1. Trump likes to brag about the apparent robustness of the US stock market but ignores the social ills in his country. As a real estate tycoon before he became president, it is a great irony that homelessness is rising rapidly under his administration. Michael Snyder is a nationally syndicated writer, media personality and political activist. He is publisher of The Most Important News. The following are excerpts from his August 2nd, 2018 article headlined "The Number Of Americans Living In Their Vehicles 'Explodes' As The Middle Class Continues To Disappear". (Begin excerpts) If the U.S. economy is really doing so well, then why is homelessness rising so rapidly? As the gap between the rich and the poor continues to increase, the middle class is steadily eroding. In fact, I recently gave my readers 15 signs that the middle class in America is being systematically destroyed. More Americans are falling out of the middle class and into poverty with each passing day, and this is one of the big reasons why the number of homeless is surging. For example, the number of people living on the street in L.A. has shot up 75 percent over the last 6 years. But of course L.A. is far from alone. Other major cities on the West Coast are facing similar problems, and that includes Seattle. It turns out that the Emerald City has seen a 46 percent rise in the number of people sleeping in their vehicles in just the past year... It is time to admit that we have a problem. The number of homeless in this country is surging, and we need to start coming up with some better solutions. But instead, many communities are simply passing laws that make it illegal for people to sleep in their vehicles.... And if our homelessness crisis is escalating this dramatically while the economy is supposedly “growing”, how bad are things going to be once the next recession officially begins? We live at a time when the cost of living is soaring but our paychecks are not. As a result, middle class families are being squeezed like never before.... Home prices are completely out of control, but that bubble should soon burst. However, other elements of our cost of living are only going to become even more painful. Health care costs rise much faster than the rate of inflation every year, food prices are becoming incredibly ridiculous, and the cost of a college education is off the charts. According to author Alissa Quart, living a middle class life is “30% more expensive” than it was two decades ago.... “Middle-class life is now 30% more expensive than it was 20 years ago,” Quart writes, citing the costs of housing, education, health care and child care in particular. “In some cases the cost of daily life over the last 20 years has doubled.” And thanks to the trade war, prices are going to start going up more rapidly than we have seen in a very long time. On Tuesday, we learned that diaper and toilet paper prices are rising again... Procter & Gamble said on Tuesday that it was in the process of raising Pampers’ prices in North America by 4%. P&G also began notifying retailers this week that it would increase the average prices of Bounty, Charmin, and Puffs by 5%. P&G is raising prices because commodity and transportation cost pressures are intensifying. The hikes to Bounty and Charmin will go into effect in late October, and Puffs will become more expensive beginning early next year. .....And we are definitely going to have to tighten our belts. Many middle class families are relying on debt to get them from month to month, and consumer debt in the United States has surged to an all-time high. But eventually a day of reckoning comes, and we all understand that. The U.S. economy is not going to be getting any better than it is right now. So it is time to be a lean, mean saving machine, because it will be important to have a financial cushion for the hard times that are ahead of us. (End excerpts) Source: https://www.activistpost.com/2018/0...-the-middle-class-continues-to-disappear.html
Because most Americans believe in a make believe economy that is covertly covered up with phony statistics or stats by corrupt government bureaucrats who fill their pockets with money from corporate lobbyists who just so happen to own also the oval office.
Well said, in particular your comment on the "corrupt government bureaucrats" (of the US). I look forward to seeing more of your comments on my threads.
