Waiting for The Boom: The Emergence of a New Middle Class  

Six years ago, we entered the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression, appropriately coined the “Great Recession”. With a combination of a massive housing crash, a financial meltdown, and the underperformance of American manufacturing, we saw wealth vanish overnight. Average Americans lost their homes, their jobs, and their savings, and are still struggling to recover.

Fast forward to the present day, we face the echoes of the aftershock. Our economy recovers, but the fruits of its recovery belong to the wealthy. Our jobs return, but they are part-time jobs that underutilize talent and experience. Our lawmakers promise changes, but they are sharply divided and partisan gridlock prevents them from passing worthwhile legislation.

So where does that leave us? We can wait for our companies to give us “good jobs”, but will that happen when it is cheaper to pay someone out of the country to do the same work and more work on top of that? We can wait for our government to give us “what we want”, but will that happen when giving everybody what they want means spending more than we have in taxes and passing debt onto future generations? Do we want to continue to wait for the boom?

For some, waiting is not good enough. For some, waiting for businesspeople and politicians to deliver a prosperous economy is a luxury that cannot be afforded. An emerging class of people faced with prospects of unemployment or underemployment rejects the status quo and declares it is not good enough. These members of Main Street enter a new movement that is neither the Tea Party nor Occupy, it is profoundly American and it should make us optimistic for the future. It is an entrepreneurial fever that is sweeping America. It is a renewed faith in individuals, small businesses, and local communities as vehicles for prosperity and change. The reasons for its existence are unique and diverse, commonly defined by a notion that any individual or any group of individuals can do something worthwhile.

I believe we are entering a new age where we will all be entrepreneurs, a society of entrepreneurs.
We see it now as self-proclaimed entrepreneurs challenge the idea that American manufacturing is dead, by proudly creating products that are “Made in USA” and with the 3D printer providing new possibilities for small and mid-sized businesses this trend will only continue. They tackle issues of sustainability and inequality by creating services and goods that others deem unprofitable or unworthy of their time and money. Entrepreneurs breathe life into cities and towns that were hit hardest by the recession and make them hubs for innovation and growth.

So why is this happening? It is two-fold. Firstly, it is the democratization of the means of production. Thanks to the internet, cloud services, crowdfunding, open source, 3D printing, e-commerce, and a great number of innovations and technologies that have become accessible to average people, we see an unprecedented amount of potential for prosperity and change. Secondly, we choose this path. When mass amounts of people became unemployed, they had to reinvent themselves in order to find work. They had to adapt if they were going to survive in the new market. The old dogs learn new tricks. And the new kids rewrite the rules of the game.

So, my question to you is “Are you still waiting for the boom?” Plenty of people spend their entire lives “waiting for the boom.” They wait to win the lottery. They wait to get a promotion. They wait their whole lives, hoping one day they will be recognized for waiting patiently. Don’t wait for the boom. The boom is waiting for you. Just take it.

Featured in The Prodigy newspaper Vol IX, Issue 1