(May 27, 2018 at 8:30 am)henryp Wrote: I've thought for a while, we have a standard of living bubble. That our expectations for stuff everybody should have has become a bit unrealistic. One thing from growing up in the 80's is there just wasn't as much stuff to own. We had a small tv, a plug in phone, 3 channels, and a VCR. Now, many people have a tablet, smart phone per person, a data plan, dvr, dvd player, 250 channels, Netflix, Amazon account, large flat screen tv, 2 computers, and high speed internet, and a video game system.
My parents didn't have a dishwasher. Some didn't have Dryers. Some didn't have microwaves. The big yearly vacation was to the lake. The car was a station wagon they'd had forever. Eating at a restaurant was both rare, and we when we did it, we went to pizza hut.
If you were willing to live like people back in the late 70's to early 80's, I bet things would be much more affordable. We sort of get a glimpse of that with Captain Awesome and how he's living.
And the socialism, and leftism in general is just common sense. Millenials don't have a bunch of money, but they want a bunch of stuff. But then some of them get some stuff, and have some kids, and they want to keep their stuff, and give their kids advantages, so they become republicans or libertarians.
Well you have lots of problems there, first the basics like a house, a car, a phone,and food cost a lot more than they did in the 70's and 80's and wages haven't exactly kept up with expenses. Second your suggesting that people spend less and live simpler, that is not recipe for making things more affordable overall. If on a large scale people just cut back their spending to the bare minimum it would be devastating economically, which means job losses, poorer people, and ultimately higher costs. The key to a successful capitalist system is having a consumer base with disposable income, right now we don't which is why they invented credit cards. Right now we rely on the private sector to pay adequate wages to fuel the economy, they have not done that and they don't look like they plan on doing that, so it's not surprising that Millenials are leaning more towards socialism, we really haven't given them much of choice.
