There are no shackles holding us down. The only shackles that prevent us from succeeding is the thought that other people are responsible for our own failures.
Huh? I guess you don't think that Big Money in Politics has provided shackles on the Middle Class? Sheesh, I mean really, some of you sheep are really naive
The reason that the middle class is going away is because of big government.
When you have Government taking a large amount of the business profit for taxes and regulations it gives them no money for raises to their employees or to hire more employees.
We have to get the money out of lobbying and reform campaign contributions.
In truth, Peachy, the middle class is far from 'going away'...it is moving up into what would be called the rich category.
1. It is important to distinguish between
more Americans getting richer, and only the rich getting richer. The latter, of course, is the default position of the Old Left Media. For example, the Left bemoans the declining percentage of Americans in the moderate-income range, between $35,000-$50,000. This is regularly called the ‘vanishing middle classs.’
2. What is missed…and not by accident, is that the ‘disappearance’ is largely due to fact that the percentage of households with real incomes higher than $50,000 increased from 24.9% in 1967 to 44.1% in 2003, and the percentage with real incomes lower than $35,000 fell from 52.8% in 1967 to 40.9% .
More On The Certain Equality Of Reaganomics - Forbes
a. “…in 1967 only one in 25 families earned an income of $100,000 or more in real income, whereas now, one in six do. The percentage of families that have an income of more than $75,000 a year has tripled from 9% to 27%. But it's not just the rich that are getting richer. Virtually every income group has been lifted by the tide of growth in recent decades.”
Great American Dream Machine
3.
Mathematics is a factor in understanding the economy, as well: one must understand that the any
average, or mean, of incomes in the top 20% will always be much higher than the median income in this group, for the simple reason that the top group has no ceiling…i.e., it is everyone with incomes above the 80% percentile. Of course, this description can be applied to any “top” group…1%, 5%, etc.
a.
The median will consequently always provide a much more accurate reflection of the typical income earner in any top income group than any average or mean. So, changes in the “average” incomes of a top group are always misleading, and greatly exaggerates the level of typical income of top income groups.
b. “Mean income for the top 10% is about two-thirds larger than median income…” Reynolds, “Income and Wealth,” p. 21.
c. According to Federal Reserve data regarding incomes of different subgroups, the average or mean income of
the top 10% households seems to increase much more from 1989 to 2004 than the average or mean of the next highest 10%, or of any lower income group. This would lead one to believe, mistakenly, that income inequality is growing, with the rich getting rich faster than any other group.
But when the more accurate median income is considered, the income of the top 10% grew virtually at the same rate from 1989 to 2004 as the bottom 20%, and as the second lowest 20%. Reynolds, “Income and Wealth,” p. 20-21.
4. Similarly,
changes in the bottom limit, or threshold, of any top income group appears to be rapidly increasing the top groups incomeÂ…when in reality, it is the increase of the group below the top that has the benefit.
a. Thus, as the
incomes of those in the second 10% grows into the top 10%, we must now add incomes of those from the next group below. This makes the higher level appear to grow, while the lower group adds lower income earners in order to have the proper number to make 10% of the total. The effect is due to increase in incomes below the threshold!
b. In this case the average of the top 10% is being ‘pushed up’ from below by rising numbers of folks whose income has increased, with them
leaving what had been a ‘middle class income’ and joining the ‘ranks of the rich.’
c.
Example? The top fifth of household incomes began at $68,352 in 1980 (in 2004 dollars). But by 2004, the incomes of so many in the second 20% had increased above the former $68,352 threshold that the top 20% of earners now started at $88,029 in 2004! Therefore, if one calculates the mean average of all the incomes above $88,029 in 2004 it will be considerably higher than if you averaged all the incomes above the $68,352 as we did in 1980.
The essential point is that this
statistical effect does not mean that the rich are getting richerÂ…it means more people are getting rich, and reflects the rising general prosperity!
So....here is the money shot: "In this case the average of the top 10% is being ‘pushed up’ from below by rising numbers of folks whose income has increased, with them
leaving what had been a ‘middle class income’ and joining the ‘ranks of the rich.’
Covered fully in chapter nine of "America's Ticking Bankruptcy Bomb," by Ferrara
Don't let 'em fool ya', Peachy!
Precious. Really.
