Lost in a Lost World (Page 20) ghostgeek: Money in the old days was something you could bank on. It kept its value. Now governments engineer inflation so people will be hoodwinked into believing that their standard of living is rising when their wages increase.  Fractured fairy tale: people can"t loose there cards , They need them to Bye cheap Chinese made stuff off a Amozon or wallmart, To keep putting home grown Buinesss out of buiness , And then Cry out to Some Politican to Come Save them lol (Edited by Fractured fairy tale) Fractured fairy tale: yeah Standard of living has been Decreasing for years , Only one thing that holds Its Value over time and thats gold  ghostgeek: You'll have no problem buying gold but when you come to sell it the rigmarole you'll have to go through will likely put you off the stuff for life. Fractured fairy tale: Yeah I herd things are Stricker In the Uk with gold moe regulated , Not here stick a add in the news paper if you want theres always some one that will bye it off you ,Unless the government deems other wise there only done that once in the 1970"s to regulate its price, Its not a get rich scheme its what intrest in the Bank Is supposed to do be a hedge against Inflation , for example in the 1800"s you could of brought a Expensive suit for a ounce of gold , and today you could do exactly the Same thing , Its The only Commidity that will hold its Intriinsic value. Fractured fairy tale: its half the reson why the US broke away from the UK in the first place and peged there Paper notes 1 for 1 with a set amount of gold , So they were free from government over reach of other countries , No any more but since there ditched the Gold standard , The US is doing world wide what they accused The UK and Europe of doing to them lol (Edited by Fractured fairy tale) Fractured fairy tale: if you look at it that way you cant blame Saddam Hussane And Gaddafi for wanting to put there countries on a gold standard , and stop selling there Oil in US dollars and sell it on there own terms using there own currancy, But we seen what happened to them , No your Not allowed to leave the club , Or we will put some one in your place  (Edited by Fractured fairy tale) ghostgeek: However you look at it, it's always the little people who get shafted. If you've got a few gold rings, more than likely some tealeaf will be looking to relieve you of them. Put your savings in the bank and the government is busy inflating their value away whilst buying up bonds to hand the rich a nice little earner. ghostgeek: Everyone is busy telling you to save for your retirement when you're working, and when you finally drag yourself over the line and put your feet up you're told you should have saved more because inflation has eaten away at the value of your pension. Just another racket to feather the nest of politicians and greasy financial whizkids.  Zanjan: Gone are the days when children looked after their parents or grandparents - it's every man for himself. Low-income earners don't get a workplace pension plan so they have to save. Any pension fund could go belly up so I wouldn't rely on that alone. ghostgeek: There's a third certainty; that someone's out there trying to make a quick buck at your expense. At one time I was plagued by phone calls from India trying to scam me. The silly thing was, I couldn't understand what the hell they were saying, so bad was their English. Fractured fairy tale: LOL yeah once them people latch on its hard to get rid of them. One thing is forshore its not a good idear to rely on the government for retirement. Fractured fairy tale: I love the way they keep pushing the age up . There hopeing people will cark it before they get there ghostgeek: That's the way it always used to be. You work your cobs off, then you drop down dead before you become a burden on your betters. ghostgeek: Criminality is the way to go. If you don't get caught it's tax-free cash in your pocket and if they do nab you then it's free bed and board at the government's expense. Fractured fairy tale: LOL win win you reckon . Its makes you wonder sometimes . You see people get caught for bringing millions of dollars of drugs or Something across the border . And they only get 6years . There prolly out in 3 or four with good behaviour. Mabye the sentences are a reflection of what the politicians get away with lol ghostgeek: Pre-pandemic, middle-class Americans modeled the belief that everything was fine. Unemployment was low; consumer confidence was high; the housing market had “recovered.” In 2019, 95 percent of people in households making over $100,000 a year reported they were “doing okay” financially, a 13 percent increase from 2013. But those positive economic indicators obscured a larger reality. Forty years ago, the term “middle class” referred to Americans who had successfully obtained a version of the American dream: a steady income from one or two earners, a home, and security for the future. It meant the ability to save and acquire assets. Now, it mostly means the ability to put your bills on autopay and service debt. The stability that once characterized the middle class, that made it such a coveted and aspirational echelon of American existence, has been hollowed out. It’s difficult to tell if someone’s part of the hollow middle class because they’re still performing all the external markers of middle-classness. Before the pandemic, they were (and largely still are, absent a layoff) buying and leasing cars, purchasing homes, going on vacation, covering their kids’ education and activities. They’re just taking on massive loads of debt to do so. As journalist and social critic Barbara Ehrenreich has pointed out, it’s very expensive to be poor. It’s also increasingly expensive to be middle class, in part because wages for all but the wealthy have remained stagnant for the past four decades. Most middle-class Americans seem to be making more — getting raises, however small, sometimes billed as “cost of living” increases. Yet these increases largely just keep pace with inflation, not the actual cost of living. [ https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22166381/hollow-middle-class-american-dream ] ghostgeek: Many middle-class households try to figure out what expenses they have to cover immediately with cash and what can be put on a credit card, financed, or delayed in some fashion. In March 2020, household debt hit $14.3 trillion — the highest it’s been since the 2008 financial crisis, when it reached $12.7 trillion. In the first quarter of 2020, the average loan for a new car was a record-breaking $33,738, with an average monthly payment of $569 (the average payment for a used car is $397). And then there’s student loan debt, which, for Americans, currently totals $1.56 trillion. Not everyone has student loan debt, but among those who do — many with degrees and jobs that seemingly place them in the middle class — the average debt load is $32,731. The average monthly (pre-pandemic) payment is $393. [ https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22166381/hollow-middle-class-american-dream ] ghostgeek: So why don’t middle-class people just curb their spending? At the heart of this question is the heavy, confounding issue of American middle-class identity and the psychological and social wreckage that comes with losing it. “I don’t know that I could shake this identity regardless of how much money I do or don’t have,” Leigh, who makes $80,000 a year and spends all her take-home pay on rent and credit card bills, told me. “It’s ingrained within me.” If you’ve grown up poor and become middle class, there’s great bitterness in rescinding that status; if your parents worked years to enter the middle class, falling from it is often accompanied by great shame. There’s also the difficulty of significantly shifting your family’s consumption patterns. Once set, many find it impossible to change their own expectations for vacations, activities, and schooling — let alone those of their partners or children. Why? Because the middle class is spectacularly bad at talking honestly about money. Readily available credit facilitates our worst habits, our most convenient lies, our most cowardly selves. [ https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22166381/hollow-middle-class-american-dream ] Fractured fairy tale: Yep Thats whats its all become about , keeping up the Faccard of a ever Increasing harder to achive Dream , Start them young thats the way to do it , Fill there heads that they need a Uni Degree to make it , Then by the time there finished and figured out theres no jobs and there in thousands of dollars Dept , There got ya, hook line and sinker , Tust the Experts lol Fractured fairy tale: I really thought real estate was going to take a hammering from this Pandumic , I wasn"t taking into account the lenghts the government would go to to keep the Whole thing Propped up , real estate keeps going up , but at the same time its lmaking it way harder for further generations to obtain tthe Dream I suppose thats what dreams are , Some thing you keep chasing ghostgeek: Yes, governments are propping things up, with dream money. When the world wakes up, all that dream cash will have about as much substance as candyfloss. | Politics Chat Room 32 People Chatting Similar Conversations |