April 5, 2010

America's Sinking Middle Class

By Jack Curtis
The U.S. middle class is sinking into government-provided economic quicksand.U.S. living standards have declined ever since 1970; vanished stay-at-home moms were the alarm bell. In 1950, 37% of working- age women worked; by 2005, 75% were working, including 71% of moms with school-aged kids1. Laborsaving products and services cushioned the change, but the two-earner family lost ground even with lots of new gadgets. Typical U.S. households earned less in 2009 than a decade earlier2; median household income is still declining. Even with two earners, many live closer to the poverty line than did families in the '70s3. Middle-class family savings turned into consumer and mortgage debt, which reached 134% of household income at the end of 20074.A middle-class key, and a requirement for its upper half, is a degree. For those whose parents couldn't afford it, "working your way through college" was practicable and so common that it became a cliché, but by 2008, ABC News said,...(Read Full Article)