Death of the American Dream

[Masher88]

http://sev.prnewswire.com/workforce-...9052008-1.html

good news! Not!

[jrthebassguy]

People blaming others for their own problems. Sounds par for the course for many these days

[MakiSupaStar]

Yay. We're all going to die.

[peterbright]

World will end in 2012 so spend all your money before then.

[DaveDeVille]

... pfft .



i'm livin' LARGE ... yeah baby !!!

[hbarcat]

Here's where the American public needs to look for the reason why all their dreams aren't being fulfilled.

[Against Will]

Yeah! Dumb workers! Why can't they just go back to working for $.25 an hour and stop being such babies.

Cry me a river.

[JonathanD]

Whatever.
The average american makes abotu $44,000 a year. The average human hames abotu $2,700 a year.
Boo Whoo Whoo. You can't manage to work less than 10 hours a week, spend like an idiot, have a new car, 2 wives, a boat, and 57 basses.

You could have t work for a harvest every year for the rest of your "cotton pickin' " Life....literally.

[SuperDuck]

Originally Posted by JonathanD

Whatever.
The average american makes abotu $44,000 a year. The average human hames abotu $2,700 a year.
Boo Whoo Whoo. You can't manage to work less than 10 hours a week, spend like an idiot, have a new car, 2 wives, a boat, and 57 basses.

You could have t work for a harvest every year for the rest of your "cotton pickin' " Life....literally.

If I can pick nits, the average _household_ income is roughly $44,000, though I think the number is closer to $46-47k these days.

[Curtybob]

Survey Methodology

Zogby International was commissioned by the Marlin Company to complete a nationwide telephone survey of employed adults from May 12, 2008 thru May 14, 2008. The target sample was 755 interviews with approximately 43 questions.

Something says to me that the Marlin company paid too much for their "nationwide telephone survey." A target sample of 755 people to draw a general conclusion about the entire working population of the USA? Well, maybe there are only 755 people working today... I mean, things are a little slow around here.

Honestly, this looks more and more like one of those awfully overhyped internal "reports" that companies pass out to their own employees or something. I know nothing about the PR Newswire company, or the Marlin company, but this looks alot like a big advertisement for them and the Zogby people that rip off companies with their 755 person nationwide surveys.

[Against Will]

Originally Posted by JonathanD

Whatever.
The average american makes abotu $44,000 a year. The average human hames abotu $2,700 a year.
Boo Whoo Whoo. You can't manage to work less than 10 hours a week, spend like an idiot, have a new car, 2 wives, a boat, and 57 basses.

You could have t work for a harvest every year for the rest of your "cotton pickin' " Life....literally.

But how does this make things better? Perspective? America has more millionaires, multi-millionaires and billionaires (of which it has over 3 times as many compared to the second closest, China, according to Reuters). American productivity has doubled many times over the past 20 years, but real wages have dropped. So people are working harder for less. How are they supposed to build a better future for their kids if they are having trouble supporting themselves?

And contrary to what talkbass would lead you to believe, most people don't blow their paycheck on basses, boats and broads. Most people shop at wal-mart, reuse ziplock bags, anything to make ends meet.
I won't deny that Americans have a serious problem with spending and debt, even though consumer spending is the largest part of our domestic GDP. But you also can't deny sometimes, especially in emergencies, they have no choice but to go into debt there are a billion and one people out there waiting to take advantage of it.


And re: the harvest comment, if you give any farmer in a developing country, all the accoutrements of modern farming technology, you won't have wait long before you see his standard of living skyrocket. And that's the point. When you live in a developed, advanced, capital-driven economy, the point is that hard work and maybe a bit of cleverness will get you ahead, or at least keep you from being destitute. That's the whole argument behind capitalist economies; everyone works, everyone gets what the need proportionate to how hard they work/how valuable their skills are. But it doesn't work that way in real life, because the people at the top who are supposed to be playing the game are also changing the rules as they go along, which screws everyone else over.

[MakiSupaStar]

Hopefully those weren't home numbers, because if you're home during the day then your most likely unemployed and already living the dream riding for the govenor's surf team. Tha's gotta screw results up a little bit.

[hbarcat]

Originally Posted by Against Will

...American productivity has doubled many times over the past 20 years, but real wages have dropped. So people are working harder for less. How are they supposed to build a better future for their kids if they are having trouble supporting themselves?
And contrary to what talkbass would lead you to believe, most people don't blow their paycheck on basses, boats and broads. Most people shop at wal-mart, reuse ziplock bags, anything to make ends meet.
I won't deny that Americans have a serious problem with spending and debt, even though consumer spending is the largest part of our domestic GDP....

You have several contradictory statements here: Americans can't be reusing ziplock bags and doing anything to make ends meet and at the same time having a serious problem with out of control debt from excessive spending.


The demonstrable fact is that greater numbers of Americans have been feeling more and more entitled to luxuries bought on credit that they can't afford to repay and it's reached the point that the economy can no longer sustain it. Unsupported credit can't be extended forever without consequences, and we all get to take the hit for the unwise decisions of some.

I want to be clear: even if a majority of people live within their means, the minority that doesn't live as wisely can still **** up the economy because America is a compassionate country that provides a safety net to those who become unable to support themselves. If the safety net becomes too full, then the weight drags down all those who are supporting it. This is not to say I'm against having a safety net; it's just that if one accepts that it's a necessary component of our society then we can't complain about its inevitable cost to all. All you can do is smile, crack a beer and make do until the economic situation gets better and hope that the foolish people who lived high on someone else's dime have learned something about the wisdom of frugality.

[playinpearls]

just get the credit card and pay it off every month! oh, wait, wrong thread....

[Josh Ryan]

The American dream is far from dead, people are just realizing that it actually takes work, perseverance and that no one will hand it to you. (unless your maybe a Hilton?)

Eight years ago you could get an interest only mortgage with an interest only rate on a house you couldn't afford and pay for with a bridge loan you could never pay back. Maybe you could make the payments and buy food with your credit card that has a limit you couldn't make the minimum payment on. Now that many banks have closed, that is not so easy - and rightly so.

I do agree that our political system is very broken. We need much less of it.

Call it the death of mass rationalization, but not the American dream.

early morning pre-coffee .02$ (actual value .005$ not redeemable in euro's)