Well, things have changed since our grandparent's generation. A college degree used to be a guaranteed ticket to a decent job, and even many blue collar jobs were much better paying and less abusive. Now being 30 years old and living with your parents is not that odd.
Now, debt, unemployment and inflation are soaring (if you want to see how bad it really is, visit cities like Detroit or the non-wealthy areas of Chicago).
There is a growing wealth divide. I have nothing against "1 percenters" but I do believe the gap is becoming dangerous. 95 percent of recovered funds from this recent "improvement" in the economy (since the last crash) have gone to the wealthiest 1 percent.
Our government's budget is increasing in size, but they are not spending money any more wisely. Certain contractors make a killing (particularly in the military sector), and its kind of a false economy based not on merit but who puts money back into their politician's pocket (in the "real" world, the healthcare.gov site would have been built for a fraction of the cost and its failure would have been a huge blow to the company that created it).
Part of this is people failing to adapt to the changing world or feeling too entitled and expecting their corrupt/indifferent government to fix every problem. Part of it is that automation and oversea workers are claiming many jobs (but these are crappy jobs you wouldn't want anyway). Automation is even going into territories you might not think of. 100 years ago the US population was almost half farmers (IIRC), and now it is less than 2 percent.
Basically, you are not delusional. Things are getting harder, and worse. Competition is getting fierce as everyone is increasingly competing to justify their worth to employers. The economy is definitely in a bubble because the stock indices does not reflect the reality of debt, unemployment, and our stale economy right now. I have no good idea of how these problems can be solved. I am no Luddite, but I think that perhaps taking a step backwards in time could be an interesting experiment - create more towns that are self-sufficient, grow their own crops, build their own houses, etc. It seems like much of the wealth is getting boiled down into the hands of fewer and fewer big companies.
> I am no Luddite, but I think that perhaps taking a step backwards in time could be an interesting experiment - create more towns that are self-sufficient, grow their own crops, build their own houses, etc. It seems like much of the wealth is getting boiled down into the hands of fewer and fewer big companies.
Maybe it would be different now, what with communications technology like the internet making proximity to major city centers less important. But to me, this doesn't sound like a practical solution
My grandparents worked quite hard. Harder than my (Silent Generation ) Dad, harder than I do. Paternal g-pa was in oilfield, then a carpenter. At his age, you worked til you wore out, then after ten years... Maternal g-pa was an entrepreneur of some sort, kinds hazy what really.
Paternal Grandpa as it turns out was in some labor unrest in the Mid-Continent oil labor-strike ( with actual Wobblies! ) and that is why he went into carpentry. Violent business; gunfire, explosives. Wow. Grandpa? Really?
I was in gummint contracting from 2004-2009. It's not good in there. A few contracts are really large but it's not a good business any more. healthcare.gov is sadly probably more typical than not.
I think we're somewhat frog-boiled in luxury myself. Really look at what was the style in 1960; it was pretty spare - about what you'd have now if you were quite poor. I got new clothes basically once a year - from Sears, and they came on a train six weeks later. From Sears to Amazon in three decades...
The... uh .. Vietnam War made young men have more options then, but we don't wanna go there...
I think the higher returns constitute "winner take all" - and that means competition is actually less. Each option is much like the other, so the winner can leverage out the losers - winner take all. Of those, some fraction will persist. If innovation is heat to Schumpeterian change, then the heat is up. The rest is just endless laying off of risk through contracts/contracting.
But the basic thing is - you'd just expect more growth at the right of the curve.
The difference is that defense is an unnecessarily expense. There is no credible military threat to the United States in the world right now. We would be just as safe if we stopped maintaining such a gigantic standing army and stopped interfering in overseas conflicts.
In contrast, spending for healthcare, education, and welfare measurably makes Americans' lives better. Cutting funding for these programs looks attractive for those who don't use them anyway (the rich), but would ultimately widen the class divide and be harmful to the country.
Now, debt, unemployment and inflation are soaring (if you want to see how bad it really is, visit cities like Detroit or the non-wealthy areas of Chicago).
There is a growing wealth divide. I have nothing against "1 percenters" but I do believe the gap is becoming dangerous. 95 percent of recovered funds from this recent "improvement" in the economy (since the last crash) have gone to the wealthiest 1 percent.
Our government's budget is increasing in size, but they are not spending money any more wisely. Certain contractors make a killing (particularly in the military sector), and its kind of a false economy based not on merit but who puts money back into their politician's pocket (in the "real" world, the healthcare.gov site would have been built for a fraction of the cost and its failure would have been a huge blow to the company that created it).
Part of this is people failing to adapt to the changing world or feeling too entitled and expecting their corrupt/indifferent government to fix every problem. Part of it is that automation and oversea workers are claiming many jobs (but these are crappy jobs you wouldn't want anyway). Automation is even going into territories you might not think of. 100 years ago the US population was almost half farmers (IIRC), and now it is less than 2 percent.
Basically, you are not delusional. Things are getting harder, and worse. Competition is getting fierce as everyone is increasingly competing to justify their worth to employers. The economy is definitely in a bubble because the stock indices does not reflect the reality of debt, unemployment, and our stale economy right now. I have no good idea of how these problems can be solved. I am no Luddite, but I think that perhaps taking a step backwards in time could be an interesting experiment - create more towns that are self-sufficient, grow their own crops, build their own houses, etc. It seems like much of the wealth is getting boiled down into the hands of fewer and fewer big companies.