Elusive Trope's picture

    This Ain't 1936

    By Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 3:23pm |

    These days we see a lot of folks bringing up the class war, the working class folks versus the wealthy elite (corporate or otherwise) and their servants in D.C.  And in attempting to show just how much Obama and his administration has sold out the working class, people will turn to FDR as example of someone who took on the powers to be and the kind of leader Obama should be.  In a OrionXP's recent blog Effectively Skewering the Tea Party, SleepingJeezus makes such a point.  I think he provides an excellent point and example, which I think everyone should read, about how we each can do our part to begin to turn the tables on the conservatives.  He ends, however, with part of the audio of FDR's Madison Square Garden speech (a speech I have seen posted quite a bit these days on the blogosphere).  Here is the published text of his speech (as opposed to the actual speech). 

    I think most of us of here would love it if Obama stood up and said what FDR said that day:

    For nearly four years you have had an Administration which instead of twirling its thumbs has rolled up its sleeves. We will keep our sleeves rolled up.

    We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace—business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.

    They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.

    Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me—and I welcome their hatred.

    But there is a particular dynamic at play today compared to then which I think needs to temper our hopes of seeing a FDR return to the political stage.  Today we speak of saving the middle class.  The average salary of Americans lately has been somewhere in the $40,000 range.  Once the data from this latest slump comes in, it may show we've even slipped into the high 30K range.  During the 1930s the average income when adjusted was somewhere in the 15K to 18K range. 

    From Visualizing Economics, this graph shows how drastically average income has changed.

    As they point out at Visualizing Economics, one needs to look at things like income distribution to get the whole story.  But I think the point is clear that even if a family of four had two incomes, they would likely be right at the "poverty line" or just below/above it.  Moreover, the idea of upward mobility that took hold in the post-WWII boom had not emerged.  People didn't think about things getting a whole lot better, for themselves or their children.

    So today it is about rallying the middle class and maintaining an economy that supports the middle class, while in FDRs day it was about rallying the poor and maintaining an economy that provided any job to put some food on the table.

    Moreover, the average worker experienced a far different environment.  It wasn't until 1938, two years after that speech, that FDR finally instituted a minimum wage through the Fair Labor Standards Act.  The minimum wage was set at 25 cents an hour in order to create  a "minimum standard of living necessary for health, efficiency and general well-being, without substantially curtailing employment"  25 cents an hour would result in someone who worked 10 hours a day (good luck finding an 8 hour work day job with breaks), six days a week, 52 weeks a year (what you want a vacation?) a grand total of $780 a year.  Adjusted it would translate into making something like $11,000 a year. Chances are you would welcome those extra hours and days because working an 8 hour day, 5 days a week meant you would get about $8,000 a year (adjusted). 

    It was also the Fair Labor Standards Act that did things like outlaw child labor.  When FDR took power, there was routine exploitation of all workers because there was no regulation of wages. Sweatshops were not something illegal immigrants endured, it was the experience of far too many America citizens.  The average voter was likely not needing to be convinced about how the wealthy elite were exploiting them because they were being exploited.

    In short, the FDR's America

    Is in many way very different than Obama's America

    Or so it seems.

    Comments

    But is it so much different?

    You begin by rightly pointing out that FDR's 1936 speech would be welcomed today, and would be found to be completely relevant except for a few specific situational details.

    In developing your comparisons of income, you write "one needs to look at things like income distribution to get the whole story." But you seemingly discount this legitimate point by comparing relative wealth between the workers of 1936 and those of today. The key in this is in fact to compare the relative wealth between the upper and lower classes and review the trends. I think you will find great similarities between the injustices in wealth distribution in 1936 and the disparities we confront today. And the rapaciousness of the oligarchs today is certainly NO LESS egregious than it was during FDR's time. Just as an example, I don't think the titans of '36 would dare have held hostage relief for the workers in exchange for hundreds of billions of dollars in tax cuts for themselves.

    It's really all about economic justice. As Sanders so magnificently pointed out yesterday, this IS Class War, and we need to become engaged on those terms. It means finding and supporting champions who are capable of delivering the kind of address FDR gave to rally the troops. And, unfortunately, Obama & Co. will never be capable for reason that their owners won't allow it. 


    by SleepinJeezus on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 3:54pm

    I agree with your points about wealth distribution. That is not my point.  My point is that the voter of those days, even if they had kept their job during the depression, lived in or around poverty.  Whereas today we speak of the middle class.  In general I would say that the two see the economic system in radically different ways.  A candidate didn't have to worry about scaring off the centerists and moderates with this talk of taking on the businesses as they do know.  As much as corporations  exploit workers today and screw them over with moving their jobs overseas, etc., there is qualitive difference in the workplace experience for those who are employed.  To such a degree that we find ourselves having to persuade many of the working class that they are being exploited.  In a sense it a testament to the achievements of the unions that this is case - in that conditions have improved so much for many of the working class that it is the more subtle forms of exploitation that corporations have to employ in order for them to get their pound of flesh. 


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 4:38pm

    Are you suggesting that for us to feel righteously indignant that we should return to 1936 ?  It's not just the income that is the problem, it's what percentage of that that is needed to have just the basic necessities of life. Like food, transportation, housing and what not. And that has gone up and up and up while income has not.

    It's a whole hell of lot more complicated than you put in this simplistic post.


    by cmaukonen on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 3:57pm

    First off, there is a reason that the only word I bolded was "temper."  By this I meant that when you have in general nation (and thus the bulk of voters) whose economic commonality is actual poverty, this will alter the political playing field when compared to one where there is a history of a strong middle class whose expectation is to remain middle class (if not better). 

    As sleepingjeezus pointed out in his comment I linked to, we are struggling to convince the working class that corporations are out to get them.  When people are working in a sweatshop, one doesn't have to do much convincing.

    At the heart of it is that all in all, the middle class likes capitalism, they want it to continue because it is in their eyes what got them to be middle class in the first place.  Those working the fingers to the bone for poverty wages on the hand tend not to see capitalism in such a wonderous light.  In the times leading up to the depression (even with the Roaring 20s), most Americans never lived a middle class lifestyle, nor did they imagine they would.  This meant as a whole attacking capitalism was not a threat to their lifestyle to which had grown accustomed. 

    And while comparably in recent times things are getting worse in terms of purchasing power of Americans, when one looks at the actual conditions between now and then, we are way better as a whole then we were back then.  Think about the idea that the minimum wage for jobs was 25 cents.  That was the improvement.  And that didn't even happen until 1938.

    So you can feel indignant all you want, righteously so about how the wealthy elites are fucking up this country.  I am.  But the point is that we need to temper our understanding that a typical voter in 1936 was working in crap conditions with no benefits and taking home real poverty wages, whereas today that typical voter is what one would call lower middle class, with some benefits, with paid vacations and sick days, etc etc.  It does change the equation.  It is not the whole equation, but enough one needs to keep this in mind.


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 4:30pm

    Point taken. But also consider that one of the things that has blinded the working class to the situation is the introduction of scam credit. Kind of like the coal miners company store.  Instead of having actual money, they are given credit, which comes back later to bite you in the ass.

    And do not forget that in the 1930s we were still an agrarian society and people could get by on much less because of this.

    Things would be a while lot different with out the easy credit and credit cards. Rest assured.


    by cmaukonen on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 5:06pm

    No doubt that the credit scam issue has helped soften the working class.  And these days some more eyes have been opened to this as the party came crashing to a close.  But the catch is trying to get many of these folks to see that their debt and exploitation by places such as payday loan institutions can be addressed through the political process. 

    On the agrarian front, I would point out that one basically did not have to concern oneself about alienating those in the agrarian world back then if one went on the attack on corporate overlords.  In part because they mainly family farms (as opposed to today agri-corporations that have taken over) and were not directly dependent on them for their livlihood. 

    And from my relatives that grew up on farms during those days, not only did they get by on less, they got by with having much less.  Things like one toy at Christmas time, etc.  And when dad brought home that radio for everyone to sit around and listen to, well that was huge day.


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 5:22pm

    Great grandma Hofner who lived in the city, had a separate canning kitchen and canned food. She also bought a live chicken and kept it in the basement for Sunday dinner. Which she killed, plucked and fixed herself.

    But as you say it's getting them to see it and acknowledge it that is difficult. Especially since most are attached to the very system that is screwing them by a very large umbilical cord.


    by cmaukonen on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 5:29pm

    A.T., I really like the jist of this post. What it sparks in me is the thought of how complicated the messaging is in2010 not only to the lower income people but to the middle class as well. And I think it's very useful to look at all of this in a historical perspective, maybe we'll learn what's wrong with our messaging--or for that matter, what's wrong with the policies.


    by Oxy Mora on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 9:16pm

    Yeah, that is the entire point of this piece to me anyway, you just put it into the right words.

    I mean otherwise, why has there not been more of a hue and cry?


    by Richard Day on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 11:01pm

    ACORN was such a threat because currently the lower classes are underrepresented at the polling booth. 

    The median income in the US is just around 50K.  In 2008, the estimate is the only 58% of households who made less than 50K voted, while 77% those who marde 50K or more voted. 

    So when a politican who focused on winning the vote, as a rule, is going to tailor one's message in a way that appeals to the higher income brackets. 

    Imagine what would happen if we could get 85% turnout for those who made 50K or less.

    Another little tidbit

    Employment status is another key indicator of voting participation. In the 2004 presidential election, 66 percent of employed citizens reported voting, compared with 51 percent of those who were in the labor force but not employed. Citizens who were not in the labor force, a group that included many retired people, had a voter participation rate of 61 percent.

    The unemployed are less likely of the three groups to vote.  Yet they are the ones who have the biggest interest in getting some real progressives into the government.


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 11:37pm

    Another way to point out the differences between now and 1936 is to look at Michael Lind's observation that people who were dirt poor then knew they were dirt poor, whereas now there is a substantial number of people who thought they were part of the middle class when they never were and very likely never will be.

    What Lind is pointing to is not the whole story, of course. There are lots and lots of dirt poor people who have no illusions about their condition or place alongside the trickle down trough. In terms of political alignments this makes for yet another complication. At either end of the scale you have people who have no problem identifying what is and what is not in the interest of their economic class. In the middle, there seems to be a swirling mass of confusion.

    Messengers who bring unwanted news are often perforated or forced to become Wallmart greeters.


    by moat on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 5:10pm

    Interesting article, and good point.  And as C points out above, the easy access to credit helped create that swirling mass of confusion.  "How can I be poor if I have a flat screen tv and the latest Xbox."

    I remember on a past episode of Real Time with Bill Mahr during the Bush years some lamented about their confusion as to why the working class kept voting for the party who was the least likely to actually do something in the people's interest and supported the wealthy elites. Jason (Castanza) Alexander pointed out I think quite accurately that is because they think they will be part of the wealthy elites someday.  "When I do make my fortune, I don't want the government to take it away." 


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 5:59pm

    No Taxes on the rich ! Read my gun lips.


    by cmaukonen on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 6:56pm

    Yeah something like that.


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 7:01pm

    All seriousness aside, I believe the Trope has a major point there. The Poor in a lot of areas do not live like they are poor. I fact in some places they are not even aloud to. When was the last time anyone has seen a trailer park or a shanty town. Except for the major cities you do not see really poor areas as much.

    Where I grew up we had three trailer parks and this was a very rural area too. Cities and towns and counties have enacted zoning laws and such that make it a crime to live like you have no money to speak of. No old cars, no trailers and sometimes you cannot even hang out laundry. It's the old shell game. If you cannot see the poverty, then you don't have any. So you are forced to use money you don't have or get and go deeper and deeper into hock.

    I think that in and of it self makes getting anywhere even more difficult.


    by cmaukonen on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 7:53pm

    Thanks for the link to Lind.  I was thinking about him the other day.  His keeps getting better and better.


    by EmmaZahn on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 7:06pm

    If we get a choice, I pick perforation, please.

    by wabby on Sun, 12/12/2010 - 12:07am

    Yup. And I'm sure the centrists in the '30s were writing blogposts saying how American workers were doing phenomenally well compared to turn of the century Russian serfs who were literally living on dirt floors and surviving on grass, so things weren't that bad and workers were going to be fundamentally conservative compared to the truly suffering Russians. And I'm sure the Russian centrists back then were writing about how the serfs were infinitely better off than the plantation slaves in the Americas, and .... yadayadayada

    My point is - if it isn't clear - ABSOLUTE welfare counts for shit, imo. It's the perceived injustice of a system where there is more than enough money to go around, where bankers blow up a RE bubble to then get bailed out and also defraud you out of your house just to boot, as they short your company's stock so it goes bankrupt and then throw you out of a job. That's the stuff that riles people up. Unless you have a media, a president, and a whole political establishment to effectively misdirect, confuse and dissipate the anger.

    Some random other thoughts on the comparison: I've been brushing up on my Depression history these days. Interesting stuff there. One thing Paul Johnson suggests is that Roosevelt was actually an accidental revolutionary. He was running in '32 on quite a moderate - dare I say Hooverian - platform, all about growth through austerity and responsible fiscal policy - and then Hoover started sliming him as a dangerous radical lefty, and FDR decided to ... embrace the characterization. And then fully embrace that persona, and grew to become the great president we know. I find how history turns on chance like that quite funny.

    Another thing JK Galbraith mentions in his economic autobiographical remarks is how FDR never quite embraced Keynesianism. It was something he found himself implementing due to a true conspiracy of Keynesians. Currie, the first National Economic Advisor, used his clout to get Keynesians assigned to different important policy positions in the different departments, so that the proposals that floated up to the White House all fit the Keynesian script and drove the national debate. According to Galbraith, people suspected it existed, but they didn't know the full extent of it. And if they HAD, they would have found it just as dangerous as the supposed (yet fictional) Marxist cabal the right wing got all paranoid about.

    I don't know what all that means. Maybe that to take on the establishment, you need some luck - both in the candidate and in the opposition - and you need some good, smart, and above all, courageous people in important places who know how to build up the counter-establishment argument until it achieves some critical mass.


    by Obey on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 5:51pm

    As far as that austerity thing goes, in looking up the New Deal timeline, one of the first order of business (after bank stabilization legislation) that he did was the his economy bill which cut $500 million dollars in scheduled payments to vetrans and federal employees. 

    But back to your opening point.  Thank you for saying it: for it is all about perceived injustice.  I guess I didn't make my point very clear.  Which is it is a hell of lot easy getting someone to perceive an economic injustice is happening when they are experience it personally in absolute terms. And while times are tougher, even if you put real unemployment at 20%, that means there is 80% who are employed.  And when we look at median household incomes, it starts to get a little dicey trying to convince a good number of them that it is the whole establishment (capitalism and all) is seriously warped.  One can say many are experiencing the depression right now, but qualitively the two time periods are not the same by a long shot.  If you start talking about upsetting the applecart in order correct the system, what many of them think is "will that lead to me losing my job."  And then one starts talking about income distribution and they turn the channel to Dancing with the Stars.

    Which is another way of saying that in this country the middle class and those moving their way up to the middle class (or at least perceive themselve to be) generally don't respond well to counter-establishment talk.  While they might see some of the Wall Street bankers and speculators as criminals, they don't see the system as inherently corrupted.  They might find no problem with taking some of the bankers off to jail, they won't stand for the government to nationalize the banks.  And that just means one just gets the same old crowd with new faces in charge, except now they are in freak-out mode.

    So because of how people are perceiving the injustices, we get mainly "the injustice is that there aren't more jobs. get us some" and not "take on the system and then get me some jobs."  I would add that because of the nature of the media white noise that exists today that didn't back then (there was some but very little), getting to critical mass point at this stage is nearly impossible, that is the point in which American turn on capitalism and embrace consciously a more socialist approach.


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 6:58pm

    I agree to some extent, insofar as this is probably more 1931 than 1936. There is the whole "let's not make things worse" viewpoint, which was probably stronger in '31 than it is now. After all, the thirty years preceding the thirties were a huge success for the general population, whereas the last thirty years NOW, not so much. And it probably took the population a few years - back then: four years - before they were ready to try something, anything.

    I'm a bit out of touch over here, but I get the sense that people still expect the economy to turn around anytime now, that this is somehow the 'natural' thing for it to do. The whole faith in 'Say's Law', that prices will adjust and the economy will trend back to full employment all by itself. Same thing back in the thirties. Until they start to realize that you can't just sit around and tweak a little here and there.

    Of course I may be wrong to think that something more needs to be done. Maybe it'll all bounce back magically. Which would be great. And that doubt is part of what is holding back the 'change' momentum. So agreed. But that doesn't detract from the sense that alot of people, elected officials included, could and should be doing a lot more to push the progressive approach. Because if the lefty-Keynesian take on how the economy works is remotely right, the Dems are going to head into the '12 election with the economy in the toilet, and the electorate increasingly ready to 'try something'. And at that point, given that they've been given what they will take as Lefty progressivism for four years, the 'something' in question won't be progressivism, it will be some horrid creature of the right.


    by Obey on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 7:50pm

    I definitely think something needs to be done.  I also think Obama panicked because they knew without more stimulus things would start deteriorating again.  I would hope that a more progressive frame is placed on the solutions going into the future.  It will be interesting to see if Obama begins to shift his language along the lines of a comment he made after his angry outburst announcement of the deal: that is, it is up to the Republicans to make the case over the next two years why the tax breaks shouldn't sunset for the wealthy.  There are those who lost faith that Obama will take up a more progressive approach to the issues, that he will just cave (or for more cynical, do what he really wants to do and give the Repubs what they want).  As someone else said on another blog, much will be known after his next state of the union speech. 

    But in the end, much will depend on where the economy goes.  If things start to get a little better, I don't expect much movement away from the centrist frame.


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 8:14pm

    A.T., thanks for the post. Some great comments here. Like you, I caught that glimpse of Obama shifting his language and that's what I am waiting for. I am encouraged by the floating of Levin's name to replace Summers. Not that we need any more Yalies in government, but Levin holds a contrarian view toward the banks, so I''m hopeful.

    I think there needs to be a focus on the banks, and I don't think it is too late. O.K we saved them and prevented systemic risk. Now it's time to make them competitive. I was actually surprised to learn from Bernie that three Fed District Presidents actually favor decentralization. I'm going to call it the Bank Competition act, put a free market spin on it. It seems to me that splitting up the banks into more responsiive and competitive units is a different kettle of fish than saying the government is going to take them over, nationalize them, etc. It's also a different concept than talking about the "wealthy". As you noted above the poor retain that American Idol hope--which imo is a major reason why tax arguments are so hard to win.


    by Oxy Mora on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 8:51pm

    I like your spin on the Bank Competition Act. It would be difficult for the Republicans to fight something that supports competition.  Of course they'll try and find a way to convince people it is some kind of end-around to eventually nationalize the banks and give more power to the bureaucrats.  But I think it is something I see Obama taking up as 2012 now appears on the horizon.


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 8:57pm

    I sincerely hope we don't see anyone disagreeing too strongly with your title alone.

    More seriously, as regards addressing the FDR mania so prominent in the blogosphere lately, I just want to throw in something that I actually haven't checked out--a tip from Bill Clinton in his press conference introduced by Obama, something he suggested Obama check out.  I was just looking at that trancript for a comment on another post, and was reminded he said this.

    Q    The reason I ask you that is because a lot of them are sort of antsy.  And I know you never used the term back in your first term, but they’re antsy about the precedent of triangulation.  They’re still smarting over that.  And your appearance here today might not necessarily push them in the direction that the President wants them to be pushed.

    FORMER PRESIDENT CLINTON:  That’s right, it may not.  But I would like to -- you know, I told President Obama, and I’ll tell you, you ought to go back and read a lecture that Franklin Roosevelt gave in 1926 before he was the Vice Presidential nominee, before he came down with polio, to his old alma mater (inaudible), in which he discussed the dilemma of the progressive movement in American politics.

    I plan to, but I haven't yet, checked out that FDR speech, so I have no opinion on what he said there one way or another (it's actually hard to tell without reading it.) Just passing it on.

    I would think that even if you're someone who vehemently disagrees wiht Clinton and Obama on "triangulation" or whatever it is you want to call it, surely you'd want to get a better idea of what this is all about, that which he recommended Obama read from early FDR as regards progressivism. Cause we might just see echoes of it turn up in "Obama speak" or in his actions.


    by artappraiser on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 6:40pm

    He must be referring to Wither Bound? [the question mark is in the title]

    The future President's first book, comprising the text of a lecture delivered at the Milton Academy on the Alumni War Memorial Foundation on 18 May 1926. FDR delivered this address in commemoration of fallen First World War alumni. His thesis is that the young rightly experiment with life and with moral standards, "for it is through unrest and experimentation that civilization is advanced."

    I can't find anything in terms of excerpts from the book, just rare book dealers trying to sell a copy of the original book.


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 7:46pm

    Shucks, looks like he said the date wrong or the transcriber got the date wrong, or he remembered the chronology of the speech wrong, see

    When did FDR run for the Vice-presidency?
    In 1920 the Democratic Party nominated Ohio Governor James M. Cox for President and Franklin D. Roosevelt for Vice President. They were defeated by Republicans Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge- @ http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/facts.html#fdr

    His alma maters were Harvard BA 1903 followed by Columbia Law School -admitted to the bar 1907.(from@ http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/archives/resources/timeline.html)  I'll keep looking. Maybe easier to find in my own library from an index (still good for a lot of things, google is nice but definitely not god.Smile ) Will let you know if I do find it.


    by artappraiser on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 8:23pm

    Did you ever find the lecture? I would love to read it too.

     


    by John Woods (not verified) on Sat, 09/17/2011 - 4:54pm

    No, Trope, you're right; it's 2010.   ;o)

    Ans one in seven Americans is on food stamps, more might be if it weren't so humiliating.  Next month a frig of a lot more will be.  Oh: those pesky '99-ers!  The how many million who will be 'food insecure' because no one scored them UE extensions.  Rats.


    by we are stardust on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 7:10pm

    if it weren't so humiliating

    This is a major problem, as well as just getting the knowledge out there about what benefits and other services are available (in part because for some this is their first time in need of assistance, what some refer to as the 'new poor.').  Then there is the issue of things like lack of transportation to get to five or six different sites in order to get assistance for heating bills, medical help, etc.  Right now I'm working on a pilot project that is looking at more innovative ways to bring the benefits and services to the people where they are in a manner that is more dignified, or at least more comfortable in terms of familiarity of surroundings.  The effort is in dealing with in collaboration with schools, community centers, and other neighborhood contact points to provide a "one-stop" approach. 

    One of the facets of the project is to get the local business leaders (most of who are unabashedly Republicans) involved in terms of developing new forms of relationships between those seeking financial stability and those in a position to help.  Breaking down the sterotypes (the poor are poor because they want to be poor, etc) will help in the long run in regards to shifting perspectives on the role social benefits and programs.  I suppose one of the silver linings (if one can call it that) of this recent economic downturn is that because there are a number of people who are now receiving assistance who had been employed workers all their lives is that the extended community is suddenly looking at the people standing in those long food lines with a new perspective. 

    Which is a long way of saying that we are still fighting the forces who want to end things like food stamps (something they didn't have back in the day).  And it isn't just Wall Street Bankers and others making 6 or 7 figure incomes.  It is people who make 40K and 50K a year, who have become disconnected from those who are struggling to put food on the table. 


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 7:42pm

    It is people who make 40K and 50K a year, who have become disconnected from those who are struggling to put food on the table.

    Depends on where you are as well. 40k to 50k a year is peanuts anywhere near NYC, but maybe good wages in Central Wisconsin.   Also how many credit cards you have in your wallet. Try to live on that with out plastic money in most areas. It ain't easy.


    by cmaukonen on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 7:59pm

    This is true.  I'm thinking in Midwest terms.  So adjust accordingly. Keeping in mind, too, that most households are two income based, so the figure would be closer to 60K to 70K.  But basically the person who is working in the cubicle at some corporate office or in some factory. 


    by Elusive Trope on Sat, 12/11/2010 - 8:21pm

    And your point is?

    I think you are incorrect in thinking that Americans didn't think about upward mobility.  They sure did, because they didn't have it.  That's, in many ways, the point many on the left are making to people who obviously don't appreciate history or know it well like our President.  Capitulation to and accomodation of the Republicans is allowing them to recreate those very days of sweatshops, desperate workers barely able to make ends meet, complete lack of protections in the work place and so on.  That is precisely the agenda of the Republican Party and of some Democrats who do not share the vision of the New Deal but essentially believe as the Republicans do and that is that the rich guys should be allowed to call most, if not all, the shots in the economy in the workplace and for that matter everywhere else.  The whole point of the New Deal, The Fair Deal, The New Frontier and the Great Society was to prevent there ever being a return to those rotten days.  Each accomodation of the Republican agenda brings us closer to that very ugly past.  What kind of person submits to that?  What kind of person fails to fight such things? 


    by oleeb on Sun, 12/12/2010 - 3:19am

    And your point is? But seriously, to say someone thinks about moving up the economic ladder doesn't mean that there is some collective belief that they will more well off then their parents and their children will be more well off then them, and so on.  There were some who tried to make their fortunes, and some did, but the average American just did their job.  Looking at the average wages before the New Deal they are basically flat.  One went into the factory or down into the mine or out on the family farm, and that is what you did til you couldn't do it anymore.  And if somewhere along the line you made a little more than you did before, you considered yourself fortunate.  Then you went to one of those new moving pictures and watched those in the upper classes in their formal wear and lavish lifestyles.  Afterwards, the left the movie house and went back to their flat and expected life to be the same struggle ten years from then.  I would posit that there was a much more intense sense of class (as in the poor are the poor and the rich are the rich and never shall two meet). Something that the post-WWII boom unraveled in a way that hadn't been seen before.

    But even if that isn't true, even most of those factory workers making at the time $1,200 a year believed in a decades time they would be making $4,000, the significant point here that the typical voter in the 1930s, even if the depression didn't happen, were, by our current standards of living, existing around the poverty line.  This is compared to where we are today, where we speak of the middle class, where the median household income is about 50K. 

    Many of these of voters have lost their personal connection to the New Deal, The Fair Deal, The New Frontier and the Great Society, just as many workers have lost their sense of gratitude to the union workers that struggled to get to the concessions over the years. 

    This is added to the fact the more income one makes, the more likely they are to register and vote.  In the past election the estimate is the only 58% of households who made less than 50K voted, while 77% those who marde 50K or more voted.

    My basic premise, which you can argue against, is that typical voter whose household makes 40K, 50K, or 60K are not inclined to respond well to the "class war" and "anti-capitalism" rhetoric.  Their incomes and fortunes are tied up with the "corporate overloads" and are not in the mood to overturn the system.  They are just as likely to see radical change as leading to those rotten days as they are to believe it will be the workings of evil capitalists.

    The short of it is if the foundation of political constituency is basically poor, this will increase the likelihood that a politician/president will be able to successfully campaign and govern through a progressive framework than if that foundation is the middle class.  That is why we should temper our hopes on another FDR at the moment since the current economic class driving the elections find little resonance with New Deal, The Fair Deal, The New Frontier and the Great Society.  I would argue that for most Social Security is seen as essentially separate from the New Deal as a whole. 

    A good indicator of this situation is to listen to a white collar moderate Democrat on his or her opinions regarding union workers and unions in general.  I would say you would likely hear a pro-management position than a pro-union one.  If you were a politician looking to win what you say to that pro-management Democrat?  That is what we are facing.  Among other things like the influence of corporate donors in campaign financing, etc.


    by Elusive Trope on Sun, 12/12/2010 - 11:56am

    Latest Comments