It’s not the demise of the middle class, it’s the creation of the American underclass. Which stated in the 70s with a slow decay and has accelerated the past few years with the debt collapse. A combination of the US rebuilding the world after WWII, technological innovations and our hundred year cheap fossil fuel suck down(we were the Saudi Arabia of the 40-70s) caused the rise of the average first world citizens lifestyle. Actually the average citizen of the US lives better than nobility of the old world because of those things. Nobility could not get chilean sea bass, costa rican bananas and an ipod built in china all at one place. The amount of energy coupled with technology needed in that consumption potpourri was unfathomable 100 years ago.
All factors that caused the rise in the average citizens lifestyle are coming or have come to an end. The post war rebuild boom came to an end in the 70s. Technological advances are now making many jobs irrelevant and actually proper application of new technologies could eliminate millions more of current jobs. And our master-resource(oil) has peaked or will soon peak causing a massive decrease in net energy per capita, regardless of what we do, coupled with the rise of Asia’s energy demands competing against ours. Basically a dynamic is created that a rise in Asia’s lifestyle can only be possible with a decrease in western lifestyle. This was very easy to see in the past two years. Western energy consumption went down via millions of job loses and asia’s went up. There is nothing to change this dynamic. Of course geo-political stress with this and debt dynamics will only increase.
Not that any of these things are inherently bad, they are what they are. But they are a completely new environment and in a new environment you either change or die, both for individuals and societies. Societies die because they don’t adapt. We have thousands of years of history to teach us this. According to Jared Diamond who wrote Collapse, a comprehensive study of civilization collapses, civilizations that adapted to changing environments and survived had to change some deep held cherished beliefs. This is just the nature of evolution, things work, until they don’t and you change or die. Being in a new completely new environment means we are stuck on permanent stupid leadership-wise, until we do a complete reformation of the political structure, IMO. They just have no clue what to do other than trying desperately to keep things the same, doing the same things, while being completely captured by vested interests and fighting a confluence of unstoppable macro-forces. Though, I’m sure many of the politically well-connected comprehend the coming contraction and are gaming the system for their own personal gain, but that is a different discussion. It’s not a conspiracy per se, it’s the nature of the system.
With current trends, we will only create a larger and larger underclass, collective living conditions will get worse and wealth disparity will exponentially increase doing things the same way. Now, the inertia of the global debt conflagration will play out over the next few years and it will knock the western world on it’s ass, if the whole planet does not slip into a depression first and we all get knocked on our ass with global social strife built to the equation. This really can’t be stopped and there is no use hand wringing over (insert bad policy or corruption here). It’s very much a systemic and inevitable. IMO
Of course, being in the top 10% of the worlds wealth pyramid and living in the most desirable areas, leaves you isolated, blinded, protected(for some time) and biased. Take a trip through old midwest mfg towns turned to meth production and wall mart living. Small towns are laying off all city workers and crime is taking over. Just recently there were power outages from the decaying grid for days at a time in michigan. The list of social and physical decay is endless, even if a good portion are living better than ever. It’s a trend that will reverse for the majority.
My advice, to be taken or left of course, is to take a broader view, understand the other side and seek the synthesis for your own information, rather than adhering to old assumptions. Always retain an open mind, even about your deepest convictions, or you’re little more than an artifact.
