The American middle class isn’t coming back — it’s going to die with the Baby Boomers

The American middle class isn’t coming back — it’s going to die with the Baby Boomers – Salon.com.

This is a recent article by Salon written by Scott Timberg.

The American Middle Class Isn’t Coming Back – It’s Going To Die With The Baby Boomers

It’s no secret that the American middle class has been on the ropes for a while now. The problem isn’t just a crippling recession and an economic “recovery” that has mostly gone to the richest one percent, but the larger shifting of wealth from the middle to the very top that’s taken place since the late ‘70s. Add in things like the dismantling of unions that has accelerated apace since Ronald Reagan crushed the air-traffic controllers, and we’ve seen the middle class more solid in places like Canada, Germany, and Scandinavia, and begin to grow in a number of nations even while it shrinks here. Economists like Thomas Piketty thinks the process is inevitable with global capitalism, while others – the equally wise Joseph Stiglitz, for example – think the balance can be restored if we can find the political will.

It turns out that those concerned about a tattered middle class are right about most of it, but overlooking one thing: Boomers – or rather, a particular strain of Boomer and near-Boomer – are doing great. That is, if you were born in the ‘40s, you are going to be the last American generation to enjoy a robust safety net, and your gray years will be far more comfortable than those a decade older or younger.

Here’s a New York Times story, which looks at “the 25 million Americans now between the ages of 65 and 74”:

Supported by income from Social Security, pensions and investments, as well as an increasing number of paychecks from delaying retirement, older people not only weathered the economic downturn that began in 2007 but made significant gains, a New York Times analysis of government data has found.

And despite our generally ornery Xer jingoism, we’re going to concede something here. We’ve noticed that our friends who we could call “young Boomers” – born in the late ‘50s and early ’60s – are often far less privileged and spoiled than those born in the years right after World War II. This younger group grew up or came of ago, after all, in the ‘70s and ‘80s, as the postwar boom was fading, colleges were becoming expensive, and the Reagan Revolution was pulling the rug out from under the middle class.

And it turns out that those young Boomers are indeed a kind of transition generation. It’s the group now retiring that will take most of the spoils of the U.S. postwar boom and leave the rest of us with scraps:

In the past, the elderly were usually poorer than other age groups. Now, they are the last generation to widely enjoy a traditional pension, and are prime beneficiaries of a government safety net targeted at older Americans. They also have profited from the long rise in real estate prices that preceded the recession. As a result, more seniors now fall into the middle class — defined in this case between the 40th and 80th income percentile — than ever before.

If you wonder why you are working so hard to get a job, please note that a lot of these guys are sitting on theirs or at least working part-time. (It reminds us of the Onion story: “Parents With More Vacation Time, Financial Resources Want To Know When Son Will Come Home For A Visit.”)

The Times piece shows how a variety of Americans in that sub-generation is faring. Some are struggling, like the rest of us. But between the fancy cruises and fat pensions and gated communities and golf courses and vintage ‘57s Chevys, it’s not a world that younger Americans have any reason to expect. In fact, it sounds like something from a museum of postwar affluence.

So part of us is glad the American middle class will go out with a boom, so to speak. We don’t begrudge these people – our teachers and professors, our older friends, our parents and other relatives – comfort in their gray years. The way Americans, in the days before social security and other protections, lost their footings in old age was simply inhumane. But why couldn’t the prosperity be spread so that those born in the ‘50s, ‘60s, and after can enjoy the same stability and wealth?
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Well, this is a complicated one, and we’ll nod to the usual suspects: Globalization, technology, and the depletion of natural resources (especially energy) meant that the postwar boom would not last forever.

But you know what else the original Boomers brought us? Despite their dabbling with progressivism and hippie utopianism, this group served as the shock troops for market-worshipping neoliberalism and the Reagan-Thatcher shift in the ‘70s and ‘80s. They gave us junk bonds and the privatization push and Gordon Gekko. Some of them went into the corporate world and started dismantling.

Let’s hope they enjoy their retirements. But these gray Boomers and grayer Silents – not all of them, but enough to do substantial damage – put forces in motion that mean for the rest of us, the twilight years will be significantly less cozy.

Editor’s Note

The message of the article is simple. Income inequality is worsening with each succeeding generation. This has happened since 1980 – a time which corresponds to trickle down economics, Free Trade, deregulation and the advent of Nationalized Big Box stores. Maybe the middle class is just an artificial glitch caused by the strength of Labor Unions (1950-1990), while globalization and all of its Free Trade deals designed to get rid of Labor Unions, have brought the United States and its capitalistic economy back into an equilibrium which is found in almost all capitalistic economies: two classes – the haves and the have nots. Will we have a middle class in the future? It depends on whether we change. Stay the course and continue to outsource good paying US jobs to any number of foreign countries who are willing to pay their workers nothing OR make it easier for people of any economic class to climb the ladder of success and to think of the USA as a whole and not just thinking about profits (90% of which go to the top 1%). The choice is ours, if we vote and we stand up for ourselves.

Abercrombie and Fitch Not Stocking Larger Sizes For Women

Abercrombie & Fitch Not Stocking Larger Sizes For Women « CBS San Francisco. The video link was shown on KPIX in San Francisco on May 8, 2013. This video lasts 2:21. There is a fire-storm that is continuing to brew. Thanks to an article published on Business Insider on May 3, 2013, written by Ashley Lutz, the remarks of Abercrombie and Fitch CEO, Mike Jeffries, seemed to confirm what had previously been known but never publicly expressed, that Abercrombie and Fitch do not want overweight women in their stores (overweight men are okay because they could possibly be wrestlers or football players). In fact, there are no sizes above 10 for women, either in their stores or in their catalogs. Whether you think this is correct, take for instance, their main competitors, all carry X-large or 2XL.

Abercrombie and Fitch CEO, Mike Jeffries

But behind this policy, represents the attitude of CEO Jeffries and this had previously been published in an article in Salon, in 2006. Probably his most inflammatory comment was this: “In every school there are cool and popular kids, and then there are the not-so-cool kids,” he told the site. “Candidly, we go after the cool kids. We go after the attractive all-American kid with a great attitude and a lot of friends. A lot of people don’t belong [in our clothes], and they can’t belong. Are we exclusionary? Absolutely.” It feels like you are going to visit a preppy Fraternity or Sorority as a Freshman in college. Maybe they should have ropes and bouncers with weight scales outside all of their stores.

Another comment from Abercrombie and Fitch’s CEO – The business is built around sex appeal. “It’s almost everything. That’s why we hire good-looking people in our stores. Because good-looking people attract other good-looking people, and we want to market to cool, good-looking people. We don’t market to anyone other than that,” said Jeffries. By excluding people who wear larger than size 10, I surmise that Mr. Jeffries thinks that this group can neither be popular nor good-looking.

The Salon article did bring up a couple of previous controversies to which Mr. Jeffries responded to. One example was the time that Abercrombie and Fitch made thongs for middle school girls which had “Eye Candy” and “Wink Wink” on their fronts. Jeffries responded, “That was a bunch of bullshit… I still think they were cute underwear for little girls.” The second example was ‘A & F Quarterly” which boasted articles of orgies and pictures of chiseled mostly white all-American boys and girls (but mostly boys) cavorting naked on horses, beaches, etc. The American Decency Association called for a boycott of A & F. ‘A & F Quarterly’ discontinued its publication in 2003. And, of course, A & F constantly gets flak for their semi-naked images on the store fronts, their garment bags and in their commercials.

Typical marketing

My Personal Feeling on Abercrombie and Fitch

My personal feeling on Abercrombie and Fitch is based on my research over the past two years. I have visited many different and various stores to determine how much “Made in USA” clothing is within stores. Over the two years, I have visited Abercrombie and Fitch three times, I made three separate trips at different locations at different times. When I enter the store, I am usually not greeted by their apathetic “good-looking” staff, because I don’t fit their demographic of pre-teen. But, then I could be shopping for my kids, or my nephew, and usually I am dressed ten times better than the staff, still, I am usually left alone for a prolonged time. (Tip for older people on a budget – next Christmas when you are shopping for your pre-teen relatives, go to Abercrombie and Fitch and wear baggy clothes, take as much…time as you want). Oh, regarding my quest for “Made in USA” clothing – absolutely zero. That is right- zippo. No clothes “Made in USA” at A & F, nor it’s poorer sister store, Hollister. So, I already have recommended that Abercrobie and Fitch is a definite ‘No Go’. Now, that A & F discriminates against heavier women in public (that is the actual crime that it has been said in public), my recommendation has changed from ‘No Go’ to ‘Boycott.’