Will the globalization of economy raise the standard of middle class in America or depress it?

Answer 1

At this point, there is no way to tell. It looks like globalization will benefit some members of middle class and hurt others, possibly to the point of pushing them down the social ladder into the working class. It is also possible that it will help lift some of today's working class into the middle class.

You might want to read this to liven up your thinking on the subject:

http://www.pkarchive.org/theory/backwrd2.html

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Answer 2

The globalization of the economy will raise the living standards for everyone around the world. This is because globalization increases the efficiency of the marketplace leading to cheaper goods and services for everyone. For example, imagine if every state in the U.S. had to produce all of their goods and services and not rely on other states for them. Certain states have more resources than others. By allow intra-state commerce we allow everyone in the U.S. to have the benefit of all of these resources. Now, take that same concept but on a global scale.

However, this is a slow process so it is difficult to see this in the short-term. In the short-term, people lose jobs as the result of offshore outsourcing. This is nothing new. America's economy has changed over the years from agricultural to manufacturing and now to service and knowledge based. With these changes, people have suffered in the short-term where entire industries have collapsed. For example, the guy who made horse buggy whips is out of a job when the automobile is introduced. That is a shame for the guy making whips but we can't deny the overall impact the automobile had on our economy.

Yes, we need to help people who will suffer because of the short-term changes globalization brings. However, this should not cause us to be shortsighted and be negative on globalization. Globalization will in the long run be beneficial to everyone on the planet. This could have the potential to lead to many positive things outside of just the economy. For example, world peace is more easily achieved if all countries were more dependent on one another as a result of working in a global economy.

Answer 3

I think globalization will lead to greater income disparity. As far as I know, the middle class has been shrinking in the US for about 20 yrs. I think globalization will increase the standards of middle class because wages may decrease due to higher employment. I'm not too certain though

Answer 4

depress it probably unless we begin to get alot more educated, american education systems seem to lack and pass people on just to move them on, out competed for by chinese and indians, though there are so many more of them so I could be wrong, we could just be so outnumbered for example we produce about 80,000 engineers annualy. while China produces 500,000 engineers annually, but then again, we dont have 1 billion people