Decline Of Middle Class Has Accelerated

The AP reported the obvious today: with the economic depression hitting households in the $39,000-118,000 range harder than any other income group, the decline of the middle class has accelerated. According to the Pew Research Center, who compiled the data cited in the AP article, 85 percent of middle class Americans say it's more difficult now than a decade ago to maintain their standard of living.

With scant employment opportunities outside of dead end McJobs and chronic unemployment derailing many middle class Americans' careers, "upward mobility" is quickly becoming a term of the past. Indeed, the middle class holds the majority of the more than $1 trillion in outstanding student debt (the next bubble to burst), but is not advancing through higher education. As Bernie Marcus, co-founder of Home Depot, has pointed out, Washington has made it nearly impossible for a middle class American to replicate his American Dream story, and, despite what many conservatives claim, you often have to come from money to make money in the "new normal".