Readers React: Blame gun violence and radicalism on a declining middle class?

To the editor: Does anyone else see a connection between the shrinking middle class, disenfranchised white males, xenophobia, gun violence, racial bias and the radicalization of immigrants? (“Middle-class families, pillar of the American dream, are no longer in the majority, study finds,” Dec. 9)

I would suggest that much of these troubling trends would be resolved if jobs were available that provided incomes that let more people feel secure, successful and hopeful for the future.

For years the business and corporate world has become focused on the bottom line at the expense of a robust economy. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if workers barely earn enough to live on, there isn’t much left over for the extras that can move the economy forward.

Marty Wilson, Whittier

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To the editor: Reporting the increases in the lower and upper income levels for the period from 1971 to 2014 as 28% and 47%, respectively, is deceptive. It suggests that the lower income group’s income went up more than half as much as the income for the upper group did.

However, in terms of dollar changes, the lower income group went from averages of about $19,000 to $24,000, while the upper income group went from about $119,000 to $175,000. In terms of additional purchasing power, the upper income group’s income went up about 11 times as much.

There is no indication that the trend toward income increases favoring the wealthy is abating. In addition to being an unfair distribution of the wealth of the U.S., I believe that the trend will be destabilizing to our society in the long term.

Darrel Miller, Santa Monica

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