There are still lots of options for the former middle class: we could have autocracy like China or grinding poverty like Bolivia. But broad prosperity just wasn't working out for the big money donors and had to be abandoned.

   - "Whenever "everyone knows" something so complicated, you can be certain it's a religious belief, not a fact"
     - "Are you crazy or in denial? Are you not aware of the many publications released about how we are no longer even close to the prosperity of the 1940s-1970s as regular Americans?"
        - "According to who?"
     - "According to who?"
        - "Are you crazy or in denial? Are you not aware of the many publications released about how we are no longer even close to the prosperity of the 1940s-1970s as regular Americans?"

How do you define a "comfortable life"? I'm thinking the goal posts are constantly moving and that's why people think things were better back in the 1970's. Not blaming anyone for it, it's the human condition to always want things to be better.

Let's see: 1940's - WW2, America is just coming out of a 15 year recession 1950's - Constant threat of nuclear war, Korean War, economically things are looking up 1960's - Numerous race riots, economy is still doing relatively well 1970's - Rampant inflation, rather stagflation, gas shortages

I've asked my family (older generations) and they agree things are way better now. And they aren't what you'd even call middle class.

I can do it all from the comfort of a temperature controlled office.

Many people seem to think they need to live in New York or San Francisco to live the good life.

https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...

read some of that. you might find it helps you know what you're talking about.

The data on billionaires appears to be fairly mixed (50-50): http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2014/jun/23/...

Silicon Valley ideologues always preach the concept of "exit." Well, maybe it's time to exit Silicon Valley.

I would also be very skeptical of any politician who claims to be the solution to this. They're using you; economically frustrated masses are a very good way to gain power.

The people I know who actually manage to cobble together fulfilling lives today usually do it by thinking locally: developing local friendships, local business relationships, consumption preferences that reflect what they want, and then opting out of the national conversation.

>>> That's not the Silicon Valley mindset

Having grown up in the heart of the valley, Palo Alto, traveled the country and the world in the military, and now back working in tech, my observation is that this mindset is more SV than people give it credit for. It’s better packaged as meritocracy and innovation but the results are fairly apparent in the disparity of economic outcomes. I like a lot of aspects of the SV mindset (engineer focused, innovation focused, risk and failure tolerant) and know a lot of good people in SV, but I wouldn’t imbue it a purity above Wall Street, or Hollywood, or D.C. or any other power center. All are fairly dismissive of flyover country and self-assured in their wealth, power, and status.

>>> skeptical of any politician… They’re using you;

I got used by the military for a decade and assume everyone is using me. Haven’t seen much change in SV. But I’m also a sucker for trusting people. Life ain’t easy.

>>> Economically frustrated masses are a very good way to gain power.

Yes, but they are also the primary internal way to change power structures. And democracy allows us to do this in a controlled fashion through law.

>>> thinking locally… opting out of the national conversation

While I agree with the ethos of thinking locally, to the extreme it can also be taken as, "Don’t worry about the big things, leave that too other people. Don’t worry about what the hirer-ups are doing, just do your job. Don’t worry about the country, you can’t change anything” As a Veteran, I disagree with the attitude of total disengagement. I got sent to war by politicians. Only two presidential candidates are saying the Iraq war was stupid. That gets my vote. These decisions are life and death for people.

Large swathes of the country it is very difficult to find any work at all. Never mind work with pay one can exist on.

That's not true at all. It's just that all the jobs are now temporary and part-time. . . sorry, I meant to say contract and flexible scheduling.

This is an added value! People value flexibility in their employment, and millennials don't want to be tied down by full-time employment. Problem solved!

His stance is that you're either rich or poor.. there is no in-between.

Today's middle income people can barely afford to raise children and have neither retirement savings nor the promise of future pension. They have miraculous pocket computers and unlimited streaming entertainment, but they're only a paycheck or two from desperation and they feel powerless to make real decisions in their lives.

Maybe today it's a hollow marketing campaign, but in the 1950s there really was a group of people who had a significant degree of choice about how to spend both time and money. They were better off than the poor and worse off than the rich, a true middle class.