After reading Sarah's blog that discussed the issue of avoiding problems involving race, it made me think about what other problems. Actually I had a very similar discussion with my dad about some of the financial problems that were being avoided but were eventually going to become a major issue.
The most interesting issue my dad brought up was the fact that very few Americans actually have a retirement account that can support a retirement. After looking a little deeper into the issue, I found this article that shed a little more light on the problem. One of the most surprising things the article said was that "half of Americans have $2,000 or less in their [retirement] account."
This begs the question, what will the 50% of people with less then $2,000 in their retirement accounts do when it comes time to retire? The article also did say that the average amount in a retirement account is $50,000 but still, how long is $50,000 going to last if your only other source of income is social security?
Now of course, the reason most people don't have enough money in their retirement account to retire is because they can't afford to put money away. This dilemma caused me to look deeper at the core problem and after looking around, I think I found the answer.
The reason so many Americans don't have enough saved to retire goes back to the 1960's and America's slow transition from a manufacturing to a service economy. This blog has a great graphic that shows this change based on the largest employers from 1960 compared to 2010. The biggest employer in 1960 was General Motors and the biggest employer in 2010 was Wal-Mart.
Another important factor is that in 1960 one third of Americans belonged to a union (http://www.infoplease.com/timelines/laborunions.html) while today only 11.8% of Americans belong to unions (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm). These unionized workers received higher wages allowing them to better save for retirement. Now the same working class is working at big retailers which don't give as good a salary or benefits which doesn't allow them to put any money away for retirement.
So what is the solution? Is there even a solution? This is a very complicated issue with many factors. With the increasing automation of manufacturing service might be the only source of employment in the future which will only exacerbate the problem. This is a big problem but no one has stepped up and tried to solve it.
Monday, February 20, 2012
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Modern Reconstruction
We have been talking in class recently about better ways to manage the era of reconstruction after the civil war. This made me think what would be the best way to reconstruct the time we live in now? With so many issues being battled with on a daily basis, where would you even start?
Personally I think we should start with the education system which would hopefully allow us to prepare for tomorrow and have a more well rounded society. An education would allow those people living in poor areas a chance to escape their current lives and give them an all around better shot at success. When I was reading an article on how education is funded that can be found here, I found that even though the U.S. puts the most money into the education system out of any country, "nations that spend far less achieve higher levels of student performance." So the answer isn't to just throw money into the education system.
Finland is rated the top nation in terms of education. This article, on the World Education Forum, describes the Finnish education system and why it is so successful. The biggest problem I feel our education system is facing is the massive gap between the well funded education in affluent areas and the underfunded education in poor areas. This comes from the schools being funded by property taxes. It seems to me that the simple answer would be to fund all schools the same amount. In Finland education is provided to everyone "regardless of their economic situation." In the U.S., most quality education is provided to the lucky few that can afford to pay for it. This could either be by enrolling in a private school or moving to an affluent neighborhood.
In Finland, According to the World Education Forum, even the post-compulsory education, which is like college in the U.S., is free for everyone. This comes from the Finnish government wanting to achieve "as high level of education as possible for the whole population." If we look at the current situation in the U.S., does the U.S. government want the same thing? The costs of colleges are continually rising leaving many families of kids who are qualified for college unable to attend on the sole basis that they can't afford it.
Now I realize that it would be near impossible to scrap the current education system. But why not tweak it a little? Maybe try to fund schools more evenly. Give the under privileged children a fighting chance. Maybe the U.S. could buck the trend of only focusing on the present and invest in the future which is all of the children in school right now.
Personally I think we should start with the education system which would hopefully allow us to prepare for tomorrow and have a more well rounded society. An education would allow those people living in poor areas a chance to escape their current lives and give them an all around better shot at success. When I was reading an article on how education is funded that can be found here, I found that even though the U.S. puts the most money into the education system out of any country, "nations that spend far less achieve higher levels of student performance." So the answer isn't to just throw money into the education system.
Finland is rated the top nation in terms of education. This article, on the World Education Forum, describes the Finnish education system and why it is so successful. The biggest problem I feel our education system is facing is the massive gap between the well funded education in affluent areas and the underfunded education in poor areas. This comes from the schools being funded by property taxes. It seems to me that the simple answer would be to fund all schools the same amount. In Finland education is provided to everyone "regardless of their economic situation." In the U.S., most quality education is provided to the lucky few that can afford to pay for it. This could either be by enrolling in a private school or moving to an affluent neighborhood.
In Finland, According to the World Education Forum, even the post-compulsory education, which is like college in the U.S., is free for everyone. This comes from the Finnish government wanting to achieve "as high level of education as possible for the whole population." If we look at the current situation in the U.S., does the U.S. government want the same thing? The costs of colleges are continually rising leaving many families of kids who are qualified for college unable to attend on the sole basis that they can't afford it.
Now I realize that it would be near impossible to scrap the current education system. But why not tweak it a little? Maybe try to fund schools more evenly. Give the under privileged children a fighting chance. Maybe the U.S. could buck the trend of only focusing on the present and invest in the future which is all of the children in school right now.
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