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On the one hand, being middle class now is perfectly good and comfortable, aside from probably working a 40 hour week. On the other hand being rich in 1900 not
by iuguy 16y ago
On the one hand, being middle class now is perfectly good and comfortable, aside from probably working a 40 hour week.
On the other hand being rich in 1900 not only gives you the freedom to do what you want (within the more conservative boundaries of society and technology back then) but also allows you to travel and see cultures in a way that isn't possible now.
If you go to a developing country, people wear t-shirts with slogans on them. Advertising is everywhere. If you went to New York in 1900 it's be completely different to the New York of today, as would Paris, London, Shanghai, Buenos Aires, Istanbul and so on. The cultural differences would be so much greater than they are now, as would the dress, the traditions and so on (perhaps less so for the traditions). Then you start looking further afield, away from the cities. Places like Fuji, Rhodesia, India, the near east etc.
To experience those things would be somewhat incredible, perhaps moreso than the global, homogenous McDonalds/Starbucks in every town world we see today.
Then there's the experiences you could have. You could watch Sandra Bernhard perform. Go to see the Kitty Hawk's maiden flight. Go to Paris and meet people like Claude Debussy, or to Holland and meet Vincent Van Gogh. Visit Sigmund Freud in Austria, watch the birth of Hollywood and meet people like Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin and Stan and Ollie.
As for things to see in 1900, you could travel to a still Victorian London and see Queen Victoria's visit. You could go to Australia for the first time (Australia was 'created' in July). You could see the opening of the Paris Metro, and while sipping a bol du Café read about the Boxer rebellion in China. Or you could meet Mark Twain as he comes off the docks back to the U.S. then go to the first Automobile show in Madison Square Garden. It's not as clean cut as you might think.
Personally I'd rather be middle class now for various reasons, but I wouldn't rule 1900 out just on the grounds of health or technology.
- jonknee 16y agoI didn't assume that it meant be rich in 1900 and have full knowledge of the future. How would a rich person in 1900 know to go to Kitty Hawk? Or that Hollywood would be what it was? Rich people today are similarly missing out on what will be remembered as the greatest moments (and greatest people) of our times. Where was Bill Gates when Google was founded? Hindsight is 20/20 as they say. Plus, $70k in 1900 is about $1.8m today. You'd never have the clout to do half the things on your list. Not to mention the time, it takes a long time to cross the Atlantic.
- iuguy 16y agoYou are of course completely right about the former. I wasn't suggesting that someone would or wouldn't have knowledge of the future, simply that you'd have the opportunity to witness such events. I'm sure there are plenty of events now that are worthy of attending, and just down the road too (LHC switch-on maybe) but damned one-temporal-directional memory gets in the way. The things I put forward were suggestions of ideas for things to do, not that I'd suggest you attempt to do them all and you're right in that you'd probably end up running out of money if you tried. I'm trying to remember a set of films I saw, from a pair of then extremely rich people who largely lived on cruise lineers during the inter-war years. They filmed all kinds of stuff, like pre-war france and germany and the ceremonies of various south and east asian islands. I can't remember their names though but I'm fairly sure the video is public domain. Of course, I digress. Thankyou for your comment, it's always good to be challenged and I think you raise a number of good points.