Mainecoons
08-29-2013, 11:53 AM
A very thoughtful piece. The parallels to Japan are pretty striking.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-08-29/americas-social-recession-five-years-and-counting
Here are the conditions that characterize social recession:
1. High expectations of endless rising prosperity have been instilled in generations of citizens as a birthright.
2. Part-time and unemployed people are marginalized, not just financially but socially.
3. Widening income/wealth disparity as those in the top 10% pull away from the shrinking middle class.
4. A systemic decline in social/economic mobility as it becomes increasingly difficult to move from dependence on the state (welfare) or parents to the middle class.
5. A widening disconnect between higher education and employment: a college/university degree no longer guarantees a stable, good-paying job.
6. A failure in the Status Quo institutions and mainstream media to recognize social recession as a reality.
7. A systemic failure of imagination within state and private-sector institutions on how to address social recession issues.
8. The abandonment of middle class aspirations by the generations ensnared by the social recession: young people no longer aspire to (or cannot afford) consumerist status symbols such as autos.
9. A generational abandonment of marriage, families and independent households as these are no longer affordable to those with part-time or unstable employment, i.e. the "end of work".
10. A loss of hope in the young generations as a result of the above conditions.
Really, I feel so bad for today's young, even though they have been brainwashed by bad and leftist "educators" into believing that the same failed policies that got us to this point are somehow going to save them.
I feel bad for them but I can't really comprehend what the experience must be like for them at a gut level.
We dealt with nothing like they are facing. Graduating with an MS in civil/sanitary engineering, I sure didn't have to grub around looking for a low paying job. The day I graduated, I was chosing between a number of nice positions, any one of which planted me firmly in the middle class right out of school.
Now I realize that too many of these kids have wasted their time getting "liberal arts" diplomas from colleges that are little more than diploma mills and leftist indoctrination tanks, still it is pretty shocking that half can't find work in their fields and an amazing number of them are stuck in McJobs.
This is not a partisan piece--Zero Hedge recognizes as many of us do that this has absolutely nothing to do with partisan labels. It has everything to do with political and social institutions that cannot grasp or are in denial about the mega trends driving this situation. In a nutshell, as it takes less and less labor to produce anything, even McBurgers, real jobs become a scarce commodity, capital ownership captures all the wealth, a few people get good jobs and get into a shrinking middle class, and the rest are marginalized.
Anyway, I found it one of the best reads I've seen in a while.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-08-29/americas-social-recession-five-years-and-counting
Here are the conditions that characterize social recession:
1. High expectations of endless rising prosperity have been instilled in generations of citizens as a birthright.
2. Part-time and unemployed people are marginalized, not just financially but socially.
3. Widening income/wealth disparity as those in the top 10% pull away from the shrinking middle class.
4. A systemic decline in social/economic mobility as it becomes increasingly difficult to move from dependence on the state (welfare) or parents to the middle class.
5. A widening disconnect between higher education and employment: a college/university degree no longer guarantees a stable, good-paying job.
6. A failure in the Status Quo institutions and mainstream media to recognize social recession as a reality.
7. A systemic failure of imagination within state and private-sector institutions on how to address social recession issues.
8. The abandonment of middle class aspirations by the generations ensnared by the social recession: young people no longer aspire to (or cannot afford) consumerist status symbols such as autos.
9. A generational abandonment of marriage, families and independent households as these are no longer affordable to those with part-time or unstable employment, i.e. the "end of work".
10. A loss of hope in the young generations as a result of the above conditions.
Really, I feel so bad for today's young, even though they have been brainwashed by bad and leftist "educators" into believing that the same failed policies that got us to this point are somehow going to save them.
I feel bad for them but I can't really comprehend what the experience must be like for them at a gut level.
We dealt with nothing like they are facing. Graduating with an MS in civil/sanitary engineering, I sure didn't have to grub around looking for a low paying job. The day I graduated, I was chosing between a number of nice positions, any one of which planted me firmly in the middle class right out of school.
Now I realize that too many of these kids have wasted their time getting "liberal arts" diplomas from colleges that are little more than diploma mills and leftist indoctrination tanks, still it is pretty shocking that half can't find work in their fields and an amazing number of them are stuck in McJobs.
This is not a partisan piece--Zero Hedge recognizes as many of us do that this has absolutely nothing to do with partisan labels. It has everything to do with political and social institutions that cannot grasp or are in denial about the mega trends driving this situation. In a nutshell, as it takes less and less labor to produce anything, even McBurgers, real jobs become a scarce commodity, capital ownership captures all the wealth, a few people get good jobs and get into a shrinking middle class, and the rest are marginalized.
Anyway, I found it one of the best reads I've seen in a while.