Celebrated by doing a hike with my girls on New Year’s Day, Cindy, Sandra, Monica, and Elaine.

Oops, I didn't write a Christmas or New Year blog. OK, too late. I will just let it go. Some how that feels OK.

Some time back I wrote about how “We Are Getting Hosed”, May 2, 2013. There is more of that going on that I had originally observed. Back in 1986, I moved to Santa Clara County from the LA area. That was with a new job that increased my salary by 50%, not bad. I got a 2 bedroom apartment for $650 / month, not bad, nice and had pool. See on the left, now in Santa Clara County a 1 bedroom apartment goes for $1919 / month. Ouch, someone is getting hosed.

Found this data about the cost of living in our USA in 1938, that is only 75 yrs ago. Was looking for when did our Federal Gov set the first minimum wage, it was 1938, and was set at $0.25 / hr.

Average income, see on right, less than $1 an hour. A home, little over 2 yearly salary. A car about half of yearly salary.

Today, Minimum wage to be $9 / hr. Income of low end of middle class is about 17 to 18 higher than it was in 1938. But a house is around 60 times higher, a new car about 30 times higher, tuition at Harvard is around 160 times higher. Basically, income for the average (hopefully middle class) american increases much slower than what we should be able to buy to have the good life. I think I finally understand why we, middle class america, are shifting to the bottom toward being poor. Our $$ has much less value than it used to have.

I point this out, because This year is the 50th anniversary of President Lyndon B Johnson's War on Poverty. We are really getting hosed.

So, our so called leaders, at the Federal, State, County, and City government, should not only focus on job creation, but equally important on how to increase the value of our $. As far as I can tell nobody is paying attention to this fact. It seems that perhaps, in 30 yrs, at a $100,000 / yr salary, one will not be able to own a house.

Perhaps, the value of the $ has decreased because of the “Credit Game”, that has been playing since the end of WWII. Buy now, what you want, with the $$ you have not yet earned. Credit amount also is not increase as fast as the cost of things you want/need to buy. Hence, a time will come when the Average American will not be able to earn enough in a life time to buy a home; yep, we are hosed.

Not the way to start a new year, but we should do it with eyes wide open, then perhaps we can change things a bit for the better.