Today families need dual incomes just to purchase a modest home and carry health insurance. How is this not a decline in standard of living from a few decades ago?
Where's our new airports? New rail transit systems? New infrastructure? Everything in this country is old and getting older.
What's your point.
> sweeping linear statements like "decline"
Who are you talking to? When did I make any statements of that nature?
I was pointing out the provided example was stupid. Smart phones are "cool" and all, but it'd be a tough sell to argue successfully that connectivity has increased societal cohesion, education, information dispersal, or any of the other virtues you might hope for.
Instead, iPhones and virtual doctor appointments are like bandaids on a societal-wide decline, where increased privatization combines with government inflation to create a caste system they disguise as capitalism. Inflation-adjusted salaries are lower than ever across the board, housing prices are skyrocketing both absolutely and as a function of salary-years, corporate control of information has reached unprecedented levels, and the "relative value story" of now vs 40 years ago makes it pretty clear it's tougher to have a good life now even if you can have fancy toys to interact with corporate-controlled data-mined ad-laced entertainment
The naivety is almost making me feel better, but I don't think you understand what capitalism has done to our world's power structures if you think we stand a chance to change anything
Now, my plan is to accept that even with a good salary securing a future at good QOL costs a lifetime, so I will try to enjoy myself and hopefully buy a home that doesn't get burnt down in the increasingly frequent and devastating forest fires of my native home.
Hooray for 2022!