Concerning the Dec. 15 commentary, "Plight of Middle Class is About More than Recession," by Jim Tankersley of the Washington Post.

The article by Tankersley was an interesting and heart-rending human interest story, but never answered the question he raised: "Why did the economy stop boosting ordinary Americans in the way it once did?" He claimed the answer was "complicated."

We all know that this five and a half-year old recovery has been lackluster. Unemployment has dipped below 6 percent, but wage growth has been de minimis and labor force participation, at 62.8 percent, is at levels not seen since the late 1970s.

It has been a failure to reform both the individual and tax codes, by which is meant a simplified code with lower nominal rates and fewer exemptions, concomitant with a deluge of regulations that have imposed enormous burdens on employers.

The bipartisanship that allowed for tax reform and Social Security reform in the 1980s, and welfare reform and the ratification of NAFTA in the 1990s, is missing in today's polarized Washington.

A recent study sponsored by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) showed that the cost to manufacturers of complying with federal regulations is $19,654 per employee. That cost rises to $34,671 at companies with fewer than 50 workers, the employer of most Americans.

It is an overtaxed and over-regulated environment that, in my opinion, has done the most to keep this recovery feeble.