Marx Right? Class Not Race Key To Happy Retirement?

What if Karl Marx was right about one thing: Most human struggles are about class not ethnicity or race? The thought occurred while reading the WSJ’s “Retirement Crisis Hits Black Americans Hard” because its quoted government, academic & political sources used “average” data to back up the headline’s premise.

Such “average” analysis has historically been used to highlight the plight of “minorities” compared to supposedly privileged whites, which invariably glosses over the huge number of folks in the so-called “majority,” but are really in the same class & who have roughly if not exactly the same woes as their minority counterparts. “Yeah, BUT...being Black is different so” is the usual comeback (mentioned in the WSJ piece), but rich Blacks obviously don’t need new legislative safety nets. All forgotten folks in this country do. Meanwhile, this myopic ID research leads to warped public policies & legislation that angers folks & distorts the root problems of poverty. The WSJ headline could just as easily included poorer Hispanics, Appalachian whites, & so on.

BUT, that doesn’t change the underlying reality of the WSJ piece, i.e., all folks who were in precarious financial straights before the COVIC-19 pandemic are increasingly unable to retire. As the WSJ noted, too few Blacks in particular earn enough in wages to have set aside money for the golden years & since homeownership now tends to be underwater or is often non-existent, they (& similarly situated whites) are less likely to be able to weather a job lay-off let alone fund a retirement. Likewise, many Blacks with solid white-collar jobs had to borrow large sums to get their requisite college degrees. The lack of intergenerational wealth can also play a role. Unfortunately, the WSJ offers no solution. But, back to Mr. Marx. Might the ability of anyone to retire like a human be more about the class & the “average” JOB in it after all?

Davd Soul