The Cultural Contradictions of the Middle Class
The decline of middle-class capital is partly self-inflicted.
Conventional explorations of why the middle class is shrinking focus on economic issues such as the decline of unions and manufacturing, the increasing premiums paid to the highest-paid workers and the rising costs of higher education and healthcare.
All of these factors have a role, but few comment on the non-economic factors, specifically the values that underpin the accumulation of capital that is the one essential project of middle-class households.
Daniel Bell’s landmark 1976 book The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism held that“capitalism–and the culture it creates–harbors the seeds of its own downfall by creating a need among successful people for personal gratification–a need that corrodes the work ethic that led to their success in the first place.”
6. Lifelong learning: human capital is skills and experience. Adding skills and experience takes work, focus, accountability–what I call the eight essential skills in my book Get a Job, Build a Real Career and Defy a Bewildering Economy.
7. Accumulating the social capital of emotional intelligence and trustworthy collaborators.
8. Setting and achieving long-term goals: saving enough money to buy a home or investment property with a 50% down payment, saving enough to pay for college in cash (with the student working part-time in the academic term and full time in summers), etc.
9. The desire to own productive assets rather than unproductive bling such as luxury vehicles or a fancy home.
10. Work-family-leisure balance: avoid burnout and maintain strong family/friends ties.
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