To the editor,
It is clear after the re-election of Trump that the Liberals have made the same mistake the Democrats did by the misjudgment that over half the population is really the working class and not middle class and they have been basically passed by any improvement in the economy since COVID.
It may not be as bad as in the states here, but working people are suffering here as well. Again the government figures all workers have benefited by the improving economic conditions were but as can be seen from an article by Micheal Mechanic of Mother Jones just after Trump was elected this November:
There is little that leaves people as ticked off and frustrated as the feeling that no matter how hard they work, they can’t ever seem to get ahead. And this feeling has been slowly festering since the 1980s, when Ronald Reagan and his cadre of supply-side economists launched the first salvos in what would become the great screwing-over of the American middle and working classes.
From further on in the same article Michael states: In short, half of the people living in the richest nation on the planet have no wealth at all.
Further in the article he states: They’re not doing so hot income-wise, either. In September, the Congressional Budget Office reported that average income of the highest-earning one per cent of taxpayers in 2021 was more than $3.1 million, or 42 times the average income of households in the bottom 90 percent, according to the nonprofit Americans for Tax Fairness. That’s the most skewed income distribution since CBO began reporting this data in 1979, the group noted. Back then, the disparity was only 12 to 1.
We can see why people voted Trump as the economy has done nothing for working people. The same as here. A house purchased in Ajax, say 25 yrs ago, for $180,000 is now worth $1.3 million, but to replace that house suddenly you need $1.5 million which means you really don’t have wealth you just have a place you really can’t afford. Newcomers and younger people can’t even considering buying in Ajax, but governments say everything is improving. For whom? The only winners today are the one per cent who own everything. Working people need help now not platitudes of having our backs.
Ross Singleton,
Thunder Bay
