Well you've just about covered the Libertarians vision of America in the future. Don't ask me why they want it that way. I don't know. But that's where we are heading. It's too bad we had such possibilities as a nation.

Simplistic and banal. The teachers and electricians who sold their modest beach cottages to the mansion builders enjoyed a tidy windfall profit. Would you deny them the fruits of their investment? My daughter is a college librarian, she's doing all right. Her boyfriend is an engineer, he's doing great. The kids who struggle either didn't get an education or studied sociology or art history or womyns studies. I see kids who study math, science or engineering but they seem to be immigrants or children of immigrants.

I'd agree with you except the author is writing about tendencies and directions. Anyone who even slightly follows the direction of pensions, wages, etc. recognizes that current directions are towards an accumulation of wealth and a declining middle class. It won't effect my life in the long run, but I am certainly curious as to why this does not bother those whose future it will impact.

Middle class wealth has been declining since 1973. Where families once had one full time worker, now they have two. I worked part time and summers to pay for college, but working one's way through public college is now impossible without going into debt. The difference between bosses and their employees' salaries is growing exponentially. There is plenty of evidence that Merullo is right.

Thank you for your thoughts, Mr. Merullo. The concern has been around for a while. Your article reminded me of a great Onion piece on the dead middle class in this country, including a picture showing a "middle class museum". The piece was hilarious and completely and sadly prescient. This reminded me also of the "frog experiment": put a frog in a pan of cold water and set the pan on the stove to get the water to a boiling point; the frog will stay in the water and boil to death (because it slowly acclimates to the rising temperatures). However, have a pot of water boiling and throw the frog in it, and the frog will jump out. I believe we can say that the middle class is the frog. The middle class has been in the pot for a while, since Reagan, and is slowly boiling to death... Indeed, it may take a little while more as one of the alert commenters here suggests, but we're heading that way. Thanks, Mr. Merullo for your well articulated "musings": they succeed powerfully and are scary as heck!

Interesting dystopian view of the future, however, never let facts get in the way of a good story… According to the Pew Research Center (hardly a right-wing bastion), when examining income changes from the 1960's to today, most Americans (84 percent) exceed their parents' income at a similar stage of life. Among the poorest fifth of incomes, their median income rose 74 percent, adjusted for inflation. The majority of Americans (57 percent) born into the lower fifth moved up to higher income brackets, in fact, 4 percent moved into the richest fifth. A recent issue of "Money" magazine showed that 81 percent of American millionaires are self-made and did not inherit their wealth. So yes, the rich have gotten richer, but the poor have gotten richer, too. And many poor have become very rich.

You are not at all off the mark. It is the rubbing it in our faces with the McMansions that is the icing on the cake.

We're already there.

Interesting data, rdh-nh, but then why do a raft of other studies find a relative lack of upward mobility in the U.S. and a shrinking middle class? The NY Times published this story, "Harder for Americans to Rise from Lower Rungs" on 1/4/12. It said: "At least five large studies in recent years have found the United States to be less mobile than comparable nations. A project led by Markus Jantti, an economist at a Swedish university, found that 42 percent of American men raised in the bottom fifth of incomes stay there as adults. That shows a level of persistent disadvantage much higher than in Denmark (25 percent) and Britain (30 percent) — a country famous for its class constraints." And speaking of right-wing bastions, the same article says even certified right-wingers like Paul Ryan are beginning to accept this truth; it's becoming conventional wisdom. Evidence for a shrinking middle class and rising income inequality is solid, including a 2011 Stanford U. study by Sean Reardon using U.S. Census data that found we are witnessing the birth of a two-tier society. So I'm in good, broad, bipartisan company in sharing Professor Merullo's nightmare. Keep up the good work, Prof. Merullo. I appreciate your contributions to this page.

What gets me is the numbers of middle class people who conservatives convinced to fight for the rich to get richer and avoid responsibility to the nation. Usally accomplished by promoting "they're wasting your money" or "someone's getting something you don't." Works every time.

I guess we should all just give up and go on food stamps

This summer I made a day trip to Newport and was hit by the excess and opulance of the period. It go me to also look at what is happening today in our socienty and unfortunately we may be headed back to that type of society where there really is no middle class to speak of. Ultimately this is the outcome of the me generation launched in the 80's. Further we all want things done to some extent by government and yes want spending limited, so long as it does not impact what I want or what is important to me. NIMBYism but on the government and social side of our society. I have hope that the tide will turn, but as long as we are dominated by extremes of both the right and the left our society will flounder and we will not move forward as teh great society we are capable of being.

Mr.Merullo we are all concerned with what the future holds because voters keep voting in the same ole, same ole politicians, who refuse to make any changes to make the world a better place for anyone but themselves. Politicians love the stats quo: they have nothing to worry about with each 'new' cohort of naive voters who think they will change the inequities of the political government system to make the world a 'better place.'

I don't think we have to wait 20 years for the middle class asperations of prior generations to become unattainable. It's already happening. At my age my parents owned a home, each had a car, they had two kids, they had disposable income, and they did it all on one salary. This is impossible today. I don't guess--I know--that if I have children I will not come close to offering them what my parents provided for me. The problem is salaries have just not kept up with prices and the cost of living, and to earn one of these salaries you first have to incur thousands in student debt-- a monthly bill my parents did not have to worry about at the vulnerable start of their careers. The growing level of income disparity is an infinite loop-- as the very rich drive up prices for once middle class amenities, the gap between income and costs only widens.

You don't need a 4+ year college degree to gain wealth. That has been the fraud perpetuated upon the young masses. And while we are looking at education, look at the cost of a college education together with the salaries of the professors, teachers and administrators of said college. Now there is a topic for another day, but certainly plays a part i your huge college debt.

if it were that simple pvalen. Maybe many of those middle class voters you can't get imagine what our parents imagined - you know doing what you have to to support yourself and your family, not believing that the handout from the government is such an easy fall back. 50 years ago this country had a work ethic that is nowhere to be found today.

If it is true, as many people here suggest, that one of the main causes to the disappearing middle class is college debt, I suggest we look at that. Why does a professor make 300 grand for one class? Is that professor worth it? Why does the president of a State University make the salaries that they do? And, to say that these great salaries don't add to the cost of the education for the students and parents to bear is ignoring a huge problem. We need to look at our current educational structure.

I think HHKitchener2 makes a good point by introducing globalization into the discussion. The world is becoming "smaller" and one's economic competitors could literally be on the other side of the world. That arguably has implications for thinking through strategies to preserve the US middle class.

"willow2" are you serious? "50 years ago this country had a work ethic that is nowhere to be found today." You don't think people work hard today? Most of the the people I know and have seen work extremely hard and do so for money far short relatively speaking of what I earned at their age. I understand someone in their 30's or 40's not recognizing what is happening, but I'm in my 60's and the working man, the middle class is getting stiffed and it is not because they don't work hard. It is because they have lost all leverage in the workplace and have been misled into believing that someone other than the businesses that they work for have brought about this decline of the middle class. Now the partisans on either side can blame the politicians if they will but the fact is the public has bought into this "boot strap" myth and the myth of the poor wrecking the country. However, the fact is the rich and the corporations have been killing this economy, moving it overseas for the past thirty years. If you're not old enough to have seen it then I'd suggest taking up some reading or talking to someone who was alive in the 50's through the 80's.

You have not been reading the news for the last 10 years of so. Pensions were eliminated and not just for Unions. 401k's were wiped out. Remember Arthur Andersen? All those retired partners who lost everything over the Enron fiasco? And if your daughter truly is a College librarian she better start looking for another profession because she is on the endangered species list and not in a protected way. Most colleges have started to eliminate them as the move to an elctronic catalogue. In fact Colleges themselves are in trouble as more and more of them are looking at online education. Just ask the president of the University of Virginia how tentative a highly educated person's job can be. I worked in high tech for years. This industry especially goes through highs and lows and engineers are disposed of like day old bread. There is no such thing as loyalty anymore in business. That went the way of the dodo back in the 80's.