Bernies New Comb
Posted on 02/21/2020 6:37:12 AM PST by Kaslin
A record-high number of Americans -- 90% -- say they are satisfied with their personal lives, according to Gallup. And 74% are optimistic that they will continue being financially satisfied moving forward. Needless to say, the United States will never be a utopia, but for the vast majority of its citizens, most things are going in the right direction.
During the Democratic presidential debate last night, Bernie Sanders, lamenting how a once-prosperous society had been hollowed out by capitalism, claimed that we are no better off today than we were many years ago. It's a shame that not a single debate moderator ever challenges this farcical assertion. In Sanders' telling, "people ... after 45 years of work are not making a nickel more than they did 45 years ago."
For those who weren't alive then, the 1970s were largely a crime-ridden decade of stagnant economics, city bankruptcies, crushing energy prices, sky-high interest rates, institutional rot, garbage and retirement-destroying inflation. Though it was a far better place than the Communist hot spots Sanders praised during those years, it certainly was not ideal.
And a big part of the post-'70s economic boom we're still experiencing today -- the one that certain progressive and some statist right-wingers like to disparage -- was propelled by policies that freed Americans from overbearing technocratic oversight, intrusive regulations and stifling taxes that undermined growth.
The alleged "wage stagnation" to which Sanders and others are constantly referring is a myth. For one thing, "wage stagnation" fails to take into account the health care benefits, pensions, vacations, family leave and other perks now embedded in job packages -- somewhere around 30% of an employee's overall benefits. Once those benefits are added, Americans probably have seen about a 45% wage increase since 1964. More important, the amount of time we work to buy things we need is less. What we buy does more, and it's of higher quality. Does anyone believe that a dollar spent on medical care in 1975 equals a dollar spent today?
Partly because of a worldwide retreat from collectivism, extreme poverty has dramatically decreased. Massive new markets have opened to us. Despite the perception of many, medium household incomes are at an all-time high. The middle class is growing -- especially the upper-middle class. In the past 50 years, spending on food and clothing as a share of family income has fallen from 42% to 17%. Your house is probably more expensive than the average house was in 1975, but it's also more comfortable and safer.
The year Sanders graduated from college, less than 6% of his fellow Americans -- the majority of them wealthy, very few of them minorities or women -- were enrolled in higher education. In 1975, only around 11% were enrolled in college. According to the Federal Reserve study, millennials are the most educated generation, with 65% of them possessing at least an associate's degree.
Better education, soaring productivity and technological advances allow an increasing number of Americans to pick vocations that are safer, less monotonous and more rewarding.
In 1970, around 14,000 workers were killed on the job in the United States. That's somewhere around 10,000 more deaths yearly than the number of those who perished in the entire Iraq War. Although the workforce had more than doubled since then, the number of occupational deaths in the United States has dropped to around 5,100.
There's a decent chance that Sanders' heart attack would have killed a 78-year-old man in 1975. If not, it would have required dangerous surgery. Despite a small dip recently, life expectancy has skyrocketed in the United States over the past 45 years -- adding more than six years since 1975. The cancer casualty rate has fallen more than 27% in the past 25 years -- which adds up to more than 2 million deaths averted during that time. We've been able to mitigate the damage of so many diseases and ailments over the past 45 years -- allowing millions to lead longer, more active and less painful lives -- that it would take a book to lay out the miraculous number of advances properly.
Most of these developments, not incidentally, were brought to us by profit-driven companies.
In 1975, the child mortality rate was 18.8 per 1,000. In 2019, it was 5.7. Fatalities due to weather events have plunged. Deaths due to air pollution -- surely near its smoggy height in 1975 -- have fallen, as well. We have cleaner water and cleaner streets.
In 1975, Sanders' hometown of New York City saw 1,645 murders and rampant criminality. In 2017, there were 286 homicides in NYC. Vehicular fatalities per 100 million in 1975 were at 3.35; now they're near a historic low of 1.13.
Also, you have a supercomputer in your pocket that offers you instant access to all of human knowledge.
Yes, some Americans still suffer, and some of our goods and services are more expensive than they once were (usually due to market intervention). But we are, by nearly every quantifiable measure, collectively better off today than ever before. And what sufferings millennials do experience today often are a result of their making different choices than their parents did. Bernie should understand this better than most. It's not in every country that a professional revolutionary can afford to buy a dacha on Lake Champlain.
My memories of 45 years ago:
- We didn’t have color television
- We didn’t have cable television
- We didn’t have the internet
- We had only land-line phones and had to pay extra for every extension and every non-local call.
- We had no air conditioning
- We had one generally beat-up used car
- We bought generic no-name canned goods and ground beef mixed with soy protein to stretch the grocery bill
- We piled on sweaters and even coats indoors because we could not afford to keep the thermostat above the mid-60’s
By a lot of economic measures we were not better off.
Though by nearly every social measure we were.
I’m certainly not going to agree with Sanders on anything.
And, as this article documents, looking at technology and economic issues, we are better off today than we were 45 years ago.
But I wouldn’t be too glib about the emotional sentiment Sanders is pushing. Because a lot of Freepers (including myself) have had similar feelings.
I was a kid in the 70s. Quite apart from technical or economic issues, I think it was a great time. I rode my bike all over town. I played outside until dark (and after dark). Some of my teachers in school were excellent. It seemed like everyone went to church and took nice family vacations. It was a simpler time.
Is Bernie going to bring that back? Certainly not! But when a clever politician like Sanders gets nostalgic for a bygone era, some voters WILL respond. They will remember how it used to be, and they will react favorably to that politician.
This article focuses on technology and economics. I think a better antidote to Sanders is to focus on growth of government, restrictive policies in the home, and the workplace. The decline of families and churches, All of these things are (in part) due to the errors of Socialism. Sanders is the cause, not the cure. I think if we don’t call him out on that, then his talk of “how it was 45years ago” resonates more than it ought to.
In the late 1970’s my neighbor managed a Monkey Wards warehouse. I worked there in HS every so often-winter breaks etc.
After graduating he offered me a job there around $7.00 hr which also included full health insurance dental, disability and yes a real pension plan not a 401k. I never took it because I was going to college
That $7 back then based upon the inflation calculator is about $22 hr today
Yes the country is better today overall but 45-50% of the population are struggling with low paying jobs. The folks who will never go to school to better themselves and who will vote for Sanders. This number is going to rise when AI and automation is implemented.
Remember Sizzlelean a substitute for real bacon? I remember buying that and it wasn’t bad. It was marketed as being healthier and perhaps was.
Bernie is crazier than a loon. He just opens his mouth and spouts meaningless words. Why would he even focus on 45 years ago? What was supposed to be so magic about that? That’s when we went through the oil embargo, people lost jobs among other problems facing the nation, and yes, interest rates were sky high. Great time other than that tho’.
‘Rat politician financial scams are WAY improved from 45 years ago.
Bernie knows.
Yes, we are better off now, than we were four years ago.
But of course we all know this isn't what Sanders is talking about, at all. His entire argument is based on the fact that the CEOs and wealth creators are making "too much more" than the rest of us.
True.
There is a difference, I think, between what Sanders SAYS and what some people HEAR.
Politicians are in the business of persuasion. Sanders says he wants to tax the heck out of successful people. But if he says it in a nostalgic kind of way, people hear that life used to be better, in some ways, 40 years ago.
I worry about politicians and their Jedi mind tricks.
Those young kids standing behind him in photos/videos... I have pegged them as spoiled and don’t want to work... they want it given to them... to vote for an old santa claus or an old grampa.... to get those freebies..
They have no idea what communism is nor what a socialist is... and it gets my dander up that there are kids who have been raised to “want” and to be indoctrinated so easily .. just sit in class and let it enter in...
No brain matter and no common sense.. anything given to you by someone.. you owe them and they own you.
“Come little ones and follow me.”..into the pit of hopelessness.
Sanders is thinking back to his time in the commune
Bernie can claim were not better off because he defines ‘better off’ as more socialism. Bernie’s only standard to judge an economy is ‘equitable distribution of wealth”. He doesn’t care if everyone is better off. He just wants to make sure everyone has the same wealth even if that means less wealth.
Is there a cartoon with Bernie as Santa Claus? That would be perfect. His followers are like believing 3 yr olds.
If you have a communist’s perspective, we are worse off. Free people think otherwise.
Same here except we managed to get a used color TV to watch the only 3 channels we could get.
Even in school we kept our coats on all day. There was a popular store around here at that time that sold only the black & white label generic food. Instead of bagging your groceries for you, they provided piles of cardboard boxes you packed up yourself. Personally I think the generic pasta used some of that cardboard as filler. :( It was awful.
Bernie can go back. I’m enjoying the present.
And we had fun playing tunes on the touch-tone phones and spent big bucks on calculators that are less powerful than the average wristwatch...and were gearing up for odd/even lines at the gas pumps...
These days the average person has so many devices/technology that didn’t exist back then it’s incredible - and we couldn’t have afforded them even if they were available at the time.
We didn’t get a color TV set until Christmas, 1975.
My dad resisted that. My mom forced the issue because
she got sick of her kids always begging her parents to
come over and watch stuff in color.
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