Farewell to the middle class – El Heraldo de Chihuahua

In a globalized world, the impoverishment of a country makes it defenseless above all else: Amrita Sen

In many countries, the consequences of the Covid pandemic, the struggle for global markets and oil prices, has been the decline in the incomes of the middle class, and thus the main driver of social welfare. The rich are richer and the poor are poorer, but in the middle class, the survival of a social model based on ideas of citizenship, equity and democratic quality is at stake. In Mexico, under the policies of the Obrador government, great cracks appeared in the foundations of the middle class in a stubborn declaration of demolishing its structure.

The middle class lost between 6% and 8% of its purchasing power between 2010 and 2016 with negative growth through 2021 to trim another three percentage points; With a government that only supported the productive sector during the health crisis with 1% of GDP (such as Uganda), while in Germany it supported 35% of GDP. This policy in Mexico reduced the middle class in 2021, to cover 27.6% of the population, according to Conval.

President Obrador has been resolute in his chant to the point of nausea: “the poor first”, being thus the focal cities of capital and creativity that lose their dynamism every day in the face of the 4T government’s positions of condemnation of the neoliberal-mediated class, aspiration and ambition, when economists know they are with a class Businessmen support the battered economy and public spending in this country.

The topic of economics and population statistics is long, but authoritative sources such as INEGI, Conapo, Banco de México and Coneval agree on the gradual disappearance of the middle class, in contrast to the latter part of the last century where better urban centers accumulated jobs, talent, schools and universities. It is also, after all, where spaces have been hosted for cultural, artistic and scientific development, commercial or technological projects have flourished, social innovation has flourished, etc.

Despite the abandonment of the countryside (which is not justified), the more urban the context, the greater the opportunities for social mobility and growth of the middle classes when the FTA was formed, and the increase in remittances and income from tourism, which, together with oil exports, facilitated increased production and consumption, as well To create millions of job opportunities.

Unfortunately today, this year the OECD forecasts a very weak 2.2% growth as other African countries; Without a comprehensive agenda to house the productive machinery, no doubt, the vast majority of Mexicans would be confined to poverty.

Planting more poverty in Mexico by encouraging them to wear a pair of shoes is crippling the dreams of the nation. With another 4 million poor, it’s indisputable to say that the middle class is heading in that direction, disappearing like the stubborn promises we Mexicans still believe in.