My thoughts exactly! It is actually sad how cost of living has been skyrocketing while cost of living wage increases are almost not happening. My father just retired this year making almost as much as me, and he was only a high school graduate. I have two degrees in science and engineering, and the difference between my dad and I is that his company gave him reasonable cost of living increases throughout his whole career where my company gives it's employees barely any. I got a semi-reasonable increase this year, but that is only because I got exceeds expectations in 8 out of 10 categories on my year end review. If not for that I am sure I would have gotten a 2.5% increase with the rest of the employees.
It is sad, but the problem is really created by the governments lack of a budget, and can not totally be blamed on corporate greed. That along with the fact that capitalism doesn't work in a global economy when competing with countries that basically allow slave labor. Most people don't realize that the whole reason Abe Lincoln opposed slave labor wasn't that he was sympathetic with the slaves. No, he opposed it because non slave owners would not be able to compete with slave owners. The same way that America can not compete with countries like China, because their workers are working for almost nothing. We used to do a decent job of competing when our products were made with quality, but once the quality went away no one wants to pay double the price for the same crappy product.
So, of course less people are going to be flying planes who the hell can afford one? Not me. My Grandpa had one, a 1970 Cessna 172, but I'll probably never be able to afford one. He was also an engineer for Mcdonnell Douglas before they merged with Boeing.
