You are absolutely correct, as a life long frugal I can attest that it is no longer possible to live in America without a lot of money now. I always bought used cars, paid cash at state auctions, cooked all my food, fixed all my own stuff. We did all are shopping at thrift stores, I replaced the elements in my 30 year old stove 3 times and am still using it. This worked fine for the last 40 years as I always had enough money to meet the unexpected expenses. Now unexpected expenses are routine, sticker shock everytime I open a power or water bill. These normal expenses are now absurdly high. Insurance seems to increase with each bill, I haven’t been to a dr in years and certainly can afford any medication. Tried to get my teeth fixed a few years ago and the estimate was $20000 what the hell, who has 20 grand sitting around for fking dentures. A car battery $200 what, cat food $1.20 a can what, a new pickup truck $80 grand, how is this even possible. We are having hyperinflation but the economist and politicians are trying their best to hide the truth but all you have to do is go to the grocery store once and it’s plainly obvious. My retirement is twice what my working wage was in the eighties and it’s still has about 1/2 of what is required to maintain the same standard of living I had in the 80s and 90s.
The one thing that’s changed is we now have several hundred billionaires that have and are gaming the system and have ruined our currency our government and our standards of living. We should be rioting daily and should shut this country down until regular people are given a chance to live like normal citizens of the richest country in earth. We are in a race to the bottom and most of our citizens are or will be poor shortly by allowing these parasites to drain our lives away. No billionaires allowed ever, anywhere. They need to be taxed out of existence.
Preach! “The one thing that’s changed is we now have several hundred billionaires that have and are gaming the system and have ruined our currency our government and our standards of living. We should be rioting daily and should shut this country down until regular people are given a chance to live like normal citizens of the richest country in earth.”
I grow tired of this bleak existence. Like you,, I do all I can to cut costs, but alas I'm retired, and worried about finances.Yes, these smucks are robbing the American people, and lining their pockets. The American people need to prepare for a depression.
I think we are there. It’s disguised because there are enough wealthy people around spending money. At least half of us really can’t spend shit beyond extreme necessities.
And people just elected Donald Trump lol. What’s wrong with 76 million people who think he’s gonna help them? But for what it is worth, prices are never coming down. A deflationary economy would be far worse.
Absolutely, and many of my students live in their cars, or come to class hungry. I see it first hand every day in the community college where I teach. Sometimes putting food on the table is more important than class work. I’m grateful my school has a food pantry, but it’s still not enough.
What is wrong with us that we have students dealing with this? These are people trying so hard to establish a career/start a new career, and we expect some of them to live in their cars? This is not how America is supposed to be!!!
Christian of otherwise its “American” to have convinced ourselves its fine, normal, paying our dues, deserved. We convince ourselves wealth is attainable and should be worshipped
The wealth gap is past the point of no return in both the U.S. and the E.U. The only thing left is this simmering anger that will turn into a major fire when the right spark happens. I suspect something will happen in 2025. As incompetent as Trump is, things are likely to get very bad in some places as he calls out the military by invoking the insurrection clause. Europe is heading for a major move to right nationalism. I am afraid that chaos is in the near future for all of these nations.
I am stocking up on what I can because the grocery stores are going to take a hit in a few months due to the real possibility of trade wars between the U.S. and everybody else.
I feel bad for the majority of the lower income people in the western nations. I define lower income as any family unit that makes less than $125,000 a year or equivalent Euros, Canadian dollars or Pesos. We are all going to feel it soon.
Again, I can't comment on the state of America because I'm Canadian but it sounds like we're living in parallel universes regardless.
I think our average single family home (in my city) is now over 700K. And let's not even talk about vegetables lol. Or the tariffs your president wants to impose on us 🙄
Your writing about income inequality feels like a book with no ending...ever. Like, will there ever be a solution? Sad state of affairs, that's for sure.
Unfortunately, I will never run out of things to write about inequality. Believe me, I'd be thrilled if this subject became moot! I can write other stuff! Let's make income inequality not a thing!
I wish there were enough of us willing to start a movement that would actually be impactful. Like, millions willing to STOP feeding the industries that are keeping them poor. But unless everyone was willing there'd be no point.
No one is coming to save us, it’s up to us to save ourselves. Form mutual aid groups. Join civic organizations and go to city council meetings. Stop voting for Republicans. Support local news.
I agree with what you said, Martha, which is why I am supporting the Workers Strike Back movement that does not depend on begging & pleading billionaire politicians and their 150K-plus servant class. What we must also do is support independent media and fight to turn every state into a citizen ballot initiative state, so we can directly vote for the economic and civil libertarian policies we want without begging & pleading duopoly politicians who will never give them to us
And yes, that also means to give up on the Democrats as well as the Republicans. The former have proven with 8 years of Clinton, 8 years of Obama, and 4 years of Biden/Harris that they will do nothing for us economically, and their only appeal is to liberals who favor their identity politics. That just causes too many workers to jump ship over to the other wing of the capitalist duopoly. We need to fight to convince workers to reject the *whole* duopoly and cease believing that either wing is "more likely" than the other to give us the policies we desperately need, want, and deserve. And we need to work together rather than being at each other's throats (which is what identity politics is designed to do).
It's goal is to fight capitalism itself, not bicker over which duopoly party might run it "best." That includes building a new political party and to cease supporting billionaires and actually expecting them to come through for us. We just need to get many more people down for that. The potential is there.
I grew up like you. As a musician, I made $50,000 only one year in my life. I am childless & have sacrificed a lot of things that others around me took for granted so as to have savings for retirement. It was that or being alone & penniless. I’m nearly 80 now & looking back, I’m glad I was not born later. Olds who blame the young have NO IDEA what it’s like now. They need to find out the hard way perhaps…
I'm listening to my husband work in our recording studio right now. Man, some incredible talented people come through here! But it's hard to support yourself that way. Sometimes, I make food for the young musicians who I know are struggling.
Eventually, something's got to give. You know it and I know it. At some point, when millions of people realize no level of hard work and thrift is going to be enough to allow them to live decently, something will happen. I hope we fix things peacefully, but the antics of Elon Musk and Trump are not giving me hope.
In order to maximize future opportunity for our children we bought the least expensive house in the best school district we could afford to live in. It seems to have worked out for our offspring as we’d hoped. Part of what that meant was most of our children’s friends lived far more affluent lifestyles than our family could afford. Our ‘acceptance’ in the community was mixed, but generally positive because we volunteered as much as we were able to with civic engagements like PTO and Scouting. Working the equivalent of 2 full time jobs to make ends meet meant nearly all of my free hours were devoted to home maintenance and volunteering. And I consider myself fortunate to have been able to manage well enough to help our children get one of the best possible public school educations available in the region and state.
Our children were keenly aware of the differences in socioeconomic status where we lived, but would never have realized that by comparison to most inner city families ours would be considered affluent, had we not told them about it. I was very much aware of others employed where I worked, who held down 3 or even 4 different jobs and still struggled greatly to manage, often not well at all. Most of my neighbors were clueless about the state of affairs with which some of my coworkers struggled.
I know that the formula we were able to use for helping our children get ahead is much less available now to their generation than it was for ours. This is often the result of be saddled with high student loan debts in addition to affordable housing stock being removed from the market by private equity investors. Add to this the fact that the sort of blue collar union job I had then is much rarer. And now, to top it off, public education is a target of defunding by the political and religious right wing.
I can clearly see how a growing lack of opportunity for middle class began with Reagan and is culminating with the incoming administration. And yet so many Americans buy into the conspiracy theories from millionaire and billionaire politicians and their minions, like Limbaugh and Jones, who’ve helped conflate “welfare queens” along with a fear of government, immigrants, and gender fluidity into the cause of an ever widening income and wealth inequality in the US.
For people who can manage to do so, this can be a good strategy. It does, however, make it hard to fit in. I’m thankful to have grown up where there was just one small school. We didn’t have cliques or anything like that.
Thank you for validating my existence! When I'm not writing (for free) on Substack, I am working for $17 an hour as a SpEd Teaching Assistant. I divorced last year and I'm starting from scratch with everything. Thankfully, my eldest child is grown and supporting himself and my other child is turning 18 soon, so no childcare costs. But rent alone is enough to bankrupt me. No savings for my daughter's college education. I haven't been able to afford groceries consistently so I've been getting food from the food bank. I just moved in with a family member to try to save money for a little while. Sorry- TMI, but it is refreshing to read your post on Substack, Thank you.
To state the obvious, someone supporting Special Ed kids should not be forced to go to a food bank. Thank you for what you do. (And not demeaning use of a food bank, emphasizing you should be paid more!)
As soon as I saw Michelle’s story illustration of “The Chickens” I laughed— and knew this was going to be a right-on treatise. So many of us engage in idle dreams of how we could “survive this nightmare” only to realize — it’s not the Great Depression, it’s not our grandparents’ time, it’s a dystopia with higher stakes. I wish I could “chicken” my way out of it! ;-) But stronger stuff will be required.
I have a very similar story. I have done amazingly well on an amazingly small amount of money. I'm 60 now and I look around me and realize there is no way I could repeat that. It really makes me sad.
I agree. I spent 40 years teaching preschool— no addictions, no fancy stuff. My retirement only works because of generational support from parents and grandparents who bought/built homes and land. If I had to rely on my pension I’d be on the street. I’m another who can garden, preserve food, cook, sew— but that doesn’t pay the electricity bill or property taxes.
Very true. I wish leaders actually knew this. Right now the elderly are the fastest growing population of homelessnes. And not all the poor drink, smoke or do drugs. To get out of the cycle, it takes a big break somewhere.....
I am fortunate to have two wonderful children I can count on. But I hope to be lucky enough not to have to depend on them. My husband and I are doing everything we can to try to figure out how to retire someday. I used to think having a paid-off house was going to make it possible. Now, I don't think that will be enough to save us. There are just so damned many crazy expenses that you have no choice but to pay that are unaffordable to most of us.
Queen of Frugality here. Raised and homeschooled my kids on one income which was no small task. But yeah. You're spot on. And all the things I used to do for side hustles to supplement extra needs have disappeared too. For example, I used to flip furniture or even cars. I'd find a good deal, improve it, and sell for a profit. Gone are those days with shows that feature flippers. Thrift store prices are much different from new even.
Oh, I could go on and on. The hardest part is seeing my adult children trying to survive and I'm unable to help them.
Pretty much all the increase in income and wealth since the 1970s has gone to the top 20% with the bottom half's income not keeping up with inflation.
In California, the minimum wage is between $16.50 and $23.00 depending on location and industry, but it would take over $31 per hour to match the buying power of minimum wage of $1.6o in 1968, which when it was at its greatest. Actually, $35 is likely closer. If you don't believe me, please do a comparison of the cost of rent, food, and transportation between the years of 1968 and 2024.
People often blame the poor, the homeless, the lost for being so, but it costs roughly $2000 and usually more to rent a single one bedroom apartment in the San Francisco Bay Area. The minimum wage just about covers rent if you work full time.
Thank you for another exceptional article, Michelle! Few other writers I know of can evaluate class issues as you can. And with your firm understanding of this, I hope you can at least understand why "bread and butter" issues will be by far the most important to working class people when it comes to their voting choices. And that means, we need to get *ourselves* out of this mess and not rely on billionaire politicians in Congress or their 150K-per-year capitalist wannabes in the House and local politicians.
I quote you here and the very salient point you made:
"Nobody knows how the other half lives, because increasingly, the two Americas never see each other. They live in different places, work in different places, shop in different places and worship in different places. Their children go to different schools and do not get to know each other.
"This is why nobody can agree on how good the U.S. economy is: The one you live in is nothing like the other one."
Yes! This is why no duopoly politicians are going to do anything for us. Nor will any politician who favors capitalism, such as the Libertarians.
We have to change the structure of this economy. It never gets to the ballot box. We can do it by moving left as Robert Reich said to do today. We can create a platform for which even most Republicans will vote. I am not kidding. I need help to make a platform. https://hotbuttons.substack.com/p/next-we-do-good-work?r=3m1bs
You are absolutely correct, as a life long frugal I can attest that it is no longer possible to live in America without a lot of money now. I always bought used cars, paid cash at state auctions, cooked all my food, fixed all my own stuff. We did all are shopping at thrift stores, I replaced the elements in my 30 year old stove 3 times and am still using it. This worked fine for the last 40 years as I always had enough money to meet the unexpected expenses. Now unexpected expenses are routine, sticker shock everytime I open a power or water bill. These normal expenses are now absurdly high. Insurance seems to increase with each bill, I haven’t been to a dr in years and certainly can afford any medication. Tried to get my teeth fixed a few years ago and the estimate was $20000 what the hell, who has 20 grand sitting around for fking dentures. A car battery $200 what, cat food $1.20 a can what, a new pickup truck $80 grand, how is this even possible. We are having hyperinflation but the economist and politicians are trying their best to hide the truth but all you have to do is go to the grocery store once and it’s plainly obvious. My retirement is twice what my working wage was in the eighties and it’s still has about 1/2 of what is required to maintain the same standard of living I had in the 80s and 90s.
The one thing that’s changed is we now have several hundred billionaires that have and are gaming the system and have ruined our currency our government and our standards of living. We should be rioting daily and should shut this country down until regular people are given a chance to live like normal citizens of the richest country in earth. We are in a race to the bottom and most of our citizens are or will be poor shortly by allowing these parasites to drain our lives away. No billionaires allowed ever, anywhere. They need to be taxed out of existence.
Every single word of this is exactly what I'm talking about.
Amen
Preach! “The one thing that’s changed is we now have several hundred billionaires that have and are gaming the system and have ruined our currency our government and our standards of living. We should be rioting daily and should shut this country down until regular people are given a chance to live like normal citizens of the richest country in earth.”
I grow tired of this bleak existence. Like you,, I do all I can to cut costs, but alas I'm retired, and worried about finances.Yes, these smucks are robbing the American people, and lining their pockets. The American people need to prepare for a depression.
I think we are there. It’s disguised because there are enough wealthy people around spending money. At least half of us really can’t spend shit beyond extreme necessities.
And people just elected Donald Trump lol. What’s wrong with 76 million people who think he’s gonna help them? But for what it is worth, prices are never coming down. A deflationary economy would be far worse.
Absolutely, and many of my students live in their cars, or come to class hungry. I see it first hand every day in the community college where I teach. Sometimes putting food on the table is more important than class work. I’m grateful my school has a food pantry, but it’s still not enough.
What is wrong with us that we have students dealing with this? These are people trying so hard to establish a career/start a new career, and we expect some of them to live in their cars? This is not how America is supposed to be!!!
It's the sickness inflicted on us by psychotic Christians who think we all deserve to suffer.
Christian of otherwise its “American” to have convinced ourselves its fine, normal, paying our dues, deserved. We convince ourselves wealth is attainable and should be worshipped
Yes. Totally agree. It’s gotten worse than when I started teaching.
The wealth gap is past the point of no return in both the U.S. and the E.U. The only thing left is this simmering anger that will turn into a major fire when the right spark happens. I suspect something will happen in 2025. As incompetent as Trump is, things are likely to get very bad in some places as he calls out the military by invoking the insurrection clause. Europe is heading for a major move to right nationalism. I am afraid that chaos is in the near future for all of these nations.
I am stocking up on what I can because the grocery stores are going to take a hit in a few months due to the real possibility of trade wars between the U.S. and everybody else.
I feel bad for the majority of the lower income people in the western nations. I define lower income as any family unit that makes less than $125,000 a year or equivalent Euros, Canadian dollars or Pesos. We are all going to feel it soon.
Again, I can't comment on the state of America because I'm Canadian but it sounds like we're living in parallel universes regardless.
I think our average single family home (in my city) is now over 700K. And let's not even talk about vegetables lol. Or the tariffs your president wants to impose on us 🙄
Your writing about income inequality feels like a book with no ending...ever. Like, will there ever be a solution? Sad state of affairs, that's for sure.
Unfortunately, I will never run out of things to write about inequality. Believe me, I'd be thrilled if this subject became moot! I can write other stuff! Let's make income inequality not a thing!
I wish there were enough of us willing to start a movement that would actually be impactful. Like, millions willing to STOP feeding the industries that are keeping them poor. But unless everyone was willing there'd be no point.
No one is coming to save us, it’s up to us to save ourselves. Form mutual aid groups. Join civic organizations and go to city council meetings. Stop voting for Republicans. Support local news.
I agree with what you said, Martha, which is why I am supporting the Workers Strike Back movement that does not depend on begging & pleading billionaire politicians and their 150K-plus servant class. What we must also do is support independent media and fight to turn every state into a citizen ballot initiative state, so we can directly vote for the economic and civil libertarian policies we want without begging & pleading duopoly politicians who will never give them to us
And yes, that also means to give up on the Democrats as well as the Republicans. The former have proven with 8 years of Clinton, 8 years of Obama, and 4 years of Biden/Harris that they will do nothing for us economically, and their only appeal is to liberals who favor their identity politics. That just causes too many workers to jump ship over to the other wing of the capitalist duopoly. We need to fight to convince workers to reject the *whole* duopoly and cease believing that either wing is "more likely" than the other to give us the policies we desperately need, want, and deserve. And we need to work together rather than being at each other's throats (which is what identity politics is designed to do).
Rshama Sawant (one of my heroes) has started such a thing with the Workers Strike Back movement: https://www.workersstrikeback.org/
It's goal is to fight capitalism itself, not bicker over which duopoly party might run it "best." That includes building a new political party and to cease supporting billionaires and actually expecting them to come through for us. We just need to get many more people down for that. The potential is there.
I grew up like you. As a musician, I made $50,000 only one year in my life. I am childless & have sacrificed a lot of things that others around me took for granted so as to have savings for retirement. It was that or being alone & penniless. I’m nearly 80 now & looking back, I’m glad I was not born later. Olds who blame the young have NO IDEA what it’s like now. They need to find out the hard way perhaps…
I'm listening to my husband work in our recording studio right now. Man, some incredible talented people come through here! But it's hard to support yourself that way. Sometimes, I make food for the young musicians who I know are struggling.
So true. And I worry that many are nearing the breaking point
Eventually, something's got to give. You know it and I know it. At some point, when millions of people realize no level of hard work and thrift is going to be enough to allow them to live decently, something will happen. I hope we fix things peacefully, but the antics of Elon Musk and Trump are not giving me hope.
In order to maximize future opportunity for our children we bought the least expensive house in the best school district we could afford to live in. It seems to have worked out for our offspring as we’d hoped. Part of what that meant was most of our children’s friends lived far more affluent lifestyles than our family could afford. Our ‘acceptance’ in the community was mixed, but generally positive because we volunteered as much as we were able to with civic engagements like PTO and Scouting. Working the equivalent of 2 full time jobs to make ends meet meant nearly all of my free hours were devoted to home maintenance and volunteering. And I consider myself fortunate to have been able to manage well enough to help our children get one of the best possible public school educations available in the region and state.
Our children were keenly aware of the differences in socioeconomic status where we lived, but would never have realized that by comparison to most inner city families ours would be considered affluent, had we not told them about it. I was very much aware of others employed where I worked, who held down 3 or even 4 different jobs and still struggled greatly to manage, often not well at all. Most of my neighbors were clueless about the state of affairs with which some of my coworkers struggled.
I know that the formula we were able to use for helping our children get ahead is much less available now to their generation than it was for ours. This is often the result of be saddled with high student loan debts in addition to affordable housing stock being removed from the market by private equity investors. Add to this the fact that the sort of blue collar union job I had then is much rarer. And now, to top it off, public education is a target of defunding by the political and religious right wing.
I can clearly see how a growing lack of opportunity for middle class began with Reagan and is culminating with the incoming administration. And yet so many Americans buy into the conspiracy theories from millionaire and billionaire politicians and their minions, like Limbaugh and Jones, who’ve helped conflate “welfare queens” along with a fear of government, immigrants, and gender fluidity into the cause of an ever widening income and wealth inequality in the US.
For people who can manage to do so, this can be a good strategy. It does, however, make it hard to fit in. I’m thankful to have grown up where there was just one small school. We didn’t have cliques or anything like that.
Thank you for validating my existence! When I'm not writing (for free) on Substack, I am working for $17 an hour as a SpEd Teaching Assistant. I divorced last year and I'm starting from scratch with everything. Thankfully, my eldest child is grown and supporting himself and my other child is turning 18 soon, so no childcare costs. But rent alone is enough to bankrupt me. No savings for my daughter's college education. I haven't been able to afford groceries consistently so I've been getting food from the food bank. I just moved in with a family member to try to save money for a little while. Sorry- TMI, but it is refreshing to read your post on Substack, Thank you.
This is what I’m talking about. You’re doing important work and deserve better.
To state the obvious, someone supporting Special Ed kids should not be forced to go to a food bank. Thank you for what you do. (And not demeaning use of a food bank, emphasizing you should be paid more!)
Thank you! 💯
As soon as I saw Michelle’s story illustration of “The Chickens” I laughed— and knew this was going to be a right-on treatise. So many of us engage in idle dreams of how we could “survive this nightmare” only to realize — it’s not the Great Depression, it’s not our grandparents’ time, it’s a dystopia with higher stakes. I wish I could “chicken” my way out of it! ;-) But stronger stuff will be required.
I have a very similar story. I have done amazingly well on an amazingly small amount of money. I'm 60 now and I look around me and realize there is no way I could repeat that. It really makes me sad.
I agree. I spent 40 years teaching preschool— no addictions, no fancy stuff. My retirement only works because of generational support from parents and grandparents who bought/built homes and land. If I had to rely on my pension I’d be on the street. I’m another who can garden, preserve food, cook, sew— but that doesn’t pay the electricity bill or property taxes.
Yes. Such skills help but they aren’t enough! We don’t live in Little House days.
Very true. I wish leaders actually knew this. Right now the elderly are the fastest growing population of homelessnes. And not all the poor drink, smoke or do drugs. To get out of the cycle, it takes a big break somewhere.....
I am fortunate to have two wonderful children I can count on. But I hope to be lucky enough not to have to depend on them. My husband and I are doing everything we can to try to figure out how to retire someday. I used to think having a paid-off house was going to make it possible. Now, I don't think that will be enough to save us. There are just so damned many crazy expenses that you have no choice but to pay that are unaffordable to most of us.
There really are. I know I am hanging on by a thread....despite working my whole life, not having addictions and being frugal.....
We need to talk about this more.
Yes. I am OK for now, my needs are met to which I am so thankful. I can't think too far in the future....one day at a time doing all I can.
Wish you a lovely Christmas Michelle. Feel free to DM me if you'd like.
Merry Christmas to you as well!
Keep it up Michelle. You make a difference
Thank you for always being so supportive, Greg. I truly appreciate it.
Queen of Frugality here. Raised and homeschooled my kids on one income which was no small task. But yeah. You're spot on. And all the things I used to do for side hustles to supplement extra needs have disappeared too. For example, I used to flip furniture or even cars. I'd find a good deal, improve it, and sell for a profit. Gone are those days with shows that feature flippers. Thrift store prices are much different from new even.
Oh, I could go on and on. The hardest part is seeing my adult children trying to survive and I'm unable to help them.
Pretty much all the increase in income and wealth since the 1970s has gone to the top 20% with the bottom half's income not keeping up with inflation.
In California, the minimum wage is between $16.50 and $23.00 depending on location and industry, but it would take over $31 per hour to match the buying power of minimum wage of $1.6o in 1968, which when it was at its greatest. Actually, $35 is likely closer. If you don't believe me, please do a comparison of the cost of rent, food, and transportation between the years of 1968 and 2024.
People often blame the poor, the homeless, the lost for being so, but it costs roughly $2000 and usually more to rent a single one bedroom apartment in the San Francisco Bay Area. The minimum wage just about covers rent if you work full time.
Thank you for another exceptional article, Michelle! Few other writers I know of can evaluate class issues as you can. And with your firm understanding of this, I hope you can at least understand why "bread and butter" issues will be by far the most important to working class people when it comes to their voting choices. And that means, we need to get *ourselves* out of this mess and not rely on billionaire politicians in Congress or their 150K-per-year capitalist wannabes in the House and local politicians.
I quote you here and the very salient point you made:
"Nobody knows how the other half lives, because increasingly, the two Americas never see each other. They live in different places, work in different places, shop in different places and worship in different places. Their children go to different schools and do not get to know each other.
"This is why nobody can agree on how good the U.S. economy is: The one you live in is nothing like the other one."
Yes! This is why no duopoly politicians are going to do anything for us. Nor will any politician who favors capitalism, such as the Libertarians.
We have to change the structure of this economy. It never gets to the ballot box. We can do it by moving left as Robert Reich said to do today. We can create a platform for which even most Republicans will vote. I am not kidding. I need help to make a platform. https://hotbuttons.substack.com/p/next-we-do-good-work?r=3m1bs