The Great Challenge of Our Time: Re-Creating America's Great Middle Class

By Marie Cocco, Washington Post Writers Group
Posted on October 14, 2009, Printed on October 15, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/story/143284/

The challenge of our time is to re-create America as a middle-class nation.

The idea does not find voice in the cacophony of the 24-hour news cycle. It has no place in the media's daily digest of gossip, false controversy and ideological cant. It is barely mentioned in the halls of power, where the very officials who capitalize on the economic angst of working people to win election forget that this raw anguish -- not the sophisticated arguments of lobbyists and campaign donors -- is supposed to motivate them every day.

It is easy to blame the financial crisis, Wall Street's breathtaking bonuses or the culture of excess that glittered until we found ourselves on the precipice of a second Great Depression. In truth, we've been dismantling the economic foundation of the middle class for more than three decades.