The Disappearing Middle Class

Elizabeth Warren is brilliant. The only two people I’ve ever said this about are Paul Krugman and the late Molly Ivins, but let me add Elizabeth Warren: if she writes it, read it.  I won’t try to do it justice, but two points in her discussion about changes in the US economy since the 1960s especially caught my eye:

“In the boom of the 1960s, for example, median family income jumped by 33% (adjusted for inflation). But the boom of the 2000s resulted in an almost-imperceptible 1.6% increase for the typical family.”

and

“By the early 2000s, families were spending twice as much (adjusted for inflation) on mortgages than they did a generation ago — for a house that was, on average, onlyten percent bigger and 25 years older. They also had to pay twice as much to hang on to their health insurance.”

It’s fairly common knowledge that taxes for the top 1% had decreased markedly, that health care costs were growing far above inflation, and that the Wall Street firms responsible for the collapse of 2008 were trying to prevent the enactment of regulations to prevent similar future collapses.  But I don’t think the middle class squeeze could be much better distilled than these two points: paying much more to live, getting no more to live on.

Cohen’s Cookie Calculations

It has been almost three years since Ben Cohen’s (of Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream fame) oreo cookie presentation hit Youtube, but I thought I’d include it here since it still gives a general reflection of the comparative scale of the Pentagon budget.  Rev. Jim Wallis has correctly noted said “a budget is a moral document.”  Some of the budget numbers have changed and there is no question that there is an issue with controlling entitlement costs in the long run non-discetionary budget, but let’s not let President Obama’s escalation in Afghanistan provide any moral cover for those legislators and lobbyists who have a stake in plundering the purse for Pentagon pork.