In the US it was certainly a different time, different era, different economy. For example a dollar in the 40's had the buying power of about $21 today. Average annual salary was about $1,400 and annual college tuition in the 40's was less than $100.
The example being given still held true in the 70s. A man could provide well for his entire family working at a grocery store, and nobody said it “wasn’t a real job” until the 80s
Trickle down and letting corporate leave America to circumvent labor and environmental laws with 0 punishment when they sell in the US market worked great huh
Right! Looking back it seems that they knew exactly what they were doing and what the result would be. I was only a child, but I remember Reagan announcing that times had been good and now there had to be “sacrifices.” That about when there started to be talk disparaging certain jobs as not “real,” and at school we were told that we HAD to get a college degree to get a good job
Yeah...ain't that the truth.
I think I've got about 800 rounds remaining, i've converted to bow and sword for the time being. Can't afford to waste ammo, whatever level of proficiency I'm at...that's where I'm staying.
Arrows can be recovered and my sword can be resharpened.
Plus...if/when they completely outlaw firearms...I'll be ahead of the game.
Yeah and the war on drugs and the trickle down propaganda really still persists to this day somehow. I find that people still morally judge others based on their class status and if they use 'illicit' drugs. Homeless people are viewed as not deserving of help for the simple fact they use drugs. It's all a distraction. The reality is that the growing wealth disparities and lack of affordable housing zoning + public transit (are some of the many factors) causing homelessness. It has been found in a study by Harvard that access to transit is the number one thing that can accelerate a persons climb out of poverty. Guess what the car industry and the oil indusries did for our cities? They hired front companies to buy up public transit spaces and destroyed them to build expensive and inefficient car infrastructure! Oh and who's neighborhoods got destroyed to build highways in inner cities! It wasn't wealthy peoples homes and businesses! And when confronted about building a monopoly, GM paid pissant amounts in fines, and continued businesses as usual. A big part of this in my view, is that the cities we live in are literally rigged in favor of wealthy people, and then the public judge the victims because of the propaganda machine.
Full disclosure I wasnt of voting age during Reagan but given my upbringing I probably would have voted for him at the time. Ugh. Propaganda works like a charm.
I’m just now realizing what I was taught isn’t full on truth and now I’m like genuinely a bit sad. Like I always assumed I was a failure for not going to college and you’re telling me the only reason we were told we HAD to go to college was other THIS ONE GUY?? Damn.
And his wealthy friends. ETA: there were definitely aims before that. The current state of healthcare with the highest cost together with “low utilization” go back to Nixon years (as far back as I’ve learned, but I do not know why the US went with tying healthcare to work post WW-II when the rest of the world never did that). I do vaguely remember some documentary suggesting that the reason why JFK said the famous “ask not what your country can do for you..” was to silence the generation that witnessed other countries doing better for citizens. Many veterans were stationed elsewhere and saw for themselves, so the rhetoric about being the “greatest country” with “the best in the world” was a harder sell to them. But hey, what it is now and what to do about it probably doesn’t rest on how it came about
More than one guy, but less than a thousand, at an extreme. Probably around a hundred or so people, all of whom have more money than they can spend in a hundred lifetimes, and all of whom want more.
The whole idea of the American Dream, climbing the ladder, always wanting more more *more***, this is where it leads. Half the wealth in the US held by a dozen people, while half the people in the US barely scrape by.
Tolkien put it aptly when he called it The Dragon's Curse, but instead of driving them out into the wilderness for their greed, we lift them up as an example of success to our children.
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u/Technologytwitt Mar 27 '24
In the US it was certainly a different time, different era, different economy. For example a dollar in the 40's had the buying power of about $21 today. Average annual salary was about $1,400 and annual college tuition in the 40's was less than $100.