- Do you believe that if people work hard enough, they will achieve success?
At the
beginning of his article, Edward McClelland tells us a story that his history
teacher told at an era him where people without education could still earn a
huge amount of money. He then argues
that the middle class from the 70’s and
80’s are dying by telling us a story about how a couple who were in the middle
class back then and how have their lives been changed today. He claims that the cause of this is the
irresponsible government and we need more government interaction in the
market. He claims this idea by listing
the political trend since Nixon who he thinks is the “last president who had a
plan for protecting American workers from the vicissitudes of the global
economy.” By doing that, he points out
that only when the government steps in and regulate the market on a certain
level, the economy can grow back again and so will the middle class.
In the
From Nickle and Dimed article, the author Barbara Ehrenreich just simply tells
us a story about her experience to work as a cleaner in a company called The
Maids. She introduces what she has
experienced during her first week working time as someone who is new to the
position. She describes some of her
coworkers’ backgrounds that they are not homeless but they can’t even put up $2
together. In detail, she compares the
different environment one of her coworker’s kids are in and Mrs. W’s who is way
more rich than her coworker. Furthermore,
she also introduces how the company values them and how some of the customers value
them as well to which they are basically treated like machines. Overall, she has not commented on any of
thing she has done during the first weak, but she blames the society where people
who are in the lowest class experience so differently with people who are from
a higher class based on what she has experienced.
In the article by Edward McClelland RIP, the Middle Class: 1946-2013 McClelland expresses just how much economics has changed throughout society. McClelland portrays the economic balance in the 70’s as one that is a thriving culture not based solely upon the classes in which people fall under. The middle class as he explains begins to slowly fade as the decade of the 70’s turns into the 80’s. McClelland then begins to compare this economic equality that once existed to the society we live in. One where 18-year-olds cannot graduate from high school and then go on to make that of a college graduate. McClelland admits that America will never again be as economically inclined as we once were during the 50’s and 60’s decades.
ReplyDeleteWithin the article From Nickel and Dimed, written by Barbara Ehrenreich the audience is told a story through the eyes of a maid. According to Ehrenreich the maids who work for a specific service are expected to work very rigorously for very little in return. Ehrenreich expresses that when promised thirty minute lunch breaks she was really given five. She also tells of how the calories in which they worked off could barely be replenished along with all the electrolytes the maids would sweat off during just one room. Along with these thing Ehrenreich plainly says that she doesn’t believe how under paid the maids are, but how doing a freelancing job would require her own resources. Ehrenreich altogether shares this story of how hard it has become to have a job that pays well.