In a world of more educated workers needed dealing with robots in the workplaces, the knowledge economy with low wages and a big income divide shows up in many fails. Like running in a circle chasing your tail the Gig Economy with broke people around you! It's not sustainable! The question comes up how much tomato juice can you get out of a sun dried tomato? Those 1%ers took the juice!
So, Just another minimum wage retiree common now. Not being able to get into the middle class. Or lowering the middle class to if you walk without a car or have a unsafe one! It's a bad time for everyone with depression, drugs and a bunch of stupid out there. Well look around you be more self aware and notice the lack of safety nets for people as they go down the main road in a wheel chair. Sad!
The income divide is causing the social problems people have today! There is just not enough money for the people out there today so they just act accordingly and so is like quicksand for others!
~~~~~Many Gen Xers desolate as they reach middle age, study says
Despair runs rampant through Generation X as these Americans struggle through middle age, a new study reports.
So-called indicators of despair -- depression, suicide, drug and alcohol abuse -- are rising among those in their late 30s and early 40s, and it's occurring across-the-board, researchers say.
On the other hand, Generation X might be reflecting overall societal trends that have led Americans to feel hopeless and helpless.
These include the erosion of the middle class, declines in traditional family structures and social cohesion, and the highly acidic level of national politics, Gaydosh said.
Katz points to societal trends as a more likely cause.
"My list includes divisive politics, the elevation of racism and xenophobia, the ever-widening disparities our culture propagates, and of course the truly ominous implications of climate change hanging over all of our hopes for the future," Katz said.
Gaydosh said that small-scale efforts to combat the symptoms of despair, such as alcohol treatment programs, may not be enough.
"From what I've learned, it seems when you address one symptom, these underlying causes manifest themselves in other ways," Gaydosh said. "Addressing the underlying structural causes is really the only way to improve the health of all Americans. Otherwise, it's like a game of whack-a-mole."
https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2019/04/23/Many-Gen-Xers-desolate-as-they-reach-middle-age-study-says/1081556022199/?ts_=16
~~~~~Stop Pretending You Don't Know Why Millennials Are Mad About Student Debt
Before we get to work dispensing these arguments, it’s important to acknowledge that they are, on some level, understandable. A lot of Americans, especially those who got their bachelor’s degree before the early 2000s, find it baffling that younger generations can’t work their way through college. If the costs are so immense and the debt is so burdensome, why can’t young people simply choose not to attend college at all?
The answer is that for young Americans, skipping college or working your way through it are both much less viable options than they used to be.
Over the last 20 years, getting a bachelor’s degree has become more essential than ever. College-educated workers earn more than twice as much as high school graduates. Last year, nine out of 10 new jobs went to workers with university diplomas. From unemployment to job security to workplace benefits, the gap between college-educated and non-college-educated workers is wide and growing.
Over the last 20 years, getting a bachelor’s degree has become more essential than ever. College-educated workers earn more than twice as much as high school graduates. Last year, nine out of 10 new jobs went to workers with university diplomas. From unemployment to job security to workplace benefits, the gap between college-educated and non-college-educated workers is wide and growing.
On Monday, Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren proposed a plan to cancel current student debt and make public college free. But as college has become more necessary, it has also become more expensive. Since 1989, the average cost of attending a four-year university has risen almost eight times faster than wages. Thirty years ago, when a college degree cost less than $10,000 per year (yes, that’s adjusted for inflation), students could work 10 or 15 hours a week and make a meaningful dent in their fees. These days, a part-time job at the federal minimum wage barely covers the price of textbooks.
Taken together, these trends leave many young Americans feeling trapped. If they don’t go to college, they have little chance of getting a steady, well-paying job. If they do go to college they’ll be on the hook for tens of thousands of dollars in student loans.
This calculation hurts low-income and minority students the most. Nearly 90 percent of African-American students take out loans to attend public universities, compared to around 60 percent of white students. After college is over, minority students earn less and are more likely to default on their loans.
While it may be a foreign concept to the Americans who didn’t go through it themselves, the high cost of college profoundly shapes the lives of young workers. Student loans are the only form of debt that can’t be vacated in bankruptcy. They impose hundreds (sometimes thousands) of dollars in monthly fees on young workers at the most vulnerable stage of their careers. College grads enter and leave professions on the basis of whether they will be eligible for loan forgiveness (and are understandably livid when it doesn’t come through).
But the biggest impact of student loans may be on those who decide not to apply for them at all. In contrast to the over-educated stereotype, most young people did not go to college. In a survey last year, 70 percent of millennials said finances played a role in their decision about whether and where to attend university. In the middle of an economic recovery that so far has delivered most of its benefits to the college-educated, erecting a financial wall around higher education could leave millions of Americans behind.
So however you feel about the specifics of Warren’s plan, it’s important to acknowledge the reality that young people face. There’s little evidence to suggest that millennials differ from previous generations in moral values or work ethic. There is abundant evidence, however, that they inherited vastly different economic and educational conditions than their parents.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/stop-feigning-ignorance-about-why-millennials-are-mad-about-student-debt_n_5cbf270be4b0f7a84a755c47
~~~~~The Truth About the Gig Economy
Last week two influential labor economists revised down their much-cited estimate of the size of the alternative workforce, meaning workers in temporary, on-call, contract, or freelance positions. Lawrence Katz of Harvard and Alan Krueger of Princeton had initially found that this workforce grew five percentage points in the decade up to 2015, accounting for nearly all job creation over that time period. Now they think it is more like one or two points. Their correction comes shortly after a major government survey—one that surprised a lot of labor and workforce experts—found that 3.8 percent of workers held “contingent” jobs as of 2017, roughly the same share as in 2005.
There’s another reason why a false narrative might have hold: Gig work is vastly more prevalent in the big coastal cities where many investors and journalists live, leading to a kind of media myopia about the scale of the phenomenon. And gig work seemed like the future. It suddenly appeared during the brutal years following the financial crisis, at the same time that declining unionization rates, widening inequality, and the spiraling cost-of-living crisis, among other trends, were battering working families. Given widespread fears about the ways that automation and technology might further shock the American workplace, it just stood to reason that in the coming dystopia, everyone would have to settle for “jobs” with little security, low pay, and no benefits.
The gig economy isn’t taking over, but it has become a useful emblem of what it is like to work for a living in late-stage capitalism. No wonder it seemed to be everywhere.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/01/gig-economy-isnt-really-taking-over/580180
