According to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center, just 33% of Americans think their children will have a better life than they did. On the other hand, 62% believe their children will be worse off.
They’re likely to be right. The typical American family has seen its real income (adjusted for inflation) fall for 5 consecutive years now, and it earns less in real terms that it did in 1989.
According to the Census Bureau, median household income fell in 2012, and it languishes 8.3% below the pre-crisis peak in 2007.
The Brookings Institution, meanwhile, calculates that real incomes for working-age men in the US have fallen by 19 per cent since 1970.
(Of course, if you’re fortunate enough to be a member of the super-rich who, thanks in large part to central bankers driving up asset prices, saw their real incomes rocket by 20% in 2012.)
In Europe things look even more dire. Just 28% of Germans think their children will be better off than they were. In the UK it’s 17%, in Italy 14%, and in France just 9%.
In Britain, research by the Financial Times shows that those born in 1985 are the first cohort to suffer a living standard worse than those born 10 years before them.
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