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Welcome To The Future: Downward Mobility & Social Depression
Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,
If you don't think these definitions apply, please check back in a year.
The mainstream is finally waking up to the future of the American Dream: downward mobility for all but the top 10% of households. A recent Atlantic article fleshed out the zeitgeist with survey data that suggests the Great Middle Class/Nouveau Proletariat is also waking up to a future of downward mobility: The Downsizing of the American Dream: People used to believe they would someday move on up in the world. Now they’re more concerned with just holding on to what they have.
I dug into the financial and social realities of what it takes to be middle class in today's economy: Are You Really Middle Class?
The reality is that the middle class has been reduced to the sliver just below the top 5%--if we use the standards of the prosperous 1960s as baseline.
The downward mobility isn't just financial--it's a decline in political power, control of one's work and income-producing assets. This article reminds us of what the middle class once represented: What Middle Class? How bourgeois America is getting recast as a proletariat.
The costs of trying to maintain a toehold in the upper-middle class are illuminated in these recent articles on health and healthcare--both part of the downward mobility:
Health Care Slavery and Overwork
How a toxic workplace could, literally, destroy your health
We're afraid our work is killing us, and we are right
This reappraisal of the American Dream is also triggering a reappraisal of the middle class in the decades of widespread prosperity: The Myth of the Middle Class: Have Most Americans Always Been Poor?
And here's the financial reality for the bottom 90%: declining real income:
Downward mobility excels in creating and distributing what I term social defeat: In my lexicon, social defeat is a spectrum of anxiety, insecurity, chronic stress, powerlessness, and fear of declining social status.
One aspect of social defeat is the emptiness we experience when prosperity does not deliver the promised sense of fulfillment. Here is one example: A recent sociological study compared wealthy Hong Kong residents’ sense of contentment with those of the immigrant maids who serve the moneyed Elites. The study found that the maids were much happier than their wealthy masters, who were not infrequently suicidal and depressed.
The maids, on the other hand, had a trustworthy group – other maids they met with on their one day off – and the coherent purpose provided by their support of their families back home.
Downward mobility and social defeat lead to social depression. Here are the conditions that characterize social depression:
1. High expectations of endless rising prosperity have been instilled in generations of citizens as a birthright.
2. Part-time and unemployed people are marginalized, not just financially but socially.
3. Widening income/wealth disparity as those in the top 10% pull away from the shrinking middle class.
4. A systemic decline in social/economic mobility as it becomes increasingly difficult to move from dependence on the state (welfare) or one's parents to financial independence.
5. A widening disconnect between higher education and employment: a college/university degree no longer guarantees a stable, good-paying job.
6. A failure in the Status Quo institutions and mainstream media to recognize social recession as a reality.
7. A systemic failure of imagination within state and private-sector institutions on how to address social recession issues.
8. The abandonment of middle class aspirations by the generations ensnared by the social recession: young people no longer aspire to (or cannot afford) consumerist status symbols such as luxury autos or homeownership.
9. A generational abandonment of marriage, families and independent households as these are no longer affordable to those with part-time or unstable employment, i.e. what I have termed (following Jeremy Rifkin) the end of work.
10. A loss of hope in the young generations as a result of the above conditions.
If you don't think these apply, please check back in a year. We'll have a firmer grasp of social depression in October 2016.
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Welcome to Obama's World!
Yes we can.......brainwash you.
This must be what total transformation looks like.
Actually I see the fully employed types being moar socially isolated cause they're in the minority now.
And they're so uptight about losing their "careers"
You make a great point - it is isolating, to have a job ... a non-crappy one.
I think the biggest problem is that not 1 in 10(or 100) can actually understand what is going on.
If you do not sniff around the internet you would never know 90% of what is going on.
So, the system must be working to hide this information if it is easily found (finding is easy, accepting is more difficult).
Why not earnest discussions about the nature of fractional reserve banking in the halls of CONgress?
Because they are in on it.
The Media?
They are in on it.
It is difficult for people to keep their heads out of the sand when all day long it is being dumped onto you.
Eventually most just go along and try to get their piece. It is especially difficult for those to wake up when their week is full of work, and the culture steals the rest of their time, energy, and mind on the weekend.
Blaming people born into a corrupt system for that corrupt system is disingenuous. Especially if that system is hiding the nature of it from day 1.
Like blaming a goldfish for shitting in their fish bowl.
pods
"Eventually most just go along and try to get their piece"
Until you get a nasty sting. And even then you may try again repeatedly until the correct mindset sinks in.
You started out slow (stating the obvious) with this post, Pods, but ended up with a bang. I almost always enjoy & benefit from your perspective.
We'll show you some downward mobility, bossman.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/industry/11911943/AIr-Fr...
Wow, the US will have to take some classes from the French on "providing feedback to executive management".
The French seem to be excelling on that.
wait hold on, I've been told by the media and Soetero that things have never been better...I'm starting to think that maybe they are not being truthful...
/sarc
yes, and if you question that the usual response is: "just imagine how bad it COULD have been! Why, Barry, Ben/Janet, and the rest of the Washington overlord cartel has SAVED you from impending doom!"
I don't feel very saved.....mostly just screwed.
The Obama Tax helped me alot ... helped me realize how much the Dems -- Barry and Pelosi -- hate Amerca's middle class.
You ain't seen nothing yet. Wait until Congress passes the Trans Pacific Partnership, NAFTA on steroids. Then we all will be under the economic thumb of the New World Order.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/06/business/trans-pacific-partnership-tra...
The TPP will affect the top 20% more than any other group as all the systems are taken apart that limit the "profit opportunity" - environmental rules, zoning, labor rules, pricing limitations, generic drugs, permits, lawsuits etc, etc.
Most of these systems are maintained by the administrators in the system to include lawyers / doctors / local officials / consultants of various kinds / bankers - white collar generally.
As the personal income cash flow leaks out within 5 years it will be a different middle class even from what is touted above.
Uh....where will the jobs come from as we further outsource the manufacturing of all those items?
.
.
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The "Dems" had a lot of help. Or are you just saying that before you thought the "Dems" were better than the other robbers?
The Obama tax has helped us a lot also. We do not buy frivolous stuff or meals out anymore. A lack of income in excess of what is needed to survive tends to suppress purchases
Downward in relative terms .... the entitlement class is rising in numbers .... and prosperity .... the working poor, small business owners, the self-retired and illegal aliens .... are just rising slower ?
The inequity and inequality won't stop until the ruling class of parasites become very afraid for their lives.
People need to rise up. Nobody has ever "voted" themselves to freedom. Freedom is fought for. This democracy thing is intended to pacify the sheeple into nothing but submission.
Yet the power to rise up is within each and every one of us, so just what is it that is keeping the people "from" rising up? Could it be a physcial fight with ourselves?? and once that fails, or is not reconized, a physcial fight with others over each ones independent ideologys, talk amonst yourselves.
It could be. Everybody has a breaking point. Maybe the average person has been conditioned to put up with alot. Think of all the establishment propaganda hard at work to deceive. It takes a strong mind to see through it all and to find ways to withdraw consent from such a system that won't land you in jail while doing so.
Its once the critical mass builds up that not even the fear of jail can stop a group of people who have had enough. We are not yet at that stage, but its getting there.
so just what is it that is keeping the people "from" rising up?
Because getting individualists together is like herding cats. We're ALL at our breaking points as you'll note from the comments on sites like this one that cheer this establishment's demise.
The problem is that I'm not, you're not, none of us is going to rise up alone or else these jack boots will cut us down with a handful of the king's men, "news about the loon at 11."
It's going to take one gigantic galvanizing event to make it happen, and you better hope that when it does, people have God in their hearts or else it will turn into the French Revolution. And guess what this country does NOT have a surplus of. This is a culture of death and it WILL manifest when SHTF. We should all be VERY AFRAID of SHTF.
There's a solution at the end of this article:
https://atokenmanblog.wordpress.com/2015/09/19/the-one-percent/
"Final thought – If we were to get rid of 90% of the world’s population, nothing would change. If we, on the other hand, were to get rid of 0.01% of the world’s population, everything would. Which would be the more humane solution?"
Georgia guidestones be damned!
Syrian, Eritrean and Somali "refugees" .... hit the ground running .... with docs and bennies .... they enter the mix at about the 50tieth percentile .... not bad work if you can get it ?
I've noticed most of those "refugees"......are mostly combat aged males.
The white girls are already here .... to forage and pillage ?
Downward mobility is the price we pay for our love of banker rule and their massive government and massive government taxes and interference in our lives.
I have never been one who believed in equality. However I am one who believes in fairness. The government does not treat the people fairly (or equally for that matter), relative to the way it treats itself.
So, it is always with despots who are separate from the people and their will.
'Fairness' is code word used by "the people and their will" (aka - those little despots) that would use the power of govt to steal from others for their own benefit. Life's not fair. Never has been, never will. Drop that stupid notion and get over it and you'll be light years ahead of the rest of the FSA.
Mission Accomplished.
2008 was a massive loss of wealth, few however see the results of 2008 going forward - the loss of income from savings - the fed policy of zirp and qe - the stalling of jobs and industry across the western world - when you add those in the loss of wealth by ave people is much more massive - of course the wealth did not disappear - the 0.1% are benefiting nicely:
http://www.liveyachting.com/the-largest-private-boat-eclipse-the-superyacht
Obama and Moochelle .... are trying to slender down .... and improve the looks .... of American blacks .... by importing big eyed, skinny, less black Somalis and Eritrean Muslims .... to mix with the fat, useless eaters slave remnants .... so their offspring will look more like him ?
Preezy has some sandnigger in him, a breed apart from the cotton/rice pickers. And talk about a recipe for conflict. The cotton/rice picking niggers dislike the African niggers.
I am socially depressed.
I get a $250 check from AT&T .... since I was 65 .... 5 years ago .... it has balooned to $250.88 .... meanwhile, EBT benefits have gone through the roof ?
Not only in US of A, also in Europe... only (as usual) a couple of years later.
But, do they see it coming?
Dutch Proverb: a ship on the beach is a lighthouse to the sea. Except when you are blind.I think this is true for people who play the game of the system. The sysytem wants you on the treadmill, always pushing forward economically, judging your worth based upon human social conventions. The key to true long term fulfillment is breaking out of that illusion. I see people competing for social hierarcy and it all seems so empty, meaningless and silly.
7 years ago i 'sold out' of society and bought 100 acres in a remote mountainous area. I built a cabin, then a woodshed, then a barn, and finally a chicken coop.I learned to cut hay, grow veggies, and raise a small flock of sheep. I got a milk cow. I learned to cut and store wood to heat my cabin. On one of my rare trips to town I met a country girl. Married her. We have a son. In my life, my most important relationships are to the land that provides for us, to my livestock, and to my small family. My other human interactions basically boil down to monthly trips to town for supplies or customers who come up to buy hay, vegetables, or meat. Thats it. Humanity and the system are tools for trade. They have their place but it's limited in the scope of my existence. It is impossible to compare and compete and judge myself against others, I'm an individual. It's like comparing rocks to apples, one has nothing to do with the other.
I'm surprised the EPA hasn't stopped by to 'RESCUE' you from your polluting stove, unpasteurized milk, and untested (water) well. Sounds like you need to pay some more environmental taxes. Your carbon footprint needs downsizing. ;)
They can't get blood from a stone. Unless they take firewood in lieu of payment they're out of luck. They get much more going after people with money to tax. People who play their game are much easier to rob ;)
Time to start studying Buddhism.
This article is spot on. I'm 53, and have always been able to rely on my extensive skill set to work through the tough times.
This time, or should I say, these times, it's differant.
I've analized the situation, and concluded that the solution is to " lighten the load, and go Galt". I've looked out, and see two distinct groups somewhat succeeding, or at least maintaining.
One group is Government workers. Including anyone who is employed selling a product to the government. Such as military industrial or road building companies. Business that would go broke in 24 hours if the customer base was private. Includes teachers, police, firefighters,building inspectors, and the huge Buerocracy the government maintains.
The other group is illeagals. Paid with cash,do not have to abide by the same rules and regs natural born do. Politicians bending over backwards to court them. Massively taking advantage of our systems. Health care, schools, etc. Sending large remittances back to their home countries, money that does not get spent here.
So I would like to jettison the "things" that define me as a middle class American, because they have become nothing but anchors pulling me down. But, it's a challange to get off the bus, once you're on. The system does not want to let you go too easily.
If I saw a light at the end of the tunnel, that would be one thing. But I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop. All signs point to this whole deal getting worse, not better. At some point, all the " garbage" has to clear.
Interesting times.
I met and married a woman from Indonesia in 2003 when I was surfing Bali. I am trying to sell my two dumpy houses here in California. Currently live in my van in San Francisco. I work 7 days a week and we just broke ground on our 3rd house in Sumatra. She is a civil servant over there. I'm trying to GTFO. America is going down in flames....
Sometimes I'm thankful for growing up poor (Gen X single mom yadda yadda). Had it, lost it, have it who gives a fu*k as long as your able to hide at least 100K to purchase land like the above commenter. Oh, and 20K for hookers and blow
Aspirations for a car and house are a bit different.
In communities where they never expect to be able to buy a house, they would sometimes over strive for the car outside what they would normally be able to buy.
This was very visible in lower class whites and blacks buying Caddies to the point that Cadillac changed their marketing because they were becoming a bling car....
Brushhog: I also live on a farm although I'm not as secluded as you. I feel the same way as you do. I really feel like my farm "itself" is my own country and the rest of the world is seperated from my being. Our farm, our animals, & our local neighbors is all that I can effect change upon or interact with. All of our elected officials in America and all the people invading our country through massive immigration are a threat to my farm, IE, to (my country.)
To me the social effects of 2008 to present are much more indemic even within the context of a recovery. Sure, I was 25 in 2005 but my behavior with money is now vastly different now than it was then. Particularly considering I'm now making considerably more of it. But the depression had a lasting effect on me. I look into the next couple years with income possibilities (regardless of the general economy) many fold over what I made in the last few years... and I'm not going to be buying shit.
Stacking and holding. The house I have is fine, the interest rate is too low to even consider paying off the mortgage early. Not buying cars, boats, or other peacocking bullshit. Might squirrel away for some pretty expansive yearly vacations but that's it. Private tutoring for my daughter, including apprenticeships for her later years instead of college (if she so chooses, she'll be an adult).
The banking class doesn't really know how much they've fucked themselves yet. I'm 35 and am about to make more income than I ever have. There are many like me in my age bracket. We struggled through our 20s to realize that the American Dream was bullshit and no one was going to protect it for us, so we do it on our own. It will be interesting to see capital inflows over the next decade compared to the decade (per capita) BEFORE the meltdown. Investor confidence of my age bracket simply is not fucking there.
KCMLO: Regarding: [[Private tutoring for my daughter, including apprenticeships for her later years instead of college (if she so chooses, she'll be an adult).]] I have a 19 yr old in a comunity collage & a 16 year old that thinks he's going to be an actor [moviestar! "pray for me"] I like your idea of private tutoring a lot!!
Haha, yeah it's a tough thing to deal with! My daughter is only coming up on 2 so I don't quite have to deal with how outside influences affect her. Community College isn't so bad relatively speaking. You won't spend a mint in those two years while they "find themself" if she chose to go that route I wouldn't be too upset. Though I would be heavily suggesting she doesn't go to a US university when her comm college term is up. There's so many great english-speaking colleges all over the world I couldn't justify paying the insane fees here.
As for the actor... well... if they're good or at least willing to hone their craft, why not? If it's something they're hellbent on doing (which, to be honest, they'd have to be to succeed) I'd also be encouraging them to look overseas. There's so many studios, theaters, etc. Look to India, Hong Kong, all over Europe. All have great cinema and live theater. In the Far East in particular there's a shortage of white actors that speak the local language. It may not be Hollywood stardom if that's really their goal, but they could make a living doing something they love, which is really my only real goal with my kids.
Either way though, my hat is off to you. I don't envy your position in the slightest and I'm sure I'll be right there when she's a teen as well!
Neverending wars overseas where you don't bring home any spoils to cover the cost except for worldwide condemnation probably didn't help much.
Eh whatever, right stupid goy? As long as israel gets what it wants.
The developed nations especially America are simply acting as vampires feeding on the sweat & blood of poor developing countries.
While they live in too much luxury , having big mansions , with big lawns, swimming pool, exotic pets , several vehicles .
And the poor hard working people in developing countries who produce goods for them, live in single room , look for daily wages for their next meal. Their countries sell their best fruits , fabric , minerals etc to rich countries and the money earned is used to buy arms, ammunitions, tanks & fighter planes . The money goes back to west & does not reach poor.
So the time has come , either westen people lower their living standard, stop being vampires
or
The west must be destroyed.