Mobility

The American Dream is a bumper sticker without a bumper.  Upward mobility, symbolized by 1950s automobiles, has jammed in a massive pile up.   Public transportation is needed.

In the aftermath of WWII, America was largely unscathed, and at full industrial production.   Our allies were crippled by a costly victory, and axis powers, by an even more crippling defeat.  American industrial might was unchallenged.  The big three auto makers, facing no credible competition, could afford to buy labor peace rather than squeeze every dollar out of union negotiations.

The middle class surged.  Workers could put their children through college, and maybe even have a little vacation cottage on a lake in northern Michigan.  Charitably, this is the great America symbolized by the Trump sea of red hats.  But reversion to the mean, is a social, as well as statistical, reality.  Globalization was inevitable.  Not even the unlikely return of industrial jobs, would herald the return of 1950s industrial salaries.

Third world level income inequality, is the product of social stagnation.  A permanent under class will eventually become self aware, with dire consequences.  Therein lies the appeal of Elizabeth Warren's plan to tax the ultra wealthy to subsidize college tuition.

Education increases income.  We can argue about details of taxation and tuition subsidies.  We can consider steps to slow the rise in the cost of a college education and alternatives to traditional colleges.  But high paying industrial jobs are the shiny chrome of the past.  The glow of the future is on computer screens and smart phones.   We need a new path to upward mobility.