What Color is the Sky on Your Planet?

[kevin_standlee]

Over on another community -- some of you reading this may still be following that discussion, too -- I had reason to question the economic assumptions of someone claiming that we're in a "bad economy." I asked how long we've been in a "bad economy." The reply, cut-and-pasted here exactly so I can't be accused of misquoting, was:

i think our economy has been in a primarily steady decline since the 50's with the occasional boost.

This is someone a few years younger than me. I was born in 1965 and grew up in different parts of northern California. I am not from a wealthy family, nor have I won a lottery. I'm pretty middle class, I reckon. For the record, I do not think that the US economy has been in a sustained 50-plus year decline.

It makes me think that the dot-com boom did even more harm than we thought at the time: it convinced some people that the running with a high fever is the "normal" state, and than anything else is a depression.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

As Howeird notes, it is all a question of what measures you use. Inflation is certainly one, although the fact that the purchasing power of the dollar has declined steadily over the past 50 years does not mean that Americans have got poorer; they have generally got richer.

There are, of course, many other measures you could use. It seems fairly likely, for example, that over the past 50 years more and more of the nation's wealth has fallen into the hands of (gasp!) women. There are some who will see that as a Bad Thing.

An environmental campaigner might note that the US economy has seen a period of sustained growth, and that in consequence every year Americans need more and more of an unfair share of the world's natural resources in order to sustain their lifestyle. That's certainly "bad" by many people's definitions.

Then again there is the question of the increasing gap between the rich and the poor. Even though poor Americans are getting richer, the very rich are getting richer much faster, which many people view as bad. This one, however, is probably a relatively recent trend, and not something that has been sustained over the last 50 years.

Also, of course, it depends what you are comparing. Is the US economy "bad" in comparison to Sweden? To Argentina? To Cambodia? To Zimbabwe? Or simply to an ideal standard of affluence that your correspondent believes The Government has a duty to provide?

- Cheryl