> Life is objectively much better today for the average person than it has been for 99% of humans in 99% of history.

Life is objectively much worse for many communities in this country.

Get on a plane to Detroit if you don't understand what I'm talking about.

We allowed one of the most powerful and sophisticated industrial economies in history to be taken over by bankers who shipped the jobs to a different country, bought off our politicians, and spend most of their time coming up with new ways to use monopolies to overcharge us for shit.

You can talk about 99% of history all day long, but if you're standing in a town and the stores are boarded up and the jobs are all gone, or alternately, if you have to move further and further away from the community that you were born in because you can't afford to live in the same neighborhood that your parents raised you in, then you're not interested in statistics or people telling you it's the best we've ever had it.

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pclowes 3 hours ago | parent [-]

What?!

Real median household income is the highest its ever been and risen steadily for 50 years: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N

Unemployment rate is 4.3%

Also, I go to Detroit about once a year. Every year it is more vibrant than the lows of 2010. Real estate prices support this argument. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/ATNHPIUS19804Q

Not saying some people somewhere don’t have it rough but overall we are doing better than we ever have.

	▲	CPLX 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> overall we are doing better than we ever have Yep, this is it. This is the fundamental disconnect in our culture. Who do you mean by "we"? And why do you think that Detroit being increasingly unaffordable is a sign that things are going well for working people? Huh? For a large group of working people you are definitely wrong about this, and the signs of the crisis are literally everywhere in our politics right now, but if you can't see it, I can't make you see it. Perhaps file this conversation in the back of your head as you go about your business in the coming weeks and months, and see if you can see any examples of what I'm talking about after all. Instead of taking me at my word, just consider it as a hypothesis that you'll objectively try to verify or disprove. My hypothesis is this: for regular working people who don't have access to excess capital by virtue of birth, connections, or high levels of education, life has increasingly become a living hellscape of being ripped off and exploited in every aspect of their economic life. They are more precarious and less able to control their own destiny than at any time in the modern post-war era, and they are increasingly mad about it.