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> Seems like you are talking about social inequality (a zero sum game) vs poverty (a non zero sum game)

The two are not opposed. There is significant overlap significantly in many ways, even in the way government treats the very definition of poverty. In most countries, you'll find that poverty is defined as a percentage of median income.

Let me try to rephrase to make this more tangible. The minimum of things and services I need to procure to get minimally acceptable social inclusion is lower in some contexts than in others. 1970 versus 2021. Silicon Valley versus rural Latvia. I hope you get the point.

> The idea that no one was expected to own cell phones so they didn’t enrich our lives is clearly false.

I was certainly not claiming that! Cell phones or cars can clearly enrich the lives of those able to afford them. Their existence also creates a potential gap between haves and have-nots though.

Or to formulate it more sharply, you couldn't be poor because of not being able to afford a cell phone in 1970. You can be poor because of not being able to afford a cell phone in 2021. Does that mean a cell phone is a bad thing? Of course not!

> Or to formulate it more sharply, you couldn't be poor because of not being able to afford a cell phone in 1970. You can be poor because of not being able to afford a cell phone in 2021. Does that mean a cell phone is a bad thing? Of course not!

So.. how does that imply that people are worse off now than in 1970? Your entire thesis seems to be that the jealousy people will feel from seeing others have things they don't will outweigh all of the material gains of the last half century.

That seems.. obviously false? to me

>So.. how does that imply that people are worse off now than in 1970? Your entire thesis seems to be that the jealousy people will feel from seeing others have things they don't will outweigh all of the material gains of the last half century.

As an American, I don't subscribe to that thesis. At all.

What I do see (as someone in his mid 50s) is that the biggest difference is that folks back then believed (and it actually happened for many) that they would be better off than their parents.

That's no longer the case. There are a variety of reasons for this, not least of which are the systematic[0] changes to our economy that pushes wealth and resources to the top, at the expense of those at the bottom.

This didn't happen by accident, and I'm not really surprised that folks here on HN aren't focused specifically on that issue -- primarily because most of us are beneficiaries of said systematic changes.

The worst part (IMHO) is that these changes will only benefit those at the top for a limited time. Given that 70% of the US economy is consumer spending, taking purchasing power away from the vast majority of consumers is a recipe for a bad economy.

Increasing wages and safety nets makes good economic sense, as it broadens the market for consumer goods, makes it easier for folks to act in entrepreneurial ways, and in the medium to long term expands the economic pie, creating a healthier, more resilient economy.

Pushing wealth/resources to the top just doesn't do that at all. How many yachts/houses/cars/dresses/suits/pizzas/kale smoothies/etc. can one person reasonable purchase/use?

Even if you spread the money around more broadly, the wealthy will continue to be wealthy, and the rest won't have to work two or three jobs just to feed their kids boxed macaroni and cheese five times a week.

[0] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/systematic

? I absolutely agree with you. Inequality nowadays is quite bad, overall welfare could be much better if we weren't hamstrung by it.

But I don't see how this means I'm ideologically committed to the absurd thesis that we haven't seen quality of life improvements for the average person in the last half century - going from a time where we had only recently eliminated actual starvation in the US, schools were still basically segregated, inflation rampant, a draft, etc. etc.

>But I don't see how this means I'm ideologically committed to the absurd thesis that we haven't seen quality of life improvements for the average person in the last half century - going from a time where we had only recently eliminated actual starvation in the US, schools were still basically segregated, inflation rampant, a draft, etc. etc.

I don't believe my comment even implied that.

Rather, I was providing my own take on your assessment of markvdb's comment[0], which I don't disagree with, I just wanted to address the elephant in the room (the systemic changes pulling more wealth/income to the top at the expense of those at the bottom) that hadn't been addressed.

That's not to say you didn't make a good point. You did. But I felt there was more to say.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29592162

> So.. how does that imply that people are worse off now than in 1970? Your entire thesis seems to be that the jealousy people will feel from seeing others have things they don't will outweigh all of the material gains of the last half century.

The point is that there are many things you are now required to have to meaningfully participate in society, that were just not required in 1970. For example, to get vaccinated in my country for COVID, you need to access a web page, sign up using email, and you'll get an SMS notification when your registration is accepted.

So, without an internet connection and mobile phone, you have to rely on someone else who does own one of these.

The conclusion being: someone who can't afford a mobile phone and internet connection may be poor in 2021, even if people without an internet connection or mobile phone were perfectly well off in 1970.

> to get vaccinated in my country for COVID, you need to access a web page, sign up using email, and you'll get an SMS notification when your registration is accepted.

I guarantee you that if you live in the developed world there are alternate pathways to getting vaxxed.

> someone who can't afford a mobile phone and internet connection may be poor in 2021, even if people without an internet connection or mobile phone were perfectly well off in 1970.

Funnily enough, a greater proportion of people have smartphones in the house today than had landlines then (60s & 70s), so even by this (absurd) metric where having a smartphone is equal to having a landline in terms of utility/welfare, we still have seen material improvements.

I am surprised that this has prompted such an argument here. I am curious as to the ideological motivations behind denying any progress in the last half century, this sort of rhetoric didn't seem nearly as popular even a few years ago.

People aren't denying progress, they're denying the idea that inflation should treat that progress as a decrease in prices.

> most Americans are significantly worse off since the 1970s

This statement seems obviously false to me and is what I was disagreeing with. This entire conversation was spawned because many people felt the need to defend this statement.

>This statement seems obviously false to me and is what I was disagreeing with. This entire conversation was spawned because many people felt the need to defend this statement.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I don't disagree with your point at all.

Materially we've got more stuff, sure. The issue I pointed up (and perhaps that others were alluding) is that social mobility has been negatively affected over the past 50 years.

And the prospect that one won't be able to "succeed" (whatever definition of success you want to use) because the deck has been systematically stacked against you in favor of those who are already wealthy is definitely a factor in why folks feel they're not as well off as they'd like to be.

What's more, it's been getting harder for the poorest Americans to make ends meet for quite some time. And that situation has been making its way up the economic ladder too. That result is no accident either.

As such, it's no wonder many folks wonder why they can't get ahead even if they do what they're told is necessary to make that happen.

That's a cultural and economic problem that has been growing for a long time. And one that cheap gadgets and technology can't fix.

What could help is sharing the economic benefits of the increased productivity enabled by technology. But we're not doing that, are we?

> social mobility has been negatively affected over the past 50 years.

I'm really not at all confident this is even true, unless you are restricting your sample to white people & men.

Seems like social mobility for women, who comprise half the population, is markedly better than it was 50 years ago.

I don't think it is true that it has been getting "harder" for people to make ends meet for quite some time. Again, in the time period we're comparing to, people were quite literally starving to death/dying from malnutrition at times. Nowadays, people have their ends met well enough that this does not happen in America.

This is in spite of rampant inequality, but still - measurable improvements on pretty much all measures. Really, many of the bigger causes of early death now are due to self-destructive things people can do with more material abundance.

> The idea that no one was expected to own cell phones so they didn’t enrich our lives is clearly false.

It's not like everyone in the 70s was walking around completely depressed waiting for some breakthrough in computing technology so they could carry a computer in their pocket and ease all their ills. People could be content and maybe even happy without access to technology that didn't exist. Many Americans would likely be happier if they got rid of the "smart" part of their phones.

Well happiness and material wealth are two very separate things.

People can be very content and happy with very basic necessities. Some of the happiest people on the planet are renunciate monks and nuns based in brain scan research (for eg mathieu richard)

And of course people can be depressed even to the point of being suicide while being wealthy. (Any number of high profile cases)

I get what you're saying and I absolutely think the invention of phones, the internet, etc. made everybody's lives better.

But it's also true that these things become necessities when everybody is expected to have them. There is a low but non-zero level of "keeping up with the Joneses" you have to do just to keep living your life reasonably, because things change around you. Job applications are done over the internet now. Most higher education requires a good computer, webcam, and internet connection. You hail a cab with your phone. People suck at giving directions because they assume you have GPS. Stuff like that.

So I think it is fair to price some of these "luxuries" into the cost of living even though in the past people got along just fine without them.