How Has The American Dream Changed?
CNN’s Jack Cafferty has an interesting question for viewers of his show today, and invites readers to contribute to the discussion. How is the American Dream changing?
We’re in the midst of a recession not seen since the great depression. Millions of Americans are out of work, unemployment has soared to 9.4 percent. Millions of good paying jobs have been have been shipped overseas never to return. And the manufacturing base that was once the engine of our economy is on life support. We simply don’t make “things” anymore.
We are in debt up to our eyeballs to China and other foreign countries as we increasingly look to them to finance out deficit spending. And through it all have you noticed? There’s no talk in Washington of cutting expenses or reducing the size of government.
There are unfunded liabilities in the tens of trillions of dollars for Medicare and Social Security; and no plan for how to pay for health care reform. Add in the drain of millions of illegal aliens and the fact that many states are bankrupt. We’re in serious trouble here.
Here’s my question to you: How is the American dream changing?
Good question, Jack, and I’d like to invite readers to contribute their own thoughts for an upcoming piece I’m working on. Of course, I’ll volunteer a few initial thoughts of my own.
I’m probably older than quite a few of the readers here, but not as old as the dreamers of my father’s generation. The American Dream has most certainly changed, and like many an old fogey I would say not for the better. The biggest area of change seems to be in the scope of our expectations, not only of what we believe we will get, but of what we’ll have to put out to get it.
I’m old enough to remember the era of small, family owned businesses. In the town where I grew up there were quite a few, including two local butchers. The family name was tied to the butchering, preparation and serving of quality meat. The sons had an expectation of inheriting the business, running it, and passing it on to their children. They’re both gone now, of course. The same applied to several barber shops in the area.
For those not involved in a family which owned and operated a successful business, there were still traditions involving work. General Electric had three plants operating near my home, and many families grew around fathers who worked there for their entire lives, built a retirement plan, and knew their children would be able to get good jobs there as well. Today, corporate culture treats employees as a necessary evil to be trimmed at every opportunity and costs per employee must be kept to a minimum. That is no longer the American dream.
But we, as workers, seem to have evolved a very different set of sensibilities as well. There was a time when you expected to work hard, frequently get dirty, but earn your way so you could buy a home, raise a family and hopefully retire to do some fishing.
Today’s environment is geared toward a throwaway, high tech and/or Wall St. culture where we should all wind up with an office job where a fingernail never gets broken and we amass great wealth in investments where our money does more work than we do and we vacation in the islands. The collapse of Wall St. should have been a wake-up call to all of us on that score.
I think we have had such a good ride in America on the backs of the Greatest Generation and what they wanted for us that our grasp has exceeded our reach by a large margin. And the current dismal conditions may be a much needed wake-up call for those coming up now. You may not be a tech bubble millionaire who will never have to turn a wrench and makes millions flipping real estate. You may have to work for your supper and save your money. But if you make a good life for you and your family, have the occasional vacation to go camping, and wind up happy with what you’ve done for your life, you’ve done a good job.
So… what is the American Dream today? Has it changed? Or, as the Tubes once famously asked… what do you want from life? To kidnap an heiress or threaten her with a knife? (Watch that video if you’ve never heard the tune.) Let us know. What DO you want from life?
EDIT: Apparently some of you have never heard of The Tubes. Here are the lyrics. Read along and listen to the song. It’s particularly applicable in our modern era.
What do you want from life
To kidnap an heiress
or threaten her with a knife
What do you want from life
To get cable TV
and watch it every nightThere you sit
a lump in your chair
Where do you sleep
and what do you wear
when you’re sleepingWhat do you want from life
An Indian guru
to show you the inner light
What do you want from life
a meaningless love affair
with a girl that you met tonightHow can you tell when you’re doin’ alright
Does your bank account swell
While you’re dreaming at night
How do know when you’re really in love
Do violins play when you’re touching the one
That you’re lovingWhat do you want from life
Someone to love
and somebody that you can trust
What do you want from life
To try and be happy
while you do the nasty things you mustWell, you can’t have that, but if you’re an American citizen you are entitled to:
a heated kidney shaped pool,
a microwave oven–don’t watch the food cook,
a Dyna-Gym–I’ll personally demonstrate it in the privacy of your own home,
a king-size Titanic unsinkable Molly Brown waterbed with polybendum,
a foolproof plan and an airtight alibi,
real simulated Indian jewelry,
a Gucci shoetree,
a year’s supply of antibiotics,
a personally autographed picture of Randy Mantooth
and Bob Dylan’s new unlisted phone number,
a beautifully restored 3rd Reich swizzle stick,
Rosemary’s baby,
a dream date in kneepads with Paul Williams,
a new Matador, a new mastodon,
a Maverick, a Mustang, a Montego,
a Merc Montclair, a Mark IV, a meteor,
a Mercedes, an MG, or a Malibu,
a Mort Moriarty, a Maserati, a Mac truck,
a Mazda, a new Monza, or a moped,
a Winnebago–Hell, a herd of Winnebago’s we’re giving ‘em away,
or how about a McCulloch chainsaw,
a Las Vegas wedding,
a Mexican divorce,
a solid gold Kama Sutra coffee pot,
or a baby’s arm holding an apple?
opinions powered by SendLove.to
48 Responses to “How Has The American Dream Changed?”
“The biggest area of change seems to be in the scope of our expectations, not only of what we believe we will get, but of what we’ll have to put out to get it.”
Indeed.
Boomers have exibited what has been called, rightly, an “entitlement” mentality, and subsequent generations are even worse in this way, as well as dysfunctional in other ways.
To what extent this reflects changes in child rearing and to what extent it encompasses what one book of mine describes as a modern day Golden Age (post-World War II until the 1973 oil shock, which really was the first of a number of demoralizing things to strike us during the 1970s — society in general was truly optimistic during that time with no limits to see as to what could be achieved in addition, in the future) is open to question.
Note that this use of “entitlement” is character-directed and isn't the same as the mentality associated with government entitlement programs, though the two are remarkably similar and both worth mention.
The other, even more broadly observed, phenomenon is that there is no typical anticipation and often expectation that subsequent generations will “do better” or live better than their predecessors. (This goes far beyond post-1960s developments that include ever larger taxes to support ever greater government, or the increase in the cost of living and things like housing to levels that were unprecedented in earlier years. For example, nobody seems to view the older benchmark of 25 per cent of after-tax income as the reasonable maximum to spend on housing. For decades it has risen to values like 33 per cent or more.)
Every time there has been an economic downturn in my life, the inevitable 'end of the American Dream/you will live worse than your parents/etc.' gloom and doom op-eds begin appear.
We cannot see what the next step forward will be, but somewhere in the current crisis is the set of opportunities that will drive us forward yet again. We are fundamentally an optimistic and opportunistic country, and I for one refuse to join that doom and gloom.
However, it will be a while until we do hit the next expansion/growth, due the triple coming whammy of commercial real estate collapse, high interest rates, and hyper-inflation. But we have overcome those before also, and will again this time, I am sure.
“I for one refuse to join that doom and gloom” (@AR)
I, too, refuse to join. The post kind of comes off as “Oh, kids these days!” I don't think the dreams and expectations of young people are all that off from, say, 50 years ago, except in those allowed to do the dreaming. I'm a 20-something person, newly married, excited for life, even though the world seems like a scary place sometimes. I'd like a fullfilling career, a house, a family, a dog, a little yard, the ability to spend time with my friends and family, perhaps an international trip a few times a decade. I'd like to think that's pretty much the same as people my age 50 years ago (maybe the “internation trip” part is slightly newer and more common today). I'm happy that it's a dream that seems reachable for a more diverse group of people than before — I am a woman, and the “fullfilling career” part would have been much more difficult in the past, but now seems to be coming along quite well. I “expect” these things only because I know that I will work to make them happen. I know very well that if I don't, they most certainly won't fall into my lap.
As for what we're willing to do to make our dreams come true — I also think the “Lazy kids these days” approach is just beyond reality. Sure, there are lots of lazy young people, but while I wasn't there to see them, I'm fairly certain there were plenty of lazy young people out there 50 years ago. I did quite a bit of teaching a while back, and what these kids are learning is, quite frankly, more than I was taught even just a few years ago, and is way more advanced than what, say, my parents learned in school. More people are getting higher educations than ever before. Even those who don't butt up to reality pretty quickly and get out there and work hard to make a living, often figuring out that they would like a degree in the process.
Now, it is certainly a world where many people end up making gobs of money sitting in an office not “making” anything but money (I would strongly reject the notion that “high tech” falls into this category). I do think, though, that to aspire to such a thing is in all ways logical — I mean, heck, the system is in place, it's the way the game is played, why not take a piece? Whether or not the game needs to change is an entirely different subject, but let's not disparage the young'uns for going for a piece of the good life.
I refuse to doom and gloom it up as well. In fact, this is the happiest my wife and I have been in our marriage. Why?? We're living beneath our means, spending less, and spending more time together as a family (I have three children). This whole recession has helped me prioritize my life in a healthy way. Now does that mean things are all roses and sweet tarts? No! But I'm an opportunity guy. And I damn sure going to find opportunity in this recession. Heck I'm finding now by really helping people and making money from it at the same time. A double positive!
“But we have overcome those before also, and will again this time, I am sure.”
The longer-term future threatens much worse (not only inflation but an aging population, problems in earnest with elderly-related entitlement programs, and a Baby Boomer sell-off of assets to finance retirement that point to a long bear market). But we'll get through that, too, somehow.
Within our childrens' lifetimes they will see the depletion of many of the resources we rely on every day.
Health care costs at current rate of increase will be half of median income within 10 years, will exceed median income within 20.
Take a look at the exponential function sometime and apply it to current rates of increase and decline in everything from population to species extinction to depletion of fish, cost of energy, depletion of oil, zinc, copper, etc. It's not a pretty picture.
AustinRoth
I'm with you on this one. You speak via the authority of history. The biggest change in the American Dream is seen in how people today tend to think that now is somehow cut off from what previously occurred.
I think this may come from the fact that the large majority listens to TV pundits for political analysis and gets its sociological views from reality TV. It goes back to the other post about an educated populace.
People tend to be taught what to think instead of how to think.aaa and what's being “taught” is be afraid, be very afraid.
“Is that doom and gloom? Sorry, but it is reality and bears considering…”
No argument here if unpleasant things really are there and must be faced.
Environmental catastrophism and alarmism have no legitimate place here. (Nor climatic Lysenkoism as the pretext for government intrusion and misconduct where none is merited.) That there will be resource depletion, or more often and correctly, scarcity (which will raise the cost of living as well as impose some hardships we ordinarily don't face) is no myth, on the other hand. Look at not only California (where I've lived through some drought adventures) and the Southwest where many have moved, and more will in the future, and its future problems with water and electricity, but look also at the Southeast, where there will continue to be growth and development and future retirement as well as job-seeking migration. All these areas will have scarcity problems (and in fact, we have seen recent “water war” among Georgia, Alabama, and Florida as well as involving the federal government).
The exponential function is useful to understand (how I wish it were applied to government excess and problems like that of future entitlement program costs and other government liabilities, not only to other non-environmental topics like disease and health-care-related costs, say), but shouldn't be misused for alarmism or “mere” sensationalism. (Our future picture is more complicated than that, anyway; we in the developed world and in so much of the rest of the world have seen falling fertility to where we face future population stasis or likely decline, which only harms our ability to pay escalating costs, for example.)
“Is that doom and gloom? Sorry, but it is reality and bears considering…”
[grin] We know the answer! Obama will turn Grandma and babies into Soylent Green!
“Is that doom and gloom? Sorry, but it is reality and bears considering…”
Well, sure. It all bears considering. But throwing up our hands and saying, “sorry kids, but your life is gonna suck, whoops!” doesn't really seem like the correct solution. The younger generations will have grave problems that we will have to confront and overcome, but so, if I remember correctly, did the Greatest Generation that Jazz seems to think had a different American Dream than we do today.
Exactly roro80! I don't ignore at all resource depletion and other pressing issues (heck I'm member of the Lifeboat Foundation where we talk about global issues and future catastrophes daily). But I can't be “doom and gloom” because my children are watching. When I was unemployed for several months, I told my kids the truth and how there would be some changes. But I kept myself in good spirits to set an example (and to keep me focused as well).
So I can accept realities and not be doom and gloom.
Median wages hit their peak in the mid 70's, the minimum wage hit it's peak in the late 60's. The American Dream has been on life support for the last 40 years, slipping out of reach of more and more Americans every year…
DQ -
Yeah, that's why our standard of living is so much lower now than then.
Oh. Wait. It isn't.
You just like to revel in your misery. Fine. Sorry life sucks for you.
That's why my wife works a full time job.
Until the seventies, it was common for a working stiff to support his family in a middle class standard of living on one income, try to do that now…
Again, sorry life sucks for you. Stay away from sharp objects.
ROTFLMAO…
My household income puts me solidly in the top 20% of Americans, I have been happily married for 15 years and have two lovely kids, I and my family are in reasonably good health. It does not get a whole lot better.
None the less median wages for the average American have either been stagnant or going down for the last 40 years. You can deny it all you want, ignore the facts all you want, it will not change them.
I am both appreciative and annoyed by the attitudes some members of the older generation seem to have about us young people. I was born in the early 80's, so I don't have personal experience in observing how things used to be, so I cannot comment on the comparisons with any real credibility. However, I agree with roro80:
“. . .the system is in place, it's the way the game is played, why not take a piece? Whether or not the game needs to change is an entirely different subject, but let's not disparage the young'uns for going for a piece of the good life.”
If people of our generation seem to have an entitlement mentality where we expect more for less, it's because that's the world we grew up in – the one that was given to us by PRIOR GENERATIONS. It's a world in which, by and large, people DO have a better standard of living than they used to. Why would we expect anything different?
Call it what you want (I agree it is a serious problem), but please realize that we are all a product of the society we grow up in. That, and we're not all self-centered materialistic spoiled brats, either. Just as poverty was a challenge faced by the depression-era generation, consider that prosperity might be another type of challenge (I know, I know, wealth is SO hard!).
DQ -
None the less median wages for the average American have either been stagnant or going down for the last 40 years. You can deny it all you want, ignore the facts all you want, it will not change them.
Wrong again, Chicken Little:
Real median household income 1967 to 2005
United States Income Distribution 1947-2007
There is a subtle difference between Median Wage and Median Income. The Median Income can go up despite the fact that Median Wages goes down by working more hours, which is what the US has been doing for the last 40 years.
I remember back in college studying Chinese history and the Confucian examination system, For those of you who are not aware of how that worked, Chinese government official below the ranks of the hereditary positions at the very top, were selected from among those who did the best on examinations of the teaching of Confucius and other classics. Its actually pretty remarkable and one of the earliest merit based system for attaining political power. Anyhow, anyone could become a public official of great power and privilege no matter how humble the origin, although the well off certainly had advantages.
It was a proverb of sort that said there were four generations in a scholar family. The first generation started off humbly but studied hard and passed the exam. The second generation benefited from the new position and was able to learn even more and get promoted to even the best assignments. The third generation was spoiled did not study and lived off the labor of his father and grandfather. The fourth generation had nothing let to inherit and returned to the streets.
In many ways this remains true.
DQ -
You are STILL wrong:
Hours worked hits historic low=
DQ -
Yet more: Average weekly hours 1976 – 2004
DQ -
Anyway, enough of this. You can continue to live your life thinking it is a chore, and how horrible it is to be alive at all.
I will live my life on a more positive note.
Which includes no longer trying to convince you that this is not the worst of times.
You can take a horse to water, but you can't make it drink.
DQ -
You found your one little nugget of flawed data, and you are sticking to it, eh?
Do one quick calculation, and see how truly ridiculous these findings are. According to it, the 'real wage' of 90th percentile earners, in 1997 dollars, is $26.77. To be in the 90th percentile in 1997, you needed an income of approximately $120K. So, on AVERAGE, you would have to be working 87.3 hours per week.
Also, ask yourself, is the standard of living lower today? No. By any measurable standard it is higher.
You mentioned having two children. What do you tell them, as they grow toward adulthood? “Children, the world you will go into will suck. You can never achieve as much as me or your grandparents did. Everything will be worse for you. You were born at the wrong tine in history. You are doomed to a lower standard of living, slave labor conditions in the workforce, and a life that sucks even worse than mine. There is no reason to try in life to better yourselves, because the trends all say it will only be even worse as you get older. There is no hope for you at all. Now, eat your breakfast and get ready for school.”
For the truly last time, I am sorry your life sucks so much.
When I first started working, I thought once I got a good job with a real company (for me it was working at a newspaper) I would have that job for life. Instead I was chemically poisoned and canned in less than two years. I was raised thinking company loyalty would be rewarded, but I've only quit two of the 20+ jobs I've held in my life. I want to work hard and come home knowing I did a good job, but why should I, when I know I'm getting laid off next week? Why work towards retirement when everyone gets laid off two years before they are eligible for early retirement?
The American Dream is now to avoid getting canned. Avoid working for the Man unless you can screw him like he is surely screwing you. Stay afloat with credit cards, and die in debt so deep your kids are screwed.
The horrible part is that I still think I'm an optimist about all of this.
One thing left out of this conversation is personal debt – not government debt but the massive use of personal borrowing to sustain the increased standard of living for many.
The debate between AR and DQ on standards of living and median income/wages over time turns on two major forces: the price of energy (mostly but not entirely oil) and willingness and ability of American consumers to borrow and spend. When energy prices go up a ton, families experiences real inflation and thus cut back other forms of spending. That happened in the summer of 2008 as gas hit $4.50 a gallon. Most analysts predict that we will be back to $4.50 a gallon again as the economies of China and India pick up again. Indeed, talk of a “double dip recession” is often predicated on the anticipated rise in oil prices again – something not likely to be solved in the near-term future by either more drilling or more alternative fuels.
But then there's the bulge in personal borrowing, which fueled so much of the gains in wealth over the last 30 years. Increasingly creative mechanisms on Wall Street to spread the risk around have made personal borrowing so much easier. I still remember when car companies bragged about 7.9%APR financing in the mid-1980s. Now it hovers around zero. Of course, this whole system imploded last fall under its own weight – low interest rates encouraged irresponsible borrowing, overleveraging of risk, and a massive housing bubble. We now debate whether or not it could have been so much worse – or if the cure was worse than the problem going forward. Either way, consumption has dropped, people are “living within their means” more than ever before, and the long-feared hyperinflation still seems far away.
I don't think these problems are unique to this generation. Nor do I buy into the long-term doom and gloom. But I do believe that we will need to find something – a new product, industry, technology, market, etc. – to undergird the next phase of real growth. We haven't had such genuine driver in growth (and productivity) since the 1990s and the rise of the World Wide Web.
This is why I supported the stimulus and the cap-and-trade bills – because they begin to steer Federal dollars toward subsidization of an alternative energy industry that really could serve as a bulwark for new economic growth. I'm less motivated by concern over climate change here than I am over oil scarcity and the need to find ways to avoid the inevitable oil-based inflation (which killed us in the 1970s). Obviously this is costly in the short term, but I do believe it will help over the long haul.
AR, you crack me up; a rich old guy dismissing how tough it is financially for young people. It's still morning in America, huh? When I was starting a family, you couldn't get a house loan if the mortgage would be 25% of your income. How that has changed. 10 years ago health insurance cost half what it does today, but no one below your lofty income level has seen their wages double in that time. Within 10 years that cost will double again, making it 4 times what it was 10 years ago. Do you really think average folks will be making 4 times what they did 10 years ago? I want some of what you're smoking.
DLS, I DO look at the exponential function with respect to government programs, as well as private ones. It's one of the reasons I favor a nonprofit government program for health care. Private insurance is rising at 7% a year. Medicare goes up by 3%. The doubling rate is 70/X so private insurance cost will double in 10 years, while it will be over 20 years before Medicare does. This doesn't address the increasing numbers of people in either case, just the per-patient cost.
“The American Dream is now to avoid getting canned.”
No, just revised, downward. There are no guarantees or “rights” for people to expect things to be as they were in the “Golden Era,” as Roger Bootle named it (1950 to 1973, from recovery after World War II and putting the USA into high gear domestically, to the oil embargo and oil shock, of increasing ambition and expectations about living standards and capability of people and government to achieve anything, only a matter of time before goal X would be achieved). Moreover, in addition to environmental problems (and also crowding and costs in higher-demand Southwestern and Southeastern locations where people have been migrating and will continue to migrate), there will be an increasing need for education and problems for those who don't have it, as low- and unskilled labor becomes revalued as the rest of the world continues to develop and to be opened to trade (labor being repriced to its correct, truly global, level).
Environmental, cost, crowding problems? Some of these will be met as they must, by increased development and exploitation of natural resources (including large water transfer projects, tapping the Great Lakes to be more seriously considered later than now, and so on, in addition to more power plants of all kinds and continued imports of petroleum even as we finally better exploit our own). Some of these will be met by going elsewhere, other than south and west to the most desireable locations, meaning a welcome trickle into the Midwest and even back into northern and Northeastern Blue Nation ghost states for year-round in addition to summer-vacation living. The reckoning of too much government size and cost will be resolved some way — I still say it will be an attempt to spread the pain evenly among retirees (the government beneficaries of obvious note) and the taxpayers. No telling how labor shortages will transpire. (Replacement migration to the levels needed for today's retiree-taxpayer ratios is impossible.)
* * *
“I DO look at the exponential function with respect to government programs, as well as private ones.”
I hope you look at this, too.
http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/TRSUM/index.html
DLS, I know any doubling rate that is higher than inflation and wage increases is a problem. What I'm pointing out, which I'm not sure you appreciate, is that when the rate of increase for one option (nonprofit) is lower than another (for-profit), the doubling time, as with compound interest, makes the worse option (for-profit) get much worse faster. For example, Medicare now vs 10 years ago, up 40%. Private doubled. 10 years from now, private insurance will be 4 X what it was 10 years ago. In 20 years, 8 X as much. There is no conceivable way that real earning power for, say, a plumber, will be 8X what it was 10 years ago.
Looking at rising health care costs between countries, ours increased as a % of GDP from 7% to 15.4% 1970-2004. In the same period Canada's increased from 7% to 9.9%. Germany 6.2% to 10.6. UK 4.5 to 8.1.
(note for those who think insurance rate increases are due to increased health care cost. Insurance rates doubled in 8 years, health care costs doubled in over 30 years)
DLS, let me acknowledge that I do know entitlement spending is a problem, or will be within a few decades. I am confident we will find a way to afford it, and I fervently hope it will be by deep cuts in military spending and increasing GDP by becoming world leaders in green tech, the growth industry of the 21st century.
Gee GD, if you have so much foresight on what WILL happen, you have nothing to worry about either. Go make a fortune with your perfect prediction capabilities.
And there is no doubt in my mind that in 10 years, my son and daughter, both of whom have just entered the work force (my daughter of course has a temporary setback), will be making at least 2 times, and very likely more than 4 times more than their starting salaries.
The point I have been making is even older people than I, like say you, go around grousing about the rotten state of the world, and how the good times are behind us.
The young instead see the opportunities that you are too hide-bound to notice, and are willing to make the effort to position themselves to both take advantage of and help drive to the next version of the economy.
At least the ones that are not raised to think the world owes them some pre-determined standard of living with no effort on their part.
AR, as I explained up front, I'm using the exponential function, which is mathematical fact as you know. I think you also know about the doubling rate equation, which I've simplified as 70/x where x is the rate of increase. Can the rate of increase change. Of course, but it is not encouraging that the insurance industry itself says that rate is not expected to change “by more than a percent or two”.
I'm not sure if you're implying that I believe the world owes me anything. I don't and have succeeded entirely on my own initiative. I also think we have a duty to our children to have a little concern about their futures. Passing on to them a degraded planet and a mountain of debt doesn't satisfy my ethical standards. How about yours?
ncreasing GDP by becoming world leaders in green tech, the growth industry of the 21st century.
HA HA HA HA HA!
Green tech, A.K.A. as Liberal Mortgage Backed Securities, Collateralized Debt Obligations, and Enron Energy Swaps.
Green tech is another feel-good crunchy-granola term that has no basis in actual business facts or models, except to detach money from the federal government and stupid liberals with cash.
AR, that is a ridiculous comment. Solar energy, wind energy, improved appliances, the entire Energy Star program, light colored roofing, energy efficient windows and doors; all of these are a part of green tech, as are things like the coatings on radiators today, catalytic converters, etc. I don't care if you like the “crunchy granola” term or not. We need to create a more sustainable lifestyle and there are many creative intelligent people, including successful businesspeople who are working in this field.
It is currently less expensive to generate electricity with wind than nuclear or fossil fuels, and conservation is more cost-effective than any of these. Why demean those who are working to help your children have a better life?
Actually, wind and coal are about the same cost, but wind has limiting factors that make it unusable as a base energy component.
Here is a good comparison list, btw:
Cents Per Kilowatt-Hour
They are either ridiculously underpaid at the present time, or they have rare and exceptional skills that are difficult to acquire. Far more likely, you are in for a nasty surprise when they move in with you permanently ten years from now.
DQ – God man, how do you keep from blowing your brains out? You are a basket case of despair and gloom.
As for my children, they have just prepared themselves for the future, having acquired valuable skills in the case of my son, and in the process of acquiring a new set of valuable skills for my daughter. They are also adaptive self-starters who feel it is their responsibility to take control of their life, not sit on their asses crying and waiting for for the government to take care of them and make it all better.
We also don't see the sky falling as you do, Chicken Little (you really need to change your avatar and name. You do not tilt at windmills; you run from their shadows in ignorance and fear).
We are not blind to the coming troubles. Both of my children have been raised to expect exactly $0 from Social Security and other such government programs, as they are unsustainable. I am one who has been saying non-stop at TMV and elsewhere that the worst of the recession has not hit, as commercial real estate, high interest rates and hyper-inflation all are on the horizon.
But you don't curl up into a fetal position and whine like a baby about the unfairness and nastiness of life. You plan for it, you deal with it, you overcome it, and if plan A doesn't work, you go on to plan B, then plan C and so on. But you don't give up, you don't wallow in self-pity, and you don't look for someone else to rescue you. It is called self-reliance and resilience.
Hope you have done as good a job preparing your children, but it seems from your comments you are preparing them to live in a post-apocalyptic world in a cave. Good luck with that.
Nonetheless, AR, though you claim to have a background in physics, you seem to be ignoring the exponential growth in population, pollution and price, coupled with the exponential decline in critical resources including food, water and oil. Good luck pitting your optimism against solid trend lines. Somehow I guess you think your clever kids will miraculously find a sudden reversal of these trends.
No, I am not ignoring them. The same arguments were made in the 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's and now. The resource de jour was going to run out, population growth was unsustainable, and mass death and plague were just around the corner.
That is the exact type of ongoing gloom and doom that I reject. Making such predictions is the way to become the darling of academia and the press, but when the predictions fail to come true, and those who argued that currently unforeseen market forces would prevail over temporary current shortages are proven right, time after time, the doom and gloomers maintain a pristine reputation, and the correct predictors are shuffled off the stage. Inconvenient truths are not liked one little bit by the Left, which makes its stock in trade false crisis that they and only they can save us from, and almost always by claiming the need to ration.
[trying again -- posting failed earlier]
“The resource de jour was going to run out, population growth was unsustainable, and mass death and plague were just around the corner.”
NOTE: This Malthusian mentality has been applied to (as an excuse for the Usual Solutions for) the current “crisis,” global warming, climate change, or whatever it will be called next.
One thing that will brighten our future (even if all the electricity to power it indirectly were from coal) will be electric vehicles (and all kinds of new uses for new batteries) and fuel cells (for vehicles, for portable power, for “off-grid” power supplies for buildings, which means even space heating can be electric, and thus cleaner than nowadays with gas, as most space heating uses).
But when it comes to Instant Miracles, the regurgitation of unrealistic belief in Wind and Solar (the change from Hard Power to Soft Power as lib activists called it in earlier decades) along with Instant Electric Cars, what we definitely see is:
“Green tech is another feel-good crunchy-granola term that has no basis in actual business facts or models, except to detach money from the federal government and stupid liberals with cash.”
We see all of this currently in Michigan, with Governor Granholm's breathy (and vapid) gushing about the electric car and New Batteries (the $40,000, 40-mile-range Miracle Chevy Volt has already been admitted by Government Motors officials that it will lose money) and “green jobs,” “green industry,” and “green” everything. Meanwhile, she joins the stupid crusaders mindlessly against both coal now and nuclear now and later for baseline power production, and joins the wacky Obamaniacs in support of legislation that requires imposed, arbitrary proportions of generation that must be “alternative” or “green” sourced as the years go along — which makes us informed people as well as businesses deeply concerned.
So far, there's no progress on any uprating or new transmission construction to support 765 KV (we have 345 KV from the Sixties — like the auto makers — currently, here). Nor is there widespread understanding of the correct role of wind energy, the favored pet right now (even though winds are good in some places but troublesome in others, and the NIMBY problem is due to happen in parts of this state near communities, developed lakeshore areas, and state parks), while the “green jobs” in practice, in reality, are often found in China and Mexico rather than in the USA, which left Dems like Waxman have not failed to notice.
This “green” silliness in Michigan as well as in Washington, DC with the Obamaniacs (play-pen stuff!) adds to the lyrics of a foreign band's song that already describes the shift of center of modern auto industry in the USA from Detroit to Nashville. And what of other businesses and people in Michigan, and elsewhere there is silliness or deliberately business-unfriendly choices made by government?
The boom time it is over
A ghost town is all that's left here
The gold rush it is over
And depression days draw near
Tonight after sundown
I'm going to pack my case
I leave without a sound
Disappear without a trace
I'm going southbound
Drifting like a drover
Chasing my career
From the ships docked in the harbour
New horizons will appear
Tumbling with the tumbleweed
Down the open road
Taking only what I need
Before my head explodes
I'm going southbound
Hey, you're not getting any younger
The wild west has already been won
Northern lights are growing colder
And the old eastern ways are gone
So tonight after sundown
You must go from this place
Without a tear, without a frown
Disappear without a trace
I'm going southbound
AR, none of the predictions have failed to come true. Population growth is still exponential. No new oil has been found, nor additional sources of any of the minerals I've cited. I guess you mean that since we're still not yet OUT of any of them (no one predicted we would be), their exhaustion date has not changed significantly, and hence are a BIG problem for your kids, and mine. It is not a matter of doom and gloom, nor of personal philosophy. It's a matter of time. If we don't conserve, the predicted exhaustion dates will come to pass.
Look at American oil as an example. We've used 80%. No more has been found. The last 10% is horribly expensive to get (tar sands, oil shale etc). You want to just use up the rest right now? How selfish, in my opinion. If US Oil was a 6 pack, we've finished 4 cans and opened the fifth. Do you really want to finish that one and open the last can before your kids can even drink?
I think that is the very definition of selfishness and poor planning.
I was talking about previous predictions of food shortages, water shortages, various other natural resource shortages predicted in the past. None of them came to fruition. Technology and market forces, which are never allowed for in apoplectic predictions, prevented those from happening. I have the same confidence it will happen again, even if I cannot point to WHAT the solution will be at this point in time.
DLS: “green jobs” in practice, in reality, are often found in China and Mexico rather than in the USA, which left Dems like Waxman have not failed to notice.
This is just plain wrong. Installation of solar panels, insulation, windows and doors, lighter colored roofing, more efficient water heaters, space heaters, etc. All of these are American green jobs and furthermore CANNOT be outsourced to China or Mexico. They are local installations in all 50 states. The green economy touches every single community with local jobs and better sustainability.
The installed products can be domestic, as most insulation, roofing, windows and doors are. The fact that many of the other products, such as solar panels (Japan, China) and appliances are not American made is due to YOUR love of globalization and disregard for maintaining our own manufacturing sector. We CHOSE to give up those industries so we could buy cheaper stuff abroad. It is still our choice if we want to be a leader in green tech or just buy it from Asia and Mexico.
If we spent every dollar on wind energy that we currently spend on drilling for oil we would NEVER need another oil well. Long after that oil well is dry, the wind generator will still be cranking out power (From NREL). Transmission and storage problems are not as daunting as you suggest but they'll damn sure be harder if we wait until copper is critically short in supply. Your love of nuclear is surprising as I generally consider you a skeptic of talking points (maybe only “leftie” talking points.)
Let me dispossess you of this one. Nuclear energy from a new plant will cost 8-11 cents a kWh. Wind energy costs 5 cents per kWh. Swapping an incandescent bulb for a compact fluorescent amounts to less than 4 cents a kWh. Plus, it takes 10 years -minimum- to get a nuclear plant online. The wind plant can be up an a week. DLS, it seems to me you are ideologically opposed to something that is obviously the more practical solution.
Furthermore, unless we use taxpayer dollars to insure the nuclear industry (Price Anderson Act), not a single nuclear plant will ever be built here. None has been built without the government “insuring” against loss and liability in over 40 years. As one who curses people for shirking personal responsibility, as one who deplores government intervention and handouts, as one who argues for the private market model of health care insurance, how can you blithely go along with an industry that can't pay its own way, needs big daddy to make it profitable and shield it from loss and liability and is economically nonviable compared to available alternatives?
“I was talking about previous predictions of food shortages, water shortages, various other natural resource shortages predicted in the past. None of them came to fruition. “
Julian Simon had a great time winning the debates about these things. He is gone, but not the “Malthusians” (and others turning climate science into PC Lysenkoism as well as a form of religion), who have seized for years now on global warming as their new problem threatening hyped catastrophe (beyond alarmism at times, to catastrophism) and “crisis” [sic] requiring prompt Usual Solutions (same as for the other “crises” in nature and intent).
* * *
“DLS: “green jobs” in practice, in reality, are often found in China and Mexico rather than in the USA, which left Dems like Waxman have not failed to notice.
This is just plain wrong.”
Well, Waxman does act frequently as if he doesn't notice or know things, admittedly, as well as act in ways to induce industry to relocate overseas.
But it's true that production (not installation, which can't be outsourced) in China or Mexico rather than in the USA is well-known already, and was the subject of ads for a while here in Michigan.
Installation cannot obviously be exported, though beware of more foreign workers, with green cards for green jobs.
Related:
http://www.goodjobsfirst.org/pdf/gjfgreenjobsrp…
http://www.greenmomentum.com/wb3/wb/gm/gm_conte…
http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/…
Etc.
“It is still our choice if we want to be a leader in green tech or just buy it from Asia and Mexico.”
At what cost? Is this neglected, as is the fabrication of the components you have neglected when you concentrate only on the last step before grid connection when you say with wind,”The wind plant can be up [in] a week”?
* * *
“If we spent every dollar on wind energy that we currently spend on drilling for oil we would NEVER need another oil well.
Wind is intermittent. It's not a base load supply source for electricity; it can't compete seriously with coal, gas, nuclear, and hydro where we have hydro. (Where we can do more hydro, we should.) And what about transportation and space heating, the principal uses of oil, not for electricity generation?
“Transmission and storage problems are not as daunting as you suggest but they'll damn sure be harder if we wait until copper is critically short in supply.”
Storage is prohibitively daunting right now and will remain so for ages. This is what has always killed the electric vehicle, and what keeps battery-powered electric vehicles (rather than ground-level or overhead power supply-using vehicles) a distant future item, still largely a dream.
* * *
“Swapping an incandescent bulb for a compact fluorescent amounts to less than 4 cents a kWh”
Conservation can help (I thought of the compact fluorescent bulb when touring an old submarine last year, and considering how long and well it could last submerged during combat operations), but never has been the magic solution so many believe it is (we will grow and need more power in our future, not less), much less a legitimate excuse for deliberate deprivation or lowering of our standard of living.
* * *
“Your love of nuclear is surprising as I generally consider you a skeptic of talking points “
Does not follow. But yes, I support nuclear power, of course, though it's too expensive now often to compete with coal, the other, cheaper, primary electrical power source. Nuke start-up costs are great, and don't forget the decommissioning. The newest designs need to be tried (if Uncle Sam is to do R&D, this deserves priority, along with things like converting coal into liquid fuels for transportation to satisfy our needs in the short to medium term), and of course tort reform is overdue, as the costs of an accident are wrongly elevated. Even with all this, nuclear can make sense. It does here in Michigan, but it and coal plants (which also make so much sense still and which are sought here) are fought by crazies and by a governor enamored of PC over sensibility. Business and residential power customers aren't so enamored, to say the least.
We know it's popular among some…
http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstates/dis…
Which is why hundreds of thousands of people are starving in the Sudan, hundreds of thousands have died of starvation in Ethiopia & Somalia in the last couple of decades and why many more are likely to starve in Kenya. It's also why millions are slaughtering each other in the Congo. Not to mention the massive decline of the Russian population in the last couple of decades.
An estimated 30,000 die of starvation globally every day.
But like you said, there are no food, or resource shortages anywhere in sight…
Haiti’s poor resort to eating mud as prices rise
4800 Starvation Deaths in India in Last 4 Years: Naqvi (If they are reporting 4800, it's probably a lot more).
India: Tribes, living in stigma and starvation
Trapped Sri Lankans face starvation
Bleak warning that UK fish face extinction
Mexico oil exports plummet
Not to far in the future, it's very likely that Malthus is going to laugh his ass off as the world runs out of oil…
But remember there are no food, or resource shortages anywhere in sight…
DQ -
You must be either mentally handicapped or purposely ignorant.
There are no shortages of food due to population ANYWHERE in the world. The food shortages that do exist, tragic as they are, all have in common transportation and corruption issues, not an inability to produce sufficient quantities of food.
I also stated quite clearly (for those who do not have mental capacity issues) that indeed there are energy resource issues looming. However, to quote myself, I have the same confidence it will happen again, even if I cannot point to WHAT the solution will be at this point in time.
Keep avoiding those sharp objects.
AR, I have never claimed that *global* food shortages were the source of starvation (though certainly local shortages are), I have worked in some of the world's poorest places, and know the disturbing and shameful truth is that we have always had, but failed to distribute, food enough for all. This may not always be the case, especially with the decline in fish populations, a source of protein for huge segments of the world population. But my immediate concern, as yours should be, is that critical minerals and energy sources are being depleted, and it seems to me that people like you are just in denial that it will be a problem for future generations.