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Is OP saying that today sucks? I don't think so. I think what they are saying is that the direction society seems to be heading doesn't seem to be one that wi

Is OP saying that today sucks? I don't think so. I think what they are saying is that the direction society seems to be heading doesn't seem to be one that will sustain the common man. What are your thoughts when you hear about "vanishing middle class"?

Consultant32452 8y ago
I think the middle class hasn't been vanishing, it's been expanding into other parts of the world, particularly in India and China. The common man (globally) has more prosperity today than they have ever had. I think many people mistake an accident of history, the relative prosperity of white men in America after WWII as being something other than an aberration. Our stuff just happened to not be destroyed, so we did pretty well. And we're still nominally better off today than we were then, we're just not relatively better off compared to other people in other places because they're catching up to us.
- hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
  It's not just white men: https://www.ajc.com/news/national/cdc-life-expectancy-for-white-women-drops-increases-for-black-men/3p6DUseTYj2HsGvQUXVJTL/ https://www.ajc.com/news/national/cdc-life-expectancy-for-wh... But even the rise of "the common man (and woman)" in places like India and China only further highlights my point. Rich Western countries have essentially treated labor in India and China like another form of automation - we don't yet have robots for a certain class of tasks that can perform the work at 25% of the cost of a Western worker, but India and China DO have people willing to work at that price. But what do you think will happen to those workers in India and China when we DO build robots that can do those repetitive tasks?
  - Consultant32452 8y ago
    Are you arguing that the best time to be a woman was a few years ago when their life expectancy was one month longer? Okay, I'll accept that. Is the decline somehow the result of Jeff Bezos making even more money compared to the average woman in the last few years? Remember, wealth inequality is original proposed root cause of our supposed civil instability. Please try to tie these things together. How does there being more people with more wealth in more places highlight your point at all? It seems to be a complete refutation of it. I expect the people in India and China to slowly transition into service economy jobs, much like the people in the US and other wealthy Western countries did.
    - flanban 8y ago
      I think that comment was more about the implications of the disintermediation of the current manufacturing giants.
- peteradio 8y ago
  Good point.

Consultant32452 8y ago

I think the middle class hasn't been vanishing, it's been expanding into other parts of the world, particularly in India and China. The common man (globally) has more prosperity today than they have ever had. I think many people mistake an accident of history, the relative prosperity of white men in America after WWII as being something other than an aberration. Our stuff just happened to not be destroyed, so we did pretty well. And we're still nominally better off today than we were then, we're just not relatively better off compared to other people in other places because they're catching up to us.

hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
It's not just white men: https://www.ajc.com/news/national/cdc-life-expectancy-for-white-women-drops-increases-for-black-men/3p6DUseTYj2HsGvQUXVJTL/ https://www.ajc.com/news/national/cdc-life-expectancy-for-wh... But even the rise of "the common man (and woman)" in places like India and China only further highlights my point. Rich Western countries have essentially treated labor in India and China like another form of automation - we don't yet have robots for a certain class of tasks that can perform the work at 25% of the cost of a Western worker, but India and China DO have people willing to work at that price. But what do you think will happen to those workers in India and China when we DO build robots that can do those repetitive tasks?
- Consultant32452 8y ago
  Are you arguing that the best time to be a woman was a few years ago when their life expectancy was one month longer? Okay, I'll accept that. Is the decline somehow the result of Jeff Bezos making even more money compared to the average woman in the last few years? Remember, wealth inequality is original proposed root cause of our supposed civil instability. Please try to tie these things together. How does there being more people with more wealth in more places highlight your point at all? It seems to be a complete refutation of it. I expect the people in India and China to slowly transition into service economy jobs, much like the people in the US and other wealthy Western countries did.
  - flanban 8y ago
    I think that comment was more about the implications of the disintermediation of the current manufacturing giants.
peteradio 8y ago
Good point.