The typical U.S. household headed by a person age 65 or older has a net worth 47 times greater than a household headed by someone under 35, according to an analysis of census data released Monday. While people typically accumulate assets as they age, this wealth gap is now more than double what it was in 2005 and nearly five times the 10-to-1 disparity a quarter-century ago, after adjusting for inflation. http://www.chicagotribune.com/busin...-and-old-widest-ever-20111107,0,5088133.story
SOL is about how it is. Generatoinal warfare might set in and settle the score. The boomers let the system run up a debt that no one will be ever be able to pay off. They are not using the wealth to rebuild the system. There are four or five public works projects that could be going on right now. This place has become a failed expeiriment in democracy. The system regressed to an animalistic state which is also known as corperatism. I am still trying my best to liquidate all assets and exit before the &^% hits the fan. Ross Perot was right about the sucking sound. NAFTA was a pipe dream. Welcome to Planet Misery, Akuma BUY MORE GOLD!!!
No, it's because the destruction of unions then allowed companies to loot their pension funds and generally destroy benefits, minimize wages, all that. The post-WWII generation fought hard to get unions in place, and by the mid-sixties they were in and succeeded in getting in place longer vacation times and defined benefit pensions. After that, the country swung conservative, and we commenced the long, slow chipping away at all of these benefits, to the point where now defined benefit pension plans and the 40 hour work week are both a thing of the distant, mythic past. Now you work 50 to 60 hours for the right to contribute to a 401k which the company may or may not remit the money to (many companies are in arrears to their plans) and which has no chance at all of giving you a decent retirement. But of course no ordinary worker even thinks about forming a union anymore, and it's not even part of the national conversation. That will change.
Never ceases to amaze how so many workers thinks unions are "evil". But corporate unions are ok--they will take care of us [insert here: ideological arguments for tax cuts, lobbying, unfettered free trade]. Like anything at some point the pendulum will swing the other way.
The biggest problem is that my generation, geny, can't get the entry level jobs to start their careers. It's not even the dream first job, but a relevant job at all. Boomers fail to understand when they entered the workforce there was less competition because there was less college grads and less global competition. Boomers have also failed by not creating enough jobs for those entering the workforce or wanting to stay in. Only solution is more entrepreneurship by anyone.
Entrepreneurship is always welcome, but not everyone can be an entrepreneur and those that have future potential are being stifled right now. Rhetorical question: At this point, what do you think deters entrepreneurship more? Lack of a social safety net (in case you fail) or lower taxes? Though, the corps. always tell me about their entrepreneurial work environments.
You can already see all the generational in-fighting. The Boomers are scared to death of asset deflation and wholeheartedly support anything that continues to artificially prop up the values of their stock portfolios or real estate. On the flipside, the "Millenials" I guess they are called are having a hard time finding high paying jobs (outside of the F.I.R.E. sector of course), which makes it all the more untenable for real estate to be "transferred" from one generation to another on the open market. There is no question that the inheritance will play a big part in the lives of this upcoming generation. The bigger question is how much will be left if we continue down this path of perpetual ZIRP, skyrocketing medical costs, college tuitions and the minefield in the financial sector.
As an ex-entrepreneur, taxes aren't a major issue because you're not in the black right away. Taxes are important once you're in the black and want to grow. Entrepreneurs need to accept failure as a real result. The biggest thing to answer your question is the lack of capital. If entrepreneurs had more capital, there's always the greater likelihood of success. But because it's so risky, I would lower the capital gains tax rate to 0 for those investing in startups or expansions.
Or how about the higher cost of doing business in the US versus abroad? Remember the wage arbitrage game that the large corps play of re-importing into Western economies has been the profit center for years now. It's very hard to compete in a global marketplace if you are paying US wages (and ancillary benefits) while your competitor might be running some third world labor racket elsewhere.