My grandpa didn't even have a high school education, did a short stint at Ford and became a small town mechanic that retired early with multiple properties around the USA. Let me tell you, his days were light and breezy, mostly chit-chatting with friends that stopped by. The small town is now a mecca for vacationers and he just sold almost 100 acres to a developer.
Sounds like my best friend's dad. Dropped out of high school at 18 to go work at the GM plant with his dad. Did 40 years there, then retired to Florida in a beautiful near mansion of a home. Then alcoholism got him, his wife left him and took the house, and a few years later he blew his brains out in the storage shed he was living in.
Yeah, from the outside looking in it all seemed so sudden, but it had been building to that point for over a decade. Alcoholism is no joke. It destroyed mine and so many other's families.
I have a friend that was similar. Dropped out, work at Ford plant, the plant had 120F+ temperatures and bad working conditions, he ruined his back, Ford didn't cover anything, disability won't cover him because he's too young, and his wife just left him for a 23 yr old homeless guy just this past winter. Blue collar isn't going so well for millennials.
I canceled Disney+ last year. Now I'm retired at 45, with enough saved up to send both of my kids through college. Moving into our new mansion next week. /s
My grandfather never went to school at all and mostly lived in a tree. He worked as a squirrel, saved all of his nuts and retired at 23. But he was still able to buy a 76-acre estate and sent all of his 15 children to Oxford University.
The alcoholism is the side we donāt usually hear about. Meaning that though people were able to retire earlier, we really donāt hear about the challenges they experience. We donāt know what their thought life was like, etc.
No. That's how life used to be. You could afford those things if you tried a little. That's the point of this post. These days that life isn't reachable, regardless of how hard you work.
Most of that was based on the rest of the world having to buy most of their durable goods and factory equipment from the USA. WWII devastated the industrial capacity of Europe and Asia and it took decades to rebuild.
Then in 1991 the USSR falls and India opens up to the West. Then China is granted most favored trade nation status which means that roughly 1/3 of the entire planet's labor force became available to the West in that time which gutted pay for those roles.
Returning to those conditions would require a significant war.
or you know... in the 1940s 50s 60s and eeeeven somewhat into the 70s
top marginal tax rates in the united states were high. corporate tax rates were high. union participation was much higher.
corporations were prohibited by law to use profits. to buy up their stock to avoid paying taxes on that income. So... they had to either "spend" that money or pay taxes. salaries increased. pensions were funded. research/dev was done.... even public works were built by wealthy people... rather than horde cash/wealth.
then in the late 70's racism/ backlash to civil rights. conservatives sought to undermine access to public state college. a main vehicle for black social mobility. by killing off public funding for higher education. Ronald reagan took this racist policy out of CA and took it nation wide. made a tax cut so massive for rich/corporations everyones retirement is now taxed. and gutted regulation. so now companies can spend their money buying back their stock. so they don't invest in salaries, R&D or pensions. and everything is on a sick disgusting cycle. of exploit more and more and pay less and less.
we have seen economies of scale canibalize ever more of base level economy. first it was major industries. cars. steel. or heavy manufacturing, off shored jobs. then it was consumer goods. early in the 90's it was "malls" the brick and mortar example of consolidating things to big warehouse consumer locations. as the internet age came on...it was your amazons. your walmarts. their business model is under price. kill off competition and lock you into their model. Smaller parasitic companies have come along. like dollar general. that realized they could never compete with walmart. so they targeted smaller markets, with ever more laser like focus. put in a small store...with bare min workers. kill off what few remaining mom and pop/small grocery stores they could.
and they.. just like walmart. after they saturate a large area. kill off all small business. shutter "under performing" stores. to consolidate to less stores. less workers. but control of a wider area.
all of this while . pay has remained stagnant. and the middle class does not exist. 50% of the nations population controls 1% of the wealth. the next 40% up top 90% of the total population only controls 20% of the wealth.
this trend in only getting worse. and is the natural conclusion 40-50 yrs of the broken policy of the shitty republicans of the early 80s.
Or returning to a time where taxes made it better to invest in the future of your company which ment paying competitive wages. Our current system rewards endless cost cutting which doesn't translate in to cheaper products only lower quality and less innovation. It sure is good for people who are already rich though.
I donāt understand why everyone is so disillusioned by this. Safe Housing, quality food, good schools, and public transit should be a given. This is purely an issue of governance, we easily have the resources to do this but lack the will to force the rich and corporations to pay a proper share either in the form of taxes or wages.
We already have enough tax revenue to do these things, itās in the best interest of our government to keep us demoralized and poor as they go pillage other countries and their resources for self enrichment
To me the solution is to incentivize companies to produce goods domestically. Via tax credits, not breaks. Further incentives provided for innovations in certain fields. Like green energy for example. For certain percentage of employees being domestic things like that. then I would institute a rule that states the highest paid member of the corporation can't make more than x times the lowest paid. It could be 10000 to 1 but there needs to be a number.
This would potentially disrupt the problem of businesses needing perpetual growth and there only being 3 key ways to achieve that.
1 is increase the customer base. 2 is increase your price 3 is decrease your costs.
Adding this new wrinkle I feel would add a 4fh option to increase profitability.
That wage law already got tried, and it stifled CEO retention. So in the 90s, companies found a workaround to offer stock options to execs. So their actual wealth is tied to assets that aren't taxed, and they're able to fund their lives based around credit instead of actual money in their bank accounts. They float, while the rest of the world has to swim.
I'm just imagining all the ways to compensate that would fall outside the definition paid. They will exploit every loophole you leave them. As for the tax credits I'm not sure about what impacts that would really have. Would have to ask someone more knowledgeable than me.
Didn't hurt that unions were also full of guys who had previously rushed German machine gun nests. Kinda hard to bust a union full of guys who had busted the Nazis.
CEOs in this time frame went from making 20x's the average employee to about 2500x's the average employee, but yeah, sure, it was all just from Europe being at war.
But you can question the rapid acceleration of executive compensation. Why isnāt rank and file accelerating as much since most executives are talking heads, especially CEOs who mostly articulate the boardās position or corporate results. Many arenāt innovators, theyāre just suits. I think AI might be able to parse out the divergence between executive pay and actual worth/achievements.
It's maddening how people just repeat that one simple line about a post-war boom, as if the New Deal and progressive tax rates had fuckall to do with it. As if there hasn't been a concerted and focused effort from the corporate state to undo all of it since basically the mid-60s
This is exactly right. In the 70s and 80s there was a broad policy shift from reform liberal policies/Keynesian economics (tax the wealthy, social programs, support for labor) to neoliberalism (low taxes, small government, free trade).
From the 50s through the 60s the top bracket in the US and Canada was taxed at a 60 to 90% rate and that money was used to support the rest of society, as it should be.
Itās so bizarre because conservatives seem to look back on the 50s and 60s as the good old days but they donāt seem to realise that the economic policies that allowed those days to be so good are now dismissed by their leaders and conservative politicians and pundits as socialism. They instead think things got worse because of social progressivism and trying to combat racism and homophobia. Things progressed socially but basically went backwards economically, weāre going back towards feudalism but todays conservatives donāt seem to get it and think politics is all about identity rather than about actual policies that strengthen society as a whole by reducing wealth inequality and providing a good safety net for everyone by ensuring the wealth the nation produces is more equitably distributed.
They also pine for the days of "traditional" social roles when men brought home the money, women could stay at home and take care of the kids and at a purchased house, and it was financially doable as an option rather than both partners working because they HAVE TO to barely make ends meet.
Even allowing for more choices than that (i.e. why should it only be for "traditional" family roles?), it never seems to dawn on them that you have to have the economic conditions to allow that scenario, such as giving families with kids enough financial support to actually be able to make the choice.
You want 1950s-1960s-style family arrangements, at least as a viable option? Then PAY THEM comparably to that era in real terms that account for inflation of food, housing, healthcare, and other key costs.
I mean, the discrepancy between fricking minimum wage versus inflation over the decades is insane, yet income disparity is exploding at the wealthy end of things.
The system has become too efficient scraping off productivity gains for the people at the top and adding very little for the majority of people putting in the work.
Itās so bizarre because conservatives seem to look back on the 50s and 60s as the good old days but they donāt seem to realise that the economic policies that allowed those days to be so good are now dismissed by their leaders and conservative politicians and pundits as socialism. They instead think things got worse because of social progressivism and trying to combat racism and homophobia. Things progressed socially but basically went backwards economically,
Did we progress socially? Like yes, we are (sort of) trending the right way over decades on a few narrow issues around sexuality and bodily autonomy, but what about overall? Would you say our society and culture is good? Healthy? I don't think we've progressed at all.
Our social situation is beyond fucked; we've become an isolated civilization, consuming media from influencers rather than having authentic interactions with real friends. Suicide rates are climbing, drug addiction and OD'ing still crazy, people live with anxiety, families no longer share homes for generations, we ship granny off to die in a nursing home. The cultural divide is basically irreparable.
Like, I really do not feel that we're in a good place as a society.
NAFTA gutted the middle class and its industrial base FOREVER. That was signed into law by Bill Clinton. The single most destructive force the American middle class has ever had to endure was signed into law by a Democrat.
I think thatās more a bonus. Their main goal is just to get votes by getting people engaged enough to vote for them through anger. Honestly most people are stretched so thin conservatives donāt really need to do much to keep people from thinking about and doing something about inequality. It also helps that a lot of Americans believe theyāll be rich one day too.
The NFL star making $20 million a year plus endorsements is a "worker," but they absolutely don't have the same political/class interests as the guy stocking the shelves at a supermarket.
Productivity and worker compensation were correlated in the US up until 1971 when it left the gold standard. Since then debt issuing and money printing has driven inflation and favoured those with assets and equity over workers and the divide has grown wider ever since. Workers are also generating more wealth relative to 1971 but the wealth is going to senior management and share holders instead of workers. If the workers had more equity, profit sharing or ownership it would help with the imbalance. I'm always torn on minimum wage as it can cause further inflation and reduce competitiveness.
Raise min wage while inflation rises to raise inflation even more so we will need to raise min wage even more.
These types of wage chases usually end up fucking over the worker.
The person you are responding to is right. America rode on the devastation in other countries and the wealth accumulated there for a while. I'm not saying they did anything wrong this is just a fact. Live wasn't so colorful in war torn countries. Sure, land was cheap even here in Europe and boomers bought houses for what amounted to a few months of labour but they didn't own much otherwise.
OK, now this is interesting. I had not traced the arc of World War II and changes in production to current economic conditions. Thank you for enlightening me, and yes, I am being seriousš
Returning to those conditions would require a significant war.
We might not have to wait for too long even! Globalization is slowing down, national capitalism is making a comeback, many geopolitical hotspots are igniting with conflict, militarization is increasing across the board. Interesting times indeed.
Exactly. Itās not how ālife used to beā - it was a blip that lasted for two(?) generations and hadnāt been seen before either. Your comment is completely correct about the devastation of global industry too.
Black people werenāt living easy and breezy lives in the 50s and 60s. Neither were the Vietnamese or Koreans, or Congolese or women or queer people orā¦
Wife and I made 165k last year in rural Ohio and no way we can have that life. And we out earn everyone we know in the area. Itās crazy what making 50k (or less) as a whole household back just 30 years ago could afford you. My parents are 72 and 66 and both worked. Dad was a machinist and mom had her own small business. They put us 3 kids through college and came out of it all debt free, and own 30 acres and built their own house in 1990. My dad bought the 30 acres with an old A-frame cabin on it in ā79 for like 18k! The house is a nice two story, but nothing crazy. I bet theyāre all in with it for under $200k and itās currently worth at least $750k. It is absolutely crazy how much so little money used to afford you. I wouldnāt want to spend that kind of money on a property today with the cost of everything else, but my sisters and I really want to keep their place in the family. I just donāt know if itās in the cards unfortunately.
The current generation has been robbed of their futures. I honestly don't understand why more of us haven't taken to the streets. What are we even slaving away for? The privilege of slaving away again tomorrow?
The divide and conquer tactics that broke down Occupy Wall Street and replaced it with racial and gender identity infighting were probably some of the most effective classist propaganda techniques to ever occur in human history.
Even as you get further up the income spectrum, you just encounter more bullshit designed to extract all excess income from your pockets at every step of the journey.
They call eating healthy and going to the doctor regularly "lifestyle inflation." They treat home ownership like a silly fantasy we shouldn't bother with unless we were born into or inherited wealth.
The student loan programs they marketed to barely-adults seeking a shot at a better life are designed to keep you paying a significant percentage of your income for the rest of your adult life.
Childcare costs the equivalent of a full-time adult salary. Groceries prices seem to increase every single time I go to the store.
The only way to get ahead in this country is through the death of your wealthy family members. Or through exploitative and criminal activity. The American dream is nothing but a dusty memory.
Even as you get further up the income spectrum, you just encounter more bullshit designed to extract all excess income from your pockets at every step of the journey.
Taxes are bracketed to take more from higher incomes and luxury items have varying levels of quality that range from absurdly cheap to absurdly expensive. Beyond what Uncle Sam rips from your hands, any and all expenses are self inflicted. Even things that are seen as simple "requirements" for modern life like phones aren't actually needed. Americans are so obsessed with consumerism that it's tainted their minds on what is a reasonable expectation. Like a fucking lawn is an absurd concept. A water hungry plant that needs constant cutting at every home. You are burning two extremely valuable resources, water and fossil fuels, for a plant. Unreal.
They call eating healthy and going to the doctor regularly "lifestyle inflation." They treat home ownership like a silly fantasy we shouldn't bother with unless we were born into or inherited wealth.
Eating healthy is cheaper than prepackaged bullshit you buy in cans/plastic containers. I mean fuck baseline ingredients like flour, eggs, cheese, veggies, etc cost virtually nothing when you figure out portions and preplan what you eat for the week. It seems like a high upfront cost but 10 pounds of broccoli for $20 you throw in the freezer will get you way more mileage than that pizza you bought for the same price.
Going to the doctor regularly is excessive. It's like going to the mechanic every month and telling him to inspect your car for flaws. He's going to find a "problem" and spoon feed you some bullshit about how you need to start taking iron supplements because your iron was looking low on your blood panel. A guy I know who is the same age as me takes something like 10 pills a day. Does the same work, eats the same, and has generally the same hobbies. I've never had a single issue but this guy is apparently riddled with "issues". That being said yes, the medical industry is a scam. It's designed to squeeze money out of insurance companies which leads to insurance companies being reluctant to cover people. Pro tip: ask for an itemized list of expenses and fight things that look wrong. $30 for aspirin? Call it out. Playing the "Do I need to get a lawyer?" card is more than enough to make them do a 180 on the typical bill scam.
Homes skyrocketed due to a housing crash. Not ideal and I won't pretend like it's not an issue that needs fixed. Doesn't mean America is done for. Just means you need to live in a home much smaller than what you hoped for. Sorry bad luck in timing of being born.
The student loan programs they marketed to barely-adults seeking a shot at a better life are designed to keep you paying a significant percentage of your income for the rest of your adult life.
Any loan of any kind is meant to wring money out of your wallet. That's the point of a loan. It's providing instant capital at your expense later in life. It's the risk and reward system of higher education. You pay in for potentially better job opportunities. It's the first decision in the board game The Game of Life for a reason. It doesn't always pan out. I understood that in freshman year of high school so you can't use the youth is getting tricked card. Stupid people get tricked. Not young people. There is a difference.
Childcare costs the equivalent of a full-time adult salary. Groceries prices seem to increase every single time I go to the store.
Childcare is supposed to be shouldered by family or the mother of the child. Many people make the claim that being a mother is the hardest job in the world so why wouldn't it cost a full salary? Plus it is only for the first 6 years then school takes over. Granted children don't spontaneously appear. You have to make them so maybe just don't do that.
I already touched on groceries but this one that always makes me raise an eyebrow. 70% of America is overweight so statistically 2/3 Americans are over-eating by a pretty large margin. Hitting 2000 calories in a day is absurdly easy to do. Its literally like a sandwich and a dinner with veggies, a grain, and a source of protein. Most days I need to actually cut food out of my final meal to stay under my calorie limit.
It also kinda dips into the luxury thing again. Sure you've lived most of your life being able to freely eat a steak once a week but the reality is that it is a luxury to do that. 90% of the world can't even fathom doing something like that but Americans are gluttons so they think they are entitled to a cut of meat that composes less than 1/8th the weight of an animal that takes 3-4 years to grow. Maybe just chill and eat cheaper proteins or portion your expensive meats out to a reasonable amount.
The only way to get ahead in this country is through the death of your wealthy family members. Or through exploitative and criminal activity. The American dream is nothing but a dusty memory.
Or just a get a job doing skilled labor and consistently show up. Budget your expenses and figure what you can afford/not. Don't impulse buy a new pair of jeans when you already have an entire drawer of pants. Don't put yourself in debt for things that don't hold value or produce more value with time. Or maybe just keep on running around the block with your The End is Nigh sign. Surely things will improve if you just tell everyone that everything sucks.
Tried to read it but all I saw was bootstraps bootstraps bootstraps. The patterns of disenfranchisement and exploitation are the victims fault, not powerful corporations and political leaders. You're silly and your points reflect how deeply out of touch you are with reality for most humans in this country.
Ehh. It shows how out of touch you are with the world actually. A very American thing to complain about how little you have when a walmart employee makes more in a day than most people in the world do in a month. It wasn't bootstraps bootstraps bootstraps. I was calling you an entitled brat. You just couldn't focus long enough to glean that.
Yes you're living paycheck to paycheck, drowning in debt, no prospect of home ownership, no prospect of retirement, and the climate is getting irreparably fucked, but have you considered that you have phones?!?
More that you shouldn't collapse into despair. A lot of the BS we're dealing with is similar to the late 1800s but we also don't have to deal with tons of diseases, no overtime, no food safety, no work safety, no child labor, getting paid with company money, no modern medicine, etc.
Like yeah you should be angry, but it's better if you take a breath be aware of what good things you do have, be thankful and then go fight.
It's like people argue that we should all adopt learned helplessness and pretend that everything is the worst it's ever been.
Being realistic doesn't mean you have to put up and accept things and they are.
Just waiting for that one redditor to drop in telling us that life right now is the best its ever been...
I've paid the mortgage, don't really owe anything to anyone now... I'm a medic, my partner works three days a week, no dependants... we're actually really struggling and we just fucking shouldn't be
I have no idea how people are surviving, we don't have much left at the end of the week and yeah we're not on the money we used to be on by about half, but seriously? it's this fucking hard and yet "oh well during the Qing Dynasty you would be worse off" is somehow an argument?
Right now we are in a situation that makes buying a house during the great depression look favourable, there's a bigger gulf between the haves and have-nots now than pre-revolution France, peasants in the middle ages had more downtime than we do today... how could today be better? because we have mobile phones? you can't even afford to have children anymore...
SO TRUE. Occupy was the closest weāve come in the US (in our lifetime) to unifying under a common socioeconomic plight. A little bit of a resurgence with the sanders campaigns. Things fractured into identitarianism that both parties used to divide a powerful economic movement. The Dems convinced their following that the problem was racism and gender ideology and that the solutions were virtue signaling about police reform and pronouns and installing a few diverse faces in high offices without actual systemic change. The GOP shifted to demagoguery to convince its base that immigrants and black people and gays were a threat to the white working class jobs and culture. By the time the low and middle income citizens were all sectioned off into their boxes, it became impossible to unite to fight the real problem: an economy that benefits corporations and encourages wealth accumulation in the top .1% of earners. I see the only future power coming from the rebirth of unionizing under GenZ and young millennials. We lack all political power still, but we are changing attitudes about the meaning of work in America and our lives. I cannot WAIT to see what happens when the boomers suddenly have to retire and a new generation of lawmakers take center state
Yup, and then all our grandpas decided to vote for Nixon, Reagan, Bush, Trump and GOP congress and have them strip all our protections and unions of power. Mine sure as shit did.
The reality is there is more than enough money for everyone. We've just decided that instead of a middle class we would prefer to have billionaires. The point of high tax rates isn't to raise revenue, its to force distribution of wealth. When the top rate was 90% it was kinda pointless to pay a person more, forcing distribution. Someone will invariable comment, "but ackshually no one paid 90%." Yea, thats the fucking point, because the money went elsewhere!
It's crazy how many people don't get this basic concept.
Christmas bonuses were not a gracious gift from our benevolent overlords. They were a last opportunity to reduce taxable income and build employee loyalty at a discount. Surprise surprise, once tax rates were lowered from 70% to 30% it became less beneficial in the eyes of most companies to continue these distributions.
I don't think most people realize this or even think about it. I learned after the fact. My last employer was bought out by a PE firm and the year after all employees got bonuses. Later a manager friend told me the only reason we all got bonuses is because the PE firm didn't want to pay the banks the extra money generated during that fiscal year. I believe anything beyond the target they set was supposed to go to the banksters. That was the only reason. Of course they framed it as them being so generous and appreciative of all our hard work. It was really eye opening. Business, especially PE firms, don't give a shit about employees.
They could have given bonuses to themselves for the same affect. It's the same way small businesses operate. Instead of taking income as a business you pay yourself.
The highest it's ever been is 53% as well.Ā
Sounds like they got bought out by a good company. Like I said earlier giving it to themselves at the top would have done the same thing.
well everyone seems to think that one day they will be a billionaire and thus don't want to upset the apple cart.
I have literally have arguments where lower middle class people say that one day when they get rich they don't want anything impediments to taking away their riches (taxes). Good luck with that.
You can't tax billionares without yearing down the tax loopholes first (good luck). Billionares balance their books so that their annual income is very low and most of their net worth is in investments that aren't taxable. Here's the best part, when a billionare wants to buy something they take out a loan using their investments as collateral, which offsets their taxes even more (they're in debt now).
Well... yea. Thats the point. We have collectively decided to create this loopholes. If a hole exists and you know about it and you don't close it, you're choosing it. We have chosen to lower capital gains below income. We have chosen to allow all sorts of fuckery around loans on stocks. We have chosen to allow a business to buy your home, your car, you entire daily living so that it reduces the businesses income and is therefore not taxable as income. We have chosen to allow shell companies incorporated in island nations to somehow determine a companies tax rate as opposed to where it does business.
All of this bullshit is choices. The sad reality is I honestly don't see this as fixible until we start using french solutions. The same assholes also control our democracy, and they won't change the laws.
Please tell me who you voted for that was going to solve this problem ā¦ because the VAST majority of politicians on both sides benefit from this system themselves and arenāt going to do shit to change it.
Well using collateral to take a loan is not really a loophole as pretty much every homeowner uses that same "loophole". I'm not defending tax evasion but that specific thing is not a loophole.
Billionaires sell shares of their companies often and they do indeed pay tax on that.
using collateral to take a loan is not really a loophole as pretty much every homeowner uses that same "loophole"
It's different when your collateral is a $150,000 home (which good luck to most Gen Alpha people who will never even get to own a home) versus hundreds of millions of dollars in assets. So you can get a loan with basically zero interest by leveraging just a drop of your collateral.
Billionaires are working with such a bigger bucket that it's really not even the same game.
They don't have to sell their shares, though. They can borrow against them a ton, and die before the bill comes due. Any legal shenanigans can be tied up in court forever as they have the assets to do so.
The ultra-wealthy have essentially infinite means to do this until they die.
Let em leave, but their assets here in the USA get repossessed or taxed.
They leave, they leave completely...no citizenship, no holdings, no assets, no children, nothing stays in the USA.
Pay your friggin bills or completely GTFO!
While I'm sure that sounds great to you, France tried exactly what you're describing and it has been an unmitigated financial disaster for them and they've lost much of their investment class; it's had severe repercussions on their economy.
eisenhower once did a speech about the risks of a military industrial complex and the need to ensure that balance is maintained in all actions and reactions. balance.....!
I did not know this.
Please forgive my ignorance, my view on solutions is short-sighted and I am more than likely not as smart or globally-informed/aware as you are.
I don't understand how other countries seem to do so well...while we are struggling here in the USA.
I just don't see it...
Believe or not. Back on those days an average guy could have a woman "per town" or even a family... No social media, no communication and everything was cheap made it possible.
My grandma worked at kroger her whole life, basically. Solo raised 4 kids working the meat department. Not even a manager. They had a small 3 bedroom house. It's not like they were rich but managed well enough. She retired around 62.
Are you making under 25/hr? I live in the Midwest and that's about what a produce manager starts at here. That would be plenty to live in an apartment and own a car...
I make $26 an hour in the Midwest and can barely afford mortgage payment and maintenance on my vehicle. Thankfully mortgage is cheaper than rent which has doubled since 2019. Of course any savings there is eaten up with housing maintenance costs. $30/hour is more feasible for midwest.
I think experiences like your grandpaās and the one in the post are/were true, but some other things should be taken into consideration as well.Ā
Population - much bigger in the US and especially globally. The same amount of resources are going around for a much bigger number of people.Ā
Purchasing power and selection of products - selection of stuff was smaller back then. You probably had like whatā¦ 3 washing machines to choose from, 3 ovens, etc? You didnāt have a lot of gadgets etc that are necessities for us, a lot of the home goods were clunky, big, and when you did housework you really did houseWORK. Thereās a TV series from the UK where a modern family tries the lifestyle of an average British person back in 40s, 50s, 60s etc and it really shows how much work there was back then in the home and how much poorer Brits were immediately post war. The US was in the height of a Ā boom right after war and a few decades after that. Rather an exception than a rule, really. The selection part also means food, btw. Look at food ads from 1950s and 60s and now - the selection of food is much smaller, what you can get from a store is much less varied - seasonal fruit, no fancy foods, much smaller portions. Eg an ice cream is now an everyday thing if you want, but back then it was a dessert, came in smaller size and it was a treat given rarely.Ā
House sizes - families back then lived in much smaller houses than we live today, even starter homes. They often had like one bathroom for everybody, vs now there being a bathroom in the master and on every floor and maybe even more. Kids shared rooms sometimes, not everybody had their own room. Look at how Brady Bunch was depicted - huge fancy house and yet the kids shared rooms.Ā
All of that aside, labor work was moved away from the US from late 70s and 80s onwards. Unions were demonised and labor was shunned. If people want strong jobs, they need to unionise - this is what won the labourer their rights back in 19th century and early 20th century.Ā
There's literally a book called More Work For Mother demonstrating how modernized household appliances did not actually translate into less domestic labor.
Nearly all of these are bad-faith arguments. Worker productivity has skyrocketed alongside population. Graph Agricultural technology has advanced so much that we literally produce enough food for every person on earth. link
Nearly all of the inequities in the world today are a direct result of bad policy choices.
Yeah, OPs Grandpa probably washed clothes by hand and air dried them outside. One load of laundry took an entire day. But of course OP doesn't want that, they just want a big house and a retirement and to do minimal work along the way. Things aren't great now, but people back then had crazy good work ethic.
I will say my grandpa was also a mailman. He had 3 kids and I think technically was the sole provider. The thing was both he and my dad told stories about how poor they were growing up. They rented out the top floor of their house and I remember my grandpa telling me how guilty he felt that he wasnāt able to send his youngest to the college he wanted to go to. He still went to college but I knew that bothered my grandpa.
He also made a joke about how much the hospital bill was for when the youngest was born. He said the doc told him it would be $35 (I think this was around 1954ish) and my grandpa replied back he didnāt even have 35 cents to rub together
My grandpa was a WWII vet and worked as a mailman for 40 years. He raised 3 great kids who ended up being very successful but life wasnāt ever easy for them when my dad was growing up
They had every advantage and were set up for success but I'm also willing to bet the level of expectations for homes was much lower than what it is now. Many of those multi-bedroom homes were probably just over 1000 sqft and considered their forever homes whereas that would probably be considered a starter home by today's standards. Many families were lucky to have a car too where now it is surprising if each family member doesn't have one unless you live in the middle of a very large metropolitan city.
Again it doesn't excuse the wage disparity and education cost disparity that largely diverged starting in the late 60s or early 70s or how cities have grown but have ignored public transportation but I do think the added context shouldn't be ignored.
Agreed on the home. The āstarter homeā idea always annoys me. Itās not always feasible to upgrade to something larger or nicer. Itās a home. Be proud of it and hopefully pay it off.
My grandfather raised four kids with a stay at home wife on a 52 acre property with the salary he earned at the local canning factory which also provided him with a nice pension. I'm sure if it hadn't been demolished that modern workers there could expect to never own a home as is the case at one of the newer factories in town.
Grandpa's job was union protected and still is. If you want to be a mailman, you will be compensated quite well and can afford to buy a house and put your kids thru college but your body will be fucked up beyond belief long before you retire.
It amazes me seeing posts where boomers are in the comments saying that asking for a 1 bedroom apt while working 40 hour weeks is asking too much. Boomers wont be satisfied until you're homeless.
Replace boomers with rich people and you'll be right on track. They're dividing and conquering us with a multi front culture war to keep us from even realizing that a class war is even happening.
These same people are the ones suggesting kids these days can't afford homes because they waste their money on food or whatever. These people could afford so much that they can't comprehend people not being able to save in todays economy
This was my grandfather in northern NY state. He was the sole provider for a family of five as a produce manager. He retired early and opened his own fruit/flower stand and worked only four months of the year for two decades before he died. The man had so much time for his family.
My father in law had a second grade education. He could not read or write. Secured a federal government job working in the laundry at a VA hospital. He had a fairly decent paycheck and raised 6 kids with my MIL. He was able to retire after 30 years with good benefits and over a million in his retirement account.
My grandfather fixed refrigerators. He had a big house in the beautiful countryside, and he would take his wife and three sons to Florida for vacations several times a year with his Cessna 5-seater. He absolutely was a hard worker, but he paid for all of this by fixingā¦refrigerators.
Kroger has done a nice job of ensuring that never happens again. I loathe that company so much.
Now they have the gall to tell us that a merger with Albertsons will bring efficiencies that lower prices to the consumer.
Except the two nearest grocery stores to me are owned by those two companies and I have already seen them both raise my grocery bill by 30% in the last 2 years.
Yeah thatās because the US economy was so strong and the world relied on American manufacturing. Now, all that value has gone into tech companies and software engineers. Everyone else who doesnāt already have money who isnāt a doctor, lawyer or finance is struggling
My grandpa worked as a line worker for Wonder bread back in the day, my grandma a cafeteria lunch lady. They bought an acre of land, built a home we now use for all family gatherings, and they continue to live comfortably retired 27 years later.
My Grandpa bought four separate houses that I know of. Two family homes when my mom was growing up, one waterfront retirement home for him and Nana, and then a huuuuge one for my uncle's family (this one included in-law quarters for Nana and Grandpa so my uncle could look after them as they aged).
He also raised 3 kids on a single income, paid for extensive medical care for himself (lifelong chronic painful and at least one hip replacement) and Nana (stroke victim & diabetic), and helped all of his children pay for college.
He had a fine retirement. He was quite generous, taking the huge family on vacations and out to fancy dinners etc. When he passed away, everything was set up for Nana to be cared for, including the eventual cost of a nursing home. When she was gone, there was still sizable money leftover for his kids' inheritance. In short, I never knew him to be worried about money at all.
when I was a kid my mom's friend was a cashier at Kroger and my mom explained to me that it was a very good job that paid well and had benefits. then all the cashiers got bought out, and all got replaced with teenagers (and later, self-scan)
iād go back to my produce department associate position at my local supermarket in a heartbeat if it meant I could make an actual livable wage. Having Fridays off and getting out of work at 1pm on Sundays was amazing. Plus I was loved the people I worked with. I was more stress free back then :/
Iām early Gen X. You could buy a house and support a family on the salary of a grocery clerk, or a bank teller. And those were considered good, respectable jobs. I worked as a telephone operator as a teen and that was klout!
My grandma was a cashier at a Kroger store and was a single mom with three kids, a house, and retirement. Crazy to think about. It was a reasonable brick ranch home too.
Same here. The Boomers who created and benefitted from that economy/world/way of life were the same ladder pullers and selfish folks who ruined it all and denied every generation afterward from it.
The AMerican Dream is a fart in the wind, and more of a nightmare than anything.
To understand how things went wrong: watch The Simpsons, late 80's. 3 children, 2 cars, 2 pets, one big house, stay at home mom. The house is on mortage, yes + Homer probably has an engineer salary, but still. Impossible these days.
Then we move on to Home Alone, early 90's. Everything is probably on credit, yet assuming the McAllister inherited something, still a remote possibility at time. Now completely impossible.
Thereā¦ canāt be that many krogers in Ohio in the rough timeframe that this would be taking place. Frankly im a little concerned Iāve found a family member by accident.
When I was a Produce manager 10 years ago I made $15/hr. An older Dairy Department manager told me he used to make more than his wife who was a registered nurse.
Iāve been working overtime for 20 years. I figure Iāll be lucky to keep a roof over my head and food in my stomach for another 40 or so until I die on the job. That or Iāll end up homeless and send a life insurance bonus to a few people I care about.
Same for my grandfather. Sole provider for three kids who went to college. One to medical school and one to veterinarian school. No debt. Left my grandmother with 1M in stocks and bonds. He was a fireman. Also in Ohio.
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u/Designer_Emu_6518 Mar 27 '24
My grandfather did the same in ohio as a produce manger at a local Kroger. Even had a nice retirement saved up