So how do we get a middle class back?

[begin_within]

What would it take for a large, stable, real middle class to come back in the U.S.?

[Kennah]

1. Tax increases, tariffs, manufacturing, a couple of decades, for starters.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

2. Demand that hefty tariffs be charged for all products NOT manufactured here.

Suddenly we'll have jobs here out the wazoo.

[OhioChick]

6. +1000 n/t

[SugarShack]

19. Close offshoring/outsourcing loopholes, and jobs will come back as quick as they left!

When everyone is working again...paying taxes....and spending...and not afraid to take a loan for a kitchen..cuz they know their job is safe...then we'll have a middle class. We need JOBS.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

20. ABSOLUTELY! nt

[sakabatou]

3. Eisenhower-type public works projects

[Safetykitten]

15. Agree. A nationwide high speed rail would do nicely.

[LostInAnomie]

4. Tariffs

[DefenseLawyer]

5. We must suspend "free trade"

We can't allow multinational corporations to flood the united states with products made by people making $3 a week. Wages, not jobs, are the key to renewal of the middle class.

[Ozymanithrax]

7. Join a union and fight for decent wages, good working hours, and benefits...

That's how we got it the first time.

[DefenseLawyer]

8. As long as companies can move to the third world

and face no penalties for replacing American workers with slave labor, all the organizing in the world won't change much of anything.

[Ozymanithrax]

10. Organizing can not hurt.

It is better than crying because the big bad companies took the jobs away.

[Modern_Matthew]

9. Let's get rid of classes altogether. *GASP* nt

[begin_within]

14. We were supposed to be a "classless society"

but somehow that didn't work out.

[Armstead]

11. Change our basic values as a nation and stop supporting and enabling immoral bullshit

That's pretty much what it boils down to.

When I say basic values, I mainly mean the atrocious culture of greed and apathetic self-indulgence that has taken hold at all level since the 1980s.

Not only at the top, but among all of us at all levels. This is our collective fault as a nation.

[begin_within]

17. I think that culture of greed and apathetic self-indulgence has been here since

the arrival of Europeans in this hemisphere...

[Name removed]

18. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[begin_within]

23. Alerted moderators to that.

Personal attacks are a violation of forum rules.

[dissidentboomer]

24. It was an attack on your response.

[StarsInHerHair]

12. become a precinct committee member in your area 1st, you decide who gets on ballots

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nczt5cN8hd4&feature=youtu.be

http://theprecinctproject.wordpress.com/category/becoming-a-precinct-committeeman-step-by-step/

[MzShantal]

13. For starters, how about

taking a page from the teabaggers hostage taking handbook and congress' leave the FAA and 70,000 workers hanging and go on vacation handbook take all of your money out of big banks and put it a safety deposit box or credit union and, with the exception of essential services, e.g., hospitals, police and fire departments, go on a nation-wide vacation until more jobs are created here in America and give us back our bailout money.

[mmonk]

16. Find a country that has one it intends to keep.

[Karmadillo]

21. Citizens willing to make the oligarchy afraid of them.

nt

[BeFree]

22. $1 A gallon gas

Its the same oil that has been in the ground for a million years.
When it went past a dollar a gallon the middle class began shrinking.
At $4 a gallon we imploded.

[Harmony Blue]

25. It must first be clearly defined as a starting point

then, from there you can build a case on how to sustain, and build a middle class. Currently, the U.S. has a middle class that is tiny compared to lets say, Canada.

[Golden Raisin]

26. I don't think it's possible,

The damage is like cancer and already too severe. But the following would have helped:

- Repeal NAFTA
- Bring back Glass-Steagall
- Bring back Fairness Doctrine
- Stop our insanely wasteful foreign wars
- Appropriately tax the very wealthy
- Paper ballots counted by human beings

P.S.: I don't see any of the above being enacted anytime soon by either a Republican or Democratic administration/congress.