{"id":862,"date":"2010-07-01T11:29:26","date_gmt":"2010-07-01T11:29:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/roddreher\/2010\/07\/the-death-of-the-western-middle-class.html"},"modified":"2010-07-01T11:29:26","modified_gmt":"2010-07-01T11:29:26","slug":"the-death-of-the-western-middle-class","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/07\/the-death-of-the-western-middle-class.html","title":{"rendered":"The death of the Western middle class"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/globalguerrillas.typepad.com\/globalguerrillas\/2010\/07\/journal-the-decline-of-the-middle-class.html\">John Robb says that&#8217;s the real social and economic story now.<\/a> The postwar creation of a broad middle class in America allowed for stability because it provided a broad base for prosperity and creativity. But that&#8217;s going away, he believes. Excerpt:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The <a href=\"http:\/\/globalguerrillas.typepad.com\/globalguerrillas\/2009\/03\/parasitic-predation.html\">social contract that enabled this success<\/a>, particularly the post WW2 social contract that shared the increases in wealth generated by improvements in productivity with the more productive workers that enabled it, ended with the financialization of economic activity and globalization (and governments that facilitated and catalyzed the process).  In sum, the increase in wealth the western middle class produced over the last three decades has been transfered to global financial elites (who misspent it) and mercantilist nations (China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, etc.).  We can see the result of this.  It&#8217;s tangible:  The median income (the best measure of the health of the middle class) of the western middle class today <a href=\"http:\/\/globalguerrillas.typepad.com\/globalguerrillas\/2009\/04\/journal-stagnant-median-incomes-and-parasitic-predation.html\">is less than it was in 1974<\/a>, despite massive top line GDP and productivity growth (both global and national) during the same period. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>What&#8217;s this going to mean for us? Robb predicts:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u2022Economic stagnation\/depression.  An ever increasing loss of vibrance.  Shrinkage, across the board.  Wealth destruction.<br \/>\n\u2022Inevitable government bankruptcy.  An ongoing and inexorable reduction in the bulk of the tax base that funds government activities.  Government&#8217;s become slaves to global bond markets.<br \/>\n\u2022Political instability.  Increasingly fractious political discourse.  Increasing violence.  A rise in criminality and corruption.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/globalguerrillas.typepad.com\/globalguerrillas\/2010\/07\/journal-the-decline-of-the-middle-class.html\">Read the whole thing. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>John Robb says that&#8217;s the real social and economic story now. The postwar creation of a broad middle class in America allowed for stability because it provided a broad base for prosperity and creativity. But that&#8217;s going away, he believes. Excerpt: The social contract that enabled this success, particularly the post WW2 social contract that&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The death of the Western middle class - Rod Dreher<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/07\/the-death-of-the-western-middle-class.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The death of the Western middle class - Rod Dreher\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"John Robb says that&#8217;s the real social and economic story now. The postwar creation of a broad middle class in America allowed for stability because it provided a broad base for prosperity and creativity. But that&#8217;s going away, he believes. Excerpt: The social contract that enabled this success, particularly the post WW2 social contract that&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/07\/the-death-of-the-western-middle-class.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Rod Dreher\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-07-01T11:29:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Rod Dreher\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The death of the Western middle class - Rod Dreher","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/07\/the-death-of-the-western-middle-class.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The death of the Western middle class - Rod Dreher","og_description":"John Robb says that&#8217;s the real social and economic story now. 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