24 million go from 'thriving' to 'struggling'

[RamboLiberal]

Source: USA Today

Casualties of the economic downturn include easy credit, rising home values, stable retirement investment accounts and 4.4 million jobs.

Some fear that the American dream may be in peril as well.

The aspirations that have defined the American experience — that those who work hard and play by the rules can get ahead, and that the next generation will have a better life than this one — have been battered by a devastating recession that shows few signs of having hit bottom.

-----

More than 24 million Americans shifted in 2008 from lives that were "thriving" to ones that were "struggling," according to a massive study by Gallup and Healthways, a Tennessee health management company. Results from its Well-Being Index — including physical and mental health as well as personal finances and job satisfaction — are being released Tuesday.


Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/2009-03-09-americandream_N.htm

[apnu]

1. Personally, I think that the "thriving" ones weren't really thriving...

... they were living on credit. IMO, that's not thriving, that's borrowing trouble for tomorrow.


The only sad thing in all of this, again IMO, is that so many people were duped into this borrow and spend economy that Bush and the Republicans cheered for. People really are sheep and they've just been lead to the slaughter.

It's gonna get much darker before the dawn folks.

[Kittycat]

3. You should consider those being crippled by healthcare costs as well.

On paper, my family appears to be an upper middle class household. In reality, we have a child with Cerebral Palsy, and make too much to receive any amount of supplemental or even coinsurance support for him. As a result, we've seen our insurance premiums (through the employer) sky rocket, while our benefits decrease. Resulting in $28K in fees for 2007 alone (we're still working on 2008 receipt reconciliation). The saddest part in this - our son has a mild, low-tone version of CP (Ataxia) - so his health needs are far less than those facing a life time of surgeries. Pretty much everyone in this state that makes more than $65K/year with a special needs child is out of luck. Imagine that - when I get frustrated, I stop and think about the people making $65K, having to pay $28K+/year for their child. Makes you wonder how many services they're having to forgo. As it is, we have to forgo developmental therapy - and are putting off an intensive feeding clinic, until we think our child will be better equipped (even though he could enter now), because our Insurance isn't going to cover the 9wk program.

[apnu]

5. Yes that's true.

But I've never considered anybody with difficult health care as "thriving"

But good point, your story is exactly the reason why we need a single payer health care system were we all get 100% coverage, no matter what.

I know your family climbed into debt knowing what you were going to face because of your special needs, however, I have friends and family who have no extraordinary needs like your household, but are up to their ears in debt and drowning. It is to those people I was referring to.

But, again, you bring up an excellent point, thank you.

[superconnected]

27. You also should consider the millions of jobs lost.

Not to mention the millions of jobs who lowered their pay.

[Two Americas]

4. I want to forgive them

Yes, people were duped into this easy money nonsense. But they were relentlessly driven by a massive propaganda campaign, and there were few voices saying anything else. It is not simply a matter of "Bush" since the Democrats did little or nothing to counter the right wing Reaganomics propaganda, and many of them still do not seem to understand what is happening.

Since I see myself as one of the people, and since we are all going to the slaughter regardless of whether or not we were right about things, and since we now need to pull together for mutual supports and defense, I am not going to blame the people. So many had no choice about any of this and were forced involuntarily to struggle and survive in this "free market" insanity, and it is the few - 10% maybe - who have done well in this nightmare and still could be called "middle class," those with household incomes of $70,000 or so and up who bear the greatest blame for this. They have dominated the national political discussion at all levels, and have failed to stand strongly against the libertarian Reaganomics tsunami.

[apnu]

6. being conned

That's what happened here, everybody was conned by the establishment. We both agree. My post was not meant to judge, but to honestly face the grim situation we all find ourselves in. Even those who managed to say credit debt free, this recession (depression, IMO) hurts us all.

You are right that the Democrats were eerily silent on the whole free debt, deregulation orgy of the last decade. They are, rightly, to blame as much as Republican here. Thanks for making that point.

[Two Americas]

8. very good

There is a lot of contemptuous blaming of the general public posted here. The people have lacked leadership, at all levels, and have not been hearing a strong alternative narrative that is ambiguous and intelligible. It is those with the time and interest and resources to follow and analyze politics who have been missing in action. Right here, every day, people are resisting taking up the cause of the people and attacking any who do.

The people have no dog in the fight if politics is going to be merely two aristocratic factions fighting for which of them will be in power. Many here are promoting a liberalism for the few, defending the "winners" culture of status and property and privilege and dripping with condescension and contempt toward the everyday people. Every sort of "free market" and libertarian idea is defended and promoted here, albeit with a thin veneer of "liberal" ideas for camouflage.

As I have often said, the Democratic party - and liberal organizations - hangs a sign out "we welcome the downtrodden, the persecuted, the left out and the left behind." But then should people actually show up, they complain bitterly about them tracking mud on their elegant imported carpet.

The party needs to get rid of the carpet, or take down that damned sign and stop deceiving people.

We need to stop blaming the people for recognizing the gentrified and aristocratic bias among those dominating the party, and for seeing through the hypocrisy. Were it not for that bias and hypocrisy, the right wingers could never have gotten so much power.


...

[apnu]

13. I think blaming the general public is an easy target

And that is why it is done. The general public cannot defend itself because it has no voice, so it will be picked on endlessly by groups that do have a voice.

This financial problem is a complex problem to solve, and most people, IMO, are not equipped to solve the problem. This means politicians and talking heads, but they have to say something, it is their job to say something, so they go for the path of least resistance and assign blame on people who have no way of refuting the blame.

Oddly, how we got into this mess is pretty easy to see, at least from what I understand of it. Yet many people I read/hear/see communicating about this problem seem to miss the cause frequently. Strange, the problem has an easy source but people are ill equipped to say it, it has a complex solution yet people consistently use too simple solutions for the problem.

Given the fact that most of the people that caused the problem are the ones trying to fix it, I cannot see any outcome that is fair to the people. The banks will demand that the debt be paid, even though they, too, were the ones who signed the mortgages, loans and credit card agreements along with the general public. Shouldn't they shoulder some of this blame? It like rewarding the bull in the china shop for breaking the plates, and blaming the plates for being in the bull's way.

[Two Americas]

17. I agree

Well said.

[Donnachaidh]

16. eerily silent? And who is (or was) the Senator with the state that the credit card

companies reside in? oh yeah -- Biden. HIS record sucks on the credit debacle. He should carry a full dollop of public shame and derision. I'll bet he's glad he was elevated to VP -- he can act as if he's above the *problem* now. :sarcasm:

[Laelth]

20. Liberals have not been silent.

Liberals voted against all the key legislation that put us in this hole. DLC Democrats aided and abetted the Republican machine. DLC Clinton signed some of their pet legislation, but please don't blame us liberals. We stood and fought against all this, and have done so since the 1930s.

:dem:

-Laelth

[burythehatchet]

18. Exactly. We create a culture where material acquisition is respected

We make people feel like losers when they don't acquire fast enough. We give them the means to get in the race. The we blame them for being irresponsible.

[Two Americas]

31. worse yet

Not only that, but we punish anyone who tries to live differently, and punish those who choose professions that are not all about material acquisition. That is the worst thing about it, because we are all forced to accommodate the needs and desires of the greedy and predatory few and we cannot just mind our own business and live our lives as we see fit.

[roguevalley]

14. I used to be stable. Now, I am working on the edge. SIGH!

[Skittles]

34. I am still hanging on but I see how easily it can slip away

yes indeed

[roguevalley]

35. you and me both. Not the sort of world I planned to get old in

but I am ever the optimist. :+

[Donnachaidh]

15. thriving does NOT necessarily mean living on credit

Thriving is paying your bills, with a few bucks in the bank, and perhaps even a retirement fund building up. But you take the job away with the healthcare, and try to go MONTHS without a decent job offer, and you see what happens to that few bucks and that retirement fund.

DON'T clump the working class out there with the plastic junkies. Many MANY of them are suffering because we're shoveling money at banks, when there should be some form of WPA being put into works NOW.

[FatDave]

21. Some people actually were thriving.

I was doing great until I was laid off at the end of '07. Found contract work for awhile that was a bit less than what I was getting, but it was enough. By the time that contract was up, I could only find work that would pay me a little less than half of what I was making. But I scraped by. Then I was laid off from that job in December (Merry Xmas) after my company's clients all stopped spending after the crisis hit. Now I send my resumes to jobs and don't even get a response. I have a few friends in the industry who throw me small contracts when they can, but I'm late on my mortgage with no idea how I can pay it.

Two years ago I was doing great. Now I'm in danger of losing my house.

[Lorien]

29. Wrong. I was once "thriving"; I had a nice six figure income, 80k in the bank

no debt outside of my home(which was far less than I could afford)...but those were during the Clinton years. Bush brought me unemployment and sky high medical bills. My insurance-which I had paid for for over a decade-refused to cover a damn thing. Now I'm in debt and unemployed. I don't even own a credit card OR a big screen TV!

[tavalon]

33. My household is still doing well, but we have three incomes

and we don't spend beyond our means. Housing is quite expensive up here so much of our money goes towards that and also towards our son's therapy. One of my partners just had his work hours cut by 40% but he will be able to file for underemployment starting this week. Everything seems the same in the household but it also feels like there is this sword of damacles over our heads. We have no debt but neither do we own our own home so ................

[prolesunited]

2. How about subsisting?

[Lucky Luciano]

7. I am one of them!

Lost a great paying job that helped me pay down most of the $150K in debt I had coming out of grad schoola few years ago. I have $30K in savings (including a car I can sell which I do not need in NYC) and monthly overhead of $4K per month (rent and food). So, I am living like a college kid again...sigh...

I do have headhunters galore looking for an acceptable job for me - I have had zero interviews in 4 months (though the Christmas season will not have interviews even during bull markets). I had quasi-good news today in that a headhunter in London found a firm there that really liked my CV, but did not want to deal with the visa....sigh again...but at least they had a positive thing to say!

[SpiralHawk]

9. The putrid fruit of republiconomics

Ptooey

[shadowknows69]

10. And I have news for our new "struggling" brothers and sisters

It's just a short a walk to "destitute" from struggling and "doomed" is only about a mile away.

[Donnachaidh]

19. it's not a walk hun -- it's a steep slide.

How many states are now seeing the non-profits suddenly tapped out? GEORGIA is seeing that in my county. We're going to see riots in the streets this summer - when the hundreds of thousands who worked for years and never had to ask for help try to ask for it and are told -- sorry, no money left. When the weather warms up a bit more in the north, you'll see more and more people out in the street, foreclosed on, evicted. You'll see tent cities popping up all over the place.

Those folks who dutifully paid taxes, and suddenly they'll be thrown into an underfunded system that has NOTHING for them?

THAT will be the time our representatives will be *wishing* they'd taken a 10 billion or so and shoveled it into Main Street, instead of handing it out to banks and hedge fund managers to pay back foreign investors.

[ohheckyeah]

11. The biggest lie perpetrated on the American people

is the notion that if you just work hard enough you will get ahead. The hardest working people I know are making minimum wage and have little hope that they will get ahead. Sure, hard work is important in getting ahead but not nearly as important as who you know and where you went to college.

[FatDave]

22. The people who work the hardest usually get the shaft.

The workers who actually produce a company's product are paid the lowest wages and generally treated like shit. And for each of those workers making the product, how many profit from his or her work? Working hard is about the worst possible strategy for getting ahead. The best strategy is to go to an ivy league school. Good luck with that, Mr. and Mrs. Middle Class.

Welcome to DU, ohheckyeah.

[ohheckyeah]

23. Thanks, FatDave.

I agree with you.

[Lucky Luciano]

24. Incorrect - manual labor will never get you ahead

by working hard - that I agree with. The Type A overachieving Ivy Leaguer gets ahead not so much for genius IQ, but persistence, aggression, solid 125-135 IQ (not genius), and bullshitting skills - as well as hard work that is not necessarily manual.

[FatDave]

28. I wouldn't consider programming to be manual labor.

But what I said applies there as well. In fact it's the area I have the most experience with. Programmers get shit on while management and CEO's get rich selling their work.

[Lucky Luciano]

30. Most programmers lack some of what I suggested (not all though)

"The Type A overachieving Ivy Leaguer gets ahead not so much for genius IQ, but persistence, aggression, solid 125-135 IQ (not genius), and bullshitting skills - as well as hard work that is not necessarily manual."

Most programmers are rather docile and introverted, so they often lack the Type A aggression I mention. Also, they often have a higher IQ than what I mention which often reduces bullshitting skills, though obviously not with perfect negative correlation. The programmers that have the aggressiveness and the bullshitting skills (and probably a very high IQ above 140) will often be able to secure funding (or be able to get in on a startup with new funding) from a venture capital firm through excessive persistence and stars in their eyes. ie - they are not going to sit back and watch management profit off of them when they think they are smart enough to become rich. Ivy League degree not required, but helpful for getting past gatekeepers a little more quickly.

[FatDave]

32. I'm not disagreeing with what you say.

I think you're mostly right (though I might argue that you're underplaying the advantage of being connected to the right people). I'm mostly disappointed that our culture prizes bullshit, tenacity, and aggression. Seems that our society rewards douchebags. Who hasn't been stabbed in the back by some slimy fucking corporate climber? I don't want to be a douchebag, so I suffer thanklessly despite being one of the people who is most necessary to the business.

[CrispyQ]

26. Another big lie is that the playing field is level.

It isn't. And it's getting more & more skewed against the little guy. A level playing field would mean everyone is provided with the basics -- housing, health care, education, child care. We're about to have a generation of young people who will grow up in tent cities. Level playing field? Yeah, right.

Jared Bernstein, Biden's economic adviser, says that in a just society there is no limit to how high one can climb, but there is a limit to how far one can fall.

[xchrom]

12. recommend

[Noodleboy13]

25. Hoping that people are inherently good...

I notice signs of quiet struggle in families all the time. Eavesdropping in the supermarket, hearing a mother explain that the eggs in the other section were organic and they weren't going to get them this time. Looking at other peoples carts and seeing basics. Shelves bare because all the $1 mushrooms/cheese/bagels were gone. I don't wish anyone to suffer, but making a dollar stretch requires a little adaptability. Maybe giving up the cable tv causes families to reconnect. Cooking meals from scratch is cheaper and generally healthier. I'm fortunate in that I live an urban area where having a car is unnecessary; having to deal with payments, gas and insurance could be a real hardship. I imagine that families in the suburbs are reliant on cars feeling a significant pinch.

Peace.
Noodleboy

[Blue_Tires]

36. goddamn...i'm 32 and maybe had ONE thriving career year...