to the government who depend of substinence handouts which control them as a voting block. They have sold their birthright for a block of government cheese.
The socialists, (democrats), want things this way to be able to expand government in perpetuity. The oligarchs, (GOPe), want this to be able to "maximize" profits by paying substandard wages. Together they control the law-making process and make sure that no laws are enacted to change any of this. Graft is rampant and the press, supposedly the balance in all of this is corporately owned. Whenever any freelancer tries to buck the system, they turn up dead. Fuck a new Ronald Reagan. We need a new Thomas Jefferson.
Don't forget the accomplishments of the Greenspam.
He laid the groundwork that the Bernanks followed.
Hang Bernanke and Greenspan, and Yellen, and the rest of the FED, along with Corzine, Dimon, and Blankfein, and most of Wall Street, and Washington.
Do all this lot have an army of hired thugs to protect them wherever they go while their homes have been turned into fortresses in the process. They've sure made a lot of enemies along the way and I'm truly surprised no one has tried a JFK on any of them!
given that their owners are the ones who JFK'd JFK...I'd say that's why it hasnt happened.
Ebworthen....now that's just anti semitic:-)
I'll drink to that!!! MIlestones
you don't think these fools aren't completely programmed by the the likes of GOldman?
That's probably true.
However, FDR gets at least an honorable mention for DEVALUING GOLD and NEEDLESSLY DOOMING 1/3 OF THE FREE WORLD TO COMMUNISM WITH THE STROKE OF A PEN AT YALTA.
The Federal Reserve is responsible. It's been one consistent regime after another since 1913.
The Federal Government is also responsible. It has also been one constant regime year after year. Eliminate the titular heads and look at their actions. Can you even tell the difference?
Remain Calm - I want a better design for banking. Period. Nobody is getting there money back and as far as Bernanke, Princeton is distancing themselves from him. Central banking is a private business model governments love as do mega corps like GE. It is roughly an 80 year predictable model where 2/3 of that time is general upswing and 1/3 is horrid for the people. It destroys an entire generation and literally skims about a 1/3 of your time and wealth. Your time on earth is the only commodity you can't buy.
The private central bank, the "Fed" needs.to be nationalized. The founder of this corporate model boasted that if his corporation (now the BIS) had control of a nations currency he didn't are who made the laws. That is because with this kind of control they can buy governnents.
The Fed is a franchisee to a foreign corporation and has no loyalty to America. The BIS corporation is like McDonald's in having a headquarters and franchisees. It's product as structured is as putrid as McDonald's food. Hey once in awhile I want a Big Mac. That doesn't mean I would pay $300,000 for one!
Heh, the atlantic sure does a great job of propagandizing chosenites in the jewnited states of america.
Have you seen Camden or Baltimore you piece of shit. As soon as I saw the title of this article, I knew that these things on ZH will immediately try to hijack the thread.
Exactly ....Obama must push higher the limits on thoes AMT cards for them to catch up
the great trav7777............
'The future is in backwardation.'
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/bill-gross-why-we-are-witnessing-death-abundance-and-why-gold-becoming-default-store-value
H/T and a green on ya. Great article.
Big government has never done better, and Main Street has never done worse.
Six of the 10 wealthiest counties in the U.S. are in the D.C. metro area, according to Frobes.
I've witnessed it firsthand. DC is sucking the wealth out of the whole nation, and it manifests as a cancer that has consumed much of Maryland and the eastern third of Virginia.
A friend of mine calls it the Capitalist Vacuum.
You should quickly correct them...nothign to do with Capitalism. It should be called Fascist Vacuum.
Our entire system of government changed with the income tax, collected and sent to WA DC to then be divied up.
We elect representatives to beg for its return to our state after the federal govt and their lobbiests get their cut.
The WA DC area, Arlington to Rockville is fed off the money from the other parts of the country.....as the other parts suffer.
Quite a game.
major crisis in texas cities. no way joe 6ix pack can afford to live in metro areas. Maybe san antonio. going to need to cut them a check just like obamacare.
That is one way to run a society.
Looks like we are going to find out, like it or not.
Edit: san antonio just got s&p highest rating to borrow mass quantities at super low rates in an oil state during an oil crisis, so they are slated to catch up real quick
Tell you what tho, Im a young guy in a mid sized city and its pretty nice if you ignore your retirement (just like all of our parents did). Only cute waitresses/bartenders and smart/white collar guys can afford to live in the hip younger areas for the most part. We didnt set the US on this track but we'll sure as hell enjoy those benefits while it lasts.
The people got exactly what they wanted.
Hey GM is still lumbering about. What about whatever the plural of Pirus happens to be.
LOL
gm got a mountain named after one of their trucks (denali)...... alaska thought they were more important than government motors
But whose going to clean the tiolets and tidy up the lawn sculptures?
commuters
No shit Capt Obvious.
Welcome to Extraordinary Rendition Airlines, Dr. Bernanke, please take your seat.
Urban gentrification,,,likely the plan all along.
It was supposed to read; "THE HELO" (copter)
Chinese journalism strikes again.
That magazine cover & title made me throw up in my mouth a little.
Hope you swallowed and didn't waste it
Ben would advise the same. Food is getting scarce, ya know
No worries Droogs,
Benji's on "The List."
We know where he lives.
We sit in every audience where he speaks.
We watch him go in and out of the Temple.
We know every move.
Fuck the list. I want a better model. Government could end or ammend the model any time they choose.
I tried to warn him. Ego Ego Ego !!!! Debt is fire.....not a tool for healing!!! It can clear out the underbrush so a good foundation can be laid, but it has no place in a mature successful business.
Now he needs to repay the Fed Balance Sheet, apologize to EM and China and all the lives that matter. Krugman has to be a cop in Watts.
I tried to warn him. Ego Ego Ego !!!! Debt is fire.....not a tool for healing!!! It can clear out the underbrush so a good foundation can be laid, but it has no place in a mature successful business.
Now he needs to repay the Fed Balance Sheet, apologize to EM and China and all the lives that matter. Krugman has to be a cop in Watts.
Sorry
Don't know why I get doubles...I don't know anything!
If you look at world history from the lense of the surreal bullshit going on right now it's easy to suspect that our entire history is a lie.... everything. The internet is probably the only thing that has changed, we may be the first generation of people who had the opportunity to know any better. Life is about to become a Guernica painting again.
"When the truth is found....to be lies
and all the joy within you dies...." JA
I was recently wondering the same thing myself. If this Twilight Zone shit that passes for "truth" and "reporting" and "history" today is anything remotely like what they had centuries ago, then what the fuck really happened in the past?
I like your style.
Well this so called " we may be the first generation of people who had the opportunity to know any better " is all fun and dandy so now what are you gonna do about it?
I already know the answer, sit on the internet and bitch about it...actions speak louder than words so gather this great generation of yours and take them down if you got the sack.
The Jews and their Banksters must pay!
Layed off in 2013. New job paying half what I was earning. Affordable care caused my monthly premium deductions to go from $400/mo to $600/mo. (this on top of $800 being paid by my employer). I'm feeling fundamentally transformed....
An insurgent freedom fighter is born.
Good luck, sir. I have taken a large hit in salary wise as well. But I have made more after regrouping.
I had been going more to a generalist job, thinking more chances of employment.
Funny, I got the real traction in the job market by being more specialised, doing stuff I had done about ten years before.
The salary is a bit lower than ten years ago, even before inflation, but money is still a bit of money....
Happened under Dubya, happened under Obama and will happen under any future Repub or Dem president - so why is anyone still voting for these assclowns?
Bernanke , Yellen, Greenspan - can you imagine what a PR bonanza that would have been for Hitler and Goebbels.
I call bullshit.
There are still plenty of vacant freeway underpasses available for people to "live in" and the price is right.
Well, they covered them with concrete. Back in the day you could walk up to the top of rhe underpass - walk up the grassy slope - and right under the road above was a cleared spot, dirt, where you could throw down your sleeping bag for the evening. But it's all concrete now. Fuckers don't want to pay people to mow. They ruin the simplest pleasures.
free trade bitches
trading a handful of bankster jobs for thousands of manufacturing jobs
time to get back to the american system (before the satanist overthrow in early 1900's)
tariff every import (no matter who makes it) and eliminate income taxes
BOOM
I am out of city and getting away from computer but this is what I see for the little time I am on computer...none of these are perfect I disagree sometimes with them....zerhedge of course...drudge...infowars....naturalnews....investwatchdogblog...Jim Willie....David icke has done a good job...and for biblical learning's I think Paul maguire is the best...don't care what ya think, just my way of sharing what I feel is truth...luv to all
Yeah, we're preparing to go dark ourselves. Just ordered a weekly national newspaper. Nothing is happening in real time that I can't digest in an actual newspaper on a weekly basis. Pretty revolutionary statement, crazy you say?! If the shtf/teotwawki happens, we won't be getting any advanced notice via the Internet, and there won't be any mass access available, and quite frankly, I'm getting tired of myself hitting the Pavlov's ON/Power button. We've greatly reduced our bill paying on line. Back to checks and snail mail and/or cash payment locally. No smart phones and satellite TV's days are numbered.
It's called individual secession.
And in response, the assholes at HuffPo will advocate more redistribution, passed through government - its employees, its advocates and its business and Wall Street cronies - to come out of the hides of the middle-class.
I remain baffled that this new generation of democratic socialists popping up acknowledge and decry a corrupt government and their solution is... more government to police the government.
I have a great investment vehicle for low and decimated middle-income people: Guillotines.
Highest ROI of any investment in history. For every slither, pol, and crat, and bankster put to a guillotine, one gains a piece of their Liberty back, and renewed economic opportunities.
So, invest today. Just send $537 to yourself, power up the saw and get to hammering. And if you act today, I'll include Liberty Pole. So, act today!
This offer is not applicable on the Moon, or in Antarctica.
Zion is a scheme, not an ethnicity.
Where do we send half a gold coin?
Bernanke should be in an orange jumpsuit serving time in a federal prison.
In the 19th century, rich people hoarded gold, which made it harder for the poor to get their hands on it. But people don't need gold except to trade for other things. When gold is scarce, those other things get less expensive, so real wages stay the same or increase.
Now that our gold has been taken away and our bank accounts hold only paper, rich people hoard land and housing instead. This really does hurt the poor because people need a place to live.
Hence every so often the game is stopped so the 'Trickle back up' process can work; aka DEPRESSION
Does gold get more scarce or does productivity go down?
More productivity would draw out the gold and increase its circulation. The abundance (and quality) of goods and services would determine price in a free market.
Gold as money would always be worth the same.
I'd love to wipe the evil smirk off of that pervert Bernanke's face with a belt sander and a coarse grit sanding belt.
40 grit would do the job nicely
The truth is: If there was an economic collapse, most Americans are so goddamn poor they wouldn't be affected in the least.
Do you mean that an economic collapse wouldn't be noticed because of transfer payments to them?
Not any more than you noticing any transfer payments to yourself.
We are all living the same lie. Why blame someone else?
Gee was that a swipe? So, you believe that transfer payments will continue even during an economic collapse?
My question doesn't infer anything other than the explicit question. Don't know why you inferred some judgment on my part. I do receive transfer payments. If those payments end, I will indeed notice.
I've attempted to mitigate such an outcome, because I believe that an economic collapse will result in losses of certain 'entitlements.' Smallish constituencies such as federal civil service retirements, as well as local/state pensions might be ended or more likely folded into social security payments is a scenario that might present itself under such a situation.
I'm grumpy. OK?
I would surmise even during an economic collapse transfer payments will continue.
In this country everybody gets some kind of a transfer payment, one way or another, you know? An enormous amount of people work for private enterprises but a lot of these companies receive most of their revenue from the government. People who make enough money to pay income tax... pay income tax. The impoverished who don't make enough money to pay income tax still pay tax (consumption taxes).
Everybody pays taxes. Nobody gets out of paying taxes, one way or another. If they don't own, they pay rent and the taxes are included in the rent. etc. etc., Ad nauseum...
And those taxes always circulate through the system to feed all of our asses in some way or another, whether its a 'welfare business', 'welfare jobs', or a 'welfare check'.
Ok, that's cool.
This is all happening just in time for the release of The Hero's "Courage to Act" book October 5th. Perfect timing. We should be well on our way to a global financial rout by then unwinding all the unicorn crap this hero had 100% confidence would save us. It will be a complete and utter repudiation of his claim of understanding economics and financial market function. Maybe they'll cancel the book's release.
I love the subtitle of the Atlantic article: "So why does everyone hate him?"
Oh, let me count the ways! And I couldn't help but notice the other names on the cover: Rham Emanuel, Bernanke, Alter, Rose, Sandel, Lowenstein, and McArdle. Only one of the names is not like the others. Is it too much to ask to have a little diversity with our propaganda please?
What are they babbling about, low income Americans being crowded out by lower income illegal aliens? Anyway "low income" folk who sign up for welfare are living on $50k-$60k or more. The cities are full of them. This is just more crazed leftist ranting.
I Write Code Writes his own code.
You can just run out and get 50k huh?
You mean all those living in bombed out cities are living on $60,000 and all those homeless are too stupid to get welfare? What kind of brainwashed idiot are you?
You are misinformed. Unemployment comensation is $465/week max, for a maximum of 26 weeks ($12,600); at that point they are no longer unemployed. They disappear.
That is a long way from $60K! That sounds like what you got for your golden parachute?
Like I've said for a couple of years
this is exactly what a bottom up DEPRESSION looks like
The banksters are fools if they think they can get away with something like this.
Wish we could bet on that somewhere. Bankster won't survive ETF or something.
Is this from the bible... or do people just naturally think this way?
"Do not rob the poor because he is poor, or crush the afflicted, for the LORD will plead their case and take the life of those who rob them."
hasn't happened yet
Hey Art,
Sounds good but where's the evidence?
I dunno. Maybe "taking the life" really means living an entire life filled with bitterness and then dying.
But the proles in their white collar jobs are not yet aroused enough to rebel.
The thing is bankers have decided that the world is theirs and their responsibility to manage it and everyone else too. Problem is that it doesn't work that way and never has. It is their responsibility for being wrong and it is time that they pay back for their mistakes because they were not mistakes but rather a conscious decision to be willing to accept the risks of attempting to create tyranny.
1oz Silver American Eagle €13 @ EurGold
https://www.eurgold.eu/silver/silver-coins/american-eagle-1oz-silver-coi...
Nobody would believe it but I made that Bernanke Atlantic cover my desktop wallpaper as a joke back when it was published, after awhile I tried to remove it and somehow Windows has become corrupted and I CANNOT GET HIS SMUG FACE OFF MY DESKTOP! I'm pretty Windows savvy, but I'd have to get out a resource editor to fix it at this point, I really have tried everything, it creeps me out.
do it the same way it got there - right click an image, set as background
What TF ever. We all know single moms are the real problem.
This is genocide. They are making it illegals to support homeless people. That is forcing the homeless out of the cities.
Modern urban life at its best:
http://themindunleashed.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/zombie.jpg
I have yet to see a comment that the definition of +poverty has to be placed on a sliding scale which has to slide WAY down in the new economy. If 60% of the population becomes poor and then qualifies for the government dole, something is wrong with the scale. ALL of our "poor" in America would be wealthy in Egypt. We as a nation have decided to run the country into the ground and have voted to do so for 25 years with moire free stuff. It is time to accept our new reality and declare that not more than 10% shall ever be described as poor in America and not more than that will ever receive government assistance. The rest of us are living the new American norm.
That is such a bullshit statement. The incomes are not too low. The cost of living is too high. Conglomerations are the death of competition, the only thing that will keep some business honest. A CEO (crusty egotistical ogres) making several million dollars a year in a state of economic collapse screams of STATE CAPTURE. The masses do as they are told: Work, shop, watch TV. There is no time to think that the possibility a financial war is underway and it is being disguised as a series of bad decisions resulting from poor judgment and that is the crime here you miserable son of a bitch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SrtObX4W60
"An ogre (feminine ogress) is a being usually depicted as a large, hideous, manlike monster that eats human beings. Ogres frequently feature in mythology, folklore, and fiction throughout the world. They appear in many classic works of literature, and are most often described in fairy tales and folklore as eating babies."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogre
It's actually sad that some journalists are so out of touch with reality.
These charlatan journalists aren't out of touch with reality. They just don't give a damn. They have sold their souls for a paycheck.
How about another "FUCK YOU" Bernanke...
Meaningless headline when uncle sam makes up the difference...
As long as I can remember the answer to every one of America's problems has always been to, "Throw Money" at it.
We are headed for "To the moon inflation Alice" very soon. Helicopter Ben tried to keep it all in his non lending, no interest, Bankster buds and Wal*Sneaks pockets to keep it under control but the cats out of the bag.
People here are throwing USD's around like its tissue paper.
Hang on, its all up hill from here.
This situation has not existed since two prior times in modern history. The French Revolution and the Russian Revolution.
They have it coming and deserve all that they get in retribution.
Doesn't Ben BerSpankme look like an arrogant asshole on the cover of the Atlantic?
Wall street has never done better. The Federal GOvt has never done better. Do you think they are connected?
Maybe the connection is .........The Federal Reserve
You can keep your 10 million people pooping in the water supply metro anyway.
Not worth all the money in the world for me to be anywhere near it.
https://youtu.be/U71ejhpve4U
The figure commonly cited as the “average” federal employee salary now stands at nearly $78,500, an amount that has risen by about $1,800 in the last two years despite a general freeze on salary rates during that time, according to data released Monday.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/wp/2013/04/09/despite-sa...
the price of beluga & picasso is up. what a great guy.
a lesson in corruption...top down (government) corruption
our current government is little different than the putin's
What the hell are they talking about? There are plenty of low-income people living in cities. They put public housing right downtown!
Ben's face is very punchable. Smug little tool
Butt, butt. I read here yesterday where you could get $75K a year free money from Uncle Sam.
Well, you can live in a 3 br house in Charlotte on $28k a year, and in a decent neighborhood. Not sure where they get their stats, but I rent a number of very decent homes to working class and minimum wage families who do not use Section 8 and live in the areas near downtown (on bus lines, really even walking distance to downtown)
Ben Bernanke, the hero, according to The Atlantic.
Not once the financial truth comes out. Then, Bernanke's name will be mud.
Millions of illiterate, degenerate, violent, subhuman brown people can't make enough money to live like educated, peaceful, forward thinking, gratification delaying whites? Color me unsurprised. Pun intended.