by Michael Snyder
The Economic Collapse Blog
The middle class in the United States has been steadily shrinking, and the gap between the ultra-wealthy and the rest of us has grown to absurd proportions. But it wasn’t always this way. When I was growing up in the 1980s, it seemed like almost everyone was middle class. Of course there were wealthy people and poor people in the 1980s too, but the vast majority of the population was comfortably somewhere in the middle. Sadly, things have changed so much since that time. Today, most of the people that I know are struggling. According to a report that was just released, in all 50 states it now takes an income of more than $100,000 in order for a family of four to live “the American Dream”…
A new report from GOBankingRates used that framework to analyze how much money a family of two adults and two children would need in each state to own a home, a car and a pet. The report tallied estimated annual essential expenses for such a family and then doubled that figure.