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Do we even trust our leaders to help?
Retiring old ideas about retirement
Social Security more solvent than most Americans realize
Focus group participants discuss retirement
Series looks at middle-class angst
Insurance misery has no easy cure
Health-care matchup finds Ohio falls short
Most Read Stories
Man robbed at Tallmadge Avenue eatery
Four teens restrain man, take items from his Akron home
Another winter punch heading toward Ohio
Complaints against officer keep coming
Police: Ohio girl dies after fall into snow bank
Cuyahoga Falls residents come home to find burning couch on balcony
Blogs:
First Bell - On Education:
No City of Akron basketball tonight
Pets:
Pet telethon re-airs
The Heldenfiles:
Chipmunks "Squeakquel" on DVD/BD March 30
Akron Zips:
Late surge gives Zips ugly road win
Tribe Matters:
Blogmail response on Hafner
Cleveland Browns:
Stallworth's contract terminated
Balanced Ledger:
QB in Browns future: another mock draft
Kent State Sports:
KSU Notes – February 9
Cleveland Cavaliers:
NBA Power Rankings from Around the Internet
Buckeye Blogging:
Buckeyes grab 18 players on signing day
Varsity Letters:
Garfield at Buchtel basketball
All Da King's Men:
Palin At The Tea Party Convention
Blog of Mass Destruction:
Republican Pre-Conditions
Akron Law Café:
Citizens United v. F.E.C. (Part 4): Kennedy's and O'Connor's Basic Approaches to Constitutional Decisionmaking – Top Down and Bottom Up
Car Chase:
Collector Car Hobby Loses One of the Best—Jim Roll
Let's Talk Real Estate:
Decisions Decisions: Credit Cards or Your Mortgage?
Ohio Travels with Betty:
Loucile is looking for a Lake Erie getaway in June for three kids, ages 1, 3, and 5.
Sound Check:
Talk of the Town – Top entertainment picks for the weekend
HRLite House:
Track HR Research
Akron Gamer:
Makers of 'Castle Crashers' unveil 'BattleBlock Theater'
See Jane Style:
Do IT this week: Layering
Published on Sunday, Apr 13, 2008
SPEAKING OF . . .
After publishing findings that show Americans are earning less than their parents, the Beacon Journal invited readers to participate in focus groups. Here's some of what they said:
Theresa Brown, 57, of Akron: ''That's the American dream: You graduate high school, go to college, get your degree, get married, and then have those 2.5 kids and the house out in the suburbs.''
Robert Caetta, 56, of Ravenna: ''When your toilet backs up, do you want the guy with the Ph.D. or do you want the plumber with a snake who knows how to unplug that toilet? This is the problem. We are not focusing that much anymore on the trades. Everybody's got this idea that their kid's going to come out of high school, go to college and become a vice president of Microsoft. That's just not going to happen that much. What we really need are the people to start focusing again on the trades — carpenters, plumbers.''
Mark Nicol, 48, of Green: ''The kids are coming out of school with fifty-, sixty-, seventy-thousand dollars' worth of debt. . . . College is a double-edged sword.''
Lyn Gwinn, 58, of Akron: ''The cost of college from 1998, when she (her daughter) graduated high school, to 2004, which was the last time I looked at it, went up 74 percent. There's no way people can afford that. I'm an H.R. manager. And we hire a lot of B.A.-level kids right out of college. I want them to join the 401(k) and reap the benefits — the 50 percent match — and they can't afford it because they have school loans to pay. Even with parents helping out, as we did, and the kids taking loans for the other half, those kids are leaving school with a B.A., starting at making $27,000-$28,000 with a B.A. level, owing $15,000 to $20,000. They can't afford to buy a house or move into an apartment. They can't hardly buy a car.''
Sean Djuricic, 29, of Akron: ''(I'm) still paying for school. It will be years and years till school's paid off. . . . I look at my debt and I think I'm never going to get that paid off. It's very, very stressful. That old cliche, like, there's a gorilla in the room; try not to look at it — but every two weeks, I just wonder if I'm going to make rent. And I'm doing somewhat well. It just doesn't make any sense.''
Sue Kelewae, 43, of Uniontown: ''If you're very wealthy, paying for college is not a problem. If you're very poor, paying for college is not a problem. If you're in the middle, it's a huge problem, because all they offer you are loans.''
Louella M. Reynold, 51, of Akron: ''(My daughter is going to school) because she knows, first of all, that she can do better. And she also knows that's what she needs to do to take care of herself and her children and to live independently and be a responsible person in society. That's part of the American dream.''
Middle class hanging by thread as rich get richer, poor get poorer
Meet the family: Census data form American portrait
Today's story about a middle-class family is unusual for us
The very things that define the middle class slipping out of reach for many Ohioans
Story behind the story: five decades of data
Speaking of... Voices from The American Dream series
Median annual pay in the U.S. over the decades (pdf)
SPEAKING OF . . .
After publishing findings that show Americans are earning less than their parents, the Beacon Journal invited readers to participate in focus groups. Here's some of what they said:
Theresa Brown, 57, of Akron: ''That's the American dream: You graduate high school, go to college, get your degree, get married, and then have those 2.5 kids and the house out in the suburbs.''
Robert Caetta, 56, of Ravenna: ''When your toilet backs up, do you want the guy with the Ph.D. or do you want the plumber with a snake who knows how to unplug that toilet? This is the problem. We are not focusing that much anymore on the trades. Everybody's got this idea that their kid's going to come out of high school, go to college and become a vice president of Microsoft. That's just not going to happen that much. What we really need are the people to start focusing again on the trades — carpenters, plumbers.''
Mark Nicol, 48, of Green: ''The kids are coming out of school with fifty-, sixty-, seventy-thousand dollars' worth of debt. . . . College is a double-edged sword.''
Lyn Gwinn, 58, of Akron: ''The cost of college from 1998, when she (her daughter) graduated high school, to 2004, which was the last time I looked at it, went up 74 percent. There's no way people can afford that. I'm an H.R. manager. And we hire a lot of B.A.-level kids right out of college. I want them to join the 401(k) and reap the benefits — the 50 percent match — and they can't afford it because they have school loans to pay. Even with parents helping out, as we did, and the kids taking loans for the other half, those kids are leaving school with a B.A., starting at making $27,000-$28,000 with a B.A. level, owing $15,000 to $20,000. They can't afford to buy a house or move into an apartment. They can't hardly buy a car.''
Sean Djuricic, 29, of Akron: ''(I'm) still paying for school. It will be years and years till school's paid off. . . . I look at my debt and I think I'm never going to get that paid off. It's very, very stressful. That old cliche, like, there's a gorilla in the room; try not to look at it — but every two weeks, I just wonder if I'm going to make rent. And I'm doing somewhat well. It just doesn't make any sense.''
Sue Kelewae, 43, of Uniontown: ''If you're very wealthy, paying for college is not a problem. If you're very poor, paying for college is not a problem. If you're in the middle, it's a huge problem, because all they offer you are loans.''
Louella M. Reynold, 51, of Akron: ''(My daughter is going to school) because she knows, first of all, that she can do better. And she also knows that's what she needs to do to take care of herself and her children and to live independently and be a responsible person in society. That's part of the American dream.''
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