Middle-Class Secret of Success

Democrats like Senator Jim Webb claim that the middle class is in crisis. In his “barn-burner” of a speech responding to President Bush he claimed:

Wages and salaries for our workers are at all-time lows as a percentage of national wealth, even though the productivity of American workers is the highest in the world. Medical costs have skyrocketed. College tuition rates are off the charts. Our manufacturing base is being dismantled and sent overseas. Good American jobs are being sent along with them.

In short, the middle class of this country, our historic backbone and our best hope for a strong society in the future, is losing its place at the table.

Well, is Jim Webb right?  Money columnist Liz Pulliam takes a look.  Are people “helpless pawns in a game that’s rigged against them” as Jim Webb claims?  Or could it be that they are screwed because it’s their “Own Damned Fault?”

I believe a middle-class life is still possible for most people. But you have to be smarter, more cautious and faster on your feet than ever before. You have to obey some deceptively simple rules. And one thing is certain: Wherever you currently stand on the economic ladder, the surest way to rise is to pull yourself up.

And that sums up the truth in Jim Webb’s diatribe.  We Americans have to be smarter.  We can’t just live a bump-on-a-log life and expect the world to ladle out the gravy.  Sure wages and salaries are low compared to corporate profits.  But then where do higher wages and salaries come from?  Our manufacturing base is being dismantled.  But Americans now work in front of computers, not in front of steel furnaces.

It’s easy to rail about the effects of globalization in barn-burning speeches.  But the only way to stay No. 1 is to work harder and smarter than No. 2.

The problem is that some people may think that a chap like Jim Webb can come along and bring back the good old days of lifetime employment and guaranteed pensions. 

Ain’t gonna happen. 

And Jim, here’s a question.  If medical costs have skyrocketed and college tuition rates are off the charts why would that be?

It couldn’t be that health care and college education are both riddled with government subsidy, could it?