Middle Class

The bankruptcy of the original everything store tells us a lot about where America is going.

Lessons from Aristotle for American self-government.

There are plenty of understandable objections to the tax bill sailing through Congress. Some people think it will increase the deficit. Others cry foul that it is being rushed through without sufficient deliberation. And there are those who like big government and frankly oppose the idea of letting…

Now it can be told: In 1968, I was one of those who got “clean for Gene.” I cut my hair and put on a jacket and tie to campaign for Senator Eugene McCarthy in the Democratic primaries of that year. Those of us who did so understood without having to have the matter explained to us that we were…

If the president’s tax plan is enacted, it will go down in history as the Trump Tax Cut of 2017. And it should, for both the tax reductions and the strategy for enacting them reflect his personal intervention and desires.

Donald Trump's recent sojourn in the Middle East leaves the United States where it was before the president departed: His administration remains committed to containing Iran while philosophically adopting a pre-9/11 approach to combating Sunni Islamic militancy. Sunni Arab leaders have reason to be…

Donald Trump's recent sojourn in the Middle East leaves the United States where it was before the president departed: His administration remains committed to containing Iran while philosophically adopting a pre-9/11 approach to combating Sunni Islamic militancy. Sunni Arab leaders have reason to be…

Barack Obama says part of the problem with continued poverty in America is misplaced middle-class resentment of the poor, fueled by false media narratives. The president made his remarks at a summit on poverty Tuesday afternoon at Georgetown University in Washington.

President Obama can’t run again, as he noted in the State of the Union last month, but he sought to use his address to set the tone for the 2016 campaign. His repeated references to “middle-class economics” were tactful code, speaking in front of a Republican-controlled Congress, for that perennial…

Congressional Republicans can reasonably be accused of prioritizing issues about which middle-class voters care little. The president can reasonably be said to have his priorities perfectly in order, with counterproductive proposals that won’t achieve them.

We know that supply-side economics emphasizes serious cuts in tax rates and Keynesianism relies on massive amounts of government spending.  But how in the world does “middle class economics” work?  After President Obama cited it repeatedly in State of the Union speech, I waited and waited for him…

Democrats lost white voters without college degrees—a big chunk of the middle class and an important swing vote—by huge margins this month. Why?

As Republican euphoria over the November 4 election begins to subside and more practical considerations emerge, a looming question is whether the various factions within the Republican party will be able to work together.  One recent but little-noted change in Senate leadership may have increased…

Whether or not Jeff Bell comes from behind to win the New Jersey Senate race, he deserves credit for having run a classy, ideas-focused race. That's epitomized by his "closing argument," reproduced below. If a majority of New Jersey voters actually read this email, I do think Bell would win. The…

Vice President Joe Biden talked about the trouble the middle class is having during the Barack Obama presidency at an event earlier today in Philadelphia:

Pundits throw out all sorts of numbers to explain the Republican defeat in the 2012 presidential election. So here’s our number: $65,000. That is a rough estimate of the household income of the average 2012 voter. Republicans lost because Mitt Romney did not do well enough with this voter or those…

The WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with staff writer Jay Cost on his recent story "Speak for Middle America."

A group of House Republicans has written a letter to Barack Obama to warn that the immigration bill he supports will have an adverse effect on American workers. The immigration bill will, the letter writers say, lead to an increase in unemployment and poverty, help collapse the middle class, and…

The Wall Street Journal editors are unhappy about the present correlation of political forces. Who isn't? They're also, I gather, unhappy about "Beltway sages" who, facing the fact that the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of this year, have suggested Republicans accept a modest increase in tax…

Ryan Streeter writes:

Vice President Joe Biden said the middle class "has been buried the last four years" at a campaign event in Charlotte, North Carolina:

Two months ago, Vice President Joe Biden said on the campaign trail that he is "tired of being called a 'Middle Class Joe.'" But since he's the owner of a home valued at about $2,856,950, and since he's the vice president of the United States, this didn't quite ring true. 

The latest Mitt Romney campaign web advertisement asks, "Has there ever been a president so out of touch with the middle class?"

Ladies and gentlemen, prepare for battle! The 2012 campaign is shaping up to be a struggle over which candidate best represents the interests and aspirations of the American middle class. Unable to run on his record, President Obama wants to recast the election as a choice between stolid defender…

By a colossal margin, middle class Americans want Obamacare to be repealed.  The latest Rasmussen poll of likely voters shows that, among those who make between $40,000 and $60,000 a year, a whopping 68 percent support the repeal of Obamacare, while only 27 percent oppose it — a margin of 41…

Politico reports that Warren Buffett’s idea of tax reform is apparently quite different from President Obama’s. Buffett says he would raise taxes on those with “very high incomes that are taxed very low,” but not on those making annual salaries of $50 million.

In his recently released deficit plan, President Obama lays out the “Buffett Rule” (named, of course, for Warren Buffett, the famous investor and supporter of Obama). The rule, as Obama defines it, is “that people making more than $1 million a year should not pay a smaller share of their income in…

In the New York Times, David Leonhardt discusses what he calls “a popular talking point on cable television and talk radio”—that 47 percent of Americans no longer pay any income tax. Leonhardt grants the point—“The 47 percent figure is not wrong”—but adds, “Over the last 30 years, rates have fallen…