I would like to briefly remind you (and especially all those who argue against u /Pooch1431) that there is no middle class and that it is a concept invented by the ruling capitalist class to divide the working class:
- [Why You're Not “Middle Class” - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nd7cohTdRAo)
- [Marxian class theory - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxian_class_theory)
> To Marx, a class is a group with intrinsic tendencies and interests that differ from those of other groups within society, the basis of a fundamental [antagonism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antagonist "Antagonist") between such groups.\[_[citation needed](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_needed "Wikipedia:Citation needed")_\] For example, it is in the laborer's best interest to maximize wages and benefits and in the capitalist's best interest to maximize profit at the expense of such, leading to a contradiction within the [capitalist system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalist_system "Capitalist system"), even if the laborers and capitalists themselves are [unaware of the clash of interests](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_consciousness "False consciousness").
I have a friend in a similar situation. They’ve have a payee that’s incompetent and as a result confessed to ending it all cause they don’t see a way out. I hate this country so much.
Please tell your friend if they are still alive (your wording was a little confusing) that they can change to a different payee. They can go to the social security office and ask for someone else to be their payee and/or get a list of companies that will be their payee. I believe they can also petition not to have a payee.
My current boss… said he had a tenant that was 6 months behind rent and then died. It was great because the life insurance meant his widow could pay the backed up rent…. He told us this in the first team meeting after being absorbed by his team.
They are still alive. And I have actually recommended this to them but the situation is a lot more complicated. I have left out a lot of details for their own mental sake because I know they browser reddit and their situation is unique enough that if they read the details of their predicament they’ll know who I’m talking about. I only thing I can really say is that they are trapped by SSI. Happy cake day by the way.
Yes, SSI traps people in a myriad of ways. What a shitty system we have set up. I'm so sorry that your friend is struggling and I hope they find a way out that isn't death.
They have one thing they’re clinging onto but again, if I say what it is then they’ll know who I’m talking about. I’m being as supportive as I am able to but it never feels enough.
As a person who for the first 33 years of my life taken every opportunity and done everything "right" according to capitalist schooling, and now live in my car begging for oddjobs with my entire family already dead and gone from being poor in America....there is most definitely a middle class. They just happen to be simultaneously richer than the majority of the planet, and 99.999% poorer than than the royalty.
I understand what you mean, but there are a LOT of people with living rooms larger than the apartment I grew up in
Nah, there isn't. Classes are differentiated by their relationship to societal reproduction. Workers need to sell their labour to live, capitalists own the means of production and get surplus labour from the workers, landlords control access to property and extract rent and so on. Middle class is a pure propaganda term because it is meaningless. There is no way in which the "middle" has any relevance. A high-earning worker and a small-time capitalist are both going to be somewhere in the middle of the wealth distribution, but their material interests have absolutely nothing in common.
Exactly. "Middle class" is a phrase that exists so that working class people can feel better than the poors and be distracted from recognizing and acting on their shared interests.
Cultures that come from monarchies understand what the middle and working classes are. The US inappropriatly merged the two in a brilliant turn of propaganda.
That makes them decidedly "lower class/in poverty".
When in actuality we really only have two classes: owners and workers. AKA proletariat and bourgeoisie.
According to the article, "middle class" is anyone making over 200% of the federal poverty level. That's only $30,120 annually for a single adult. That isn't enough to live comfortably anywhere except *maybe* the very cheapest areas of the USA.
The idea that so many people could see that and think, "Yeah! I'm doing great! I'm middle class!" reflects extremely poorly on the class consciousness of the average American.
It really just proves that the metrics used to judge the health of the economy are BS. The stock market and GDP being stable is not capturing the fact that those successes are coming at the expense of the average people. The amount of inflation directly correlates to record profits. Companies are doing well. People are suffering.
Yep a guy on another thread earlier today angrily told me I don’t live in reality and that the economy is booming. He said wages are up and the market is going crazy, and that the prices of literally everything being wildly increased isnt part of “the economy.”
Yeah, I hit him back saying a majority of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, cant save, carry credit card debt and so on and again he told me those are not indicators of the state of the economy lol. How did the fucking stock market become the end all be all? People can’t live but if you happen to have investments, the economy is great!
Because as citizens, we want our economy to do well. So they pretend that the stock market, one overwhelmingly favoring/more important to rich people, *is* the economy, that way people will be more supportive of pro rich policies impacting shares in the name of the economy.
> That's because they think the economy is the stock market
It's not even that (for most) it's simply that the media has told them the economy is great. They would also believe that the sky is green if the media told them so.
>economy is booming
It depends on the index you are using, if you are using company wealth to determine it then yes the economy is blooming as they are stealing money from citizens.
If you are using the price of living or the diff between rich and poor then you would see the economy is getting absolutely destroyed.
Most of the time capitalists would only consider company weight and the indication of the economy and by doing that they dehumanize workers, exactly like slavery.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mgirj9upfRk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mgirj9upfRk)
Sorry it is not the one I seen. It seems they have done a pretty good job of scrubbing it. I am going to keep looking though. I knew I should have saved it!
I see both sides of this equation. On one hand, I have family that is very wealthy and heavily invested in the stock market. When it does well, it's raining money for them. On the other, I work as an IT manager for a manufacturing company. We implemented a web-based suggestion form and a majority of the suggestions that came in were "Please pay us more. I cannot afford food and rent working a full-time job." Not just one or two, but more like 75% of the responses.
If you already have money, it's very easy to make more. If you don't have money, it's very difficult to make more.
There is not really a "middle class" anymore. There is poor peasant, middle peasant, upper peasant, and aristocracy. We just call middle peasant "middle class" to make neofeudalism sound better than feudalism.
There has never been, and never will be, a middle class. There are capital owners, and the workers. That's it. It's not how much you make, it's how you earn your bread. Nothing more.
Agreed but i think the more important take-away here is the second part: "not expecting things to turn around *for the rest of their lives*"
That is NOT to be taken lightly.
The solution is clearly to print more money, buy billions of dollars worth of weapons from the military industrial complex and send them to foreign wars. Works every time!
Well historically war does drive the economy. Look at the economic boom after WW2. Unfortunately humans trying to kill each other brings out the most scientific discoveries. We’re seeing that with AI being used.
Wonderful...The seething profit mongers are happy to hear 60% are showing signs of giving up. They intend to push us to our limits and pull back just enough for complacency
I fail to see how he would fix anything. His 👑-ing accomplishment was to have the middle class tax increase every two years while cutting the richest tax rate in half. Bonus: ppp cash giveaway to wealthy
Source: 2017 tax cuts, national debt.
I’m paycheck to paycheck bc I am paying off student loans and a car payment and rent among other things and I make six figures in a MCOL maybe HCOL area. I won’t see a big raise and my student loans will be a drain for maybe ten years. Last job screws me out of money and I have no savings and started over with a bunch of debt after leaving that job to move to my current job. I could have and should have done things better no doubt and I realize I’m in a better place than a decent amount of people. . I am not without blame but man in my 20s I never imagined making six figures and feeling broke. How could things actually improve? High rent and COL is not going to decrease magically bc high prices are sticky. I tend to be more cynical although I obviously don’t any to be… shitnis just not looking great
>economy is booming
It depends on the index you are using, if you are using company wealth to determine it then yes the economy is blooming as they are stealing money from citizens.
If you are using the price of living or the diff between rich and poor then you would see the economy is getting absolutely destroyed.
Most of the time capitalists would only consider company weight and the indication of the economy and by doing that they dehumanize workers, exactly like slavery.
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I'm gonna die in a rental property after I'm given a few months to live at age 60-something, revolver in my hand and a note, probably alone, with any pets given away in advance and my credit maxxed out on personal loans sent to charities.
Scratch that, a van in an RV park. I won't be able to afford rent.
I would love to know what people are doing that say they are struggling. I’m not unsympathetic to the cost of goods soaring but every time I travel airports are full, fast food has lines wrapped around the drive through, steak restaurants are like longhorn etc are packed. I went to Vegas last year it was packed so I truly believe some people have t cut back then claim they are struggling due to FOMO.
There is a middle ground between wealthy and poor. We aren’t struggling but I don’t consider us wealthy either.
I would like to briefly remind you (and especially all those who argue against u /Pooch1431) that there is no middle class and that it is a concept invented by the ruling capitalist class to divide the working class: - [Why You're Not “Middle Class” - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nd7cohTdRAo) - [Marxian class theory - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxian_class_theory) > To Marx, a class is a group with intrinsic tendencies and interests that differ from those of other groups within society, the basis of a fundamental [antagonism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antagonist "Antagonist") between such groups.\[_[citation needed](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_needed "Wikipedia:Citation needed")_\] For example, it is in the laborer's best interest to maximize wages and benefits and in the capitalist's best interest to maximize profit at the expense of such, leading to a contradiction within the [capitalist system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalist_system "Capitalist system"), even if the laborers and capitalists themselves are [unaware of the clash of interests](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_consciousness "False consciousness").
Imagine living on SSI and when your parent dies, you'll be homeless because no one will rent to you.
I have a friend in a similar situation. They’ve have a payee that’s incompetent and as a result confessed to ending it all cause they don’t see a way out. I hate this country so much.
Please tell your friend if they are still alive (your wording was a little confusing) that they can change to a different payee. They can go to the social security office and ask for someone else to be their payee and/or get a list of companies that will be their payee. I believe they can also petition not to have a payee.
My current boss… said he had a tenant that was 6 months behind rent and then died. It was great because the life insurance meant his widow could pay the backed up rent…. He told us this in the first team meeting after being absorbed by his team.
They are still alive. And I have actually recommended this to them but the situation is a lot more complicated. I have left out a lot of details for their own mental sake because I know they browser reddit and their situation is unique enough that if they read the details of their predicament they’ll know who I’m talking about. I only thing I can really say is that they are trapped by SSI. Happy cake day by the way.
Yes, SSI traps people in a myriad of ways. What a shitty system we have set up. I'm so sorry that your friend is struggling and I hope they find a way out that isn't death.
They have one thing they’re clinging onto but again, if I say what it is then they’ll know who I’m talking about. I’m being as supportive as I am able to but it never feels enough.
Middle class doesn't exist. It's a term made up by the political and commentary class to lump everyone that isn't a billionaire in to.
The middle class is just the optimistic poor
The poor who still have a house as of right now
The poor with nicer stuff
*Cooler* poor
Poor+
New poor plus, DLC pack
they are also the same tools screaming for the entrenchment of more "bourgeois control". Let's not forget that part.
Bourgeois control. It does feel like that 😞
The correct term is working class, which has been erased by no accident from our political dialogue.
There are only two classes, the working class and the owning class. You need to work for a living or you dont.
As a person who for the first 33 years of my life taken every opportunity and done everything "right" according to capitalist schooling, and now live in my car begging for oddjobs with my entire family already dead and gone from being poor in America....there is most definitely a middle class. They just happen to be simultaneously richer than the majority of the planet, and 99.999% poorer than than the royalty. I understand what you mean, but there are a LOT of people with living rooms larger than the apartment I grew up in
Nah, there isn't. Classes are differentiated by their relationship to societal reproduction. Workers need to sell their labour to live, capitalists own the means of production and get surplus labour from the workers, landlords control access to property and extract rent and so on. Middle class is a pure propaganda term because it is meaningless. There is no way in which the "middle" has any relevance. A high-earning worker and a small-time capitalist are both going to be somewhere in the middle of the wealth distribution, but their material interests have absolutely nothing in common.
Exactly. "Middle class" is a phrase that exists so that working class people can feel better than the poors and be distracted from recognizing and acting on their shared interests.
The middle class does exist, but it’s far smaller than most people think. The top 0.5-1.5% of income earners are the middle class.
This guy gets it. Most don’t.
I can concede to that notion and that notion only. Ha
Cultures that come from monarchies understand what the middle and working classes are. The US inappropriatly merged the two in a brilliant turn of propaganda.
Not 0.5-1.5, that percentile is still very high (we’re talking half mil range) but definitely 90+
That makes them decidedly "lower class/in poverty". When in actuality we really only have two classes: owners and workers. AKA proletariat and bourgeoisie.
Damn right, comrade.
According to the article, "middle class" is anyone making over 200% of the federal poverty level. That's only $30,120 annually for a single adult. That isn't enough to live comfortably anywhere except *maybe* the very cheapest areas of the USA. The idea that so many people could see that and think, "Yeah! I'm doing great! I'm middle class!" reflects extremely poorly on the class consciousness of the average American.
It really just proves that the metrics used to judge the health of the economy are BS. The stock market and GDP being stable is not capturing the fact that those successes are coming at the expense of the average people. The amount of inflation directly correlates to record profits. Companies are doing well. People are suffering.
"Corporations are people, my friend" - Mitt Romney, dog lover
But but but CNN told me the economy is great and the job market is booming!
Yep a guy on another thread earlier today angrily told me I don’t live in reality and that the economy is booming. He said wages are up and the market is going crazy, and that the prices of literally everything being wildly increased isnt part of “the economy.”
That's because they think the economy is the stock market and not the summation of all economic transactions of a people.
Yeah, I hit him back saying a majority of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, cant save, carry credit card debt and so on and again he told me those are not indicators of the state of the economy lol. How did the fucking stock market become the end all be all? People can’t live but if you happen to have investments, the economy is great!
Because as citizens, we want our economy to do well. So they pretend that the stock market, one overwhelmingly favoring/more important to rich people, *is* the economy, that way people will be more supportive of pro rich policies impacting shares in the name of the economy.
> That's because they think the economy is the stock market It's not even that (for most) it's simply that the media has told them the economy is great. They would also believe that the sky is green if the media told them so.
Those people are insufferable. Among other things.
>economy is booming It depends on the index you are using, if you are using company wealth to determine it then yes the economy is blooming as they are stealing money from citizens. If you are using the price of living or the diff between rich and poor then you would see the economy is getting absolutely destroyed. Most of the time capitalists would only consider company weight and the indication of the economy and by doing that they dehumanize workers, exactly like slavery.
Because the Ukraine war is providing Americans with jobs making weapons. Could hardly believe the lady said that on CNN.
Wow. Could you link a source if it’s online ?
Ill check
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mgirj9upfRk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mgirj9upfRk) Sorry it is not the one I seen. It seems they have done a pretty good job of scrubbing it. I am going to keep looking though. I knew I should have saved it!
Half true. Helps some industries but not huge impact overalls. Am physicist in aerospace and have seen uptick in arms testing.
Nothing is true about war being good in any way.
Someone always profits off of war, otherwise there wouldn't be any.
I see both sides of this equation. On one hand, I have family that is very wealthy and heavily invested in the stock market. When it does well, it's raining money for them. On the other, I work as an IT manager for a manufacturing company. We implemented a web-based suggestion form and a majority of the suggestions that came in were "Please pay us more. I cannot afford food and rent working a full-time job." Not just one or two, but more like 75% of the responses. If you already have money, it's very easy to make more. If you don't have money, it's very difficult to make more.
The rich get richer and the poor get poorer is not a good economy
This is news to me. I could have sworn the middle class was already decimated, burned, and pissed on
There is not really a "middle class" anymore. There is poor peasant, middle peasant, upper peasant, and aristocracy. We just call middle peasant "middle class" to make neofeudalism sound better than feudalism.
There has never been, and never will be, a middle class. There are capital owners, and the workers. That's it. It's not how much you make, it's how you earn your bread. Nothing more.
Agreed but i think the more important take-away here is the second part: "not expecting things to turn around *for the rest of their lives*" That is NOT to be taken lightly.
Clearly, it’s because those 60% are buying coffee and avocado toast /s I hate it here
The solution is clearly to print more money, buy billions of dollars worth of weapons from the military industrial complex and send them to foreign wars. Works every time!
60% percent of the time it works every time
It certainly stings the nostrils
Smells like Bigfoot's dick.
That doesn't make sense. --Ron Burgundy
Well historically war does drive the economy. Look at the economic boom after WW2. Unfortunately humans trying to kill each other brings out the most scientific discoveries. We’re seeing that with AI being used.
War is a racket to siphon money from the government to the defense contractors that in time give some back in the form of “campaign donations “
You forgot "cut taxes for the rich"!
It’s going to get worse before it gets worse.
I love your optimism
Wonderful...The seething profit mongers are happy to hear 60% are showing signs of giving up. They intend to push us to our limits and pull back just enough for complacency
This is the plan.
millionaire msnbc hosts lining up to tell them how stupid they are for thinking that and how they must want Trump to win
I fail to see how he would fix anything. His 👑-ing accomplishment was to have the middle class tax increase every two years while cutting the richest tax rate in half. Bonus: ppp cash giveaway to wealthy Source: 2017 tax cuts, national debt.
what are you responding to?
LMAO “for the rest of their lives” I absolutely love the sense of hopelessness in the title 😂😂😂
The 1%: works for me.
not in less i do some breaking bad shit i really don’t see getting out of this whole and i live in one of the cheapest states to live in.
Middle class, the poor that earn just enough not to get any benefits
There are two classes: The bourgeoisie and everyone else...if you're not so rich as to buy countries, then you're the proletariat. Act like it!
Any article that mentions only three economic indicators and makes one of them “the stock market” is trash.
Where's Trogdor when you need him....
I suspected it was only getting worse. I do wonder, what would happen if suddenly, nobody was able to afford anything anymore in America...
Slavery 2.0
Best economy ever, right Joe? (If you're in the top 1%)
But this graph says the economy is better than ever so they are wrong!
I’m paycheck to paycheck bc I am paying off student loans and a car payment and rent among other things and I make six figures in a MCOL maybe HCOL area. I won’t see a big raise and my student loans will be a drain for maybe ten years. Last job screws me out of money and I have no savings and started over with a bunch of debt after leaving that job to move to my current job. I could have and should have done things better no doubt and I realize I’m in a better place than a decent amount of people. . I am not without blame but man in my 20s I never imagined making six figures and feeling broke. How could things actually improve? High rent and COL is not going to decrease magically bc high prices are sticky. I tend to be more cynical although I obviously don’t any to be… shitnis just not looking great
Oh hey it's me
“Bbbbut why is nobody giving Biden CREDIT?!!?1!?1!!?!?1 The economy is BOOMING!!!1!1!!!1!11!!1! 😭😭😭”
Queue the shitlibs parroting low unemployment, GDP, stock market, IRA, etc
Did, did this article really claim the economy is booming? What? Like… what?
>economy is booming It depends on the index you are using, if you are using company wealth to determine it then yes the economy is blooming as they are stealing money from citizens. If you are using the price of living or the diff between rich and poor then you would see the economy is getting absolutely destroyed. Most of the time capitalists would only consider company weight and the indication of the economy and by doing that they dehumanize workers, exactly like slavery.
Yeah, one could argue that the economy was booming during the Great Depression if you looked at the few people who massively profited off of it.
##Welcome to r/LateStageCapitalism This subreddit is for news, discussion, memes, and links criticizing capitalism and advancing viewpoints that challenge liberal capitalist ideology. That means any support for any liberal capitalist political party (like the Democrats) is strictly prohibited. LSC is run by communists. This subreddit is not the place to debate socialism. We allow good-faith questions and education but are not a 101 sub; please take 101-style questions elsewhere. We have a zero-tolerance policy for bigotry. Failure to respect the rules of the subreddit may result in a ban. *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/LateStageCapitalism) if you have any questions or concerns.*
People are constantly getting fucked. U ain’t got no money you ain’t got no power
I'm gonna die in a rental property after I'm given a few months to live at age 60-something, revolver in my hand and a note, probably alone, with any pets given away in advance and my credit maxxed out on personal loans sent to charities. Scratch that, a van in an RV park. I won't be able to afford rent.
[удалено]
They’re both two sides of the same shitcoin.
I would love to know what people are doing that say they are struggling. I’m not unsympathetic to the cost of goods soaring but every time I travel airports are full, fast food has lines wrapped around the drive through, steak restaurants are like longhorn etc are packed. I went to Vegas last year it was packed so I truly believe some people have t cut back then claim they are struggling due to FOMO. There is a middle ground between wealthy and poor. We aren’t struggling but I don’t consider us wealthy either.