Short-term loss for long-term gain

Both Peck and Luce attest to the stagnation of incomes within the middle class that has slowly separated any connection to the top third over the past 15-20 years. The real problems had been masked due to the availability of cheap debt and financing. But the Great Recession of 2008 unveiled the implications of a growing wealth disparity. Peck asserts that recessions tend to level the playing field. A man who once wore a suit to work in the morning now has to work the Saturday night shift at Walmart. Peck and Luce and Bartels believe in the reality of political consequences that result from these gaping economic wounds that linger despite a return to normalcy.

What I liked about the Bartels piece was the reference to not only primary income, but effective access to collective resources in determining actual representation (both ideological and responsiveness). But to me the fundamental problem lies again in both economic disparity and the lack of a relatively higher baseline infrastructure. And this is where his case study on Katrina fits in. Local authorities told residents to evacuate or write your SSN on your arm in permanent ink so that the body could be identified. But those without the access to individual and collective resources had no avenue for evacuation. Would a "city of utmost necessity" work? Bartels seems to think so with many caveats...especially America's insatiable appetite for luxury. Can the recent push nationwide for self-sustainability somehow advance or inhibit this dream? Peck discusses the fluid face of the American labor industry. How flexible is the American worker today?

"But however high the tide of economic forces may rise, we are not condemned to wait behind our levees for disaster to engulf us. Imperfect as they are, the processes and institutions of American democracy provide us with consequential choices". Peck and Luce say that higher natural unemployment may be the norm but political actions and consequences can alter social and cultural norms. Or will changed norms as a result of the recession have to expedite the political action we need to eliminate political equality?