I've noticed in my travels two distinct groups of people:
Folks A) Are making tons of money with highly specialized skill sets. They are actually making more money than they ever thought possible and are reveling in new technology and increasingly easy travel and the ability to access foreign markets and customers. A good portion of these folks have no solid job. They work as independent contractors.
Folks B)Have been "caught in the switches." Their skill sets are either undeveloped or outdated. The price/value of their skill set has fallen to near zero on the open market. They either want things to go back to the old corporate model or some other real or imagined way that things "used to be."
Needless to say, there are more Folks B than Folks A. And this is a real problem.
IMHO, you've oversimplified the matter. It is more complicated than that.
Education in this country is the avenue to better skill sets.
Not everyone can afford the education. And mid-level jobs that 'anyone' can do, have been the place those people have traditionally aspired to reaching in order to be able to afford the education needed for the better skill sets. I got hired on at EDS because I was extensively self trained in multiple OS platforms, software packages etc, had a background in sales and technical freelance work. I got their not because I had a degree but because of the bulk of my experience. Once I did get there, I found that I could eventually afford schooling. As it happens, I arrived there after losing everything and much of my resources went into rebuilding my life. By the time I was offshored, I was ready to consider schooling; but, by then the option was out of the question and being 'service sector' none of us qualified for retraining - ie educational assistance - that manufacturing sector workers got.
The reality is, not everyone is single with no responsibilities or overhead. In fact few are. It's tough on my health to try to work multiple jobs. I did it for a while and nearly landed myself in the hospital which would have bankrupted me at this point. But I'll return to it soon anyway. I'll have to. So this isn't whining, it's just using the most readily available real world example that I know intimately - my own. My story isn't that different from that of others. The specifics may be different; but, the circumstances end up with the same result. Too poor to afford anything and too rich for assistance. I don't want the assistance. I'd rather croak than take money from other taxpayers who are struggling themselves. On the other hand, while the mid-level job at 10-15 bucks an hour would help me afford schooling, those are the very jobs you're side is intent on raping from the landscape and pushing overseas for greater profit. What do you call the 'land of opportunity' after you've exported most of the opportunity?.. 'the land where opportunity used to be'...
That is the dynamic. You're destroying the opportunity here while raping the landscape around us. You've literally become parasites living off the carcass and gleeful over the feast.
The kneejerk reaction most of you utter is something along the lines of "start your own business" or "go back to school". That's great if you can afford it. Most can't. Have you looked at the price of a college education recently? I have. The cost of going into business isn't much better. But let's not get distracted by the real world.
I've spent my whole life pulling myself up by the bootstraps because that has been pretty much my only option given my circumstances and my morals. And hearing people say off the cuff, "pull yourself up..." isn't an insult because they are morons in my scheme of things. If they knew what they were saying and had any integrity, they'd find something useful to say. Instead, they offer the obvious. Who needs it. I'd rather they be constrained from turning the land of opportunity into that land of what used to be.. that or given a dose of reality and their own medicine for a bit enough for them to see the error in it. As it stands, if they want to turn reality into Shadowrun, Cyberpunk or the like, I'm content to respond in kind if it comes to that. They know the risk of what they're doing. If it bites them, they'll have no one to complain to about it. Right now, the illegal immigration issue is setting the nation into a rage.
When that is dealt with and the problems still exist, the desire for blood isn't going to be any less and the patience level by that time will have been exhausted. The American Civil war II is a very real possibility of a sequal.