Re:Say Hello to Full Employment
by joefranklinsrs on Friday July 06, 2018 @03:30PM
(#17474407)
If US is the beneficiary of the past few years of emerging markets deleveraging and economic stimulus, middle class is a big recipient of the benefits. For example, any middle class who invested in the stock market would have seen great returns, maybe close to 10X if they invested in amazon, netflix, or apple. also, US middle class income has been increasing, reaching highest level in the last year: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/us-middle-cl....
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I am honestly curious... where does that income come from? We know it doesn't come from wages, because median wages of the lower 90% have risen less than 2% since 1980. Since the statistic is based on families, is it due to a larger number of 2-income families out of necessity?
For those of is comfortably in the top quintile, this is no doubt true. I'm certain many of us who post here have done quite well over the last decade. However the historical American middle class has, by and large, not benefited nearly as much. The vast majority of the gains have been captured by the top 0.1%.
Please don't mistake me for some kind of commie, PG's essay on the necessity for income inequality to drive innovation is convincing. But that doesn't mean we should celebrate shameless cronyism, kickbacks, and rent-seeking either.
Growing middle class income is nice, but income is a very poor metric to use to determine economic class. Net worth is what really matters.