Our world has become disorienting to me. What were certainties are no longer so firmly held to be true. How has it come to this state of affairs in the course of my 78 years of living in the United States of America?
As a Baby Boomer, I lived in the most prosperous time to be a white working class man. I witnessed the inclusion of diverse groups of workers over the decades leading up to this era of divisiveness and discord. I sensed changes in that veneer of prosperity beginning in 1980.
Trickle down economics has led to a flood of economic benefits going up to a small class of individuals who earn wealth through means that are not accessible to a large swath of American workers. Numerous sources point out in graphic detail the disparity in income and overall wealth that has eluded those people who attempt to survive on the effluent of the affluent. It is a shitty way to live.
Many have argued about the issues of raising the minimum wage, the impact of women and immigrants entering the workforce and the threats of automation and AI causing the problems we face. They are not the cause, they are the results of an economic ideology that has clearly failed to benefit any but the crafters of the policies in place right now. We have the best democracy money can buy.
No one political party created, nor can they solve, the problems we face at this critical juncture in our country. The wealthy elites rigged the game in their favor once money was equated as a form of free speech. We can change that.
Similar issues faced my parents’ generation during the Great Depression. The Robber Barons rigged the game in their favor at the end of the 18th century. We have more access to information, and to one another, that allows us to mobilize and vote for new candidates who truly have our best interest at heart.
I will share more on this topic as we embark upon our journey On The Road to New Solutions.