Problem with the Poor Class

[Woodznutz]

A "great opportunity" is a job that starts at $30 per hour plus full benefits. Anything less is a joke.

Who's going to pay $30hr plus benefits to an ethnic minority high school dropout with no skills, an arrest record, and a pregnant teenage girlfriend?

 

[initforme]

$30 per hour isn't much....admit it not in today's America. Not close to middle class.

 

[initforme]

american Employers want high turnover. Fact.

 

[Woodznutz]

$30 per hour isn't much....admit it not in today's America. Not close to middle class.

That's starting pay of $62,400, lower middle class but middle class nonetheless, depending on the cost of living in your area. Additional benefits would likely increase total compensation considerably.

What Is Middle-Class Income?

Middle-class household income is between $46,013 and $137,406 annually, according to U.S. Census Bureau data and the Pew Research Center. Here's what you need to know.

www.thebalance.com

 

[initforme]

Used to be. Hard to subsist on it anymore. We have an AWFUL wage issue but one can get trained in a field where one can use their skills against employers.

 

[Woodznutz]

Used to be. Hard to subsist on it anymore. We have an AWFUL wage issue but one can get trained in a field where one can use their skills against employers.

Like Amazon employees are doing?

Amazon workers just voted to join a union — here's what happens next

For the first time in the U.S., Amazon workers have voted to join a union. Now comes the negotiating.

www.cnbc.com

 

[initforme]

Forming a union is as american as it gets. Nobody is against unionizing.

 

[Woodznutz]

Forming a union is as american as it gets. Nobody is against unionizing.

I'm all for unions, unless they get too greedy. Greedy unions have put a lot of companies out of business and a lot of employees out of work, and for no good reason. This happened to a supermarket where I used to work. The employees, mostly high school kids working part time, were convinced by a union organizer to vote to join the retail clerk's union. The owner fought it as long as he could but finally agreed. A few months later he closed the store, which had been a neighborhood fixture for decades, putting about fifty full and part time people out of work.

I worked for him for five years as a meat cutter. He paid us union scale, and once confided that some years he paid us more than he earned as store owner and manager.

My brother worked in a packaging plant as a packaging designer and estimator. The shop was unionized and the employees well paid. The union steward was a troublemaker and filed grievances constantly. The company was continually in litigation with the union. Finally they had enough and closed the business, laying off 200 full time employees. My brother saw what was coming and took an early retirement.

Lots of stories like this.

 

[boedicca]

Yes they had thriving economies...........until the companies there sent their jobs overseas.

The nature of the elites destroyed those economies. Self-absorbed, arrogant, narcissistic, entitled, greedy and ignorant.

 

[initforme]

If you can't afford to hire then dont. Lower wage jobs obviously aren't essential. And if they are then the wages should be higher. Otherwise if they go unfilled no sweat off our brow.

 

[sealybobo]

Most people point to poor black families in the ghetto and blame them for their poverty.

But look at communities like Appalachia or Mississippi
Families have lived there for generations. They may have worked in the mines or worked at local farms. When they failed, there was no place to go. They may have a rundown house that nobody will buy or have strong family connections

But nobody blames rural families for their poverty

I never mentioned black or white or where the poor American lived. I’d give the kid in Appalachia the same advice I give the kid in Detroit. Doesn’t matter who’s fault it is. Here’s what you got to do to get out of th situation you’re in.

I never had kids. Never felt I could afford them. Now that I can, don’t want them anymore.

I get the feeling a lot of poor young men don’t really want to be fathers. I think they just like to **** without condoms. Advice one, don’t have kids you can’t afford and don’t want.

If you are single without kids in America, how stuck are you really?

 

[sealybobo]

Since Reagan, much of the financial burden has shifted from the rich to the working poor.

The working poor are expected to carry more of the burden for education, healthcare, retirement….

Trickle down never happened…..they just kept the money

They just changed our auto insurance in Michigan. Everyone gets $400 back. So everyone is happy. And your insurance will be $400 less next year. So everyone is happy. But get this. Now if you get into a life changing accident, you don’t get shit anymore. So people who get int these kinds of accidents are screwed. But republicans wanted to save us all money, or so they say.

Whats really going to happen is next year the insurance companies will raise our rates $100. The next year, another $100. Till eventually our rates are back to where they were only then we will all get much less coverage.

 

[sealybobo]

Americans wouldn't even be discussing this a few years ago. Now the majority are starting to understand the the good times aren't coming back.

Trump can't make America great again for them when all there is to offer is service jobs flipping hamburgers or military 'service' jobs serving evil government goals.

The corporation have gone to China and the rest of the good paying jobs are done by robots.

But still for some, the working class are poor because they're lazy!

A light is coming on in some skulls, and sad to say that Trump started it quite failing to understand that his personal agenda would motivate working class people to start standing up against corrupt government.

I think we all agree capitalism requires a poor class. Who else is going to work at subway or mcd?

And some people are lazy or have low skills and no company should have to pay them a high wage for what they offer.

My question is how poor? And how rich? I think our system is out of wack. The rich are too rich, the middle class isn’t doing well enough and too many are poor. In the 90s rich people were doing great, the middle class was booming and it was easy to get out of poverty. Maybe america was great in the 90s.

Maybe we need to roll back the bush and trump tax breaks and a lot of bush’s policies. I know Clinton put worker protections in nafta and I know bush removed a lot of those protections.

 

[sealybobo]

They have tried "affordable housing" since the '60's. It doesn't work too well. Most are torn down within 20 years from the lack of upkeep.

In my nice community, we’ve always had low rent apartments in our town. Like I said earlier, someone needs to work for all the strip mall franchise owners, Taco Bell’s, grocery stores, etc. so our town has low rent apartments for these people. They couldn’t afford to buy or rent a home in our town but these apartments are affordable. It’s working.

And their kids get to go to better schools. And our football and basketball teams are now top in the state.

 

[sealybobo]

You don't necessarily need to move to improve your lot in life or your kids lives. I mean sure if you live in cracktown you should if you can, but otherwise you would be surprised at how much bank is secreted away by some people who live in blue collar hoods. That extra grand or two a month mortgage payment in a tonier neighborhood is a shit ton of money over the life of a loan, plus the extra taxes, etc etc etc.

You read my mind. Even in the poor Detroit community I grew up in, I’m sure most of the people living there were doing fine. A lot of detroiters worked in the suburbs but continued to live in Detroit. Those households did very well. We would say they lived in $30,000 homes that would cost $150,000 out here and they drove $50,000 escillades or caddys.

 

[sealybobo]

True, one must be mobile. One reason that young urban black men struggle is that they are reluctant to leave the security or familiarity of the "hood". Other poor people also fear not being able to find housing or work if they move. The familiar becomes a comfortable trap.

I fear if it were me, I’d be a ***** and stay. I can’t believe my grandfather’s came here from Greece. Takes balls

 

[GMCGeneral]

The truly wealthy do not earn income
That gets taxed

They increase their wealth through other means

So? That's what America is all about, dumbass.

 

[Woodznutz]

I think we all agree capitalism requires a poor class. Who else is going to work at subway or mcd?

And some people are lazy or have low skills and no company should have to pay them a high wage for what they offer.

My question is how poor? And how rich? I think our system is out of wack. The rich are too rich, the middle class isn’t doing well enough and too many are poor. In the 90s rich people were doing great, the middle class was booming and it was easy to get out of poverty. Maybe america was great in the 90s.

Maybe we need to roll back the bush and trump tax breaks and a lot of bush’s policies. I know Clinton put worker protections in nafta and I know bush removed a lot of those protections.

Or we could stop the immigration of low skilled workers.

 

[sealybobo]

The nature of the elites destroyed those economies. Self-absorbed, arrogant, narcissistic, entitled, greedy and ignorant.

The rich rule every county. The key is to set policies that maximize their profits but also produce a big healthy middle class where the masses live. Not a rich ruling class that has it all and a middle class who is suddenly the working poor. No one can save enough for retirement and at the same Tim tell them not to expect their social security.

One thing I would tell someone who’s poo4 is no matter what save 10% of your pay. Or $10 a day. It will add up.

 

[sealybobo]

Or we could stop the immigration of low skilled workers.

I believe that already happened and companies all over are saying they can’t find workers. All those small business owners say we need them. Duncan donuts, arbys, Taco Bell, subway.

I think it’s ok to legally import immigrants.

We can’t ask small business owners to pay more than $12 hr to flip burgers right?