4 ms·
The U.S. is going through a greedy oligarch phase. The silent generation was the one that built all that infrastructure and had the proper tax incentives to mak
by cmurf 9y ago
The U.S. is going through a greedy oligarch phase. The silent generation was the one that built all that infrastructure and had the proper tax incentives to make both public and private infrastructure projects happen. Massive ones.
And then the baby boomers came along. And they have just cash cowed that infrastructure, not doing a good job maintaining it, not advancing it, letting it rot, while they pocket the benefit, stuffing it into the stock, bond, and real estate markets, benefiting really no one but themselves. They are a hoarding generation. And they seem fairly OK with a re-emergence of aristocracy as a result: I've got mine, you go get your own. Everything is a product. Rich people get more. Cooperation is socialism. Etc.
So it'll be up to gen X and millenials to decide what comes next.
- atonse 9y agoWell put. I can think of no better way of explaining our situation than this.
- tfvghbv 9y agoYou mean you can't do better than name calling?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- atonse 9y agoActually I kind of forgot the baby boomers line. I got hung up on the "oligarch phase" which is totally apt. I don't know if we can just blame baby boomers, unless somehow they were responsible for voting all the current politicians in.
- dragonwriter 9y ago> And then the baby boomers came along. To be fair to Boomers and contrary to the popular current Boomers.v. Millenials (with Gen X occasionally acknowledged) narrative, the effects you describe began under the social, economic, and political dominance of the “Greatest” Generation, not the boomers. Further, it's not really a generational thing, it's about shifting distribution of power among economic classes over time; which generation is ascendant at the time isn't the controlling factor, and generation v. generation narrative obstructs the kind of coalition building that could work to reverse the problem.