According to Wolff from 1820 until 1970, the United States was in a euphoria of rising wages. A time of increasing productivity, wages, and living standards. And since the 1970's the United States has never again experienced that era of euphoria. He starts off by saying that the problem within the U.S. is not an easy fix nor is it financial, and nor does it have anything to do with banking. The problem that faces us is Capitalism, and the way capitalism has transformed our society into a never ending profit fueled spiral. In the 1970's wages stopped increasing, while the productivity of the worker continued to rise. This showed businesses that they could earn more money if the average Joe continued working more to achieve his former level of living while they as a business continued to pay him the same amount of money year after year.
In We Always Stood on our Own Two Feet, Coontz discusses the myth many Americans have come to know and accept. The myth that those who are successful never take government handouts and have become successful and independent due to only their families hard work and determination. Coontz reveals to us that ever since the beginning of our nation the idea of community and government funded programs have helped and been the reason behind these families success and survival. No one has ever truly made it completely on their own, for one reason or another.
Government assistance made it possible for the worker to survive and now those whom the American people rely upon to help them in their time of need are the anti-governement businesses. The government enforced regulations to protect the average Joe from the businesses who's aim was to get Joe into a world of debt in the never ending cycle of borrowing. Those who are now in power thanks to politics are the antigovernment, who wish to dissolve any form of regulations that prevent their business from essentially doing whatever the hell they want. Never bite the hand that feeds you seems strangely eery at this point.
We are borrowers. We live in a society of borrowing. A borrowing that Coontz outlines was semi harmless when we as a nation began, but has slowly consumed us. In history we borrowed from the Native Americans and we borrowed from Mexico. That borrowing had a price, a price that we did not feel, but those whom we borrowed from felt. Now we are again the borrowers and we are the ones who are feeling the consequences of our actions. We now borrow to maintain our living standards and our lifestyles which now our wages cannot support. We have bit off more than we can chew and we cannot stop it. Today it isn't all our fault since most of us have never experienced this euphoria (to help you breathe for a second). We were raised to want what we cant economically afford. Stuff: the definition of success. We have returned to a point of borrowing to simply survive. Wolff outlines it in terms of companies and Coontz outlines it in the Frontier and Suburban family.
It is now up to us to pull ourselves out of debt. We as americans have this idea of individualism which we have talked about in class and is essentially what Coontz in parts of her article is getting at. We have fallen into this trap that we cannot get out of, a trap that we were certain to fall into, a trap that we cannot get out of without help. We like to imagine we can pull ourselves up on our own and live to gloat about it. However, its ironic we got ourselves into this trap with predetermined help and need to get out of it ourselves, except the systems in place by government and antigovernment prevent us from being physically able to do so.
It comes down to fact and myth. Fact: We don't earn enough money to support ourselves. Fact: We borrow to make up for what we cannot obtain on our own. Myth: It's ok to borrow. Myth: I can always pay it back when I have some extra cash. Extra cash that doesn't exist because salaries never rise, but the work always does. Myth: I can do this if I just work harder. This myth has reached a stand still because according to Wolff, we can't physically work any harder than we already are. So now what? Working more won't pay me more and I can't live with what I have.
SO WHAT DO WE DO?
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