Questions for the older folks here: I'm looking for context

[fredd58]

Another old(er) geezer mouth - when I started driving gas was in the 30-35 cent/gall range. We used to scrounge up change from under the seats to buy enough gas for the day (!). By the time of the OPEC oil embargo, when gas became an issue for everybody, followed by the Carter inflationary mess, I was out and working, starting my family. Sure, I knew there was a problem, I knew about the unemployment rates, but it just didn't make much of an impact on me, anyone in my family, neighbors, etc. NOTHING like THIS. This is WAY bigger. My first home was purchased with a mortgage interest rate of >13% - can't remember the exact percentage. And it still didn't make that much of an impact, because it was still affordable. We bought a 4 br brick ranch with full basement with rec room, fireplaces, the works, on 5 acres - nice house, nice property - for $35,000. Now? Probably couldn't touch that sucker for less than $200k. That kind of inflation, that kind of financial pressure is unsustainable. Our payments were $327/month. Now? Same house, crazy price - if interest rates were still that high, the payments would be around $2,420/month. Uh huh. Wages have not risen at that rate - nowhere near. All part of the overall big picture, I guess, as to why this is SO much worse.
I remember, as a kid, thinking nothing of walking several miles into town for whatever errand. Now? Anybody here consider allowing their kid to walk several miles into town? Nope, me neither. When new people moved into our neighborhood, we went out of our way to make them feel at home - we brought them dinners, helped around the house, shared newspapers and magazines, just general little stuff...Now? There's an awful lot of people who don't even know their neighbors' names. Its just a different world out there now. Makes trying to cope with a depression on this scale 10000X harder - on everybody.

[Madnsassy]

Another old(er) geezer mouth - when I started driving gas was in the 30-35 cent/gall range. We used to scrounge up change from under the seats to buy enough gas for the day (!). By the time of the OPEC oil embargo, when gas became an issue for everybody, followed by the Carter inflationary mess, I was out and working, starting my family. Sure, I knew there was a problem, I knew about the unemployment rates, but it just didn't make much of an impact on me, anyone in my family, neighbors, etc. NOTHING like THIS. This is WAY bigger. My first home was purchased with a mortgage interest rate of >13% - can't remember the exact percentage. And it still didn't make that much of an impact, because it was still affordable. We bought a 4 br brick ranch with full basement with rec room, fireplaces, the works, on 5 acres - nice house, nice property - for $35,000. Now? Probably couldn't touch that sucker for less than $200k. That kind of inflation, that kind of financial pressure is unsustainable. Our payments were $327/month. Now? Same house, crazy price - if interest rates were still that high, the payments would be around $2,420/month. Uh huh. Wages have not risen at that rate - nowhere near. All part of the overall big picture, I guess, as to why this is SO much worse.
I remember, as a kid, thinking nothing of walking several miles into town for whatever errand. Now? Anybody here consider allowing their kid to walk several miles into town? Nope, me neither. When new people moved into our neighborhood, we went out of our way to make them feel at home - we brought them dinners, helped around the house, shared newspapers and magazines, just general little stuff...Now? There's an awful lot of people who don't even know their neighbors' names. Its just a different world out there now. Makes trying to cope with a depression on this scale 10000X harder - on everybody.

Time to walk around the neighborhood, knock on some doors, and get to know your neighbors, that's what I'm thinking.

[vision-master]

My neighbor stiffed me out of $20 last Month. 

[greenmom]

Our current economic and energy problems are a continuation of the problems that first appeared in the 1970's.   There have been sectors of the economy that have flourished.  These areas are the ones that had heavy government support such as the arms industry.  Any industry(like the stock market, banking, mining and real estate) that was encouraged to operate without appropriate regulation and with heavy government support(paying for the expansion of water and sewer and utilities, FDIC insurance) also appeared to boom. 

Carter gets slammed for the inflation that hit hard during his administration.  However, it just goes to show how limited our ability to understand even slightly complex issues.  Inflation was going to happen when the wage and price controls that were instituted during the previous GOP administration were lifted.   No one seems to remember Richard Nixon's wage and price controls or Gerald Ford's WIN buttons(Whip Inflation Now).  The wage and price controls were instituted due to price pressures that came from all the money borrowed and spent on the Vietnam War without any type of control of domestic spending or increasing taxes to pay for the war.  Carter and Paul Volker stopped the economy from total collapse then, but we have no one with the guts or brains to take the hard steps that need to done to stop the collapse now.

Agriculture was always the backbone of the US economy.  Starting in the late 1960's in order to keep food prices down( due to the increased need for the government to buy food to feed 500,000 troops in Vietnam and the food stamp program) the federal government  started a ruthless policy to increase the production from farms and to import massive amounts of food from overseas to keep a lid on food prices.  This led to many disastrous consequences, including the corporatization of farming, the loss of family farms and the devastation of the rural economy throughout the United States.  The loss of family farms did not just hurt farmers,  it destroyed tens of thousands of small businesses that were kept alive by the local farmers.  This is also when the massive destruction of the rain forest started at such rampant scale.  The US encouraged the destruction of the rain forest so massive amounts of cheap grain could be imported from Brazil.  The monstrous activities in Argentina were implemented to stop the organization of the ranchers and peasants there, as well.  I must refer you to Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine on Argentina. 

The government also pushed hard for the suburbanization of our country.  From idiotic policies like busing for desegregation of schools(desegregation could have been far more effectively resolved by making the banks stop discriminating against minorities).  Busing helped fuel the mass exodus to the suburbs and beyond.  This was great for local greed merchants and they were more than happy to make money hand over fist and to hell with sustainability.  The suburban development boom made a lot of money for the banks, brought in lots of taxes for local governments, and helped to employ many unskilled workers whom had been previously employed in the ag sector.

The saddest thing is that there have been lots of people crying out against this mess all along, but we cannot seem to stop this disaster from picking up steam.  I thought we were going down the tubes thirty years ago, but it has been delayed.  Perhaps they can put up some more bandaids and keep this going a few more years, but peak oil is the one thing they are not taking into account.

Thanks for posting this topic.

[golddust]

Greenmom, you make a point about the cost of food. Food is a major issue for obvious reasons and worth straying off the path for a minute to talk about.

In most places, it's normal to spend 35% of your income on food, and the the lower income nations often spend as much as 70%. The average family in America spends less than 10%. We spend the least amount of money on food than any other country but consume alot and waste alot too. The UK and Europe even spends upwards of 15% with one set of statistics saying the UK spends 12%. I have seen something wrong here for awhile now. If it's too good to be true, it usually is. People flip when I tell them I spend something like 15% or more on ours, and usually these same people are overweight, out of shape and in poor health and consider Hamburger Helper to be good dining. I buy organic produce and buy from farmers markets and directly from the local farmers about 90% of the time and buy ingredients to make my food from scratch -- and since I've eliminated white flour and white sugar, that's more costly too to get whole wheat, oat flour, etc. When you go through a local farmer for quality meat, your ground beef is not 2.99/lb... it's more like 6.99/lb or more. But mine is not a conglomerate cow with a label of USA/MEXICO/CANADA like I see at Safeway and constantly being recalled, either. The quality is not iffy and it hasn't been treated with carbon monoxide to give it that fresh pink look you see at the supermarket and I know what the animal has been eating -- I will only get grass fed. Grain fed is bad for your health and very bad for the planet as a whole. I just learned worldwide, 50% of grain grown is just to feed livestock! Something like a billion people could get fed on that every year! And instead it goes into the cows so people with money can eat their meat and let the poor 3rd world suckers starve.  Directly from the farm, I know how my future steak lives and is treated. Same with the rest of the livestock meats and dairy products too. This was the norm back in the day. Getting a cow 2 counties over was probably considered importing your food.  I know my grandparents didn't like the idea of food from other countries.

[Rival]

I doubt anyone here would believe my narratives, so I will just pass on the personal history section. Lets just say that I have seen more things than most people consider possible. I will make a few points though.

I remember the gas lines in the 70's quite well. The issue of jobs during that time was not one of finding one: there were always jobs to be had. The issue was with obtaining money. My father worked three jobs. He worked 9:00am until 5pm at firestone as a brake and front-end alignment specialist. He did not come home for dinner, he caught a bus to his second job in a tool and die shop where her worked from 5:30 until midnight. On weekends he cleaned chemical vats at Luberzol chemical, and if things were slow he could spend some time with family on Sundays. We lived in the projects (like HUD housing only worse) for 5 years while my parents scrimped and saved every penny for a down payment of a house in suburbia. My mother worked as a waitess in two different restruants, often pulling double shifts. No one was offering interest-free loans. They kicked ass and got us out of hell. They both eventually retired as millionaires, and neither had ever set foot on a college campus. But those jobs are all gone today. The shape of the country will no longer allow such a possibility of success through honest work and sacrifice.

Just as the safetly net of the farms in the 30's have vanished, so too have the jobs that gave my parents a chance to pull themselves up. My brother has been looking for work for over a year. He will take pretty much anything. There is nothing left to depend upon but the government, and that is running out soon. Eventually I think I will have to take him in, at the same time I am trying to find a job for my son. This is the world we built for our children so that a generation could drive Porches. The traditional safety nets are gone forever.

[vision-master]

They kicked ass and got us out of hell. They both eventually retired as millionaires, and neither had ever set foot on a college campus. But those jobs are all gone today. The shape of the country will no longer allow such a possibility of success through honest work and sacrifice.

My brother has a friend that has worked blue-collar factory work his whole life. Right now I think he makes under $15 hour. He is a milllionare due to smart moves. He said this is almost impossible to do in today's world. He wears blue work uniforms during waking hours and always has had 15 to 20 year old cars. If you met him, you would think he's a low-life.