Why do Americans feel less secure?

Tonight the candidates will be debating domestic issues. Before the debate, you may want to read this very interesting article on the transformation of the American economy in the LA Times.

It's long, but has a lot to say about why so many people feel worried about their jobs, their health care, and their long-term future, even though the economy, by many measures, is improving. It's all about "income volatility".

Though it may not become clear tonight, what is lurking beneath the dispute between the candidates is a long-term, and barely recognized, shift in how our economy is structured, and how we distribute the dislocations of capitalism's "creative destruction."

Although the overall economy has become steadier — settling into a pattern of long swells of growth followed by relatively gentle dips — the incomes of working people have been beset by ever-larger fluctuations. Looked at in this way, "we haven't reduced economic risks" at all, said Harvard economist Martin L. Weitzman. "We've simply redistributed them from the economy as a whole to individual households."