By my estimation, the problems highlighted by the comment you replied to indeed started around the 70s. I think what happened recently is that the internet and

By my estimation, the problems highlighted by the comment you replied to indeed started around the 70s. I think what happened recently is that the internet and social media came along as the perfect, but also terrible, solution to those problems. I think the couple generations in between experienced the problems more as boredom and ennui. Indeed, "gen x" is pretty famous for this, and I think "millenials" are just a mish-mash of the late stage of "gen x" and the early stage of the "zoomer" generations.