middle class news stories on Newser

In Today's America, Death of a Salesman Is Dead

Kevin Spak — Thu, 03 May 2012 11:56:43 CDT

Philip Seymour Hoffman gives a bravura performance in the new revival of Death of a Salesman , but as he watched, Lee Siegel wondered "why the play was revived at all," he writes in the New York Times . After all, Salesman is about the delusions of the middle class, and "the...

Worst Liars and Cheaters: Rich People

Kevin Spak — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 11:15:05 CST

You might think that people who are comparatively well off would be less likely to lie and cheat to make a buck, but you'd be wrong. A series of experiments from UC Berkeley doctoral student Paul Piff found that time and again upper-class people were willing to do shady things...

Average Isn't Good Enough Anymore in America

Kevin Spak — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 12:57:09 CST

Once upon a time, an average worker with average skills could expect an average lifestyle in America—but not anymore. "Today, average is officially over," writes Thomas Friedman of the New York Times . Average people can't expect the lifestyle they used to enjoy, because "employers have so much more access...

Apple Proves It: Jobs 'Aren't Coming Back' to America

Neal Colgrass — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 17:19:23 CST

Last year, President Obama asked Steve Jobs whether iPhones could be made in the US instead of Asia. Jobs was blunt: “Those jobs aren’t coming back." The New York Times takes a long look at why. In short, Asia has a surplus of engineers and factory workers who work cheaply...

Middle-Class Neighborhoods Dying Off

John Johnson — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 17:53:58 CST

A major new study from Stanford finds that America's middle class is shrinking in a big way, reports the New York Times . The researchers looked at 117 of the nation's biggest metropolitan areas and discovered that 44% of families live in areas defined as middle class, down from 65% in...

One in 3 Falling Out of Middle Class

Kevin Spak — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 07:28:52 CDT

Downward mobility is rampant in the US, with a third of Americans who grew up in the middle class falling out of it as adults, according to a new Pew Study ( pdf ). “A middle-class upbringing does not guarantee the same status over the course of a lifetime,” the...

We've Made It a Crime to Be Poor

Sarah Whitmire — Sat, 13 Aug 2011 14:21:05 CDT

A decade after her expose on America's working poor, Nickel and Dimed , Barbara Ehrenreich has a sobering assessment: "Things have gotten much worse, especially since the economic downturn that began in 2008," she writes in Salon . For one thing, the economy was booming around 2000 when she did her research,...

America's 'Disneyland Dream' Is Dead

John Johnson — Sun, 26 Dec 2010 12:22:30 CST

The death of Robbins Barstow, an American dad whose home movie of his family's vacation to Disneyland in 1956 is in the Library of Congress, has Frank Rich lamenting the loss of the American dream. Or more precisely the Disneyland Dream , as Barstow labeled his film. Watching it now brings...

Why America Is So Angry and Miserable

Kevin Spak — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 08:53:00 CDT

These days, America seems defined by a near-ubiquitous “simmering resentment, frustration, and anger,” writes Charles Hugh Smith on his Of Two Minds blog. Why is that? Smith blames: A culture of entitlement: From Social Security recipients to Wall Street welfare queens, “most of us have to elbow our way to...