I am a lower middle class white guy in my thirties. I went to college…and grad school. I have a job in a high-skill, high-tech position that I would not have been able to get without my college degree. I received my degree in in the same field in which I now work…something I am very grateful for. But why do I consider myself “lower middle class”? Shouldn’t I be right in the middle somewhere? Let me continue. I purchased a house about a year and a half ago and got a good deal – 4 bedrooms for $82,000, and a decent rate on a 30 year fixed mortgage. We pay less for the mortgage than we were on rent at our previous residence, which was, comparably speaking, a Cracker Jack box. Pretty good, right? Let me continue. I have a 401k, a car, a relatively healthy credit record, etc. So, again why am I “lower middle class”? Here’s why:
I am not financially capable of living independently in this country at this time. A few years ago, I got divorced. It was, as these things usually are, a very devastating event not just for me, but for my entire family. During our marriage, my wife and I had a daughter. My wife got custody, not out of any demonstrable impropriety or lack of ability on my part, but out of a default practice in my state that virtually always gives custody to the mother. I fought it for over a year and lost. As such, I am responsible for a $600 per month child support payment that comes out of my paycheck. My ex-wife, meanwhile, receives this money and continues to live with her parents (going on 5 years now). She has a job. She has no bills. My oldest daughter is five years old, has a cell phone, and more toys than any child could possibly know what to do with…probably more toys than the average Toys ‘R Us keeps in stock during Christmas season…I’m not exaggerating.
I was in graduate school when my first daughter was born. My wife at the time had received her undergraduate degree and had been working. Money was pretty tight at the time we discovered we would be parents so we decided to use student loan money to prepare for the happy event. We bought a crib, nursery decorations, a Diaper Genie, enough diapers to keep our daughter off the toilet until she turned 12, and a whole bunch of other stuff we didn’t immediately need. The spending was irresponsible on both our parts and the very fact that it was based on my student loans was irresponsible on my part specifically. When we eventually got divorced, that debt fell to me in the amount of $30,000. My ex-wife continues to spend money much in the same way…mainly because she can. My payment on those loans is now about $200 per month.
To further complicate things, I was ill at the time my wife and I separated (my illness was the reason she left me). Being a full-time student and not having my own health insurance, I was covered under her insurance. Shortly after leaving, she had me removed from her insurance plan without notifying me. By the time I discovered this, I had about $10,000 in uncovered treatment. As part of the divorce, I was also made fully responsible for this.
Divorce is never easy, and although five years later I still feel it’s negative financial pull, I feel worse for my oldest daughter. The hardship it has caused me, and the lessons I have learned have been largely ridiculed by my ex-wife, often in front of my daughter. It is a constant struggle to instill responsible values in my daughter that I imagine I will be engaged in for the rest of my life.
Since all this, I have managed to establish some degree of normalcy, or at least as much normalcy as I can afford. I have found love again and have another daughter. I have what most would consider to be a good job, health insurance, a car, a house, all the basic building blocks for the American Dream. But right now, the dream is tenuous at best. I cannot afford my home mortgage, my student loan payments, my child support payments, my car payments, and my utility bills on my salary. I have to rely on my soon-to-be wife’s income to help me cover these…along with the costs of raising our child, food, gas, and a ton of other necessities. The truth is, if I lived alone and were still diligent in paying my bills, I would starve to death within a month. I love my family with everything I have, and I am eternally grateful for the love and support they provide me. My past experience, however, has made me paranoid and it is unfair for my family. I am constantly fearful of something bad happening- if I get sick or if I lose my job, then they’ll leave me…then everything will come crashing down. When I think about it rationally, I know it’s not true. My fiance loves me despite my many faults and I her. But the irrational fear is still always with me.
During the past year, I have seen 3 rounds of layoffs at my job. Thankfully, I have survived these so far, but I have not received a raise in two years, nor any bonuses, nor any contributions to my 401k. My 401k (do I need to mention this?) has lost 46% of it’s already meager value…I had only been contributing since I got my job about 3 and a half years ago and have since stopped contributing altogether. Meanwhile, my community has had a massive increase in property tax rates, rising crime, heating costs, plummeting property values, the list goes on and on. I’m now upside-down on my mortgage and fighting off theives (we’ve had one car burglarized and the other stolen entirely) while trying to handle all the other financial obligations I’ve already mentioned. It sucks, but I also realize I’m not the only person having such problems. Far from it…and it could get much worse- I’m now in a situation where if anything else goes badly I will likely lose my home and will join the ever-growing ranks of this nation’s poor.
I voted for Barack Obama for president and was (still am) ecstatic that he won. I did so with my current economic situation in mind, but also after having carefully considered how my own situation fit within the direction the country has been going over the last decade. As it is, it is extremely difficult for someone in my situation to dig themselves out. Interest rates on student loans have risen, credit card rates have risen to the point where they’re no longer an option for temporary funding to cover emergencies, etc., home prices have dropped, jobs are being lost, retirement funds are shrinking, and wages are stagnant. That’s one end (my end) of the economic scale, which constitutes about 95% of our country’s populace. On the other end, we’ve had huge tax cuts for people who need them least, the greed of the oil speculators that inflated gas prices for the rest of us to the point that it became difficult to afford the cost of driving to work, ballooning executive compensation (even in failing companies like Enron), war profiteering, market manipulation, insider trading. It’s the kind of environment that hearkens back to the establishment of an old-style aristocracy where the rich have the power, and through their power (and the access to power that their money affords them) laws are passed to consolidate and increase that money and power. Take the elimination of the estate tax (or “death tax” as the conservatives like to call it). Inheritances of over $10 million are not subject to tax, but someone who works their ass off to earn $10 million on their own has to pay tax on that income the whole way. How many schools or roads or libraries or museums could be built if people inheriting large sums of money were obligated to pay the same taxes as the rest of us? How much publicly-funded cancer research could be done? How much would it help with fixing Social Security or Medicare? It became clear to me that the Republicans in power had no interest in promoting the welfare of the average American. Their interest was where the money was.
A surprising fact about this past campaign season is that the Obama campaign out-fundraised the Republican campaign by such a huge margin. What it boils down to is the fact that most Americans are fed up with what has transpired under the Republicans. They not only spoke out with their votes, but here in the blogs, and with their wallets. Prior to this campaign, I had never written a blog, nor had I ever contributed money to a political campaign. But the issues at stake in this past campaign prompted me to do both for the first time. My blogs, such as they are, can be seen here, and I was able to scrape up $50 to send to the Obama campaign. I saw it as an investment in the future and based on what I am seeing from Obama and his transition team, it is the one investment in my portfolio that I have confidence in. He is genuinely interested in listening to people with differing views, involving them in the process, and working for equitable compromises.
I don’t expect the policies enacted and laws passed in the coming four years to in some way absolve me of my financial obligations. Far from it. But what I DO expect is for the architecture to be put in place that will give me an avenue to better my position and provide my children with the opportunity to build upon what I am able to provide them. I want the creation of more jobs in key areas, particularly in the overhaul of our energy infrastructure. I want a health care system that doesn’t crush me when I or my children get sick. I want an education system that isn’t based solely on throwing money at problems, but provides better incentives to attract more of our most talented people to be teachers in our most needy communities and removes teachers who don’t meet the standard. I want a government that won’t invade countries without cause or provocation, leaving us with an obligation to fix the mess we’ve wrongly created. There’s a lot of work to do to get the country out of this, but I’m more than willing to do my part.
For all the bad things that have happened to me personally and to the country in general, I am optimistic that the government now taking shape will help make things a little better for all of us. Bad luck will still strike us occassionally. We’ll all continue to make bad decisions from time to time. But those circumstances don’t have to ruin your life and prevent you or your children from doing better in the future. I am convinced that Barack Obama understands this and I am proud to have voted for him.
