The new 'average American'............

The second Obama term is sailing along much like the first. He appears to be oblivious to his critics while pent-up resentment grows among the near-majority that think of him as America's nemesis. The lads that share coffee with me at a local convenience store are on the brink of despair. One insists that O and his henchmen are all communists dedicated to precipitating and American revolution.

 

As an average American, or what used to be an average American, I see no real threat that cannot be repaired with a legal regime change. O will do his thing as best and as much as he can despite hostile Republicans who will be able to largely veto any bill they don't like. Meanwhile, O will keep on using Executive Orders to legislate his will and thereby bypass Congressional subversions. Some of his EO's are of marginal legality, but by the time that gets sorted out, he will be history as a POTUS.

 

Critics complain that O is loading the American political agenda with social issues in an effort to eclipse financial ones. This may be true, but then again there is not much he can do about financial issues that would result in a quick success. His ideology prevents him from espousing capitalistic solutions and as a result he relies on government spending to bail us out of our fiscal and financial quagmire. In the process, O is creating heavy public dependencies upon an expanding government that promises to provide the basic needs to anyone unable to obtain them through their own resources. One might add, except O that is, that such dependencies incite healthy and able individuals to rely on welfare rather than get a job.

 

Put these people together with our rapidly rising Hispanic population and we have a new definition of average American. The steadily employed citizen with a work ethic has dominated American demographics since the boys returned home from WWII. Today employed white Americans are in a minority and who knows what happened to our work ethic.

 

The latter has been seriously eroded by a number of factors. One for sure is the welfare system that rewards people for not working. Another is the devastation of the middle class through abuse, rising costs, stagnant wages, inflation and mismanagement of our financial resources. Many more former middle class people have fallen into the poor category than have risen into the rich. Simultaneously, our percentage of rich people has grown both in number and in wealth. Rich was once considered someone worth a million dollars. Today, make that a billion. Taxation, professional service costs, real estate, fuel, travel, medical costs and food have all risen dramatically and have equally and adversely affected the middle class. The rich don't care and the poor have welfare.

 

We are known for a moderate tax rate and certainly more moderate than in Europe. Yet, we are paying in the neighborhood of 65% of our income in taxes. Beginning with income taxes say at 30%, then add state and local taxes, property tax, inheritance tax, sales tax, fuel tax, and a myriad of costs that have increased in order to protect sellers for going under because of taxes they have to pay. Add licenses to do work such as a shop or bar or taxi or medical or legal office and also include annual inventory taxes for retailers and we come up with a figure approaching 65%.

 

I vividly recall former President Lyndon Johnson and his proclamation of 'The Great Society' in which human services would improve in quality and decline in cost, where we would work fewer hours every week and a majority could enjoy the leisure of a second home in the country. Indeed, adherents to this pie in the sky pipe dream were actually commissioning studies of how additional leisure time would influence the average American; back when the average American was me.

 

Today, a formerly middle class family  has mom and dad working, the kids in some kind of care until a parent gets home, two cars, a home and considerable debt and cash poor. I hesitate to characterize the new average American, but it would include poor, immigrant, welfare and single parent families. If we include illegal immigrants, the scale is tipped whereby this group of people become the new majority.