[QUOTE=SpeedRacerXXX;1059364690]
HELLO!!! The reason for the decrease in the percentage of people in the work force is simple -- baby boomers like myself have reached retirement age and have left the work force.
The increase in the number of people on food stamps was due to the 2008 recession. That number has been going down DRASTICALLY in recent years. The recession also affected the national debt. Try to understand cause and affect. See the link below.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.87c32f0a11d7
Your comment, again, on a 5% increase in average family income in one year -- how stupid are you? For the third time, I will point out to you that the 5% increase was over a 4 or 5 year period. Do you finally understand???? Do I have to say it for a fourth time?
Health care insurance premiums? I can't find any source of information that supports your statement. Here is something that states the average cost of health care premiums has gone DOWN!! http://www.cnbc.com/2016/07/27/avera...tudy-says.html
I am not super rich. I consider myself middle class. I think you have a convoluted idea of what is and what is not the middle class. Like most people working while Obama was in office I put money into a 401k program. Most of my money was invested in rather conservative stocks and I made a bundle before my retirement. Had I been more aggressive I would have made 2 or 3 bundles. Yes the rich got richer, just like Trump. But we in the middle class had the exact same opportunities as the super rich. If you didn't make out well, don't blame Obama.
Originally Posted by pussycat
There is no way you can spin your way out of this. Since Obama things got even worse, with more people in poverty, on government assistance, with lower wages, and on and on...
But this was just the most recent crisis in over twenty years of declining wages, incomes, and rising costs of living for MOST Americans.
The reason is because of the trade deficit, which is because of the de-regulation of trade, labor, and financial transfers.
All these de-regulations have enriched the very wealthy and corporations while leaving most people in the dust.
I am rich. I am very rich. I am among the tiniest fraction of the one percent. I know what I'm talking about. After 1994 I only pay 15% in Capital Gains Taxes!!!! Ha ha ha. Do you know what I used to pay before that??????
Oh man come on. Read any article or book or go on Youtube and look at the hollowing out of the Middle Class.
Here in Texas we are booming, and never saw much of the recession because of the oil boom in those years. The population of Texas has gone from 16 million in 1883 to 27 million today, and construction and selling tooth paste and cars to all these new people guarantees everything is fine, but most parts of the country are not like that.
And the labor participation rate being determined by retirement is a lie. I not only gave you the participation number but also the figures on the numbers of families who don't have a single member in the labor force to illustrate that this effects families and peoples of all ages and has nothing to do with retirement....and baby boomers don't retire anyway!!!!!!!!!!!!
Baby boomers don't retire. The oldest ones are now in their early 70s and I don't know one who is out of the labor force. All of them are still working. People today only retire when their in their 80s, if even then.