Melissa Dykes – Why Are College Students Willing to Barely Make More Money Than People Did in 1979?

A recent Pew Research report shows that the American middle class is disappearing. Most Americans are no longer considered middle class anymore. The wealth gap in this country, a gap that continues to grow, has already broken all records. In short, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. Data also shows that, despite the fact that …

America Crosses The Tipping Point: The Middle Class Is Now A Minority

Americans have long lived in a nation made up primarily of middle-class families, neither rich nor poor, but comfortable enough, notes NPR’s Marilyn Geewax, but this year – for the first time in US history, that changed. A new analysis of government data showsthat as of 2015, middle-income households have become the minority, extending a multi-decade decline that confirms the hollowing out of …

Erica Etelson – How the Myth of the Meritocracy Ruins Students

The plight of the over-scheduled, over-tested, stressed out student has become the subject of much hand-wringing and several good educational policy prescriptions. ​But if youth are to escape the educational pressure cooker, we need to understand how the pervasive myth of the meritocracy traps them in it. As the instant classic 2009 film, Race to Nowhere, and its 2015 sequel, Beyond …

Steven W Thrasher – Disaster capitalism is a permanent state of life for too many Americans

In the United States, disaster has become our most common mode of life. Proof that our daily existence was something other than a simmering, smoldering disaster has been historically held somewhat at bay by the myth that hard work equals some kind of subsistence living. For the more deluded amongst us, this ‘American dream’ even got us to believe we …

71% of the World’s Population Survives on Less Than $10 a Day

Global poverty has halved over the last decade, but a staggering 71% of the world’s population remains low-income or poor, living off $10 or less a day. These are among the findings of a new Pew Research Center reportthat looked at changes in income for 111 countries between 2001 and 2011. The report, “A Global Middle Class Is More Promise Than …

A Progressive Stimulus Package for America’s Future Sustainability

A Progressive Stimulus Package for America’s Future Sustainability by Gary Null, PhD April 7, 2009   There is no doubt that a stimulus package is urgently needed at this critical time of a global economic meltdown. Although there is great reluctance across all financial, political and media sectors to use the “D” word, there are certainly signs that the nation …

Plutocrats torched the economy: Our new Gilded Age & the hollowing out of America’s middle class – ELIAS ISQUITH

You may recall how in 2013 — and then again in 2015 — President Obama tried to give his economic vision a snazzy name, something to compete with “trickle-down economics” in terms of memorability and pith. What he came up with, and has stuck with since, is “middle-out economics,” or sometimes “middle-class economics,” which is supposed to communicate his and …

Middle Class? What Middle Class? – Jack A. Smith

A complex class system exists in the United States, but the mass media and political rhetoric generally reduces it to three components — one middle class, and two economic generalizations —rich and the poor. Indeed the term “class” itself, as a means of defining the economic and social status of the population, has been fading away. There are, of course, a …

The Only Article You Need to Read About the 2016 Election – ARUN GUPTA

If you’re progressive or on the left, here’s your cheat sheet on how to participate in the 2016 presidential election, which is just 18 months away. If you live in one of the first states in the Democratic primary process, like Iowa, New Hampshire, or South Carolina, vote for Bernie Sanders. You can also sign an online petition for him, …

Death Of The Middle Class: Homeownership Rate Drops To 29 Year Low As Average Rent Hits Record High – Tyler Durden

Overnight Gallup released its latest survey which confirmed just how dead the American Dream has become for tens if not hundreds of millions of Americans. According to the poll, the number of Americans who do not currently own a home and say they do not think they will buy a home in “the foreseeable future,” has risen by one third to 41%, vs. …