What's with the American government and the crisis?

AD Chaos said:
Hey dudes

I've been reading about the US deficit and debt problems on the webz for a while, and (at least from what I've read) the situation appears to be nothing short of horrific (for the middle class, that is?)

Congress passed a deal to raise the debt ceiling by $2.1 trillion more (amidst what it honestly looked like a media circus), Putin calls the U.S. a "parasite" on global economy (for political reasons?), a major tax overhaul seems to come next, and lots of pplz seem to unanimously accuse politicians (the US Congress and Obama, specifically) of spending more than the country has and robbing Americans of their Social Security and Medicare..

Is it true, is it political bickering, or media/public exaggerating?
Explain?
Click to expand...

this post seems to be written from someone living outside of the united states
please forgive me if this obsevation is in any way offensive

in response to your actual post
the "middle class" is an illusion, when i say that, i'm solely refering to how much money an individual person has
the USA has no "Middle Class", there's just "the people that have so much money that they're never going to be able to spend it all" and then there's the rest of us,
there are of course different levels of "lower class", and the thing that creates the illusion of a Middle Class is the fact that there exists a huge amount of lower class people that are walking around thinking that they're upper class
 
^ thats not at all true

I know plenty of people that make more than enough to live comfortably in a nice house with a couple kids, take decent vacations, have a good chunk of $$$ in the bank and invested in addition to separate retirement plans ... none of them has SO much money that they couldn't spend it all but they have enough to keep themselves in a good place

If thats not the definition of "middle class" I don't know what is
 
Skinny Viking said:
^ thats not at all true

I know plenty of people that make more than enough to live comfortably in a nice house with a couple kids, take decent vacations, have a good chunk of $$$ in the bank and invested in addition to separate retirement plans ... none of them has SO much money that they couldn't spend it all but they have enough to keep themselves in a good place

If thats not the definition of "middle class" I don't know what is
Click to expand...

More like upper-middle class, but yeah. Though, I will be the first to admit that the middle class is definitely shrinking, and is being over-looked/ignored.
 
Skinny is right, monoxide_child is wrong. The US has a huge (albeit diminishing) middle class. I'm not remotely rich but I own a car, pay my rent and never have to worry about food, heat or any essentials. This is true of the majority of people I know. Sure there are wealthy and super-wealthy people but it's important not to take for granted how much we actually have in the grand scheme of things. In fact, if anything has made this country politically docile I think it's the fact that we as a whole are generally comfortable.
To be frank though, I'm not sure what the "middle-class" has to do with this discussion though (directly).
More info here and here.
 
examples of lower class people that think they're upper class

you've just bought a car, and you think you're upper class because the car you've just bought is brand new instead of used, but if buying a used car is something that even entered your mind, you're lower class, if the car you just bought costed you less than $100 thousand, you're lower class

you've just bought a new house and you think you're upper class because you'r new house is bigger than your old one, or because you're moving into a brand-new-just-built house instead of one that someone else has already lived in, but if you moving from one place to another is something that doesn't make the local news shows or the local news paper, you're lower class

you've got somesort of corperate job and you think you've just become upper class because you've just gotten a raise in how much money you make, but if you're still getting-paid-per-hour, you're still lower class

you think you're upper class because you've got CREDIT cards, but most of the people that are actually upper class don't have CREDIT cards because they have DEBIT cards, CREDIT cards are designed to do nothing but create credit card debt, most upper class people don't bother to have credit cards because the people that are really truely upper class don't need to buy anything on credit because the actually have the money in the bank to buy whatever the fuck they want
if you even own credit cards, let alone use them, there's a 99% chance you're lower class
 
I think defining one's class is mainly based on their income/finances, not on what they think they are. By the logic in your reply, a homeless guy can think he's moved up a class because his new cardboard box shelter is larger than his old one.

Also, there are tons of upper class citizens (celebrities, etc.) that are in really bad debt with credit cards. It doesn't matter what your income is, you are not immune to falling into the credit card trap, it's just down to making the right decisions.
 
monoxide_child said:
examples of lower class people that think they're upper class

you've just bought a car, and you think you're upper class because the car you've just bought is brand new instead of used, but if buying a used car is something that even entered your mind, you're lower class, if the car you just bought costed you less than $100 thousand, you're lower class

you've just bought a new house and you think you're upper class because you'r new house is bigger than your old one, or because you're moving into a brand-new-just-built house instead of one that someone else has already lived in, but if you moving from one place to another is something that doesn't make the local news shows or the local news paper, you're lower class

you've got somesort of corperate job and you think you've just become upper class because you've just gotten a raise in how much money you make, but if you're still getting-paid-per-hour, you're still lower class

you think you're upper class because you've got CREDIT cards, but most of the people that are actually upper class don't have CREDIT cards because they have DEBIT cards, CREDIT cards are designed to do nothing but create credit card debt, most upper class people don't bother to have credit cards because the people that are really truely upper class don't need to buy anything on credit because the actually have the money in the bank to buy whatever the fuck they want
if you even own credit cards, let alone use them, there's a 99% chance you're lower class
Click to expand...

Sorry, but that's one of the most idiotic, ignorant things I've read (lately). And as Egan said...what does any of this have to do with the original topic?
 
monoxide_child said:
examples of lower class people that think they're upper class

you've just bought a car, and you think you're upper class because the car you've just bought is brand new instead of used, but if buying a used car is something that even entered your mind, you're lower class, if the car you just bought costed you less than $100 thousand, you're lower class

you've just bought a new house and you think you're upper class because you'r new house is bigger than your old one, or because you're moving into a brand-new-just-built house instead of one that someone else has already lived in, but if you moving from one place to another is something that doesn't make the local news shows or the local news paper, you're lower class

you've got somesort of corperate job and you think you've just become upper class because you've just gotten a raise in how much money you make, but if you're still getting-paid-per-hour, you're still lower class

you think you're upper class because you've got CREDIT cards, but most of the people that are actually upper class don't have CREDIT cards because they have DEBIT cards, CREDIT cards are designed to do nothing but create credit card debt, most upper class people don't bother to have credit cards because the people that are really truely upper class don't need to buy anything on credit because the actually have the money in the bank to buy whatever the fuck they want
if you even own credit cards, let alone use them, there's a 99% chance you're lower class
Click to expand...
These are your definitions which are not based in any reality other than your own opinion. Basically what you are saying is that everyone who isn't super-wealthy is "lower-class." It's just silly. What's even funnier to me is you clearly don't know much about actual wealthy people b/c they use credit cards for everything. Even multimillionaires rarely pay cash for houses b/c when you have that much money you can make more investing it than the interest costs. I know lawyer that bill $1k/hour--- are they "lower class" b/c it's hourly? I don't want to give you too hard of a time b/c I'm guessing you are 15, but seriously man, you really need to reevaluate how you interpret facts when entering an adult conversation about complex socioeconomic and political issues.
 
K Odell said:
Obama's gonna do my reamps......
Click to expand...
Reamp.jpg
 
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