Reality exposes the farce of the "disappearing middle class"
By ParaTed2k
@ParaTed2k (22940)
Sheboygan, Wisconsin
February 4, 2009 8:22am CST
Class warriors like to perpetuate the myth of the "disappearing middle class", however if you look around, you see that most of our markets are aimed at the middle class. If it were disappearing, that wouldn't be true.
What percentage of the car dealers out there specialize in high end, or custom sports cars? There are only a handful of those in each state. Compare that to the thousands of dealerships that offer cars in the middle class price range.
How many of you can even name a high end restaurant? Now list all the restaurants you know of that cater to the middle class.
People say that nothing is Made in the USA anymore, but that isn't true. Many high end products are made exclusively in the US. The reason most people don't know that is, most the people in the US are middle class and aren't in the market for these products.
Our entire culture is based on the fact that the middle class makes up the majority of our country. That's a lot of influence for a class that is supposedly disappearing.
1 person likes this
3 responses
@thegreatdebater (7316)
• United States
5 Feb 09
Para, the reason many in the middle class feel like their are fewer of them is because while their wages have been flat their expenses have gone up dramaticly. During the last 8 years the middle class used all of the equity in their houses to maintain their standard of living, while the Bush tax cuts didn't even off set the rise in gas prices, not to mention, housing, insurance, inflation, and medical insurance. But, this is common during republican administrations, trickle down economics never actually trickles down, it makes it to the top and never leaves.
I agree that our economy is based on the middle class, but that is because they are the largest group in the country, and we all know that majority rules. If you talk to people in marketing, you will see that their target age is usually the middle class. They are the ones that spend the most amount of money. Pretty simple economics Para.
@ParaTed2k (22940)
• Sheboygan, Wisconsin
5 Feb 09
The middle class did use the equity in their homes to maintain a standard of living, but they did it to maintain a standard of living that was beyond their means.
Yes, we are the ones who spend the most money, and most markets are targeted to us because we aren't disappearing. That's my point.
1 person likes this
@thegreatdebater (7316)
• United States
5 Feb 09
Para, you are correct that we are living beyond our means, but that is what we are told to do by the government, and the media. When the president tells us to spend money instead of worring about a terrorist attack, that kind of says it all. I really don't know if the middle class is disappearing, but is getting alot harder to stay middle class.
@ParaTed2k (22940)
• Sheboygan, Wisconsin
6 Feb 09
If the biggest market is the middle class, we can't be disappearing.
@xParanoiax (6987)
• United States
18 Feb 09
Mostly, I figure they're still doing the same old crap because they don't know what else to do.
@agrim94 (3805)
• India
7 Feb 09
well i can say about India.. we are still growing economy and despite the recession all over the world we would still grow in FY 2008-09 by more than 7% and we have huge huge middle class and our middle class is bigger than total population of USA and daily lots of poor people are up gradng themselves to middle class/// if it wasnt for recession in west and rest of world we would have grown much stronger this year and would have added quite a few more numbers to already enormous middle class
