3 ms·

From the original article: These basic cultural precepts reigned from the late 1940s to the mid-1960s. They could be followed by people of all backgrounds and

From the original article: These basic cultural precepts reigned from the late 1940s to the mid-1960s. They could be followed by people of all backgrounds and abilities, especially when backed up by almost universal endorsement. Adherence was a major contributor to the productivity, educational gains, and social coherence of that period.[1] People attach happy ideas during this time because during good economic times, things just work on all cylinders. However, two major things were happening that actually led to the advancements and fruitfulness of the time mentioned from 40s to mid 60s. 1) World War II happened and ended, everyone was obliterated but the US. This led to massive gains in all areas of wealth and industry. It was a war that took us to a superpower, and at the time, everyone owed us money. Good economic times lead to more ability to have kids and a solid consumer base to support middle class housing/restaurants/retail etc. 2) Women started entering the workforce and diversity started to happen opening up the workforce that was previously built for 1 person to provide for multiple people and salary needed for that, to suddenly having sometimes 2 in the house that brought in double the money needed for a time. You could say a move away from family focused housing and middle class retail/restaurants is a problem, but that is more to do with wage stagnation and the internet/productivity. People can't afford to get married and have multiple kids as they could before, wages have not truly kept up and been steadily dropping since the 70s as well as share of productivity/GDP gains[2]. People have more kids in good economic times and less kids in bad economic times[3][4], same reason there was a baby boom in the time they mentioned from the 40s to the mid 60s. The 90s are similar in terms of good economic times, people had more kids, people bought more homes, more products, people were getting wage increases, new technologies/innovation that gains advantage worldwide etc. In the end it is economics and timing, whatever is popular during those times people will attribute it to their own confirmation biases. [1] http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/commentary/paying-the-price-for-breakdown-of-the-countrys-bourgeois-culture-20170809.html http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/commentary/paying-the-p... [2] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=2Xa https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=2Xa [3] http://www.prb.org/publications/datasheets/2012/world-population-data-sheet/fact-sheet-us-population.aspx http://www.prb.org/publications/datasheets/2012/world-popula... [4] http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/10/12/in-a-down-economy-fewer-births/ http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/10/12/in-a-down-economy-...

zhemao 9y ago
Thank you. I wondered if anyone else could see why the original essay is so ridiculous. It assumes that bad culture is the cause of poverty, and not the other way around. It's pretty obvious that the decision to get married and stay married is affected by material conditions. One consequence of the decline in manufacturing jobs is that less-educated men have pretty low employment rates. Since they can't hold down a stable job and be the primary breadwinner (as "bourgeois culture" expects them to), there's little reason for them to stick around (or for their partners to keep them around). This also explains the data Haidt and his group turned up on the correlation between parents' marriage status and children's future success. The couples that managed to stay together were the ones that had a better financial/employment situation. There's no reason to believe that a deadbeat dad would improve his child's future competitiveness that much just by staying married to the child's mother. There's also the fact that single moms on welfare would lose their benefits if they married the father of their children. As one astute internet commenter on a similar article remarked, "Only an ivory tower egghead could think that poor people don't make rational economic decisions."

zhemao 9y ago

Thank you. I wondered if anyone else could see why the original essay is so ridiculous. It assumes that bad culture is the cause of poverty, and not the other way around. It's pretty obvious that the decision to get married and stay married is affected by material conditions. One consequence of the decline in manufacturing jobs is that less-educated men have pretty low employment rates. Since they can't hold down a stable job and be the primary breadwinner (as "bourgeois culture" expects them to), there's little reason for them to stick around (or for their partners to keep them around). This also explains the data Haidt and his group turned up on the correlation between parents' marriage status and children's future success. The couples that managed to stay together were the ones that had a better financial/employment situation. There's no reason to believe that a deadbeat dad would improve his child's future competitiveness that much just by staying married to the child's mother. There's also the fact that single moms on welfare would lose their benefits if they married the father of their children. As one astute internet commenter on a similar article remarked, "Only an ivory tower egghead could think that poor people don't make rational economic decisions."