two things about that: First, employers do take local cost of living into account to set pay, some implicitly due to competition, but many of them explicitly adjust wages based on cost of living data from economists. Secondly your complaint about the wrong KPIs rests in part on conflating cost of living with inflation.
The problem the Democrats face is that wage prospects and social issues are segmented by level of education more than in the past. They should run on higher minimum wage, which will benefit rural workers more, and on making inclusive social views the key to social acceptance. Might be an unpopular opinion, but the Democrats won't get the sports betting crypto Joe Rogan incels anyway, so they might as well make the most stereotypical ones the symbol of how to keep you dick perma-dry.
> The problem the Democrats face is that wage prospects and social issues are segmented by level of education more than in the past.
But that's just because more people typically seek higher levels of educational attainment than in the past, so the more capable people filter upward.
In my grandfather's day, even going to high school was relatively unusual. Back then, the "less than high school" cohort was a healthy mix ranging from those with extreme disabilities to high performing people. Nowadays, there are often even legal mandates that require anyone who is capable to graduate from high school. So, the "less than high school" cohort is now effectively only those with extreme disabilities, with all the life challenges that go along with that. As such, if you only glance at the data you might think that lower levels of education have fallen behind, but in reality they've just lost the people that helped make it look better than it really was for those who struggle.
That doesn't seem like it should be a problem. Only the counting has changed, which isn't materially significant.
I suppose what you are trying to say is that said shift has revealed how bad things have always been for the disabled, and Democrats are called upon to fix the issue making it their problem, whereas it is understood that the Republicans are always of the "fuck the disabled" mind so nobody expects them to deal with it?
The problem the Democrats face is that wage prospects and social issues are segmented by level of education more than in the past. They should run on higher minimum wage, which will benefit rural workers more, and on making inclusive social views the key to social acceptance. Might be an unpopular opinion, but the Democrats won't get the sports betting crypto Joe Rogan incels anyway, so they might as well make the most stereotypical ones the symbol of how to keep you dick perma-dry.