That's exactly right. And, worse, their children (or parents, or spouses, or siblings, etc.) could be--and often were--sold and the family forcibly separated. To praise the "family structure" that existed under slavery is ignorant at best.
The above arguments are based on an ideal and its extreme opposite, namely choice vs. no choice, freedom vs. slavery.
For many today that have family responsibility, a job and a retirement plan, there is no choice. Oh sure, among these people there will a few that say that can 'choose' to walk away from it. But slaves could 'choose' to run away, and many did.
The result of running away is the same, falling into a life of begging or of stealing, of becoming a ward of the state or a criminal. It matters not if one is property or non-property, slave or non-slave. The choice leads to the same result.
Of course, the 'ideal of freedom' is what we all want but few of us truly have it. What keeps us from capitulating into a miserable life of dependency, of modern day slavery, is a strong work ethic with a sense of personal responsibility that is transmitted from generation to generation.
An EBT card is the one item that separates many from starvation and crime, or is it? Those that have them are slaves, modern day slaves owned by the state. These slaves can runaway from their EBT masters but then find themselves begging or living a life of crime. It's really not a lot different than slaves on plantations of centuries before.
But many will disagree that modern slavery is not much different from slavery before its abolition. They will say that slaves never had a choice but as I said oreviously they did have a choice, they could runaway just as modern slaves can also choose to runaway. And those that do runaway will find themselves brought under control of a new slave master. So there's no escape for most.
First of all, ante-bellum slavery was weaker in border-states (Maryland, Kentucky, Missouri), stronger in the Upper South (Virginia, Tennessee, Arkansas) and virtually iron-clad in the Deep South (South Carolina through Texas).
In the Deep South, in practical terms, there was no escape.
But more to the point, FRiend, if you expand today's definition of "slavery" to mean "any and all obligations", then there's no such thing as "freedom", since we all owe something to someone for some past or future blessing.
But the real issue here is whether such obligations were freely entered into, or not.
As voting citizens, we are obligated to obey all laws, even such "slave-like" obligations as war-time military drafts.
But we remain "free" so long as we consider those laws to be self-imposed.
And, of course, we are always free to leave a state or country whose laws we don't like, for one whose laws we prefer.
So, to use your example: people working for their long-term retirement, who begin to chafe under the harness they've put on themselves are still free to leave.
Not without costs, of course, but those are the terms of agreements they freely chose.
In that sense, our welfare-class did chose their life-style, and can leave it if they wish.
But the fact is, many won't (making them government "slaves") until they are pushed, and trained, and motivated, and offered opportunities then kicked in the b*tt to rejoin "the land of the free, home of the brave".
That should be our ideal and goal, regardless of how often or how far we fall short of it.