Maxwell Strachan — Government Helps Rich Much More Than Everyone Else, Americans Say

The Huffington Post
Government Helps Rich Much More Than Everyone Else, Americans Say
Maxwell Strachan

Also:

The Totally Unfair And Bitterly Uneven 'Recovery,' In 12 Charts

Mark Gongloff, Jan Diehm, and Katy Hall


Rich-Poor Employment Gap Now Widest On Record
Hope Yen

Rates of unemployment for the lowest-income families – those earning less than $20,000 – have topped 21 percent, nearly matching the rate for all workers during the 1930s Great Depression.

U.S. households with income of more than $150,000 a year have an unemployment rate of 3.2 percent, a level traditionally defined as full employment. At the same time, middle-income workers are increasingly pushed into lower-wage jobs. Many of them in turn are displacing lower-skilled, low-income workers, who become unemployed or are forced to work fewer hours, the analysis shows.

"This was no 'equal opportunity' recession or an `equal opportunity' recovery," said Andrew Sum, director of the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University. "One part of America is in depression, while another part is in full employment."...

Low-wage workers are now older and better educated than ever, with especially large jumps in those with at least some college-level training.

"The people at the bottom are going to be continually squeezed, and I don't see this ending anytime soon," said Harvard economist Richard Freeman. "If the economy were growing enough or unions were stronger, it would be possible for the less educated to do better and for the lower income to improve. But in our current world, where we are still adjusting to globalization, that is not very likely to happen."

Without a job guarantee, the US faces a permanent underclass and the prospect of either an expansion of the welfare state or social chaos. The US is now facing its own Lewis turning point in reverse direction, going from developed status to under-developed status with an abrupt have/have-not divide and declining middle class.

Los Angeles Times

Amid slow economic recovery, more Americans identify as 'lower class'
Emily Alpert

The rising numbers surprised some researchers and activists even in light of the bruising economy. For decades, the vast majority of Americans have seen themselves as "middle class" or "working class." Even during earlier downturns, so few people called themselves lower class that scholars routinely lumped them with working class. Activists for the poor often avoid the term, deeming it an insult.

When people call themselves lower class, "we'll say, 'You're not lower than someone else. You just have less money,'" said Michaelann Bewsee, co-founder of Arise for Social Justice, a Massachusetts low-income rights group. But many don't consider it insulting today, Bewsee said. "They're just reflecting their economic reality," she said.