quote:

I apologise a better description would be a slow suffocation into extinction.

quote:

What about claims of a disappearing middle class? Let's do some detective work. Controlling for inflation, in 1967, 8 percent of households had an annual income of $75,000 and up; in 2003, more than 26 percent did. In 1967, 17 percent of households had a $50,000 to $75,000 income; in 2003, it was 18 percent. In 1967, 22 percent of households were in the $35,000 to $50,000 income group; by 2003, it had fallen to 15 percent. During the same period, the $15,000 to $35,000 category fell from 31 percent to 25 percent, and the under $15,000 category fell from 21 percent to 16 percent. The only reasonable conclusion from this evidence is that if the middle class is disappearing, it's doing so by swelling the ranks of the upper classes.

quote:

ORIGINAL: celticlord2112

quote:

I apologise a better description would be a slow suffocation into extinction.

That is also inaccurate.

quote:

ORIGINAL: slvemike4u

quote:

ORIGINAL: celticlord2112

quote:

I apologise a better description would be a slow suffocation into extinction.

That is also inaccurate.

HOW?

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ORIGINAL: celticlord2112

quote:

I apologise a better description would be a slow suffocation into extinction.

That is also inaccurate.

Income Mobility

quote:

What about claims of a disappearing middle class? Let's do some detective work. Controlling for inflation, in 1967, 8 percent of households had an annual income of $75,000 and up; in 2003, more than 26 percent did. In 1967, 17 percent of households had a $50,000 to $75,000 income; in 2003, it was 18 percent. In 1967, 22 percent of households were in the $35,000 to $50,000 income group; by 2003, it had fallen to 15 percent. During the same period, the $15,000 to $35,000 category fell from 31 percent to 25 percent, and the under $15,000 category fell from 21 percent to 16 percent. The only reasonable conclusion from this evidence is that if the middle class is disappearing, it's doing so by swelling the ranks of the upper classes.

quote:

Wish I had Your skills for finding sources to support my beliefs Despite the slanted cherry picked statistics cited by Income Mobility...I still stand by my previous statement the middle class in this country is an endangered species.Now the talent to find a statistical study that props up Your preconcieved opinions while admirable as a skill does not change the facts...The morgatge crisis in this country ,runaway fuel prices ,rising food costs all spell doom for the working man trying to raise a family and damm him if he believes he can send his children to a University..Statistics are nice and they can be persuasuive but life is real and I invite You to look around and please make it a hard look Your neighbors are having a harder and harder time making ends meet.Second mortgages and maxed out credit cards are now the default condition of that middle class Your statistics suggest are healthy.Median Income while a useful barometer are not the end all and be all...And does not address the gap i mentioned between the haves and have nots...does Your Income Mobility report explain the precipitous rise in executive pay ,while simulteneously downsizing of workforces ,outsourcing of services all with one goal in mind increasing the bottom line .But at who's expence ,despite what Your report say's it is the middle class that this burden crushes....

• I am squarely in that middle class.  So saith my last several years' tax returns.
• My credit cards are paid off at the end of every month
• My mortgage is paid off.  My ex has a house that is hers outright.
• I paid my own way through college.  My boys are doing the same.

1. Buy groceries for a unemployed lady friend who needed to refill the pantry after Hurricane Rita
2. Put up the down payment on another lady friend's new car after hers was totaled by a dumbass driver with no insurance.
3. Paid the rent on a (now ex) slave's apartment (in addition to my own).

quote:

ORIGINAL: celticlord2112

quote:

Wish I had Your skills for finding sources to support my beliefs Despite the slanted cherry picked statistics cited by Income Mobility...I still stand by my previous statement the middle class in this country is an endangered species.Now the talent to find a statistical study that props up Your preconcieved opinions while admirable as a skill does not change the facts...The morgatge crisis in this country ,runaway fuel prices ,rising food costs all spell doom for the working man trying to raise a family and damm him if he believes he can send his children to a University..Statistics are nice and they can be persuasuive but life is real and I invite You to look around and please make it a hard look Your neighbors are having a harder and harder time making ends meet.Second mortgages and maxed out credit cards are now the default condition of that middle class Your statistics suggest are healthy.Median Income while a useful barometer are not the end all and be all...And does not address the gap i mentioned between the haves and have nots...does Your Income Mobility report explain the precipitous rise in executive pay ,while simulteneously downsizing of workforces ,outsourcing of services all with one goal in mind increasing the bottom line .But at who's expence ,despite what Your report say's it is the middle class that this burden crushes....

• I am squarely in that middle class.  So saith my last several years' tax returns.
  
• My credit cards are paid off at the end of every month
  
• My mortgage is paid off.  My ex has a house that is hers outright.
  
• I paid my own way through college.  My boys are doing the same.

Along the way I have managed to:

1. Buy groceries for a unemployed lady friend who needed to refill the pantry after Hurricane Rita
   
2. Put up the down payment on another lady friend's new car after hers was totaled by a dumbass driver with no insurance.
   
3. Paid the rent on a (now ex) slave's apartment (in addition to my own).

I am not crushed by life.  I take it as it comes and look for every opportunity to prosper.

The Bene Gesserit in Frank Herbert's Dune taught that "fear is the mind killer".  FDR said "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself".

In every circumstance, I choose hope over despair, anticipation over fear.  It's what I do.

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what i did claim on the other hand is these are not good times for the American working man,and any claim to the contrary is a simple case of juggling statistics and chery picking facts

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juggling statistics and chery picking facts

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ORIGINAL: bipolarber

I'll answer this one without reading any of the other posts. Simply put:

I support Obama because I want my fucking country back!

Thank you.

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ORIGINAL: popeye1250

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ORIGINAL: bipolarber

I'll answer this one without reading any of the other posts. Simply put:

I support Obama because I want my fucking country back!

Thank you.

LOL, Bipolar, you want your country back?
Well now that Obama's broken his promise about not taking corporate money you'll have to stand in line behind, Exon/mobil, Haliburton, ALL the Big Pharmas, and ALL the Big Banks!
Bring a lawn chair!

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

I find it absolutely hilarious that if anyone on the left posts a link to an even remotely left source we get hammered over it but the right wingers routinely post crap made up by townhall, the Washington Times, UPI, worldnetdaily and other far right sources. In this case a fauxnews anchor wrote about an editorial in the WSJ which in turn references a study supposedly done by the US Treasury but no identifying info is given. I've just spent a half hour searching their website. I cannot find the study. If Williams, townhall and the WSJ editorial board were so confident of the data in the study why not actually point us to it?

To the OP I'm voting for Obama for a host of reasons. He believes in many of the same things I do and that is not true of McCain. I'm confident that Obama will appoint federal judges who have actually read the bill of rights and do not think they're quaint relics. I'm confident that 8 years from now if Obama is elected we won't be reading about some minor functionary of the DoJ telling the President he can do anything he wants and having had the President actually believe such patent garbage.

quote:

ORIGINAL: celticlord2112

quote:

Wish I had Your skills for finding sources to support my beliefs Despite the slanted cherry picked statistics cited by Income Mobility...I still stand by my previous statement the middle class in this country is an endangered species.Now the talent to find a statistical study that props up Your preconcieved opinions while admirable as a skill does not change the facts...The morgatge crisis in this country ,runaway fuel prices ,rising food costs all spell doom for the working man trying to raise a family and damm him if he believes he can send his children to a University..Statistics are nice and they can be persuasuive but life is real and I invite You to look around and please make it a hard look Your neighbors are having a harder and harder time making ends meet.Second mortgages and maxed out credit cards are now the default condition of that middle class Your statistics suggest are healthy.Median Income while a useful barometer are not the end all and be all...And does not address the gap i mentioned between the haves and have nots...does Your Income Mobility report explain the precipitous rise in executive pay ,while simulteneously downsizing of workforces ,outsourcing of services all with one goal in mind increasing the bottom line .But at who's expence ,despite what Your report say's it is the middle class that this burden crushes....

• I am squarely in that middle class.  So saith my last several years' tax returns.
  
• My credit cards are paid off at the end of every month
  
• My mortgage is paid off.  My ex has a house that is hers outright.
  
• I paid my own way through college.  My boys are doing the same.

Along the way I have managed to:

1. Buy groceries for a unemployed lady friend who needed to refill the pantry after Hurricane Rita
   
2. Put up the down payment on another lady friend's new car after hers was totaled by a dumbass driver with no insurance.
   
3. Paid the rent on a (now ex) slave's apartment (in addition to my own).

I am not crushed by life.  I take it as it comes and look for every opportunity to prosper.

The Bene Gesserit in Frank Herbert's Dune taught that "fear is the mind killer".  FDR said "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself".

In every circumstance, I choose hope over despair, anticipation over fear.  It's what I do.

A) Family relationships have changed: "These days many parents are facing a new fact of life: ongoing financial help to their adult offspring, even into middle age." (Gardner, 12/11/03).
B) To obtain middle-class status for their families, parents have financially leveraged themselves. Nobody has documented this stress better than Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi. Their newly released book: The Two Income Trap: Why Middle-Class Mothers & Fathers Are Going Broke, is ground-breaking. They provide a comprehensive analysis of how middle-class families are too leveraged, and within a whisker of being pushed off a financial cliff. The continuation of outsourcing jobs overseas may be the final gust of wind that does it for many of them.

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They provide a comprehensive analysis of how middle-class families are too leveraged, and within a whisker of being pushed off a financial cliff.

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ORIGINAL: celticlord2112

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They provide a comprehensive analysis of how middle-class families are too leveraged, and within a whisker of being pushed off a financial cliff.

Anyone who argues that debt is anything other than personal choice is fighting a losing battle.

I live well mainly because I reject debt.  I am able to help others because I reject debt.

And yes--it is that simple.