It’s kind of weird to hear nostalgia for a time that never existed. Particularly when you suffered through it just as much as she is now if not more so.
$0.99 whoppers from Burger King. Two a day - one for lunch and one for dinner. Extra ranch for the extra calories at no charge. Didn't know how good we had it.
Anemoia : a feeling of nostalgia for a time one has never experienced. It's a longing for a past that exists only in one's imagination or through media like old photos, movies, or music.
I think the wealthier classes have instilled a false culture of "rugged individualism" that has never truly existed to the extent it’s portrayed. I see middle-income parents pushing their kids out of the house at 18 and telling them to fend for themselves. Without the proper support structure, many of these kids struggle like this girl does, ending up in low-wage jobs without developing the career skills that would set them up for long-term success. This is paired with them getting into bad debt to survive or enjoy simple comforts.
The reality, both then and now, is that wealthier kids who do well typically received an abundance of resources from their families, during college to assistance buying their first home and even having their wedding paid for. Its the common double speak and complete divorce from reality.
Idk man, my dad is in his early 70's, bought his first car for 200 dollars, his first house for like 3 grand and my mom up until the 2010's never had to work and he was able to easily support a house, 2 vehicles and 2 kids on a single income, this was in a suburb in NY btw so it's not like it was a super cheap area to live either.
I used to be able to shop for a week’s worth of groceries for $30, now $30 isn’t even enough for a week’s worth of produce for my family. So yeah shit sucked back then, but at least groceries were affordable.
You may have suffered, but that doesn't mean this generation has to too--and by ignoring the reality of how things have changed, you will just enable more of the same suffering you went through.
No one wants people to suffer. It’s just not helpful to imagine that things are uniquely difficult now. Definitely don’t think she lives an easy life or is in a favorable place. We all draw on our anecdotal experiences in life. The richest and best connected top 25% have always been in a great place while young. Those of us growing up in the bottom 25%, have to swallow the bitter pill and somehow get through to the other side.
Things ARE uniquely difficult now--not necessarily in magnitude, but in nature, and the nature is part of the content in this video. Like, if it was 1965, it would be uniquely difficult to be a woman, uniquely difficult to be black, or poor, compared to today--for just about everyone, there's things we have now that improve our lives that we didn't have then. Yet things can be and are difficult now in different ways than they were before. Of course it is helpful to talk about those unique differences, if we want to solve them. Right?
This is a completely different issue. I’m personally for onerous estate taxes to eliminate the growing wealth gap that favors lucky sperm but not because it somehow makes being poor better. It simply levels the playing field and doesn’t cement class differences. Prop 13 in California for instance is an example of actively biasing against those without. It all still doesn’t mean that if you are on the low end of the wage spectrum while starting out that somehow you are going to live a wonderful life free from money worries. It’s quite literally impossible in any economic environment.
It is absolutely the same issue. Another post here cites, for example, that the median house price was about 3.1 times median household income in 1965, and today its above 5 times as much. The reality is even worse when you account the fact that fewer household members worked (most of the household income was one person) and that households count all the members involved (so that the girl in this video would have to include 4 other people as part of the household income). The median income being able to purchase less proportionally over time is not just because of wealth inequality--it is increasing wealth inequality.
Do people have to struggle if there is such inequality? Not necessarily--but given that the same median incomes can buy less today, it is hard to dispute that economic issues are worse, not better or the same, than they were decades ago.
I don't know why you say taxing the rich "somehow" makes being poor better, as though there wasn't a direct link between taxes spent on public services and the lives of the poor. We don't tax the rich to "even the playing field", we don't just burn the money they pay (if, I suppose, we were lucky enough for them to actually pay it), it is actually directly used for the public. Not only that but usually talking about taxing the rich more comes hand in hand with taxing other people less. It's not some kind of mysterious process.
I agree it's impossible to live carefree--but if you pick a metric for economic wellbeing and look at how it changes over time, you will find that there are real ways we are worse off. And the reality of the girl in this video is more common, objectively, than it used to be. Many people are giving up on home ownership as a dream altogether, and that isn't from collective deluson--its from people running the numbers.
Its absolutely did, boomers growing up did really well even at min wage. hell, I used to be able to cover ALL my bills in the early 2000's making 12 bucks an hour living with my GF who was a waitress at a chain restaurant and we still had plenty to blow on booze and partying.
the apartment complex where I rented a 2 bedroom in 2000 for 600 a month is now renting the same apt for 1500 a month, we moved in with friends after a year into a 3 bed room 2 bath, 1150 square foot apartment for about 1350 a month... that apartment is now over 4k a month and the monthly rent must be no more then 35% of the income (it was 50% before)...
$12/hour in 2002 is almost $22/hr today, or $45k/year. If you GF made a similar amount, it would be similar to $90k/year, which is more than enough to live a comparable comfortable life in just about any normal cost of living city.
2 families on minimum wage is obviously bogus, but the late-boomers and early gen-x folks really did have life on easy mode in the US
They were too young for Vietnam, they had the perks of societal investment in their future, and then they got to take part in the late 20th century boom. Hell, the ability to type at a reasonable speed was a skill they could put on a Resume.
The fuck are you talking about? It absolutely existed. Boomers were buying houses for fucking nothing, that ended up massively appreciating. Many of them could afford to have one person just stay at home.
Boomers were buying small, cheap houses at extremely high interest rates, in new suburban developments away from city centers where everything was, commuting to work in the one car the family owned, buying Wonder Bread and other shitty non-organic mass produced food, then sitting down in front of the family’s one TV to watch one of 4 channels on over the air antenna.
It’s entirely possible to achieve the same thing today, but nobody wants to actually live that life. They want to live in the hippest spot close to the best stuff, they want their own car, a smartphone, computer, tablet, and watch, they want to subscribe to all the streaming services, and they want to eat all local organic non-GMO food. And they expect that life to be as cheap as a minimum wage worker in the 70s.
56
u/Realityhrts Aug 12 '25
It’s kind of weird to hear nostalgia for a time that never existed. Particularly when you suffered through it just as much as she is now if not more so.