Mexico: A Middle Class Society -Poor No More, Developed Not Yet
By: Luis De La Calle and Luis Rubio
“Americans may fathom the middle class as being the obvious foundation of civilization and economic development, but most Mexicans have historically seen their country as mostly poor.” The beginning of the book starts with this statement. Throughout the book, it speaks of differences between not only the financial makeup of the country and also the view of the Mexico from the Mexican people. A major difference between the American politicians and Mexicans politicians is the general outlook of the middle class. American politicians believe that the middle class is the average American, while the Mexicans politicians view them as peasants. They have this persona that looking at Mexico as a middle class society is strange and ‘politically incorrect.’ The book
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Castaneda helps change the opinions of the Bush administration to reform their immigration policies. Castaneda is positive throughout the piece that North American economic and social integration will happen in time. Castaneda is firm on this even though he is frustrated constantly with Washington’s inability to reach a sensible consensus on bipartisan strategies. Ex Mex seems to give a modern Mexican perspective written for Mexicans.
In the first chapters, Castaneda uses several testimonials to explain how Mexican immigration patterns developed drastically in the 1990’s. Castaneda made a point to emphasize the seasonality issue from which he created the second part of the title: “From Migrants to Immigrants.” He speaks about the reduction in immigrants returning to Mexico because of the much stricter guidelines on border control. This also has made the Mexican immigrants in the United States, legal or illegally, drastically grow. There are about “11 million in 2007 and an estimated 6.2 million are
According to Gregory Mantsios many American people believed that the classes in the United States were irrelevant, that we equally reside(ed) in a middle class nation, that we were all getting richer, and that everyone has an opportunity to succeed in life. But what many believed, was far from the truth. In reality the middle class of the United States receives a very small amount of the nation's wealth, and sixty percent of America's population receives less than 6 percent of the nation's wealth, while the top 1 percent of the American population receives 34 percent of the total national wealth. In the article Class in America ( 2009), written by Gregory Mantsios informs us that there are some huge differences that exist between the classes of America, especially the wealthy and the poor. After
If the reader would notice, Eduardo used the word immigrants, as if they moved to the U.S legally, instead of using illegal immigrants like he should have, in my own opinion of course. Eduardo also mentions in the second to last paragraph “cutting illegal immigration entirely would be prohibitively costly”. Who would it be costly to? The government? Wall Street? Big Businesses? It wouldn 't cost the poor/middle class man, it would open more job opportunities. Yes, it will cost the some big businesses but, they should have hired ture citizens in the first place.
Mexican Lives is a rare piece of literature that accounts for the human struggle of an underdeveloped nation, which is kept impoverished in order to create wealth for that of another nation, the United States. The reader is shown that the act of globalization and inclusion in the world’s economies, more directly the United States, is not always beneficial to all parties involved. The data and interviews, which Hellman has put forth for her readers, contain some aspect of negativity that has impacted their lives by their nation’s choice to intertwine their economy with that of the United States. Therefore it can only be concluded that the entering into world markets, that of Mexico into the United States, does not always bring on positive outcomes. Thus, one sees that Mexico has become this wasteland of economic excrement; as a result it has become inherently reliant on the United States.
The United States has no more important foreign relation ship than that of which it enjoys with Mexico, and vice versa. These two countries share interwoven societies and economies. Although there have been disagreements and turbulence between the two countries, which partnership is without these? The Strength of each country’s democracy is fundamental to the other’s. This relationship that the two countries share directly affects that lives of millions of Mexican and United States citizens everyday. Recently these two countries have become even more unified than ever before. Tackling issues such as Border Control, Countering Narcotics, Dealing with multiple Law enforcement agencies, Human Rights laws, trade and development, etc. There are many issues that they are mutually interested in and must deal with. Yet, there are some vast differences in which these two countries are run. There are also many similarities, which we must take into account. Both Democratic Governments have similar structures, containing a legislative, judicial, and executive branch. Yet, these structures are very different internally, containing specific duties that the other country’s branch may not have.
It involved the analysis of data from 90,000 individual surveys conducted by the Mexican Migration Project to establish the presence of social effects, and the analysis of qualitative data from 120 in-depth interviews with migrants and their family members in Mexico to reveal the underlying mechanisms. Firstly, it confirmed the hypothesis that “having prior migrants in the household or community increases individuals’ likelihood of migrating net of economic and political context effects” (2013:19). Secondly, through its qualitative research, it found that tough immigration policies among other things, reduce communication channels between migrants in the United States and their families in Mexico. The flow on impact of this is a break down in the feedback loop on what is often, a hard life as a migrant in the United States. Within the context of increased restrictions on border crossings, Garip and Asad (2013) argue that restricting these communication channels simply acts to perpetuate the myth of a glamorous life in the United
Hernandez states “In recent years, a significant body of research and analysis has documented the breakdown of the middle class and the impact of the current financial crisis on family income, housing, and jobs.” The middle class has a huge impact on the income, housing, and the jobs. If the middle class completly decline, it would affect the housing market because there would only be the rich and the poor. The poor would not be able to afford the housing. Their income would be low and would cause a huge gap between the rich and poor. That is why we need to sustain the middle class because without the middle class there would be economic
The working class stays working and the middle class stays being middle. Author Nick Tingle, wrote “The vexation of class”, he argues that the working class and the middle class are separated educationally based on culture and the commonplace. Tingle uses his own personal experiences and Ethos, to effectively prove his point about the difference in class based on culture ; although, Tingle also falls short by adding unnecessary information throughout the article that weakens his belief entirely.
In Mantsios’ “Class in America” he provides us with four myths about the United States. In one of these myths the idea is brought up that the United States is, at its core, a classless society. It is also states that whether rich or poor, everyone is equal in the eyes of the law. The myth also states that health care and education are provided to everyone regardless of their financial stability. This idea about a classless society is exactly what Mantsios claims it to be, a myth. It is untrue to state that everyone is equal in the eyes of the law, and to believe that whatever differences exist in financial standing are insignificant. There are clear distinctions between different groups of people depending on their economic and social standing.
“I do not believe that many American citizens . . . really wanted to create such immense human suffering . . . in the name of battling illegal immigration” (Carr 70). For hundreds of years, there has been illegal immigration starting from slavery, voluntary taking others from different countries to work in different parts of the world, to one of the most popular- Mexican immigration to the United States. Mexican immigration has been said to be one of the most common immigration acts in the world. Although the high demand to keep immigrants away from crossing the border, Mexicans that have immigrated to the U.S have made an impact on the American culture because of their self sacrifices on the aspiration to cross over. Then conditions
The change in demographics in Mexico is labeled as one of the larger reasons for the increased number of immigrants coming to the United States from Mexico. Ojeda cites that, over the past forty years, one-third of the immigrants come due to high birth rates in Mexico. Howe...
In attempting to discuss the history of Chicanos, or Mexican-Americans and their experiences in the United States, an economic analysis may provide the best interpretation for their failure to achieve the status of first class citizens. This difficulty in achieving equality of citizenship is deeply rooted in both the economic self-interest of the Anglo-Americans, as well as their inherent perception of Otherness in Chicanos. This paper will explain the importance of this history and its context in the American framework. Beginning with the Chicano experience of the precolonial period and continuing through the Mexican-American war, analyzing particularly the Mercantilist policy which guided the colonization, alongside the principles of self-interest which carried many Anglos to Texas resulting in the war. Following, will be a close study of the period between the signing of the Treaty of Guadeloupe Hidalgo and the Second World War which was strongly defined by the Anglo capitalist industrialization of the early 20th century, and its subsequent effect on the development of the Chicano condition. It will then culminate with the Chicano resistance movements starting after the Second World War to the present with emphasis on such events as the Grape Strike of Cesar Chavez in 1968 which brought national recognition to the Chicano situation largely through economic means. In light of the satirical revisionist comedies of Teatro Campesino, "Los Vendidos" a short play by Luis Valdez will bring a conclusive view of the experience the Mexican-Americans endured according to one of their own.
Crean, Tom, and Will Soto. "Immigration and the Class Struggle in the US." Socialist Alternative. Committee for a Workers' International, 1 Apr. 2007. Web. 20 Nov. 2013.
To begin with today, social structure has political influences of who gets what, For example today if you are born into a working class area, it is more likely for your own children to also remain in the middle working class scale as well. Statistically proven by adding Hispanic working class the statistics of their children to become doctors or nurses are very low as to if a wealthier family it would be a higher percentage and a higher outcome that their children will as well become successful wealthy people. In addition to working middle class, Coming from a Mexican family who had to leave there hometown to make a better living for themselv...
... such a large border with the United States has created problems for their own country, in the past few years Mexico has begun to change this point of view. Mexico now believes their proximity to the United States is an asset and that “Mexico is the envy of almost any other country in the world for being the neighbor to the United States.” (Rice) Mexicans do not completely trust the United States and there is still to some effect an “anti-gringo” sentiment, but Mexico has learned to prosper from their position and not fight it. The public in the United States changed their attitude towards Mexico, but there is still a feeling that the U.S. is superior. “Only recently, with NAFTA has Mexico begun to revamp its formerly insular and defensive stance vis a vis the outside world. Only recently has the U.S. begun to view Mexico with newfound respect and interest.”
Mexico faces economic trouble as there are more workers than there are jobs that are available. The problem for Mexico is that half the nation’s population is under twenty years old. Making it hard to get a job even in prospers time as millions of people who reach working age go out to look for a job every year (Stein 70 ). Another problem that Mexico suffer from is that about seventy percent of the nation lives in poverty, and half of them live in dire conditions(Stein