This article was originally published by Michael Snyder on The Economic Collapse Blog.
“I have been chronicling the demise of the middle class for many years, but I didn’t know that the numbers had gotten this bad.”
The middle class in America is being systematically eviscerated, and it is getting worse with each passing year. As you will see below, one new study has found that 10 percent of Americans now own 70 percent of all the wealth. Once upon a time, the United States had the largest and most vibrant middle class in the history of the world, but pretty soon we are just going to have the ultra-wealthy and everyone else. Our system has been designed to funnel as much wealth as possible to the very top of the financial pyramid, and that means that most of the rest of us are deeply struggling. And when you are just barely getting by from month to month, all it takes is one bad break to knock you completely out of the middle class and into poverty.
I have been chronicling the demise of the middle class for many years, but I didn’t know that the numbers had gotten this bad. According to a study that was recently conducted by the Federal Reserve, the percentage of wealth controlled by the top 10 percent of U.S. households has shot up from 60 percent in 1989 to 70 percent today…
Deutsche Bank’s Torsten Sløk says that the distribution of household wealth in America has become even more disproportionate over the past decade, with the richest 10% of U.S. households representing 70% of all U.S. wealth in 2018, compared with 60% in 1989, according to a recent study by researchers at the Federal Reserve.
The study finds that the share of wealth among the richest 1% increased to 32% from 23% over the same period.
The ironic thing is that the Federal Reserve has actually done much to cause this high concentration of wealth among the elite. In response to the last financial crisis, the Federal Reserve pumped unprecedented amounts of money into the financial system, and this has created the greatest stock market bubble in our history…
The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +2.06% has climbed nearly 300% since its closing low in March 2009, the S&P 500 index SPX, +2.14% has climbed 325%, while the Nasdaq Composite Index COMP, +2.65% has soared 535% over the same period.
Meanwhile, wages have stagnated for ordinary Americans. According to the Social Security Administration, the median yearly wage in the United States is currently just $30,533. In other words, 50 percent of all American workers make at least that much per year and 50 percent of all American workers make that much or less per year.
$30,533 a year breaks down to approximately $2,500 per month, and you simply can’t support a middle-class lifestyle for a typical American family on $2,500 a month.
Meanwhile, the cost of living for middle-class families has exploded higher over the past few decades…
Everyday expenses continue to rise, and as the shadow inflation increases, it also threatens to wipe out the middle class – what’s left of it anyway. In fact, middle-class life is now 30% more expensive than it was 20 years ago, according to a separate report by CNBC. The cost of things such as college, housing, and child care has risen precipitously: Tuition at public universities doubled between 1996 and 2016 and housing prices in popular cities have quadrupled, Alissa Quart, author and executive director of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, tells CNBC Make It.
As the cost of living has risen faster than our incomes have, more Americans have been squeezed out of the middle class with each passing month.
As a result, an increasing number of Americans have become financially dependent on the government, and our rapidly expanding welfare state is a big reason why the federal government is now 22 trillion dollars in debt.
Of course, many Americans are no longer able to make it at all, and the ranks of the homeless are swelling all over the nation. In fact, we just got some brand new numbers about the growth of homelessness in the Los Angeles area that are absolutely eye-popping…
The number of homeless people counted across Los Angeles County jumped 12% over the past year to nearly 59,000, with more young and old residents and families on the streets, officials said Tuesday.
The majority of the homeless were found within the city of Los Angeles, which saw a 16% increase to 36,300, the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority said in presenting January’s annual count to the county Board of Supervisors.
Yes, it is true that we have a record number of millionaires on the west coast in 2019, but meanwhile, our major west coast cities are being transformed into rotting, decaying nightmares right in front of our eyes.
During a recent interview with Laura Ingraham, Dr. Drew Pinsky admitted that there is “a complete breakdown of the basic needs of civilization in Los Angeles right now”…
“We have a complete breakdown of the basic needs of civilization in Los Angeles right now,” Pinsky told host Laura Ingraham. “We have the three prongs of airborne disease, tuberculosis is exploding, (and) rodent-borne. We are one of the only cities in the country that doesn’t have a rodent control program, and sanitation has broken down.”
Pinsky’s comments followed news that Los Angeles police officer had contracted typhoid fever, a rare and life-threatening illness that fewer than 350 Americans contract each year.
Los Angeles had a typhus outbreak last summer and will likely have another this summer, Pinsky said. Meanwhile, bubonic plague – a pandemic that killed tens of millions of people during the 14th century – is “likely” already present in Los Angeles, Pinsky added.
Despite all of our great wealth and despite all of our advanced technology, this is what life is like in our second largest city right now.
And if things are degenerating this badly during stable times, what are things going to look like once our society plunges into chaos?
Ultimately, the American Dream is about being self-sufficient. Most people want to be able to work hard and provide a nice life for their families, but that is becoming harder and harder to do.
No matter which political party has been in power in Washington, the middle class has continued to shrink and more wealth and power has become concentrated in the hands of the elite.
Now we stand on the precipice of the next major economic downturn, and many are deeply concerned about what that is going to mean for the future of our society.
Michael Snyder is the author of four books, including Get Prepped Now.
Are you and your family prepared for the greatest economic collapse that America has ever seen? Economic expert Michael Snyder of The Economic Collapse Blog and Barbara Fix, author of Survival: Prepare Before Disaster Strikes, address the whys and the hows of getting prepared for the coming crisis in their new book. Topics include looming economic collapse, Ebola, drought and increasing weather-related disasters, our extremely vulnerable power grid, civil unrest, and practical steps for storing food and supplies that you will need. –Get Prepped Now, book description
You want to see the bleeding out of America? Google for images of Shanghai shipping port and you will see thousands of CONEX shipping containers full of exports. Search American ports and you’ll see tanks and Humvees. Gerald Celente nailed it when he stated, ‘The business of China is business. The business of America is war’.
Globalists need to bankrupt America before they can ‘rescue’ us with their global government. They have the perfect man for the job. Trump’s companies have gone bankrupt seven times. In doing so Trump bled Americans of billions of dollars and he is still doing it.
And now trump is considering banning suppressors.
Montana Guy, I really like Trump, and hope and pray he’s “for real”, but I don’t trust him at all. If for no other reason than he’s a Politian. That said, I believe in the rule of opposites. If “they” say one thing they mean the opposite. For example:
1. The Obomination was “The Great Unit-er” consequently we are as divided as ever in American History!
2. Trump was going to “Make America Great Again!” That means he will…
It’s just a theory.
“The middle class in America is being systematically eviscerated, and it is getting worse with each passing year. ”
This is TRUE and we all know it. This is the result of NWO Globalism ushered in by GHWB and magnified by the actions of every President and Congress since ….
until TRUMP.
“Free Trade” under NWO Globalism was a myth. It was Managed Trade (mercantilism) and managed to the advantage of the Global Investment Class at the expense of the American worker, family, and taxpayer.
Globalists systematically offshored 70,000 American factories & tens of millions of American jobs to China, generating the MASSIVE trade imbalance that is sucking the wealth of America offshore to China.
That is where the wealth of the Middle Class has gone. Once offshore in China, Chinese industrialists (read: the CCP) gives a cut of the plunder to the Global Investment Class (dividends & stock appreciation), which manifests STATISTICALLY as the growing Inequality Gap between the rich & poor in America.
TRUMP’S “America First” policies are designed to reverse the cash flow to China, BACK to the United States and American workers, families, and taxpayers. This reversal of fortune for Middle Class Americans cannot happen overnight. TRUMP policies, including TARIFFS, particularly TARIFFS, must be sustained over a very long time to repair the damage of NWO Globalism and unfair trade advantages provided to China by the Globalists; upon America’s Middle Classs.
Death to the New World Order. It’s totally Constitutional. 🙂
OFF TOPIC
Almost 100 shot in the past two weekends in Shitcago, imagine what it would be like if/when the grid goes down, or some other nationwide disaster happens. Bang-bang!
“A Country Boy can Survive”. Hank Jr.
Seminole Wind, I strongly believe that the three top factors in surviving the SHTF will be LOCATION, LOCATION, and LOCATION! It will be very important to be among like minded people and family. My biggest and best prep so far has been to move away from the Baltimore/Washington corridor of death and destruction. I now live in a small rural town of “like-minded” people.
Equally important, is avoiding the North American Pavement Apes whenever possible. People may say that’s not very Christian of me, but it is truthful and GOD is TRUTH!
“TRUTH” … void where prohibited by law. Also void where prohibited by stupidity.
Justice;
I agree that LOCATION is VERY important,but we all know that it will only be a matter of time until unwelcomed visitors arrive and will either be begging for help or trying to take from you..
In Real SHTF, survival will be tough but your odds will be much higher in a small community in the Rockies, with “like minded people”.
In Real SHTF, no one is going anywhere. Be there to get there. 🙂
Justice,
I constantly advocate for location. Leave the city! Get out.
Leave the cities to Democrats. Democrats are by nature stupid, and selfish, so they will ultimately kill themselves off. American cities will become, indeed are becoming mini- Venezuela’s. The rest of us should stand aside and watch.
The real reason the middle class is failing, is because we allow Democrats in our society.
rellik, one of the great joys post SHTF will be watching liberals say “But I voted for Obama” right before…
Cities and Suburbs are two sides of the same coin..Neither place is a viable option for SHTF..
Flash mobs have been starting up. Downplayed in the media so the sheep don’t panic.
Don’t be too concerned. These 100 souls will still get to vote in every election until Jesus comes. Sometimes twice. 🙁
Post-SHTF gangs will be a big problem. That appears to be a fact in Countries that experience an economic collapse.
I was thinking since I have gone TOTALLY overboard on stocking up on Kool-Aid this month , that my post-shtf gang would be called the Kool-Aid Kids?!?! That doesn’t sound very tough but it’s pretty bad-*ss how he breaks through walls!
At any rate, if you guy hear of a post apocalyptic warlord, who rules the Mid-Altlantic States and is known by many names; one of which is “The Kool-Aid Kid”, you’ll know who they’re talking about!
I like the cherry flavor lol. Rule on!
Genius, the gang will not paint our faces, but will be known by our stained red lips from drinking so much cherry kool-aid. It will look like blood driping from our mouths. That’s bad-*ss. LOL
One would think millions of citizens would be marching in the streets letting those causing the despair know how they really feel. What other option is left? Who would bring a child into this reality today?
Why do so many people like to insinuate that the decline of the middle class just started in the past few years? I was born and raised in Detroit and remember what the city use to be like..Detroit went from being “Motor City USA” to poverty in a span of less than 25 years..I remember all the jobs leaving Detroit beginning in the late-60’s and throughout the 70’s and 80’s..By 1994,Detroit had already lost the majority of its manufacturing base.. The middle class has been declining for over 40 years now..
You got that right. Too little, too late now.
In Mexico militia of citizen vigilantes have formed and are successfully clearing their towns of gangs and criminals. Enough is enough.
When government fails, at some point, the people rise up and fill the gap.
.
That’s one of the main reasons we must never be disarmed. I will never be left defenseless against certain groups. Just look at what’s happening in South Africa, if anyone needs a lesson!
The number is worse in the UK: 7% of the population owns 84% of the wealth.
The West is now nothing but a military industrial complex with a vast welfare state attached to it. We export little but raw resources and weapons to Muslims.
They just announced the main source of wealth in the US is real estate. That’s the only bubble that matters.
Being in a CLASS is a state of mind. the Richest peo0ple I know haven’t got a pot to piss in. The richest people I know are all unhappy because they want more.
So I call Bull Shit on CLASS!!!
Sgt.
You got that right Sgt.!
I am working class, not middle class.
Good for the Mexican vigilantes who are taking back their streets but where do you think the criminals are going?