The Newly Poor – The New Normal 9-28-10

Anderson, South Carolina

The American national psyche has long obtained some sort of self-satisfaction from believing America is the richest most powerful nation in human history. That may have once been objectively true, in terms of per capital income, military throw-power, ad infinitum. There is growing evidence to suggest this may be a belief in need of tweaking. Throughout Western civilization there may be increasing need of self evaluation and assessment –are we really heading where we want to be going?

A new reality in America suggests many of us are simply never going to have gainful employment again. Those of us over age fifty are being marginalized at an astounding rate. At the very same time more people are being forced to extend their working years into old age, many seniors are facing the prospect of permanent unemployment. For ten years I,ve been unemployed, having crossed the age ceiling a decade ago. For five years my applications for jobs in many disciplines across the land and a willingness to work almost for free never yielded a single interview. Seventeen years of education and thirty years of experience is yielding no financial return for me. There’s hardly a person on my street in a conventional full-time job with benefits. Many of those finding new jobs are taking pay at a third to half of what they once earned; sans benefits. In 2009 a fifth of Americans suffered a 25% drop in household income. Competition with cheap overseas labor has become a daily reality in the home land.

For two decades the media and so-called experts have used a sound bite to described structural changes in American culture – ‘the new normal.’ Two-parent households unaffected by divorce became an anomaly. Children born outside of marriage have become the rule in many areas. College graduates used to graduate with degrees. They now graduate with a mountain of debt.

The phenomenon of permanently unemployed people has been fodder for national debates about the merits of welfare programs. Structural changes in the global economy make the phenomenon much ominous. Estimates are of 250,000 households existing in England where no adult has ever held a paid job. Even with its long-standing national policy of providing robust social safety nets, The United Kingdom is facing something bigger than it can handle. On this side of the Atlantic it has been easy as the most prosperous and powerful nation ever to smugly point fingers at socialist policies as deservedly failing. On this side of the Atlantic increasing numbers of families have never had a working adult in them. Three fingers are pointing back at ourselves.

A new sound bite has come on the American horizon in the past year – the newly poor. Individuals once settled into full-time jobs with benefits, driving their minivans and European sedans between downtown and the suburbs, are losing their houses, jobs, and any sense of personal security. People long accustomed to the comforts of middle-class life are now relying on public assistance for the first time in their lives — potentially for years to come. They are the newly poor – admitted to a harsh form of life education that is daunting at best. Individuals who once worked and want to work are now being sidelined, perhaps permanently.

Every downturn pushes some people out of the middle class before the economy resumes expanding. Most recover. Many prosper. But some economists worry that this time could be different. An unusual constellation of forces — some embedded in the modern-day economy, others unique to this wrenching recession — might make it especially difficult for those out of work to find their way back to their middle-class lives. Labor experts say the economy needs 100,000 new jobs a month just to absorb entrants to the labor force. With more than 15 million people officially jobless, even a vigorous recovery is likely to leave an enormous number out of work for years.

In a culture where self-worth and identity have long derived from what we do to earn money, from what we own, permanent unemployment is a gateway to a broad spectrum of social challenges – exacerbation of mental health issues, increasing domestic violence, rising prevalence of substance abuse, disruption of neighborhoods, unintended mobility, a general malaise and despair of the soul. In a rapidly secularizing culture with declining participation in religious communities concurrent with ever-increasing materialistic focus, many individuals are finding themselves wanting for effective coping mechanisms to deal with deep and broad paradigm shifts in their daily lives.

According to the Ontario Consultants on Religious tolerance the percentage of American adults who identify themselves as Christians dropped from 86% in 1990 to 77% in 2001; an unprecedented drop of almost 1 percentage point per year. American adults who identify themselves as Protestants dropped below 50% about the year 2005. Ever increasing numbers of people identify themselves as agnostics, atheists, or secularists. From 1992 to 2003, average attendance at a typical church service has dropped by 13% whereas the population of America has increased by 9%. In subsequent years declines in participation have continued unabated.

A 2006 online Harris Poll of 2,010 U.S. adults (18 and older) found only 26% of those surveyed attended religious services "every week or more often", 9% went "once or twice a month", 21% went "a few times a year", 3% went "once a year", 22% went "less than once a year", and 18% never attend religious services. If valid, this suggests little more that quarter of the population is benefiting from the accountability, socialization, sense of inclusion, and security that can accrue from regular involvement with like-minded people. Such context is highly beneficial for those struggling with major structural changes in their lives. Seventy-five years ago, even the writings of the nascent twelve-step recovery programs suggested regular participation in ‘religious bodies’ was a most helpful adjunct to getting one’s life back on course.

We might be getting poorer in ways that really matter and they have nothing to do with money. Just where are we putting our time and treasures?