I think you are getting into the chicken-egg fallacy. The fact is, however, that inexpensive housing is already available in the US. For example, I am about to move to a coop (http://www.potomacassoc.com/WHMH.htm) which will cost me about $1,000 (one thousand!) to move in and then less than $600 per month in maintenance cost. Technically I am buying a share in a not for profit corporation that entitles me to live there as long as I wish. The only thing I cannot do with it is to sell it for a profit.
Although coops are quite popular among certain minorities (e.g. Jews or Blacks), most US-ers probably see them as socialism incarnate and prefer to pay banks three times more per month in interest to have "their own place" e.g. a suburban residence with two garages, surrounded by folks like themselves (e.g. no minorities). And they do it because they can afford it.
That prompted my question about the relationship between high wages and wasteful consumption in the US. High wages seem to enable people to make choices that fuel waste, environmental degradation, racism, dependence of fossil fuel etc. - so depressing them would force people to re-evaluate those choices, and perhaps opt for coops and public transit - both of which in Baltimore would cost you about $650 a month - well within the $1,000 per month paycheck.
Stated differently - there is a choice is between a coop and public transit @ $650 per month and a suburban residence plus a car or two @ $2,000 + per month - and nobody forces average US-ers to choose the second option - they do it willingly and eagerly.
To sum it up, corporations may be responsible for supplying wasteful gadgets and life styles, but people are more than eager to buy them with their inflated (vis a vis rest of the world) wages. Why is this wasteful consumption pattern worth preserving by maintaining high US wages?
Jon:
> It always used to be argued that the U.S. working class didn't have a
> European-style class consciousness because it didn't have the feudal
> background, and immigrants from Europe felt liberated from the class
> system they grew up in when they reached these shores, trading in
their
> old inferiority complex for a new feeling of superiority vis-a-vis
> blacks and Native Americans. By now, of course, we are talking about
> the 2nd, 3rd, or even 4th generation after those immigrants, so what
we
> have is probably a family tradition handed down through those
Some researchers (e.g. Theda Skocpol) also point to the role of nearly universal male suffrage in the US that cut through the class lines, by enfranchising males of different classes and disfranchising women of different classes. In Europe, by contrast, disfranchisement coincided with class boundaries. This enfranchisement/disfranchisement pattern, combined with machine politics (i.e. a system of kickbacks in exchange for votes) effectively killed class-based politics and organized labor with it.
Another factor - World War II thoroughly destroyed the old class entrenchment in Europe and creating an unprecedented opportunity for labor-based organizations to create political institutions. In the US, by contrast, the war victory had the opposite effect, it gave the upper hand to already entrenched upper classes that could effectively kill organized labor.
Wojtek