Myths of the Middle Class

For too many Americans, the “middle class” is an invention, an aspiration, a carrot held out to the poor, promising a life they can never afford. The best they can hope for is $7.50 an hour – not enough to feed their families, and nowhere close to helping them out of poverty.

Most people who think they are “middle class” are only two or three paychecks away from living in a tent. Given an unforeseen medial emergency, that tent can easily turn into a cardboard box – or a wooden one.

There are really only two kinds of people in the U.S. There are entrepreneurs, the bosses, and there are workers, as long as the entrepreneurs are providing jobs. Without jobs, workers become frustrated, angry, and dangerous.

The rich need protection. They don’t worry about a disappearing “middle class,” or people looking for work. They are afraid of Muslims in the Middle East. They need a powerful army and disenfranchised kids to fill the ranks. Children of the rich need not apply.

They want a small-to-non-existent government that doesn’t use their taxes to re-build infrastructure or provide medical care to the poor.

They keep the poor in check with enticing promises of the “American Dream” – the myth about living better than their parents, owning a home, and sending their kids to college. Poor kids who actually make it to college are unlikely to pay off their student loans.

People who want to be rich live in hope, until their jobs go south, their mortgages are under water, their kids take jobs at McDonalds or WalMart – it pays a bit better – and they have to move to Kansas. The problem is nobody wants to live in Kansas!

I enjoy watching the surfers at Swami’s. They all expect to be rich by next week. Some hate it that their taxes pay for food stamps – thanks to one of the truly bi-partisan acts of Congress. You can hear the uproar, even with the waves crashing, when someone mentions ObamaCare!