US middle class trapped in the middle one year after crisis

• Source: Xinhua
• [16:53 September 17 2009]
• Comments

"We can't really go to the mall. If we go to the mall we do window-shopping," Jin Fan Harvilla, a typical middle-class woman in the United States, complained with dismay, saying that the financial crisis brought unprecedented fiscal challenges to families like hers.

Jin, who is from Beijing, China, has been settled down in Virginia for nearly a decade. She and her husband Tom Harvilla live in South Riding, a suburban community in Virginia 45 minutes west of Washington, DC.

In this well maintained, typical middle class neighborhood, there is a golf course, a community swimming pool, and a shopping plaza that caters to most daily household needs.

Jin and Tom live in a 4,500 square foot three-bedroom single house with their two young children and two dogs. When the couple goes to work, the children and the dogs are left to the care of Jin's mother.

In their neighbors' eyes, this is a perfectly happy family. However, the financial storm originated on Wall Street in New York shook the household to its foundations.

First, Jin lost her job as a financial analyst at Bearing Point Inc. when the large management and technology consulting firm filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in February, 2009. The news shocked Jin who never thought a company with over 3 billion US dollars in revenue and more than 15,000 employees worldwide could fold up overnight.

"It's a global company, a big company. It should stand strong. But we didn't do very well in the crisis," said Jin, who is in her early 30s.

Jin was notified of her layoff by the company when she had just completed the maternity leave after the birth of her second child.

At a time when family spending had to increase with one more mouth to feed, the second blow hit the family: the value of their house plummeted during a recession.

The Harvillas bought their home at the peak of the residential real estate boom in 2005. One year after the financial crisis, not only the gain in home value over the last four years was wiped out, the value dropped so much that the couple would lose more money if they refinance.

"This housing price that we are in is probably the one that was hit the most," said Tom. "Because it's probably the most common price point...for a family, people in their 30s and 40s and have young kids."