How McKinsey Destroyed the Middle Class (2020)

sul_tasto 4 years ago |

I think this article should be understood in the context of the 2020 US presidential campaign. At the time, Pete Buttigieg was a candidate showing promise. This article attempts to portray candidate Buttigieg as a member of the 1% elite, at a time when the progressive wing of the Democratic party was gaining ground on the traditional Democratic party establishment. The Atlantic tends to be read by educated urbanites and surburbanites, a key constituency of the Democratic party.

greatgib 4 years ago |

It's analysis looks excellent to me, in being able to put concrete words to a phenomenon that everyone should have noticed already.

And I think that the same thing is happening with government and politics in our modern "democracies".

Gunax 4 years ago |

Of course the unstated reality appears to be that it works. That is, the middle management was not necessary. Elite students really do make better executives than former burger flippers and rivet drivers.

I know some corporations still maintain a culture of promote from the bottom, but they are the exception. It's nice to think that hands-on experience would give companies an advantage, but let's not conflate our desire for how the world ought to work with how it does.

I see this as yet another way in which capitalism's brutal efficiency finds more and more things to trim.

ChrisArchitect 4 years ago |

some discussion only 3 months ago:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28041701

SamReidHughes 4 years ago |

But the middle class isn’t destroyed.

angelzen 4 years ago | |

The middle class cumulative share of the national income and wealth has declined quite significantly over past 50 years.

Income: 62% => 43%

Wealth: 32% => 17%

https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/01/09/trends-...

footlose_3815 4 years ago | |

yes, they value has left and belongs to upper classes, and middle class has slowly turned into a unified lower class.

You’re only a couple paychecks away from losing your house and car, no matter how nice it all is.

SamReidHughes 4 years ago | | |

Nope. The middle class is losing more and more people to the upper class, who are getting wealthier.

NoThisIsMe 4 years ago | | |

For what it's worth, the first Google result for "class statistics US" [0] contradicts this.

[0] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/09/06/the-america...

SamReidHughes 4 years ago | | |

That defines “middle-income” as 2/3 - 2 times median income, which is such a fake definition, and the groups all got wealthier since the 70’s. And even with that, the article is agreeing with me, not contradicting me:

“The recent stability in the share of adults living in middle-income households marks a shift from a decades-long downward trend. From 1971 to 2011, the share of adults in the middle class fell by 10 percentage points. But that shift was not all down the economic ladder. Indeed, the increase in the share of adults who are upper income was greater than the increase in the share who are lower income over that period, a sign of economic progress overall.”

It looks like they’re also cherry-picking a year 2000 baseline in some of their charts.

Iefthandrule 4 years ago | |

They are just working two jobs.

qnsi 4 years ago |

needs a (2020) in the title

footlose_3815 4 years ago |

feb 2020?