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Middle class faces extinction
The News-Press ^
| June 15, 2003
| JANE R. JOHNSON, N. Fort Myers
Posted on 06/15/2003 2:09:25 PM PDT by Willie Green
Edited on 05/07/2004 6:06:46 PM PDT by Jim Robinson.
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To: Riverman94610
In the past they would have filled the bulk of relatively well paying manufacturing jobs but now they are obselete. Well, there is also the other half of the theory, that if manufacturing jobs are created in say Vietnam, they will have money to spend, and they will want to buy products, products that preferrably come from america. That is a long term approach to the thinking, that everything balances out. There are obvious and clear holes in this thinking and it contradicts the view both parties are espousing today.
There is a trend of thinking that believes that all white collar jobs require a better educated worker then manufacturing jobs. Sales requirements are simply and generally the same as manufactering. An Example would be somone who manufactered say office supplies, loses that job, and winds up working at staples now selling the very items that they used to make.
However, the hitch is that, that job might or might not pay as well, its an unknown variable. A huge part of the free market and free trade theory that is espoused by both parties, are that we are turning into a service oriented economy, where our people now provide servies and no longer manufacter. There are some very obvious dangers to changing wholesale from going from manufactering to service oriented in policy.
21
posted on
06/15/2003 3:33:14 PM PDT
by
Sonny M
("oderint dum metuant")
To: Sonny M
that if manufacturing jobs are created in say Vietnam, they will have money to spend, and they will want to buy products, products that preferrably come from americaIf the manufacturing jobs are in say Vietnam, then they will have products to sell and the jobs that allow them to buy them. Americans sitting around with no paycheck are neither producing products or able to purchase them.
22
posted on
06/15/2003 3:44:39 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: Pukin Dog
The rich do more purchasing than any 20 members of the middle class. All third world countries have a rich class and a very large poor class. How come all that purchasing power they have in countries like Haiti and Mexico ---where there are actually plenty of rich --as many as anywhere, are doing so poorly? It's the middle class and only the middle class that matters. Without the middle class we're like any other third world hole.
23
posted on
06/15/2003 3:47:38 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: Henrietta
So did Bill Gates. How many hospitals and libraries has Bill Gates built? The kind of rich people who care about this country are few and far between.
24
posted on
06/15/2003 3:49:55 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: Pukin Dog
based upon the thought of what middle class people would do if they were rich. What you need to worry about is what the ex-middle class people will do when they're poor, when they have nothing to lose. Look in history books at what brings on a revolution --an overthrow of power. Look at the French Revolution --- they haven't had one since they've had a middle class. Angry peasants aren't good to have around.
25
posted on
06/15/2003 3:52:15 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: FITZ
Untrue.
The reason that third world countries are such, is that their people do not have easy access to capital and credit. There is no investment need among the rich to give loans for people to start businesses, because there is no competition outside of governments for capital. The government and rich in third world nations are one and the same.
Outside investment capital is prohibited, so those enterprising persons do not have the ability to increase the value of native currency by increasing market activity.
26
posted on
06/15/2003 3:56:42 PM PDT
by
Pukin Dog
(Sans Reproache)
To: evilC
Someone once described the difference between the middle class and working class thusThey told you wrong. The upper class is independently wealthy ---they can work like some of the Kennedys do but they don't have to. Middle class are all the people who need their paycheck, they work for an income, they work for their lifestyle which can be comfortable but when the paycheck stops, the lifestyle stops. There really isn't a difference between blue-collar and white-collar anymore ---blue collar types can make $50,000-70,000 a year and some white collar types are pulling in $20,000. The poor require charity, they don't make it on paychecks.
27
posted on
06/15/2003 4:00:27 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: Henrietta
Mr Bill is now sending programing and call center jobs to India. He cares not a whit.
Comment #29 Removed by Moderator
To: FITZ
How many hospitals and libraries has Bill Gates built? Are you serious?
A better question for this discussion would be "how many millionaires who donate to charitable organizations, hospitals, libraries, etc; has Bill Gates created?"
It is not important whether or not rich people care about anyone else. It is totally irrelavant. One rich person pays the taxes that fund the services provided to poor people at the rate of over 200 to 1.
You need to expand your thinking. Compassion does not feed people. Money does.
30
posted on
06/15/2003 4:01:37 PM PDT
by
Pukin Dog
(Sans Reproache)
To: Pukin Dog
that their people do not have easy access to capital and credit. Sure they do ---do you think Fox's elite class in Mexico has no capital or credit? They don't need credit, they can buy shopping malls all at one time ----they've got vast amounts of capital. So do the wealthy elites of every country. The elites aren't much different in Haiti or Mexico than they are anywhere.
31
posted on
06/15/2003 4:02:12 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: Willie Green
It appears one day we may not have a "middle class", as we know it today. What will the country be like then? Will it be either similar to a third world society or to a European socialist country where it seems no one is either rich or poor?
Additionally, what happens when the present "minority" (a mixture of "nonwhite", I guess) becomes the majority and vote as a block, what will they do with their country?
What a challenge for the on coming US citizens keeping the best of the USA in an ever changing demographics of the homeland and a "smaller world".
32
posted on
06/15/2003 4:03:12 PM PDT
by
RAY
To: Pukin Dog
You need to expand your thinking. Compassion does not feed people. Money does.EXACTLY!!!! Money that the people earned to feed themselves. People earning money to feed themselves are the middle class.
33
posted on
06/15/2003 4:03:20 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: FITZ
Poverty does not bring revolution and it never has. Maybe YOU need to look in those history books, partner.
Restrictions against self determination; including the ability to personally improve one's living conditions, combined with the loss of basic human rights, is what is responsible for revolutions.
34
posted on
06/15/2003 4:04:37 PM PDT
by
Pukin Dog
(Sans Reproache)
To: ricpic
The greatest need of small businesses and especially start up ventures is capital. The source of that capital is "the rich." No. Just try asking Bill Gates to give you some money. The source of that capital is the banks ---where other middle class people have invested a portion of their left-over pay.
35
posted on
06/15/2003 4:05:15 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: FITZ
In no third world country, can an 18 y/o high school graduate qualify for a credit card. Only in countries where there is the possiblity of access to capitol is credit available, which increases market activity.
Third world countries have stagnant economies, and the rich who reign over them purchase from outside their poor nations.
36
posted on
06/15/2003 4:07:17 PM PDT
by
Pukin Dog
(Sans Reproache)
To: Pukin Dog
In a country like Mexico, the rich kids do have access to plenty of capital --and jobs their parents buy them (or use their connections to get for them). You'll see Mexican 16 year olds driving around in Lexus's. More than do here ---there is plenty of money but just a few have it.
37
posted on
06/15/2003 4:08:55 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: stella
"enjoying the discussion. could you list for me what some of the dangers are concerning going wholesale from a manufacturing economy to a service economy?"
Uh, like the inability to generate REAL national income to offset the capital we are bleeding to the countries we purchase our imports from?
Or, maybe the fact that the elite (as well as the other classes in America) are subjugating poor non-American people to supplement their lifestyle...all the while America is falling behind in our ability to compete on the International arena of commerce?
38
posted on
06/15/2003 4:09:20 PM PDT
by
Veracious Poet
(A sucker is born every minute)
To: Pukin Dog
Then what brought on the French Revolution? The Mexican Revolution? Poverty leads to instability. Instability leads to Revolution. Why did Marie Antoinette get her head cut off? Because the people were glad with being middle class and having enough to buy their bread?
39
posted on
06/15/2003 4:10:25 PM PDT
by
FITZ
To: FITZ
I do not have to ask Bill Gates to give me money; he already does whenever the stock goes up. The banks are NOT a source of capital, they are holders of capital, for which they offer CREDIT to others.
Come on FITZ, this is basic economics. Banks offer credit because Corporations and other entities extend THEM credit by allowing them to invest their money in others.
Banks are middlemen, they are NOT a source of capital.
40
posted on
06/15/2003 4:10:43 PM PDT
by
Pukin Dog
(Sans Reproache)
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