U.S. Middle Class nearly gone

[RolloTheGreat]

All the while, there is more segregation between the poor and the rich.  Just like the blacks and the whites of the 1700's America...  Except that it's more like a caste system like in India (albeit with just a bit of mobility).  The middle-of-the-road shrinking by 11% is FAST!!!  The line in the between segregating the 2 just becomes that much bigger, like real quick!

IMHO, a family with 3 kids with an income of less than $70K is poor to me, by living standards in the US.  It just feels like lower class, as they cannot afford to travel anywhere far, or anything like that, hardly.  They'd basically be going out on a limb just going to the Disney World for 3 days.

For example, in a big city like here in DC metro area, it seems like a family with 3 kids really needs $80K/year to live comfortably most days of the year without resorting to all kinds of trouble like driving PoS junker cars, etc.

I don't know if you can judge how far people go for vacations as a reliable indicator of status. When you live in a vacation area, it's easier and you can maximize vacation time/minimize travel time and hassle vacationing close.

We do 4-5 vacation rentals a year, and go to our own cabin more weeks than not. When Rollo Jr was young add a couple weekends at Wisconsin Dells water parks like Kalahari to that.

We spent a week at Sanibel Island over Thanksgiving, but it was the first beach vacation we've done in seven years after calling it quits 7 years ago after doing that every year for a long time.