Do you think that America has been living beyond its means for years and only now is starting to see it?

Yes, but so has almost all the rest of the developed world as well.

Yes but they did not know it. America has experienced many perks that are considered beyond needs at fair and in some cases great prices. The problem with the American habit is that they want these perks now instead of waiting for the price to drop. The Iphone is a good example. Flat screens is another example. In my country, when flat screens came out, who could afford one got one but most people just enjoyed the ability to finally afford that big screen CRT tv at a 50% reduced price instead of spending our savings or paying terms with excessive interest rates. Half the things that people have in America has interest attached to it. The interest is what I think should be beyond everyone’s means, no matter where you live. If you cannot afford it today…….buy it tomorrow.

Yes

To an extent, yes. It has been going on since Reagan was president in the 80s. Jimmy Carter had tried to set a tone of conservation and renewable energy. Reagan came in, took down the solar panels of the White House that carter put up, and began slashing taxes, spending huge amounts of money, and running up our largest deficits to date. He also began eliminating tarrifs and other trade barriers meant to protect american jobs, and that caused countries to move their operations oversees. That resulted in the loss of a lot of well paying jobs. Salaries did not rise as fast as inflation, so amercans were making less, but they were encouraged to go out and spend spend spend. And it created an artifical bubble for the next 25 years that finally popped in 2007, and it all came crashing down. Now Americans are forced to adjust their spending habits, because they don’t have nearly as much money as they thought.

This was all due to corrupt government and corporate greeed.

Sorry meant to say “and that caused COMAPNIES to move their operations oversees.”

Yes, but America is too ignorant to see it. That’s why i wanna move out of this country when i’m older!

All true! There is a saying “you can’t con an honest man.” While not entirely true in general con men appeal to other people’s greed in order to exploit them. Churches used to tell believers to give them their money and live in poverty. Now many churches tell believers that any money they give the church will be repaid several fold and some even call it “seed money” with the idea that you aren’t really making any sacrifice to give them money since you will get it back and more. Republicans exploited the same kind of greed. They told Americans that if we cut corporate taxes, deregulated business so they could make money unfettered by government regulation, and slash the top interest rate so the wealthy could plow more into our economy that everyone would prosper. In the end it is only the ones peddling this nonsense, corporations and the wealthiest Americans, that benefited. Greed is also behind the real estate crisis. Real estate was seen as the safest investment since it had appreciated faster than inflation for decades. Everyone bought houses; many people who couldn’t afford them and almost everyone else bought much more expensive houses than were prudent. Since homes were expected to appreciate the idea was it was a win-win situation. Even if you found you couldn’t afford it you could later sell it for a profit. This cycle of spending inflated home prices to dizzying heights before they collapsed leaving many people in houses they couldn’t afford that they owed the bank more than it is worth. Many simply “walked away” from their home leaving banks holding the bag; except for the fact that banks learned how to package mortgage debt as investment so a lot of people and retirement plans trying to buy into this “gold mine” were left holding the bag too. It all comes down to appealing to people’s greed and vanity. People believe they can get something for nothing if only they are clever enough to take advantage of opportunities. While this is true sometimes we should beware of people who make their living by dangling opportunities in front of us.

I don’t think so. I believe this new pitch to sell us austerity is just the latest effort by the elite to assuage the proletariat. The disparity between the rich and poor has grown exponentially. One recent study found that the wealthiest 20% of Americans controlled 84% of the wealth.

Our standard of living has increased… but technology has advanced as well. If anything, our standard of living has increased marginally as the number of heads of household has doubled in the workforce over the last 50 years. As women entered the workforce, they created a surplus of workers and this shifted the leverage of power from the worker to the employer. The difference in production served the bottom line of the head office, wages lagged behind the inflation rate increase. Now most families cannot survive without both heads of household working.

If we look at where most of the money goes when buying a house… the mortgage… and we evaluate the time value of the mortgage process…approximately .001% of the time value spent acquiring material and building the house… it is immediately clear from whence the hemorrhaging originates. The problem stems from our financial sector. This is common sense. Of course, a service centered economy is not tenable either. The statists sold us on that idea… now they are trying to sell us on the idea that we are to blame for the financial crisis. They were wrong then… they are wrong now. Never listen to statists.

If it wasnt for Ronald Reagon America would not be here