There really are two Americas, but they are not captured by the standard class warfare speeches that dramatise the gulf between the rich and the poor. Of the new divisions, one is the gap between employed and unemployed that President Barack Obama seeks to close with yet another $50bn stimulus programme. Another is between workers in the private and public sectors. No guesses which are the more protected. A recent study by the Mayo Research Institute found that “private-sector workers were nearly three times more likely to be jobless than public-sector workers”.
美国的确存在两个阶层，但标准的阶级斗争言论阐述得并不准确，它们夸大了富人与穷人的差距。在各种新的差距中，有一个是就业者和失业者之间的差距。美国总统巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)正寻求再出台一项500亿美元刺激计划，来弥合这一差距。另一种差距存在于私营与公共部门的雇员之间。哪个部门更有保障就不用猜了。梅奥研究所(Mayo Research Institute)近期完成的一项调查发现，“私营部门雇员失业的可能性比公共部门高出近3倍。”