7 ms·

Wage growth has flatlined for 30+ years! What happened to the middle class and the American dream? There it is.

by redisman 5y ago

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ryandvm 5y ago
Moving out of the country is the new American Dream
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  Is there any evidence that people are striving en masse to leave America? It seems like the vast majority of the world is trying to get in. The US has the 5th highest median income in the world, so I don't think mass exodus is likely. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income
  - ska 5y ago
    > It seems like the vast majority of the world is trying to get in. This is a common trope but only kinda-sorta true. It's definitely true that there is no sign of mass exodus. Net immigration number remain positive (3% ish) but they are well below historic highs, and currently declining YoY. See e.g. https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/net-migration https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/net-... It's interesting I think that per capita Canada (e.g. another "new world" immigration target) has fairly consistently been much higher, and is currently near 2x. The approx 10x population size dwarfs this in total numbers though (https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CAN/canada/net-migration https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CAN/canada/net-migrati...)
    - rich_sasha 5y ago
      The few times I thought about moving to America, the thing that ultimately put me off wasn’t healthcare, guns or food, but the utterly hostile immigration process. It seems that until you get a green card, the state barely tolerates your presence. So nothing to do with the fundamentals, for me anyway.
      - dnautics 5y ago
        well, if I'm not mistaken -- the US' immigration process awfulness pales in comparison, to, say the UK. I believe AUS/NZ have inherited similarly complex, kafkaesque systems. I don't know for sure, because I only have experience with the UK's (and failed to get in despite having a PhD AND having a job with money set aside waiting for me); but I have worked side-by-side with H1B holders who said "it was bad but not that bad".
        CountSessine 5y ago
        The Canadian immigration system, especially if you qualify for the skilled workers program (which most engineers do), is pretty decent overall, and much much better than the awful and outdated US system. I've looked at immigrating to the US and decided it's largely impossible. This largely explains Canada's immigration edge - it certainly isn't societal issues. I'd much sooner have immigrated to the US given the pay and tax differences. I've actually heard good things about the AU system too - apparently Canada considers AU&NZ their biggest competition in attracting immigrants.
        ska 5y ago
        > it certainly isn't societal issues That seems to be pretty variable; I've met people on both sides of that border that decided against the other one for "societal issues" of various types.
        CountSessine 5y ago
        If you're poor, Canada is a pretty good deal. If you're middle-class, it's ok. If you're upper-middle-class (top 10% in income) it's better to be in the US.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      I would imagine that the net immigration rate indicates immigration policy of the host country and not the external demand to immigrate, but even if it did indicate that the demand to enter was declining that doesn't refute that the absolute demand is relatively low compared to other countries (Shaq might be getting shorter but that doesn't mean he's short), which is to say that my original claim isn't just "kinda sorta true" but rather, "strictly true".
      - ska 5y ago
        > ... and not the external demand to immigrate, It's got to be a mix of both, no? > that my original claim isn't just "kinda sorta true" but rather, "strictly true". I don't think we are really disagreeing. My point was that the common trope about US being the only place everyone wants to go has never really been true, but that especially by net amounts, it has been and remains a popular immigration target, albeit not as much as it has in the past.
        throwaway894345 5y ago
        > It's got to be a mix of both, no? Not as far as I can tell. The rate of immigration is the lesser of “how many people are willing to migrates the host country” and “how many migrants the host country will accept” and I would be shocked if the latter number was not many multiples of the former number. > My point was that the common trope about US being the only place everyone wants to go has never really been true I’ve heard some outlandish things under the rubric of American exceptionalism, but I’ve never once heard anyone—not even my most nationalistic acquaintances nor Fox News/etc—say that the US was the only place anyone wants to go. Who are the people who believe/espouse this?
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
        ska 5y ago
        > Not as far as I can tell. It depends a bit if you have absolute quotas, or thresholds/scoring. > some outlandish things under the rubric of American exceptionalism, I was unclear, apologies. The idea isn't that nobody goes anywhere else, obviously. The idea, which I have heard many times in the US, is that once someone has decided to immigrate, all else being equal they would obviously choose the US. Clearly most times all else isn't equal; but it also doesn't seem to be true...
    - mensetmanusman 5y ago
      Pew research estimated ~700 million are interested were the borders to be completely opened.
- gruez 5y ago
  How does this square with the fact that the US is the #1 destination for immigrants? https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/top-25-destinations-international-migrants https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/top...
  - armenarmen 5y ago
    It doesn’t, but it sounds clever on Twitter
  - autokad 5y ago
    immigrants don't want to live here. They want to take the money and leave.
    - nradov 5y ago
      Maybe that's what immigrants think when they first arrive, but very few actually move back to their home countries. Despite the negatively pushed by the media elites, most of the USA is still a pretty nice place to live.
  - redisman 5y ago
    It’s a lot easier to achieve the dream when you’re moving from a poor country (large delta). For Americans social mobility has grown increasingly difficult
  - spacedcowboy 5y ago
    Well, if they're immigrants, they're not part of the "American dream" corpus, right ? Americans are dreaming of moving out, is what was said. America still has more to offer than a lot of the world, but it's not some shining peak in a valley of despair - it's more "middle of the table, some good, some bad". If you're here already, it's easy to look out, see, and decide to move where it's better, if you can. Me ? I'm a Brit, been living here for the last almost two decades. I came here for the money and the weather, nothing more. Recently, the weather is a bit crap; the money's still good, but once I get to where I can FIRE, I'm out of this country. There's plenty of places better.
- tharne 5y ago
  If that were true, why is it so rare? Even during bad periods in the U.S. there's never been significant levels of out migration, the way you see with other countries.
dantheman 5y ago
More people have moved up and out of the middle class, than down and out. I'd argue taxes and the bloat in industries such as education, healthcare, and real estate are the driving causes -- all heavily regulated and subsidized by the government.
- ido 5y ago
  Aren't taxes lower than they used to be?
  - tharne 5y ago
    Only at the federal level, which is not the majority of taxes for most people. State taxes and local property tax are significantly higher than they used to be in most places in the U.S. Other things like sales tax, fees, permits, fines, etc. have all likewise increased substantially.
    - evan_ 5y ago
      but have state and local taxes gone up enough that they've counteracted the drop in federal taxes?
      - tharne 5y ago
        In my case, yes, though obviously that depends on where you live. You can also make the argument that it's better to have low federal taxes and high state and local taxes than to have the reverse, since it's much easier to leave a high tax state or town than it is to immigrate to another country.
    - shkkmo 5y ago
      > Only at the federal level, which is not the majority of taxes for most people. You are gonna have to cite some sources for this because my understanding is that total federal taxes is the majority of total taxes, if only by a slim margin.
nradov 5y ago
Average total employee compensation has significantly increased over the past 30 years once you factor in employer contributions to health insurance premiums. Essentially our collective raises have been eaten up by increased healthcare costs. Now we do get some tangible benefits from that in terms of expensive treatments which weren't even available 30 years ago. But there's also a huge amount of waste and inefficiency.
- danaris 5y ago
  > Average total employee compensation has significantly increased over the past 30 years once you factor in employer contributions to health insurance premiums. Putting it that way is very misleading, though. The "total compensation" has increased only because health care costs have increased massively, and health insurance has increased to cover it. (Or vice versa; causality's tricky in a system like this, and there are definitely feedback loops.)
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    Which is a function of the amount of healthcare delivered greatly increasing (and/or potential to be a recipient of increased amount of healthcare in the event of an emergency).
    - danaris 5y ago
      No, it's really not. The costs of healthcare have increased massively in the last 2 decades or so without a concomitant increase in the quality of care.
      - nradov 5y ago
        It depends what you're looking at. For example new chemotherapy drugs have slightly extended average survival periods for certain cancers. But they're tremendously expensive, and that drives up insurance premiums for everyone. Are those drugs worth it? Ultimately the answer is subjective based on how we value human life. One could also argue that those drugs should be cheaper, but without the profit motive they likely wouldn't have been developed in the first place. And socialized funding of drug development hasn't worked out well either.
clarkmoody 5y ago
Obligatory link to WTF Happened in 1971? [0] TL;DR: many of these economic problems are tied to disconnecting the currency from gold, which screws up interest rates and incentives throughout the economy. [0]: https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/
- ska 5y ago
  > many of these economic problems are tied to disconnecting the currency from gold, By tied, you really mean correlated. There is at minimum no consensus on the idea that this was causal.

Wage growth has flatlined for 30+ years! What happened to the middle class and the American dream? There it is.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

ryandvm 5y ago

Moving out of the country is the new American Dream

throwaway894345 5y ago
Is there any evidence that people are striving en masse to leave America? It seems like the vast majority of the world is trying to get in. The US has the 5th highest median income in the world, so I don't think mass exodus is likely. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income
- ska 5y ago
  > It seems like the vast majority of the world is trying to get in. This is a common trope but only kinda-sorta true. It's definitely true that there is no sign of mass exodus. Net immigration number remain positive (3% ish) but they are well below historic highs, and currently declining YoY. See e.g. https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/net-migration https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/net-... It's interesting I think that per capita Canada (e.g. another "new world" immigration target) has fairly consistently been much higher, and is currently near 2x. The approx 10x population size dwarfs this in total numbers though (https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CAN/canada/net-migration https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CAN/canada/net-migrati...)
  - rich_sasha 5y ago
    The few times I thought about moving to America, the thing that ultimately put me off wasn’t healthcare, guns or food, but the utterly hostile immigration process. It seems that until you get a green card, the state barely tolerates your presence. So nothing to do with the fundamentals, for me anyway.
    - dnautics 5y ago
      well, if I'm not mistaken -- the US' immigration process awfulness pales in comparison, to, say the UK. I believe AUS/NZ have inherited similarly complex, kafkaesque systems. I don't know for sure, because I only have experience with the UK's (and failed to get in despite having a PhD AND having a job with money set aside waiting for me); but I have worked side-by-side with H1B holders who said "it was bad but not that bad".
      - CountSessine 5y ago
        The Canadian immigration system, especially if you qualify for the skilled workers program (which most engineers do), is pretty decent overall, and much much better than the awful and outdated US system. I've looked at immigrating to the US and decided it's largely impossible. This largely explains Canada's immigration edge - it certainly isn't societal issues. I'd much sooner have immigrated to the US given the pay and tax differences. I've actually heard good things about the AU system too - apparently Canada considers AU&NZ their biggest competition in attracting immigrants.
        ska 5y ago
        > it certainly isn't societal issues That seems to be pretty variable; I've met people on both sides of that border that decided against the other one for "societal issues" of various types.
        CountSessine 5y ago
        If you're poor, Canada is a pretty good deal. If you're middle-class, it's ok. If you're upper-middle-class (top 10% in income) it's better to be in the US.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    I would imagine that the net immigration rate indicates immigration policy of the host country and not the external demand to immigrate, but even if it did indicate that the demand to enter was declining that doesn't refute that the absolute demand is relatively low compared to other countries (Shaq might be getting shorter but that doesn't mean he's short), which is to say that my original claim isn't just "kinda sorta true" but rather, "strictly true".
    - ska 5y ago
      > ... and not the external demand to immigrate, It's got to be a mix of both, no? > that my original claim isn't just "kinda sorta true" but rather, "strictly true". I don't think we are really disagreeing. My point was that the common trope about US being the only place everyone wants to go has never really been true, but that especially by net amounts, it has been and remains a popular immigration target, albeit not as much as it has in the past.
      - throwaway894345 5y ago
        > It's got to be a mix of both, no? Not as far as I can tell. The rate of immigration is the lesser of “how many people are willing to migrates the host country” and “how many migrants the host country will accept” and I would be shocked if the latter number was not many multiples of the former number. > My point was that the common trope about US being the only place everyone wants to go has never really been true I’ve heard some outlandish things under the rubric of American exceptionalism, but I’ve never once heard anyone—not even my most nationalistic acquaintances nor Fox News/etc—say that the US was the only place anyone wants to go. Who are the people who believe/espouse this?
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
        ska 5y ago
        > Not as far as I can tell. It depends a bit if you have absolute quotas, or thresholds/scoring. > some outlandish things under the rubric of American exceptionalism, I was unclear, apologies. The idea isn't that nobody goes anywhere else, obviously. The idea, which I have heard many times in the US, is that once someone has decided to immigrate, all else being equal they would obviously choose the US. Clearly most times all else isn't equal; but it also doesn't seem to be true...
  - mensetmanusman 5y ago
    Pew research estimated ~700 million are interested were the borders to be completely opened.
gruez 5y ago
How does this square with the fact that the US is the #1 destination for immigrants? https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/top-25-destinations-international-migrants https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/top...
- armenarmen 5y ago
  It doesn’t, but it sounds clever on Twitter
- autokad 5y ago
  immigrants don't want to live here. They want to take the money and leave.
  - nradov 5y ago
    Maybe that's what immigrants think when they first arrive, but very few actually move back to their home countries. Despite the negatively pushed by the media elites, most of the USA is still a pretty nice place to live.
- redisman 5y ago
  It’s a lot easier to achieve the dream when you’re moving from a poor country (large delta). For Americans social mobility has grown increasingly difficult
- spacedcowboy 5y ago
  Well, if they're immigrants, they're not part of the "American dream" corpus, right ? Americans are dreaming of moving out, is what was said. America still has more to offer than a lot of the world, but it's not some shining peak in a valley of despair - it's more "middle of the table, some good, some bad". If you're here already, it's easy to look out, see, and decide to move where it's better, if you can. Me ? I'm a Brit, been living here for the last almost two decades. I came here for the money and the weather, nothing more. Recently, the weather is a bit crap; the money's still good, but once I get to where I can FIRE, I'm out of this country. There's plenty of places better.
tharne 5y ago
If that were true, why is it so rare? Even during bad periods in the U.S. there's never been significant levels of out migration, the way you see with other countries.

dantheman 5y ago

More people have moved up and out of the middle class, than down and out. I'd argue taxes and the bloat in industries such as education, healthcare, and real estate are the driving causes -- all heavily regulated and subsidized by the government.

ido 5y ago
Aren't taxes lower than they used to be?
- tharne 5y ago
  Only at the federal level, which is not the majority of taxes for most people. State taxes and local property tax are significantly higher than they used to be in most places in the U.S. Other things like sales tax, fees, permits, fines, etc. have all likewise increased substantially.
  - evan_ 5y ago
    but have state and local taxes gone up enough that they've counteracted the drop in federal taxes?
    - tharne 5y ago
      In my case, yes, though obviously that depends on where you live. You can also make the argument that it's better to have low federal taxes and high state and local taxes than to have the reverse, since it's much easier to leave a high tax state or town than it is to immigrate to another country.
  - shkkmo 5y ago
    > Only at the federal level, which is not the majority of taxes for most people. You are gonna have to cite some sources for this because my understanding is that total federal taxes is the majority of total taxes, if only by a slim margin.

nradov 5y ago

Average total employee compensation has significantly increased over the past 30 years once you factor in employer contributions to health insurance premiums. Essentially our collective raises have been eaten up by increased healthcare costs. Now we do get some tangible benefits from that in terms of expensive treatments which weren't even available 30 years ago. But there's also a huge amount of waste and inefficiency.

danaris 5y ago
> Average total employee compensation has significantly increased over the past 30 years once you factor in employer contributions to health insurance premiums. Putting it that way is very misleading, though. The "total compensation" has increased only because health care costs have increased massively, and health insurance has increased to cover it. (Or vice versa; causality's tricky in a system like this, and there are definitely feedback loops.)
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  Which is a function of the amount of healthcare delivered greatly increasing (and/or potential to be a recipient of increased amount of healthcare in the event of an emergency).
  - danaris 5y ago
    No, it's really not. The costs of healthcare have increased massively in the last 2 decades or so without a concomitant increase in the quality of care.
    - nradov 5y ago
      It depends what you're looking at. For example new chemotherapy drugs have slightly extended average survival periods for certain cancers. But they're tremendously expensive, and that drives up insurance premiums for everyone. Are those drugs worth it? Ultimately the answer is subjective based on how we value human life. One could also argue that those drugs should be cheaper, but without the profit motive they likely wouldn't have been developed in the first place. And socialized funding of drug development hasn't worked out well either.

clarkmoody 5y ago

Obligatory link to WTF Happened in 1971? [0] TL;DR: many of these economic problems are tied to disconnecting the currency from gold, which screws up interest rates and incentives throughout the economy. [0]: https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/

ska 5y ago
> many of these economic problems are tied to disconnecting the currency from gold, By tied, you really mean correlated. There is at minimum no consensus on the idea that this was causal.