The developed countries are trying to grapple with many problems and a major one is the decline of the middle class. The reasons are :- 1. The Capitalist system is not geared to the preservation of any particular class. The company owners are not interested in the steady middle class contribution. They are interested in profits and that means lowering costs. For instance many safe jobs such as bank managers have been shelved to save on wages. Any difficult problems are dealt with by centralised Head Office. 2. The huge rise in education has made the young job seekers much more desirable than their fathers. They have energy, ambition and an education of new ideas. But what is really the killer positive is that they are ready and willing to accept lower wages just to get started. The company bosses save money on their wages and get all the benefits above . Its a no brainer. 3. AI and automation. Much cheaper to run and works 24/7 without complaint.
Those are all true but... In the 1950's individuals and corporations that were above a certain level of income (i.e the wealthy) were taxed at a level that covered half of the cost of the military, roads, social services, ...everything. When Regan started what became trickle down... he said many times -- clearly and directly -- that if it continued more than 10 years or so it would destroy the middle class and eventually the whole economy. They did it because it was sold as a ploy to bump the economy and sink the Russians. End the cold war. It worked. But they never ended the tax breaks. Now 20% of American Corp's pay no taxes. Etc Etc. What was the middle class was asked to pay for everything. It doesn't work. Never will. Capitalism is fine. But no system works (capitalism, socialism, communism, whatever-ism) if the privileged put the burden of everything on the middle class.
What is "middle class"? Sounds like a psycho invention, not an economic necessity. Why should a class be preserved?
Defining "middle class" is indeed quite tricky... If I am not mistaken, it's traditionally based on self-identification.
Isn t it usually a calculation, the middle class are the people banking in around the median or average income, say from 50% below to 100 above ?
No, strictly speaking the term for this is "middle income"... You can read abt all these interesting things here: http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2008/04/09/inside-the-middle-class-bad-times-hit-the-good-life/ http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2012/08/22/the-lost-decade-of-the-middle-class/ http://ucdata.berkeley.edu/publication_record.php?recid=96 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0038038513481128
Middle class is failing because its jobs were given away to China in 1990s and 2000s. Trump promised to put tariffs on Chinese products but flip flopped as usual.
What is your proof of this statement? I was raised in a "middle class" household c1960s Stay at home mom, Dad was civil service. One car. Parents and 5 children in a 3 bedroom 1.5 bath house of about 1100sf. One TV (B&W), one phone. All of us went to parochial schools (I think tuition was around $300/yr each) We did want for anything, but certainly not rich. If you found a family like that today, you and the govt would probably consider them poor. I just checked our local MLS. Over 1100 new construction listings. Median living area 2500sf+ Median value $367,000. People buying those houses have at least 2 cars, probably 2-3 TV's, cell phones, computers, internet etc. They would certainly not be considered "rich". By every metric, education, income, and net worth, today's middle class is miles ahead of what it used to be. So explain to me how that is a "decline" in the middle class.
'Middle class' represents the median wealth level of a society. That median in the US is currently higher than the median of humanity as a whole. As global immigration and trade grows (inevitably) over time that median will gradually equalize around the globe. That can only mean that the current US definition of 'middle class' will be vastly different 50 years from now.