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There are enough flaws here that I feel most people are going to focus in on one or two they found particularly egregious so I will do the same: The pitching o

There are enough flaws here that I feel most people are going to focus in on one or two they found particularly egregious so I will do the same: The pitching of class as upper vs. middle while entirely ignoring lower is horrifically offensive in addition to being a major flaw in the argument. First because we would need to address the poor and how the massive wealth gap is harmful to all of society before we could even begin to act on any of the suggestions within. Second because the poor are, in many ways, the peasants described within or even worse off than the peasants were. Additionally, the piece portrays anyone who is not in the "upper class" as being so by their own fault, a viewpoint I got tired enough of in college after a few too many run-ins with people who could not even imagine what it would be like to be less than upper-middle class (by current socioeconomic definitions).

apsec112 14y ago
"portrays anyone who is not in the "upper class" as being so by their own fault" When did I say that, or even imply it? I made an analogy to medieval society, and no one thinks that it was the peasants' fault they were peasants.
- masterzora 14y ago
  The apparent message of the entire piece is "Want to be upper class? Just start a business!" without any notion of either (a) how the average person could do so or (b) how we could begin to change our society/culture in a way to facilitate the average person being able to do so. Result: it comes across as something you believe everyone should be able to do as is. Also, be very careful about sentences like "The middle class has a culture of spending most money as soon as you earn it." There are certainly parts of the middle class that are like this. We all know the concept of keeping up with the Joneses and overextending credit in an attempt to do so. However, there are also large parts of the middle class (and, again, the lower class you so ignore) where it's not "culture" it's "necessity". Sure, maybe some could survive on 20% less but at the cost of things you might take for granted--living in a safe neighborhood, eating healthy food, or having health insurance. But, no, surely it's just a culture of unnecessary spending. It may not have been your intended message, but it's certainly the one that comes across.

apsec112 14y ago

"portrays anyone who is not in the "upper class" as being so by their own fault" When did I say that, or even imply it? I made an analogy to medieval society, and no one thinks that it was the peasants' fault they were peasants.

masterzora 14y ago
The apparent message of the entire piece is "Want to be upper class? Just start a business!" without any notion of either (a) how the average person could do so or (b) how we could begin to change our society/culture in a way to facilitate the average person being able to do so. Result: it comes across as something you believe everyone should be able to do as is. Also, be very careful about sentences like "The middle class has a culture of spending most money as soon as you earn it." There are certainly parts of the middle class that are like this. We all know the concept of keeping up with the Joneses and overextending credit in an attempt to do so. However, there are also large parts of the middle class (and, again, the lower class you so ignore) where it's not "culture" it's "necessity". Sure, maybe some could survive on 20% less but at the cost of things you might take for granted--living in a safe neighborhood, eating healthy food, or having health insurance. But, no, surely it's just a culture of unnecessary spending. It may not have been your intended message, but it's certainly the one that comes across.