A spectre is haunting America. The spectre of downward mobility. The American dream in reverse. The elements of this have been in place for years now. The current prolonged economic downturn will provide the last push. At least this is what many middle class families fear. Even if they can’t articulate it well, they are scared of the prospect that, for the first time since the end of World War II, they and, more importantly, their kids may fall out of the middle class.
If you look at the map of support for Scott Brown what is striking is that the dozens of communities that supported Obama in 2008 and Brown in 2010 have one thing in common. They are heavily populated with families who are first or second generation middle class. The Globe’s Brian Mooney called them “the affluent suburbs” but that’s saying way too much. The incomes of the middle class residents of these places have been stagnant for 10 years before the Great Recession hit, and many incomes are now falling as layoffs mushroom and full-time workers become part-time. And we know that young people graduating from college in a severe recession face lowered earnings for years. It doesn’t take a threatened home foreclosure, it’s more likey to be the relentless squeeze of disposable income that restricts choices and dims the future. All of this creates enormous anxiety that helped fuel the revolt against Coakley and the Democrats-even among some Democrats. This is not just one bad election; it’s a potential sea-change.
What’s ironic, of course, is the Republicans have favored policies that have helped keep wages from growing and created the greatest income inequality since the Gilded Age of the 1880s. The economy imploded on their watch. They have no programs to fix the economy now (cutting taxes won’t do it). But when people are frightened, they act frightened. This is what FDR meant by, “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.” The opportunity for the Democrats here is precisely that Obama carried virtually all of the suburban swath in the middle of the state in 2008. The challenge to the Democrats is to find credible ways to offer tangible relief and the prospect of economic stability sooner rather than later. If the U.S. has anything like Japan’s Lost Decade of the 1990s current fears about downward mobility will be proved dismally accurate and the political consequences will be dire.
but I also think that one of the ramifications of the rising tide of the economy raising all boats is that perception of middle class has changed.
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p>Middle class homes are far larger than they were 30 years ago. The number of cars per household has increased. The miles flown per capita has gone way up. I’d bet that the number of televisions per household is double what it was a generation ago… same with the number of telephones.
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p>American middle class has far more stuff than American middle class did a generation ago. If, as a result of economic change, our homes get a little smaller and our televisions a bit fewer, does that mean we’re no longer middle class?
Very true, I can remember growing up in the 60’s it was a huge deal to fly anywhere. We only had one car for a period of time and my dad was an engineering manager.
but life has changed tremendously from 30 years ago. Two cars in a household is not a luxury, it’s a necessity. Miles flown per capita…is that business or recreational miles? And perhaps people fly now instead of drive. My uncle used to drive from California to Massachusetts, (for real)? Now he flies. Technology…my opinion…who needs an Ipod or an outlandish cell phone with ridiculous capabilities, or even a laptop. But we need our computers and our cable service, to stay informed and also our kids need them for school.
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p>I think(know) the middle class is downsizing because they have too. There are benefits to that. But as we continue to downsize, prices and taxes continue to go up, to eat up any efforts at saving money. National Grid was allowed their price increase, although less than they wished, an increase still. Taxes on the middle class, property tax increase, sales tax increase, bus fee increase, and more and more and more. More money out of middle class pockets for the same amount of service. With no increase in earned income to cover it.
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p>I live on the edge of one those red towns on that map. The middle class has been pinched way too far, and it continues. That allowed rate increase for National Grid really irks me. Got the bill today. They wasted no time implementing it. Not to mention the threat for continued tax increases on the middle class. I will vote Democrat no matter what, but my neighbors won’t.
Raising the Sales Tax in Massachusetts was a really bad idea and has a direct effect on the middle class.
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p>Lots of folks live in urban areas of MA, and use one car or zero. Lots of households only have one wage-earner, or even one adult. Live out in the sticks, yeah you need a car to get somewhere. We didn’t used to live in suburbia/exurbia as much as we do now… again, in plenty of cases, it’s a self-forced “need.
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p>I’d say we need computers (with Internet) or cable; we certainly don’t need both and in fact lots of people under 30 don’t have cable (and save about $1000 a year because of it).
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p>Look, I’m not arguing that we should have exactly the same appliances that we had 30 years ago. I’m simply pointing out that homes have lots more consumer goods in them then they did 30 years ago, and often times multiple instances where we used to have one (televisions, telephones, refrigerators, garages, autos, living rooms, places to sit down and eat breakfast, showers, etc).
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p>My question is maybe a more fundamental one: just what is middle class anyway? How broad is it? Is granite countertops a dealbreaker? Number of teevees? Dollar amount spent in Best Buy + Walmart + Target + Bed Bath Beyond + Home Depot + Lowes in one year? I ask because look, nobody likes to be forced into decisions, especially decisions to not buy things we used to buy. I’m not referring to serious economic disruption like bankruptcy, just the squeeze. If the middle class loses 10% of its purchasing power, and those cuts come in the form of fewer nights at The Olive Garden and replacing the rider mower with a push mower when it finally craps out, are they still middle class or have they become something else?
and are probably OK with cutting back. The problem is that you stopped eating at Olive Garden once a month to cut back and then National Grid comes along and takes the money you were saving by not eating out once a month.
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p>So then you have to cut back somewhere else, and you do. Then your property taxes go up which takes the money you were saving by your most recent household cut back. And so on and so forth. It’s starts to get very irritating, very fast. It does make you angry.
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I use one of those old push lawnmowers. I absolutely love it. It doesn’t smell like fuel, it’s not obnoxiously loud, and it is great exercise.
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p>The whole granite countertop thing is overrated. They are beautiful, but will turn into old news as fast as olive colored refrigerators. Yes, people were spending money on that stuff, via credit cards, but they won’t be anymore.
Granite countertops do not make you middle class. The house makes you middle class, in a perception sense. As far as
what income you need to earn to be middle class is a good question. The cost of living varies greatly across the nation. Being middle class has to do with, I think, living the basic “American dream” with relative financial ease. Owning one home, two cars (I know you hate that, and I would love to give up a car if I could take a train to work, the grocery store, the bank, the post office, etc.), be able to have a comfortable, modern life, with the ability to put away and save money, and still be able to have a little money left over to have some fun once in while.
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p>That’s what I think middle class is.
National Grid š I was a supporter of Cape Wind – but not anymore, this would not be good for anyone.
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p>National Grid currently pays 9.2 cents a kilowatt-hour for electricity from coal, natural gas and nuclear generators, which it distributes in Rhode Island. It will pay Deepwater Wind 24.4 cents in the first year of the contract, plus an escalation of 3.5 percent a year for the 20-year term.
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p>This would be horrible for the local economy.
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p>http://www.saveoursound.org/si…
I’m not buying the prediction from the organization dedicated to not allowing Cape Wind to be built, regardless of the cost of electricity.
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p>But look — nuclear expansion has been happening at current facilities, but that looks just about tapped out. Electricity use continues to grow because MA hasn’t been able to bend the curve like CA has. So, what do you suggest? More carbon-based fuel? That’s unacceptable. Got a carbon-free proposal that’s not being developed? I’m all ears.
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p>And, as a side note, had Cape Wind been built already, their costs may have come in lower… for not losing so much money in time and capital holding costs waiting to get the damn project started.
I think the idea is great – the costs are way to high.
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p>Massachusetts does have a huge Natural Gas (which is much cleaner) generating capacity – and the cost are very cheap.
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p>Massachusetts already has some of the highest electricity rate in the Country. I’m in a building where a printing company ran away to another state to cheaper electricity. Bounce our rates to 24.4c/KWH and we are next.
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p>Our state really doesn’t have much by the way of renewal resources and even if we did they will never get sited.
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p>Not that’s it’s different everywhere else in the country. I have a friend in the renewable business in NV/CA – they can’t even site solar equipment in the desert because of Senator Boxer.
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Massachusetts does not generate any natural gas. We are entirely dependent on sources located elsewhere. That is not a good thing.
Large generating capacity – not local source
May be expensive now, but to delay would be similar to the 1970s when we started to embrace solar, but then abandoned it when oil became cheap again.
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p>30 years from now cost of Cape Wind electricity maybe th average as oil cost will soar. Not to mention the geo-political issues surronding continued dependency on oil.
We switched to propane for drying and cooking, to try to save on electricity. I just paid a $285 dollar propane bill for 4 months of usage. While gas is touted (by the gas company) as a low cost alternative, you have to use a HUGE amount of gas in order to get a lower rate. The less propane you use, the more you pay. It’s a bad system. If they would just hold the cost down, I’m sure many people would move away from electricity to propane.
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p>For our usage, the cost of propane in 2006 was 3.49/gal. Our most recent fill up was 5.61/gal. They have engaged in the gouging game too. And there is no trying to lower usage to save money. The less you use, the more you pay per gallon. I really regret switching to gas.
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p>I have concerns too about the cost of buying electricy from cape wind. I’ve only read a little about the cost. I think the cost doesn’t have to be so high. I think it’s an opportunist gouging, just like everything else. I love the idea of clean energy, especially wind energy. I support Cape Wind. I guess I’ll have to deal with the cost when the time comes. Or not, I am not planning on retiring to Massachusetts. I will be moving to a warmer climate, either the Carolinas or California. Still quite a few years away.
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p>2. Cape Wind’s contribution: MA’s 2008 summer generating capacity is roughly 13.5 GW. Cape Wind’s maximum is about .4 GW, but it’s expected production, since the wind don’t always blow, averages about .15 GW. This is on the order of 1-2% of the state’s electricity generation during the summer; a bit more on the shoulders and winter seasons. The point: even if it did cost 25 cents per kWh, it wouldn’t make our total cost go much higher, since it’s a relatively small part of the supply.
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p>3. Because it would offset Cape and Island consumption, it would ‘compete’ directly with the Sandwich plant which burns natural gas and bunker oil (dirty refined oil unsuitable to be made into gasoline). Therefore, the offset isn’t just in cutting carbon, it’s in cutting the burning of petroleum for electricity. This is a great climate change cut, but it’s also a great balance of trade cut, a great foreign policy cut, and a great preservation cut, since after all there have been not one but two major oil spills for oil deliveries to this very power plant (Argo Merchant ’76, Bouchard barge ’03).
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p>4.
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p>This is indeed true. As I’m sure you won’t be surprised, high electricity rates correlate very strongly with less use per capita. Want to help insulate those high rates from going even higher? Reduce the amount of electricity which comes from fossil fuels, because the reality is that those prices are only going up over the next decade and beyond. A diverse portfolio of electricity generation will help to moderate price changes.
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p>5.
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p>We’ve got outstanding offshore wind, and some nice wind in the mountains. We’ve also got opportunity to use biomass to generate electricity (or directly offset industrial use of natural gas, freeing that to be used for electricity instead of oil and coal). We can also continue to tap into the almighty negawatt. The stretch code is an example of how we can try to bend the demand curve, as California has been able to do. If people are able to preserve their end-use of electricity while using less, then that’s the best outcome possible. Improving energy efficiency in appliances, in HVAC, and in lighting could get us there.
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p>6.
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p>Well sure, so long as you keep taking a nonsense number from the folks who are opposed to projects like Cape Wind and trumpeting it as fact. We are going to site renewable projects. We simply have to. You think people like living next door to a dirty coal power plant? Why shouldn’t we shut those bad boys down instead?
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p>7.
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p>I have no idea to which project you refer, but I have a hunch the problem lies with running the power lines (or the solar itself) right over a fragile ecosystem.
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p>Look, you espouse libertarian principles, but you completely forget them here. A consistent libertarian would argue that the polluting power plants should have to pay to pollute — the air and water is owned by us, and they shouldn’t be given a subsidized ride by being allowed to appropriate commons for their own profit. Naturally, by subsidizing them, they make more profit and your electric bills are lower. So, by arguing against more expensive power which doesn’t pollute, you’re arguing in direct conflict with your espoused political philosophy — you want to cross-subsidize your electrical use with the people’s air and water.
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p>It strikes me that the libertarian principle on power generation is simple: no subsidies for any energy. While this means no tax break for wind, it also means no sweetheart mineral exploration contracts for oil and natural gas, and it also means polluters (carbon, soot, mercury, whatever) have to pay the actual cost of their pollution to society, and it also means that if you carve up a mountain to get coal, you’ve got to restore it as you found it. To do otherwise would be in direct conflict with libertarian ideals.
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p>Of course, if we went that route (and I wouldn’t be opposed to it), energy prices to end users would likely go up 20-100%, and nuclear power plants would actually shut down because they couldn’t afford the price of insurance that the federal government pays for now.
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p>Whaddyathink?
for all of this information. To bring reality to the argument of cost…
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p>Makes perfect sense that it will only slightly (probably very slightly) increase the overall cost of electricity.
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p>GO WIND ENERGY!
Increasing energy cost will run what few manufacturing business in the state out. Whats even crazier is that Massachusetts power plants are very clean, even the coal plants are the cleanest in the country. Companies can run to the mid-west or they could go to China. I find it ironic that Evergreen is moving to China – I’m sure the cost of energy isn’t the main reason but I’m sure it’s one of them.
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p>Off-shore wind is the most expensive from of energy generation. I bet it also uses a fair amount of oil to service and build the towers. These tower will be very expensive to construct and to maintain. Think salt and metals.
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p>High Energy costs will also effect schools and public buildings, my town’s school system could not afford seeing their energy cost double let alone triple.
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p>High Energy costs also effect the construction of energy efficient products. HVAC equipment has lots of steel and copper.
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p>I don’t know if you realize but Wind power has to be paired with a single stage (in-efficient gas turbines) – when the wind stops blowing you need power fast. Unless we all want to ride in electric trains that stop when the wind stop. I see a new scene in Idiocracy.
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p>Feinstein Argues Against Mojave Desert Solar Power Plans
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p>http://www.silobreaker.com/moj…
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p>Source? Because, the fact is, they’re not. They’re just not. West coast states tend to use much more hydro in their mix — they simply aren’t burning anywhere near as much coal or fuel oil as MA is. Clean coal plants are far filthier than hydro, natural gas, wind, solar, biomass, etc. For example, Idaho (!) has much cleaner electricity generation — only 11% comes from fossil fuel, and none from coal nor oil. MA’s fuel mix is roughly in the middle third: not as noxious as many Appalacian and Midwestern states, but nowhere near as clean as a number of other states which for one reason or another have a much lower reliance on coal and oil.
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p>Erm, you’re “sure”? What exactly does that mean? What percent of their costs (in MA or China) are energy? What’s the price of electricity in China? In Beijing, industrial customers are charged about 79 fen per kWh as of Nov 2009 (about 11.3 cents). That’s cheaper than in MA to be sure, but it sure as heck isn’t cheaper than electricity in the big square states of the US.
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p>No it isn’t. On a capital plus operations cost requirement, it’s cheaper than solar, and it’s cheaper than nuclear which requires massive gov’t subsidies to pay their insurance premiums. Given good conditions, it can be substantially cheaper than on-land wind generation, and even cheaper than fossil fuel power plants.
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p>You’d bet? A fair amount relative to what? Relative to the amount of energy the wind turbine generates in a lifetime, the energy cost required to manufacture, ship, install, and maintain the turbine is quite small. These towers are expensive, but the payback is there — and we’ve got plenty of experience building metallic structures in water, for over 100 years now.
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p>Oh yeah? What percent of the cost of running the schools is in the electric bill? And does the school budget even pay it, or does it just come of of the town’s operations budget? No budget wants to face increasing costs, but when faced with increasing costs the beancounters adjust — in this case by figuring out how to turn the lights off at night, and calling in NSTAR et al for energy audits to see if they can delamp, improve their HVAC efficiency, and the like.
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p>That’s a second (or third) order effect, in comparison to the conservation that higher energy costs induces. You’re really reaching at this point.
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p>It’s clear you don’t realize that it doesn’t. It is true that load balancing is important, but no power plant has 100% uptime, and all power plants spin down for emergencies… so there is already surplus capacity requirements. Furthermore, there are a number of other technologies in use in MA, including pumped-storage hydro, demand side management with the help of companies like EnerNOC, and installing turbines with negative correlated wind supply. Additionally, gas turbines are rather efficient. If you “see a new scene”, I suggest you stop rereading your own posts, which are full of crap that you’re just making up on the spot.
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p>Ah yes. So, let’s review. A private, non-profit agency acquires a bunch of land because it has a unique ecosystem that this non-profit thinks is worth preserving (Wildlands Conservancy). They offer to give the land to the state, to be preserved as habitat. The state agrees. Then, the state thinks about allowing development, both of residential units and power plants. Feinstein steps in to try to prevent the development.
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p>You can site solar equipment in the desert — on your own land. You don’t get to site it on land that was purchased specifically to prevent development on the land.
Not sure if I believe this study but I’ve seen this data before.
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p>http://www.ukerc.ac.uk/Downloa…
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p>But I’ve see the data in other locations (of course excluding external costs).
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p>least expensive to most expensive
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p>coal < gas < nuclear < on-shore wind < off-shore wind
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p>Massachusetts generation of power may not be clean but we do have the cleanest dirtiest plants š
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p>My understanding is wind power requires paired single stage gas generators, which are the least inefficient. Power plants cannot just kick on and off – depending on the technology they take time to come on-line or go off-line. You can actually get electricity in the middle of the night for $0.00 on the spot market as some plants want to keep running.
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p>Stored hydro isn’t going to work around here, it’s a great idea but we don’t have the land or the political will.If someone doesn’t want to see a windmill how about a pond or lake that fills up at night and empties during the day.
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Check out page 4. It shows that the range of costs for the various technologies, at the 25, 50, and 75th percentile ranges. Notice that in that chart you simply can’t state that Technology X is more expensive than Technology Y, because even the technology with the most expensive minimum cost (nuclear other) has that minimum less than any other technology’s maximum cost.
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p>The other thing I’d point out is that large scale wind costs have gone down more quickly — off shore has fallen faster than on shore, which has fallen faster than more mature technologies. This is because Vestas, GE, and others are learning how to build larger and larger turbines, which are more and more efficient.
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p>Second to bottom line: your inequality is simply wrong. Nobody builds an “average” power plant, so you can’t simply compare averages without that stipulation. Besides, this chart doesn’t show the mean, it shows the median (in which gas is actually lower than coal).
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p>Bottom line: Now go to pages 6, 7, and 8 and look for USA. It shows wind median price as cheaper than coal and gas and nuclear!
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p>Yeah, we’ve got the tallest midget too.
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p>And as I wrote above, your understanding is wrong. I also explained above two other supply smoothing techniques. I’d finally add that there is plenty of gas supply on the grid, and any of those turbines (or a series of them) can be tweaked to offset if the wind is flickering.
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p>You and I can’t get anything, and I’d love to see a source for this. I’ve heard this claim, but I don’t believe that the demand curve makes this a reality. The only plants that you’ve got to keep running are nuclear, wind, solar, and in some cases, hydro. Even coal can be turned off or ramped down, and given that fuel isn’t free, ramping it down is much cheaper than paying the fuel and giving it away.
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p>Again, you’re wrong. You just make crap up and see if it sticks, then it’s my job to play whack-a-mole. It’s really getting tiresome. It’s you being lazy, with a very incomplete understanding of the industry, making your claims as if you were an expert. Massachusetts has not one but two pumped storage hydro plants — Deerfield Swamp is good for about 600 MW, and Northfield Mountain is good for 1,080 MW. And again, there’s always demand side management and installing turbines which generate with zero (or negative) correlation.
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p>I appreciate the dialogue: it’s about something that I care about and I love to teach others. But this has been really unfair… instead of doing some reading and research on your own. For example, it would not have been hard to google “Pumped-storage hydroelectricity” to discover the two MA plants. Instead, you just assert since you don’t care about being shown to be wrong over and over again.
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p>How very liber(atari)ating!
Looks like zero to me.
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p>http://www.fernengineering.com…
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p>BTW check out ISO n/e it’s very interesting. http://www.iso-ne.com/ It’s an example of how free markets can work well.
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p>I’ve familiar with both the Deerfield and Northfield projects. From what I can read Northfield is 75% efficent I would assume it make good sense for peak summer power otherwise that’s a lot of loss.
with much of your assessment.
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p>Thing is, a lot of those variables can be controlled with some substantial range. The value of your home influences your mortgage (biggest payment!) and your taxes — and houses have gotten substantially bigger at the same time that the middle class says it feels more squeezed. Choosing a smaller house eases lots of the squeeze, both for those two payments plus reducing the number of furnishings needed to fill the house (as well as the time needed to spend cleaning it).
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p>This is the source of my frustration. The middle class (as a group) has put itself in a difficult pinch by overbuying, and now feels frustrated.
but in 2006 you were hard pressed to find a small ranch on a postage stamp lot for less than $200,000. Even a modest attempt at homeownership cost a ridiculous amount of money in mortgage payment, and tax value. A mortgage payment with taxes and insurance for a $200,000 home is about $353/a week — that’s per week.
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p>Sure, people should have waited it out, I suppose, but the buzz at the time was that prices were only going up.
the $450,000 dollar – two story – two car garage home on an acre of land. I never thought those were affordable for a middle class person. They did overbuy, and should never have been allowed to do so.
in 2006 if you bought that house you look like a chump, buy it in 2010 for say $295,000 you look like a genius.
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p>In life timing is everything.
I was a realtor during that time. I was shocked at the way the mortgage lenders could manipulate income and the actual mortgage contract to make someone with a modest income appear to be able to afford a home. (Even the $200,000 modest ranch.) I knew my own household budget, and I absolutely knew those payments would be a tight payment if they were transposed into my budget, there would be a lot of potential for falling behind, especially when there is no leeway for unexpected expenses (btw, I also blame the sudden increase in the cost of fuel/gas/food etc for pushing people over the edge in tight situations).
Realtors around me would try to give ideas to clients how to make their budget more friendly. One instance I remember is a realtor telling their client they needed to change their withholding, too much was being taken out every week.
If they changed their withholding their weekly income would go up and they could afford more. Needless to say, it would also take away their refund in April, which many
families use to buy big items like appliances or pay off bills that caught up with them. Realtors can be very aggressive in the game of buy, buy, buy.
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p>I always tried to convey to clients that they needed to be realistic about how much they could afford. However, at
that time, a $100,000 affordable mortgage bought you a
knock down/rebuild or a trailer in a trailer park.
It was a tough time indeed.
there are some who bought the most marginal stable housing available, stretching to be “middle class”… and they happened to buy at the worst possible time.
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p>But that’s not most people. Most middle class families didn’t buy the most marginal stable housing. They bought more than that. They bought some version of the home you describe which doesn’t generate much sympathy in you.
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p>And that is kind of my point. Owning a smaller home, being a bit more humble, results in massive savings and much more security when life throws you back to back curveballs. Our tax policy (more Schedule A savings for more interest payments!), our land use policy (requiring larger lots, setbacks, square footage, etc), our tax policy (towns want people to build big homes — it improves the tax dollars:school children ratio) all encourage this kind of behavior — behavior which results in lots of middle class people struggling just a few years later.
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p>But if they are able to cut back (smaller home, not buy that 54″ flatscreen, cancel extended cable TV, maybe sell the boat that they don’t use that often anyway, clip coupons from the Sunday paper again, whatever), they’re still middle class. Just middle class with less stuff.
I think that what we are experiencing is selective wage deflation (by sector) accompanied by an increase in the disparity between the rich and the rest of us.
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p>The price of goods has generally gone down over the past 50 years. A TV can be purchased for far fewer middle class hours worked than in the past. So can a car. This is a result of global competition and technological improvements.
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p>However, some industries are resistant to global competition. Health Care. Housing. Education. Those things are probably more important to the idea of “middle class” than tangible goods. They are less affordable to the average wage earner.
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p>The other thing that the middle class once had — or maybe was believed to have — was economic security. People worked their jobs, they put in an honest day’s work, and they always came out a little ahead. Howard Cunningham didn’t worry about a massive big-box hardware store was right around the corner looking to put him out of business. Ward Cleaver wasn’t worried that his company was going to shut down and he’d have to take a job flipping burgers to get by. That seems like a relic of the past now.
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p>Also, keep in mind that most households now have two earners, so that has changed the very way households function. I’m not suggesting that women should go back to work — perhaps it should be easier for either earner to scale back from a 40-50 hour work week.
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p>Loss of manufacturing has really hurt this country. A factory job was a place where someone not cut out for higher education could earn his keep. Loss of those jobs has destabilized many communities. Now, the middle class is only available to those who have purchased tens of thousands of dollars in education, and that isn’t even a guarantee. And the next lowest rung on the ladder is usually pretty far down too.
While health care has gotten much more expensive, the results are amazing. When FDR had high blood pressure there was no medication they could give him. When Eisenhower had a heart attack, the told him to rest for the night. What happen now is impressive but expensive.
He was that era’s Chuck Norris. When Chuck Norris has a heart attack, he rests for the night too.
but you left out a key component…
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p>Now, the middle class is only available to those who have purchased tens of thousands of dollars in education or are members of a union.
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p>This is why union-busting drives me nuts. Unions have solidified the middle class historically, and in fact they continue to do so. Tradesmen and civil servants can’t easily be off-shored, and those men and women are earning middle class wages for good work.
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p>The only two ways I can imagine stabilizing the middle class is (a) a massively progressive increase in taxes (how about 50% on all income over $1M, for example), or (b) a massive increase in union membership.
Unions didn’t help the domestic auto companies. While workers in the non-unionized foreign owned US plants have their jobs with good wages and a hell of a lot better working environment. Have your ever tried to deal with a union ? There is an underling threat of physical violence to both workers and employers, you move up based on seniority and family connections not skill. Equipment and structures get accidentally broken it’s not pretty.
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p>Quality non-union Tradesmen make a lot of money – plumbers and carpenters can make 100-200K a year and are still working.
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p>The civil service pension system is not sustainable and frankly is pissing of anyone who works in the private sector. Retirement at 45 from the T or 50 from the state of Massachusetts and then working a second job to collect social security, is abusing the tax payer. BTW the state pension isn’t taxable either š
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p>The Unions didn’t hurt ’em either, not directly. What hurt ’em? Poor large decision making, a refusal to evolve, and booming medical expenses.
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p>Right, because those companies don’t have legacy health insurance costs. See, if America had separated health care from employment decades ago (like other first world nations), then the Big 3 wouldn’t have collapsed from the weight of their retirees’ health care.
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p>You’re comparing grapes to grapefruit.
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p>Yes.
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p>It’s true, that stuff does happen sometimes, and it’s wrong. It’s also true that employers screw employees all the time, and unions make it harder for employers to do it. That’s wrong too.
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p>In places where there are unions — because unions drive wages up for everyone. Not many plumbers nor carpenters make that kind of money down south, not as employees… not when most of the work can be done by day laborers or other vulnerable populations for $7/hr, with no health care.
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p>The part which isn’t sustainable is the fault of those people who were governing 30 years ago — they were the ones not funding it. Nowadays, municipalities are fully funding their additions to the pension liability: it’s state law. We’ve got to catch up on a prior generation’s unethical decision to not fully fund.
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p>Retirement after 23 is a real problem, and progressives don’t disagree. It’s got to get changed, through negotiation. As for retiring at 50… you can, but it’s a lower payout rate. My wife could retire from her private sector job now too, but the 401k ain’t going to be paying very much per month, so to speak.
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p>Of course, if the problem you’ve got is that other people are doing well for being in a union, maybe you ought to… wait for it… join a union.
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p>The Unions didn’t hurt ’em either, not directly. What hurt ’em? Poor large decision making, a refusal to evolve, and booming medical expenses.
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p>Right, because those companies don’t have legacy health insurance costs. See, if America had separated health care from employment decades ago (like other first world nations), then the Big 3 wouldn’t have collapsed from the weight of their retirees’ health care.
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p>You’re comparing grapes to grapefruit.
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p>
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p>Yes.
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p>
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p>It’s true, that stuff does happen sometimes, and it’s wrong. It’s also true that employers screw employees all the time, and unions make it harder for employers to do it. That’s wrong too.
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p>
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p>In places where there are unions — because unions drive wages up for everyone. Not many plumbers nor carpenters make that kind of money down south, not as employees… not when most of the work can be done by day laborers or other vulnerable populations for $7/hr, with no health care.
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p>
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p>The part which isn’t sustainable is the fault of those people who were governing 30 years ago — they were the ones not funding it. Nowadays, municipalities are fully funding their additions to the pension liability: it’s state law. We’ve got to catch up on a prior generation’s unethical decision to not fully fund.
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p>
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p>Retirement after 23 is a real problem, and progressives don’t disagree. It’s got to get changed, through negotiation. As for retiring at 50… you can, but it’s a lower payout rate. My wife could retire from her private sector job now too, but the 401k ain’t going to be paying very much per month, so to speak.
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p>Of course, if the problem you’ve got is that other people are doing well for being in a union, maybe you ought to… wait for it… join a union.
legacy health care cost where just one of the problems with the domestic auto markers. A friend of mine father “worked” for the UAW – they paid him but he had nothing to do. This went on for years. He hung out in a big room with friends and read and played cards.
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p>Unions have nothing to do with high wages paid to skilled craftsmen. A good non-union carpenter will make more money than a good union carpenter.
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p>While some employers do mess with employees, they usually don’t beat them up.
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p>You wife can’t retire – you can’t start pulling your 401K plan out until you are 59-1/2 – sorry private workers aren’t allowed, only the public sector š
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p>BTW – my grandfather was a founding member of a local union – I’m proud of it, I’ve got his pin – but he wouldn’t be happy with what they have become.
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You’ve pointed out a few anecdotes about “unions” and claim they represent the whole story, you couldn’t be more wrong.
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p>Here are some clear benefits unions bring to all workers:
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p>1) Unions raise wages of unionized workers by roughly 20% and raise compensation, including both wages and benefits, by about 28%.
2) A high school graduate whose workplace is not unionized but whose industry is 25% unionized is paid 5% more than similar workers in less unionized industries.
3) Unionized workers receive 26% more vacation time and 14% more total paid leave (vacations and
holidays)
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p>You claim that working in a non-union auto plant has better working conditions than in a union plant. What makes the job better? Is it the continuous quality improvement schemes that keep speeding the line up? Is it the just in time production or the demand for 12 hour shifts? Is it the lack of job security or due process regarding disciplinary matters?
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Really? Tell that to the housekeeper who’s beat up every day by her job. I knew a woman who had to ask her daughter to bathe her because her hotel job injured her rotator cuff and she couldn’t raise her hands over her head.
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p>At a factory in Des Moines, I met the wife of a tire worker who died when he was caught in machinery. The plant was working ‘lean’ to save money so he was trapped for hours before they found his body, no one was sure how long he lay there before he died. These were both union environments and this kind of workplace violence is commonplace. In Massachusetts, it would take 130 years for OSHA inspectors to examine every workplace with their current staff. The only groups who are really fighting this kind of violence are unions, by opposing them, you condone it.
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p>I’m sure you’ve got a legitimate story to tell about a construction union that was run by corrupt or mobbed up officials, that doesn’t make every union, most unions, or even many unions like that. I’m ashamed of what unions have become too. Too often they’ve lost their fight and they’re too controlled by conservative Democratic party operatives. Too many unions have confused protectionism with nationalism, too many have confused the american flag with the military industrial complex and too many operate out of fear, which carries with it a large dose of discrimination. Unfortunately, the line that ‘unions were fine for my grandad, but nowadays…’ is too often what divides progressives. Unions should, can and do stand for workplace democracy and equality – two things we’re sorely lacking in the US today.
The comment you are responding to was not made by a progressive. Your brush is too broad.
When I graduated from high school many, many years ago I remember one of my classmates getting a job at GM Framingham. Boy, were we jealous! There he was maiking 20K a year with overtime and most of us were working part time jobs trying to get thru college. Now, in the long run we were much better off with the college education. Gone are the days were you could graduate from high school and get a good job, that you could raise a family and enjoy a comfortable life!
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p>I don’t know how young people do it today! Both spouses work, child care expenses and a mortgage that could choke a horse.
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p>Sign of the times, new Lowe’s opening on near the interstate, old Aubuchon hardware store closes after 80 years. Can’t compete. Lowe’s had no problem hiring people, at 8 bucks an hour….how do you support a family on that?
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p>Grant you in material goods we have much much more than our parents. We probably could all learn to do more with less. We should have followed thru on energy policy back in the 70s but we dropped the ball.
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p>I have lived in my neighborhood for most of my life. It has gone from a semi-rural area, great place to grow up and raise a family, to suburban track housing 500-600K everyone keeps to themselves. Most people seem to be self employed. Lot of advantages to that I guess. It is no longer middle class. I feel like a dinosaur!