Every four years we continue to have politicians ask American voters during a Presidential election cycle; “Why does nothing change in life for generations of Americans?”
The reality comes in the form of hard data and not the political non-sense politicians and mass media continue to run wild about during election seasons. Answers lie within the fact we continue to ignore basic research that is hard to deal with along with our own everyday life drama.
The facts continue to indicate from research conducted by Pew Charitable Trust and other research projects that very few Americans and their children move out of their birth class. Research indicates that more Americans and their children move between lower-income to middle-class than middle-class into higher income brackets or into the super wealthy category.
This dynamic doesn’t mean success or happiness cannot be achieved, but we continue to allow the non-sense that happiness and success has to be based on money and society status. Unfortunately, politicians and the media outlets that support their campaigns for generations have created political insanity around the happiness and success of millions of Americans for political careers and an industry’s ability to make money.
The topics that create stability in a society seem to have been forgotten. Do Americans have problems with creating stability? Oh, heck yes, and the problems are growing.
African-American inner city children continue to receive failed leadership after 50+ years. Children in rural America of all ethnicities continue to lack ethical adult leadership after 50+ years. We cannot continue to ignore the data indicating lower-income households are on the increase according to Pew Research Center (2015) data on American Middle Class losing ground. There is absolutely no reason that middle-class America living standards can’t be obtained.
Who in their right mind thinks poverty, low job growth, an unstable economy, retired women living in poverty, and ongoing discrimination in the most developed nation in the world would exist at the levels it does in 2016?
The results all flow back to the political class and their inabilities to govern.
Today, according the national debt clock, Americans are $19 trillion in debt with no hope in sight. Yet, Americans keep re-electing the same political employees.
Who pays the bills?
History will always repeat if individuals do not learn how to read and critically think about what the media decides to place into the 3-second time slot of news from political campaigns. News that has never been and most likely will never be based on the most truthful information.
Certainly we are constantly fed data that are more opinion than fact. As you note, Chris, what facts we do get from government or media have been carefully laundered and massaged to show a particular opinion or view.
It seems to me that one missing element that has become common in our society is responsibility. Not just responsibility of those people and entities publishing data, but also the responsibility of individuals to think and study and analyse that data for truth and validity. Too many just accept what is presented as truth.
I see a trend where rhetoric based information is outpacing evidence base information. Rhetoric based information is information constructed to support a narrative from a specific lens. If there is any factual information, the information has gone through the spin cycle so much that the facts are at least taken out of context or at most unrecognizable.
Politics does this. Media does this. Social justice does this.
To obtain objective information, we have to dig deep, really deep into our searches to find credible sources. And each year, this is getting harder and harder to do.
Truth doesn’t trend on Twitter.