Interesting opinion piece in the National Post (a Canadian paper) by Kelly McParland that can be summarized as follows.

U.S. factories are hiring again but many are paying new hires far below former union wages with the approval of the unions. Future catchup is not guaranteed.

More Americans are turning to their families for help after losing their jobs. Many older workers are looking to their kids and others to elderly parents for financial support.

Corporate executives, meanwhile, are cashing in big time from a small revival in the stock market. They are exercising stock options that were granted in 2008 to buy shares at low prices and resell at good profits. The company gets a tax deduction based on the present higher market price. Sirius Radio, Starbucks, GE and Goldman Sachs are mentioned.

The message? Americans are resilient and innovative and will get through this crisis as they have done in the past. People are turning back to tried and true methods to survive - reliance on friends and family and their own good sense in place of political bromides from inept politicians. The large wage-earning middle class is bearing the brunt of the hard times. They are the engines of the economy.

Corporate America is showing astonishing levels of greed and selfishness. Top executives are not sharing the pain. They are enriching themselves by whatever means comes to hand no matter how undeserving.

This combination of factors is a big reason why so many Americans have so little regard for political or corprate leaders. It is why they don't trust Romney or Congress and why they view the banks and Wall Street with distrust bordering on contempt and why they feel the White House has done little to make it better. That's where the Tea Party and the Occupy movement came from.

Comment:

This Canadian perspective seems like a good summary of the present challenge to the American middle class and, as McParland says, those are the people who will have to turn the country around. I share his view of their resiliency and I do hope they have the energy and endurance to get through this, probably their biggest ever, challenge.