Everybody agrees that the rich have been getting even richer in recent years. But what about all the rest of us? Unfortunately, it turns out that flooding the system with money was really good for the wealthy, but it has made things much worse for almost everyone else. Poverty is rapidly growing all around us and the middle class is being systematically eviscerated. If you doubt this, can you explain why the number of Americans dealing with food insecurity has almost doubled over the past four years? And can you explain why store closings in the U.S. are on pace to set a new all-time record? The middle class simply does not have the same level of discretionary income that it once did. Today, we live in a country where 70 percent of the population feels very financially stressed. If you are in the segment of the population that is doing really well right now, good for you. But you need to understand that most of the country is really hurting.
Once upon a time, the U.S. had the largest and most prosperous middle class in the history of the world. But according to the Pew Research Center, the percentage of Americans that are considered to be “middle class” is a lot smaller than it once was…
Pew Research Center defines the middle class as a household with income that is at least two-thirds of the U.S. median income to double the median income. This would imply a range of incomes from $56,600 to $169,800, based on government data for 2022.
As of 2023, 51% of American households fit into this category.
But, most Americans might not be aware that this cohort of middle-income earners is getting squeezed. Roughly 61% of households across the country were part of this group in 1971 — a full 10 percentage points higher than the recent 51% rate.
Even if you still have a place in the middle class, there is a very good chance that you are not doing as well as you once did.
If you find yourself in that situation, I want you to know that you definitely are not alone.
Today, so many Americans are just barely scraping by from month to month. In fact, one recent survey found that 48 percent of Americans are “constantly treading water financially”…
A recent survey by the National Foundation for Credit Counseling (NFCC) found that 53% of U.S. adults feel like they can’t make financial progress and 48% say they are “constantly treading water financially.”
Our seemingly endless cost of living crisis is responsible for the pain that we are currently enduring.
Even if you have a full-time job, it is often not enough.
So Americans are increasingly turning to side hustles to make ends meet.
In fact, a recent survey discovered that 40 percent of U.S. adults now have at least one side hustle…
A March LendingTree survey showed that 40% of Americans have a side hustle as the cost of living increases. Most of them, about 61% of those who have one, say their life would be unaffordable without it.
“The sad truth is that life is crazy-expensive in 2025, and for many people, their 9-to-5 job just isn’t enough for them to live comfortably,” LendingTree chief credit analyst Matt Schultz told FOX Business.
Approximately a third of side hustlers say they have one due to cost-of-living expenses, while 29% say they need the money for bills and 28% say it’s used for discretionary income. When asked what the driver was for starting their side hustle, almost half of them said the current economy.
Thanks to the reckless policies of our leaders, Americans have to keep working harder and harder just to pay the bills.
Sadly, the employment marketplace is really starting to dry up and large employers have started to conduct mass layoffs all over the nation. In recent weeks I have provided numerous examples of this, and today I have some more to share with you.
We just learned that Coca-Cola has decided to permanently shut down five production and distribution facilities…
Coca-Cola is closing five production and distribution sites across the U.S., a move that will leave nearly 900 workers without jobs and mark one of the company’s largest waves of domestic layoffs in recent memory.
If the economy was doing well, this wouldn’t be happening.
But it is happening, and hundreds of hard working men and women will soon be looking for new employment…
In American Canyon, California, 135 jobs vanished when a massive 350,000-square-foot facility shut down at the end of June. A similar story is playing out in Salinas, where 81 more will be out of work by August. Florida already saw its Dunedin plant go dark in May—200 employees affected there. And earlier this year, Modesto lost a bottling center, along with 101 jobs. The biggest hit may still be coming: in Northampton, Massachusetts, 319 positions hang in limbo as the plant there inches closer to a long-delayed closure.
Intel is another large corporation that is suddenly shedding workers…
Intel this month officially began to cut down its workforce in the U.S. and other countries, thus revealing actual numbers of positions to be cut. The Oregonian reports that the company will cut as many as 2,392 positions in Oregon and around 4,000 positions across its American operations, including Arizona, California, and Texas.
To put the 2,392 number into context, Intel is the largest employer in Oregon with around 20,000 of workers there.
I wish that I could tell you that this is just temporary.
But everyone knows that lots of jobs will be lost to AI in the months and years ahead.
In fact, Goldman Sachs has projected that the equivalent of 300 million full-time jobs could be lost to AI…
Goldman Sachs predicts AI could replace the equivalent of 300 million full-time jobs. But Nathan Pettyjohn, who uses AI to run four companies in just two days per week, says the real story isn’t about replacement — it’s about evolution.
“Andrew Ng said AI is the new electricity,” notes Pettyjohn, CEO of The Applied AI Association and author of AI Wants Your Job. “But unlike electricity, which simply powered existing processes, AI fundamentally redesigns them. The winners will be those who redesign first.”
What are we going to do if that projection is even close to accurate?
We could just start funneling millions of workers into government jobs, but the truth is that we can’t afford to do that.
The federal government has already been spending so much money that the national debt is on pace to reach 54 trillion dollars a decade from now…
The latest findings from the Congressional Budget Office indicate that the national debt will grow to an astonishing $54 trillion in the next decade, the result of an aging population and rising federal healthcare costs. Higher interest rates are also compounding the pain of higher debt.
Of course we will never actually see the national debt hit 54 trillion dollars.
Our entire system will completely collapse before we get to that point.
We have been slowly committing national suicide for a long time.
Now the consequences are really starting to catch up with us, and a whole lot more pain is ahead.
Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.
About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing. You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter. Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites. These are such troubled times, and people need hope. John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.