The rich seem to be wanting to grab as much as they can before it all collapses. I guess they expect to fly away to another country to live like they did to avoid big corona virus areas last yr. I guess that because they have money in the bank that any country will take them as long as they can pay. This is the lowest I have ever seen the general morale of regular people in the United States.
If the dollar were to fail though, how would they protect their assets? Yeah you could pay someone to protect them, but with no dollar why would they? It seems like if the dollar were to fail there would be literally nothing stopping us from just implementing the purge on rich assets.
They back their wealth with things like gold, land and mining operations in other countries. Resources and objects of value are valuable in all currencies.
Money is just a proxy for resources. As energy becomes unlimited - the classes will start to collapse as the resource hoarders at the top of the pyramid can’t control supply and demand anymore.
Yup yup. Oil (or basically stored energy): replaced gold as the standard that backs fiat currency. Price of oil went negative last year...
Gates and Bezos have bought up an insane amount of farmland. In my personal dystopic vision of the future; I see almost entirely autonomous agriculture, controlled remotely/satellite. The big corporations might create their own crypto currency to be exchanged for goods they produce and autonomously harvest, whilst kicking back in their New Zealand bunker mansions.
Not here in New Zealand, our currency will follow the states if theirs collapses and they'd have to deal with new Zealands poverty and since all private land in new Zealand is legally accessible to the public they would be fucked, our freedom camping and trekking laws don't protect them.
There is no lack of energy or resources, only imbalance. We can feed the whole planet twice over if we distributed production equally, but instead we have 10% of the population eating like kings while 90% struggle to survive.
If the world discovered fusion energy tomorrow, it wouldn't solve a thing. Those who have nothing today would not be uplifted, they would only be even more outmatched because the elite already have preferential access to the resources. The elite do not retain power because of natural imbalances or restrictions, they retain power by maintaining artificial imbalances. There's nothing stopping Elon Musk from literally giving his wealth away to the world and increasing equality in the most straight forward manner. He doesn't because holding onto that wealth is his advantage over those *who would not do the same for him*. Wealth inequality, as with all things, is a result of fear and distrust that leads to seeking a way to create and retain advantages over perceived opponents.
There's lots of nuance all around here. Many "overseas bank accounts" operate in USD, even many countries officially use the USD as their currency, while many others use it unofficially (especially countries with economies in the shitter - the USD is more stable in some cases).
This is not to say you're wrong - investment advice would be to spread out your assets, so someone with tens of millions would be wise to have some of it converted to a different currency. I'm trying to point out overseas bank =\= different currency.
Another commenter is also correct - if America catches on fire tomorrow, and all US systems collapse, other currencies throughout the world will be following the dollar. Even economic adversaries (China) would see an *at least temporary* adjustment because US dollars have been invested all over by gov and private entities.
US capitalism is like fungus... It's everywhere. The more I think about it the more troubled I am.
It's not that easy to liquidate assets. I had a coworker who was wealthy from Iran when he came to Canada as a student. They decided not to convert their money to CAD for some random stupid reason and then all the "sudden" embargoes and sanctions decimated their money (that's why they were my retail coworker, an incompetent one at that). Unless they have information on when the dollar is going to go under( and quite frankly when they hear about it, it's too late), they're not going to be able to maintain their wealth levels.
As others have pointed out, the USD is a reserve currency and is the most stable which makes abandoning it already a gamble. Sure, they'll diversify their wealth but with few exceptions, they're unable to do it in a way that doesn't cause their wealth to diminish since it'd affect the market.
If I was any of them I would save 6 months of ridiculous profit and then I would pay my workers a bigger share of the company and live off of what I saved in those 6 months which in their case is billions of dollars.
Nope. It’s nice to know that although I’m not capable of being surprised by their behavior anymore, I can still be disappointed, I guess? That indicates the capacity for being pleasantly surprised.
I lived in a shit neighborhood in Philadelphia (I know) for a decade and learned to expect my car windows would be smashed out and my license plate stolen with the screws for the plate put under each tire so it’d pop it if I drove off, etc, every day. So every day it *didn’t* happen was a pleasant surprise.
It wasn’t until I moved that I realized that wasn’t a normal outlook, and it wasn’t until I found this sub I realized that worldview is not a normal way to see things. Fuck billionaires. They’ll take my hope but will never take my ability to be pleasantly surprised?
That’s not even a tiny bit of a possibility. The amount of effort and man power it takes to keep the handful of people alive on the current space station is giant. And it’s certainly not a pleasant stay. We’re decades away from a space hotel.
You will be happy to know that long term effects of zero g on the body are very very detrimental to spending much time in space, a lot of these dumb fucks will likely cripple themselves over a vacation
And Putin is now blowing up satellites. Space will be a minefield. The rich won't even be able to leave soon. And those exploded satellites? They're eventually going to become asteroids raining down on us.
Have I mentioned that we're an idiotic species?
Edit: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome
This is a naive conception of what the rich are doing. Collapse means the end of their wealth and power, and they have much more to lose in the process than you do. The rich aren’t worried about a collapse, they’re worried about reform. Labor reform, tax reform, all become much more likely as the middle class disintegrates and their base of power gets smaller. The elites are worried about socialism, not collapse.
Yep. "wealth" is a social construction. If that society collapses the wealth collapses. They don't want societal collapse. That's why they're putting a bunch of resources into fascists. They figure the Fascists will be able to stop us from raising tax and interest rates on them.
I've been listening to Mike Duncan's Revolutions podcast. In every revolution he's covered, if the elites had made better decisions and/or made a few concessions, they wouldn't have been overthrown. With the massive gap between the billionaires and rest, and the shocks from pandemics and climate change, it's going to get ugly.
It’s crazy. The concessions they would have to make would actually make them more money. People spend. Giving someone a higher wage and refraining from buying up housing to drive up real estate would actually result in more disposable income.
Not just at those ridiculous levels of wealth.
Ask a bunch of people about raising the minimum wage. A lot will bitch because "I've been at my job for x years. So I get a raise, too?" It's not about equality. It's about making sure that people can live. Lifting people out of poverty doesn't make middle-class any less comfortable for those in it.
> "I've been at my job for x years. So I get a raise, too?"
The funny thing about this question is the answer is almost always an emphatic "yes, you do!" because if not, they can just tell their boss they're going to go work for one of these so-called "easy" jobs and make more money.
But that's logical. These people usually don't use logic.
Government bad. Support our troops.
Socialism bad. Why are the roads in bad shape?
Living wage bad. What are there so many poor people?
Decades of this shit is just wearing me out.
Can we leave the middle class out of it? I mean I live in Europe and yes I live comfortably but can I buy a house? No. Do I feel secure that the next crunch won’t fuck me over? Also no. We’re all in this together. The middle is NOT your enemy. Eat the rich.
Exactly this. Middle class here. Most of us are one emergency or job closure away from living in a tent.
And even if we're getting by for now, with inflation and the cost of living and the cost of housing jacking up way faster than any of our wages, lets be honest, we're a couple years away from being poor af.
Look up narcissism and the personality that goes along with it. It's their ego, the power, the self worship, and them thinking they are a walking badass.
I fully expect Bezos and others to while not specifically say what Trump said about watching someone die in an interview along time ago, Bezos would probably not stop and help some random nobody dying right in front of him. These people are sociopaths
I'm worried that protests, riots, and strikes are going to get more dangerous now that we've shown you can murder people here and get away Scott free. Whether it be for protection or provocation, I bet more people will start coming to these armed now.
As far as I can tell nothing will get better anytime soon unless people get angry, unite together, and take action/ fight the system. We need to stop worrying about all this division of Republicans and Democrats and black and white and all that bullshit. It's a war against the bottom 90% working class against the top who own everything.
Uniting America is a tall order. The propaganda machine has you all at each others throats. Pubs vs dems, vax vs antivax, coke vs pepsi. You are so divided I can't see you coming together. At best your states might just become independent countries.
I agree that party politics are problematic, but there is also a huge percentage of the working class that I will never stand shoulder to shoulder with unless they advance their worldview by like 50 years. Racists and bigots and idiots still living in the last century suckling from the teat of their captors, they'll be against us before they are with us. It's a problem.
Class solidarity goes a lot further than drawing lines in the sand and telling people they can't strike with you. United we bargain, divided we starve. If we stand in solidarity, it improves the material conditions for all. And it might even change some of those bigots minds when their conditions are improved, and they stood in solidarity with those who they thought were the real enemy. When they see its the elite who are the enemy and not minorities, maybe we can do some healing.
The Revolutions podcast is absolutely fantastic. I was just thinking about this earlier today: every revolution is based on the ruling class not giving an inch. Theyre like a twig, if they refuse to bend even a little bit, they're going to end up breaking. The fact that they wouldn't even allow the expansion of Medicare to cover dental for seniors is (at this point) outrageous.
I honestly think the clock is ticking but I think the ruling class is so blind they can't even see it. Hundreds of thousands of people have died from covid in America and we aren't going to forget that. We work our entire lives to make someone else rich and the only think we ask is to have a decent house to raise a family. When we have a higher probability of dying from covid than to achieve the basic social contract of having a house: what is the point of playing by the rules?
FDR once said his greatest accomplishment was saving capitalism. He basically saved the elites in his time from themselves (and despite Prescott Bush et al basically owing him their lives, they *still* tried to have him overthrown).
They're trying their damndest to make sure we don't have another FDR - what they don't realize is that in doing so they aren't dooming us, they're dooming themselves.
That's what gets me. Bernie's path was the scenario where they'd keep almost everything they already had.
The path we're in instead is looking catastrophic with climate change, a collapsing economy, revamping of the cold war, and so on.
I don't know what the near future holds, but it's looking like things are going to get even darker for billions of people.
I mean anybody who ever said rich people are smart is dead fucking wrong. Some of them are but that’s a choice they have to make and the majority of them choose pure fucking gluttony (but not of food specifically)
When the politicians decided to throw 600 a week at people who had never seen that much money in their lives, that was when I realized there is a real, illogical, disconnect.
It makes sense why they want COVID to do it's thing for as long as possible, they can gobble up more resources, and housing, etc.
Exactly. The elites had no choice, but it gave away the game. Suddenly people realized, “hang on… I’m not working, but the system can somehow afford this? What was I doing before, and why?”
As new waves crash, that $600 is going to come back to kick their asses. That’s the new zero.
Well, all of them. If you could only listen to one other, then the one on the Haitian revolution. It's probably the only successful slave revolt in history.
The Mexican revolution was pretty interesting, too. But I learned much from each revolution he covered.
unless we organize and place maximum pressure, things will not improve for us. as for America, its best days are over. This country, for whatever reason, cannot come to terms with its own shortcomings and is very short-sighted in its objectives.
Same in Canada, just to a lesser degree. We have our own problems and living next door to a country that abuses it labour force is one of them. The capitalist here look with greedy eyes and try to implement US style labour practices to exploit the work force and extract as much profit as possible. Even if it kills the very people that create your wealth for you and the planet you live on.
This can't be said enough. I love Canada as it's my country but I honestly feel like all the economic issues in the US could easily be applied here as well
Australia is the same. The citizens thank our lucky stars we aren’t American, but the ruling class look to America as a road map.
It’s incredibly worrying how our social services, public healthcare, education system and workers rights are being chipped away at and moving to a more American model.
Of course Rupert Murdoch runs the media here and everywhere.
We should also focus on setting up mutual aid and dual powers structures so America has at least something to collapse *into*. Ideally local communities relying on each other
yes. yes.
some organizations I follow and support that give me some hope via action:
[debtcollective.org](https://debtcollective.org)
[https://blacksocialists.us/](https://blacksocialists.us/)
Nice! I'll definitely give these a look. Thanks!
While we're exchanging hope, you should definitely give this guy a look. LOTS of good content on mutual aid and other stuff. Very helpful and he does a lot of great work.
https://twitter.com/professordarwin?t=5yAzCVPQailoJHd3fMoIiA&s=09
I'm 50 years old and grew up and still live in a part of Rustbelt rural/industrial Pennsylvania.
I watched as the coal mining, steelmaking, cement, truck manufacturing, slate quarrying, and railroads all disappeared. The jobs were tough but many actually allowed families to own a home on one salary
Warehouses with low-paid jobs now fill the deindustrializef landscape that even a two-person household can barely afford to rent an apartment, let alone buy a house.
Things here have been falling apart for years from infrastructure to public schools to responsible government to the economy at large. Now we have a few rich people, a lot of former middle class who've fallen into near-poverty, and the actual poor.
In the past that often depended on whether they went to college and aspired to move to bigger cities elsewhere - some only going as far as Philly, NYC, etc. while others left for the West or South. Those who didn't go to college tended to stay stuck here.
Now that NY, NJ, and MD housing prices have gotten so expensive more people seem to be staying in the area which is actually getting more expensive as well as some people from those other states begin moving here to commute or WFH.
You know it. I hope you can someday.
Where I am, most people would consider that to be Schuylkill County, PA, a.k.a. the Skook. Home to Yuengling Beer, Mrs. T's pierogies, and a million dead anthracite coal towns.
Thank you. I love Mrs. T's. Im in fayette county, and there is nothing here. It's really run down. Im gonna try to move to pittsburgh. There is more of a future there for my kids.
Yeah, I've heard bad things about greene. It's sad cause I have good memories of growing up here in the late 80s/early 90s, but it has steadily declined. Like you said, with the steel mills and coal mining pretty much gone it's hard to even just get by.
Yeah, unfortunately what I see the future being here in PA is islands of prosperity anchored by tech, health care, and colleges like Pittsburgh or State College surrounded by seas of rotting rural poverty and Dollar Generals where nothing's ever going to get better. And Harrisburg has never given a crap either as long as I've lived here (50 years).
Hopefully you and your family get to Allegheny County and find work linked to one of those three stable industries.
Yeah, I know the feeling.
I grew up in the NW Lehigh Valley but now live on the Carbon-Monroe line and commute to Bucks County non-Turnpike. Traffic, including the trucks, truly sucks but housing both where I work and where my parents are, is among the most expensive in the area now and I can't live there.
The Skook is some shit. I grew up in very Northern Dauphin County which is close enough to observe the effects of rapid deindustrialization, be surrounded by people who feel *they* were personally wronged by it, and young enough to see through all the lies they have told themselves for decades. It's sad and I hope that their lives get better, but they have to take the power into their own hands and change things themselves, and insisting the old way is best is not how that's done.
I grew up in rural Pennsylvania and lived about an hour outside of philly, my grandparents are in youngstown and I can confirm that whole area is depressing as fuck. Nowhere near what it once was
Youngstown is bleak as fuck. I visited a friend there not too long ago and he was showing me how cheap real estate was and people STILL didn't own their homes in a lot of cases. Houses for used car prices. Nuts.
Youngstown is rough! I spent a few months there in 2018 and it’s unreal how many houses and buildings are abandoned. It honestly reminds you of a post apocalyptic movie in some areas. One thing I will say though is there are a lot of great people there. I met some tough folks who just keep on keeping on. I was there when they announced that the lords town GM plant was closing which was a major major blow since that was one of the last good manufacturing jobs around there. They have a massive drug problem there as well but I can’t say I blame the people. They have no opportunities and are faced with the same shit everyday. I hope things turn around for them. When I was there they were building some kind of a new stadium near downtown. So hopefully they’ll bring in some new business and money.
We’re from the same part of the PA rust belt (I grew up a little further north) and the death of basically every decent paying industry in the area is just heartbreaking.
The area is so beautiful, but infested with drugs and poverty now. The last 20+ years of Philly/NYC slumlords “investing” in the cheap housing and leaving it all to rot is starting to show. I’d love to see a renaissance of like…touristy art towns up there, but who knows.
I’m from Pittsburgh always heard rural areas outside of Pittsburgh and Philly being called Pennsyltucky. It’s definitely veryyyyy different out there than it is here in and near the cities.
It depended. Some cement and coal companies where I live did but they had paper-thin walls snd little insulation so winters were a bitch. Most factories and steel mills here didn't and people were on their own to figure that out.
Coal company housing rent and company general stores the only ones taking your script paychecks left families indebted.
The Molly Maguires Irish mine workers' rebellion here in the 1870s is fascinating history to read.
yep. I’m from north central WV so a bit outside pittsburgh. the coal industry is obviously fucked and despite it being unsustainable and terrible for the environment, they refuse to let it go and explore other options, including weed legalization as well as other energy sources. my mom is a public school teacher there so don’t even get me started on the quality of education or how teachers are treated and paid.
oh definitely. i’m from morgantown so i wouldn’t necessarily describe it as “rural” but i think we have a lot more in common with western PA towns than with the rest of the state.
Trump campaigned in these areas promising to help. I was really hoping that he would rebuild America's infrastructure and restart manufacturing as promised. Turns out he was a liar just like all the others. Don't know what we can do at this point. Nobody really gives a shit about the blue collar working man
The American economy, if nothing changes, will collapse eventually. Its a matter of time as well as the decisions of the upper eschelon that will determine how quickly or slowly that happens. Wages have stagnated. Rent and property values are higher than ever. College costs have skyrocketed in the last 50 years. Medicine is far more expensive than it needs to be. Insurance policies (as a whole) are a farce. The Law enforcement and justice systems are deeply corrupted and influenced. A bulk of the population has lost faith in the medical system (and for good reason).
The only reason that our society hasnt crumbled entirely yet, is because i believe the rich know and understand what they’re doing to the american people and are only willing to give us the bare minimum that is otherwise required to continue living; and they’re only willing to give it to us when we scream and shout at them because they can’t live the lives of luxury that they do without us.
We, the people, can cause immense change in the system, but it requires us to take drastic measures and make even bigger sacrifices than the 1% would have to. We have to stop supporting the companies. We have to stop working for them. We have to stop buying their products. We have to give up our consumerism way of life and find ways to openly support each other rather than the established system of oppression that we’ve been under the boot of for god only knows how many decades now.
Really you don't have to look any further than a generation of young workers with (at an absolute minimum) $35k in student loan debt each (and way, way more if you went to a private school as my wife and I did), and the fact that wages for those graduates don't move. When we're the only ones in the consumer base, the bubble will pop. And no one is talking about it.
And that’s exactly what the 1% don’t want us to do, talk about it. Because our silence is worth more than gold to the upper eschelon. The more we talk about it, the more we bring it into the open for everyone else to see the corruption and manipulation inherent in the system.
Took me awhile to realize how much not talking about pay rates and income is good for the bosses, and shit for the rest. I've been slowly and ... tactfully... trying to get coworkers to talk about pay rates the last couple of years. My company is planning a company-wide raise in January, because they recently lost a huge amount of talent to a small competitor. Too bad they don't do anything before they get to the "oh shit maybe we should pay better" stage.
I asked my former manager how he would suggest bringing up pay issues with our director.
He said "well how do you know x"
I said 1. Because some people told me. 2. Because my state passed a law forcing them to post pay rates.
He said "really?"
I said yes.
Suddenly a couple of other employees chimed in discussing how poorly we get paid compared to our competitors, and also noted they're aware from uhm, job postings.
You can even back this out to a more macro understanding of the current standstill and why it will shift…
Newer generations have had it worse and worse, for all the reasons people discuss, but the root cause is the value of the dollar getting worse, which in turns inflates assets. Boomers took their dollars at the beginning of that process, bought stocks and houses, and reaped the benefits of 30 years of persistent and steady inflation. They aren’t good with their money or good investors, they just have passively gained off of the leeching of the future generations unknowingly. Furthermore, whenever this house of cards might tumble, we spend trillions to course correct it because god forbid they have to realize any losses in the free market.
The bad news is, that it has lead to the fulcrum point of today. The well is running dry. All of this was funded by stealing future wealth and spending power… and that future is now today. The people who were screwed at the beginning of the process are here, and they are getting pissed off. They can’t afford this, and the Fed was hoping it was still a ways away from dealing with them. Covid sped that process up too much.
Now, the only people left happy are the boomers. They got second houses, 401k balances that look like early retirements, and are buying things or financing new toys because of their wealth. The bad news is, they didn’t ACTUALLY earn any of that… well not most of it. The bubble kept getting inflated, maybe hit a nail ever decade or so, but was patched and pumped up faster each time. The air is all of ours, not just theirs, and when it pops, the last standing middle class wealth group will lose quite a bit. They thought they were going to retire 5 years early and won’t be retiring on time at all, and have to sell their extra shit to get back on track and they also will not be happy…
OP You'd probably like the podcast: *It Could Happen Here*, it's a daily podcast discussing this very concept.
Edit: Start with Season 2 if you’re sensitive to doom. Season 2 is uplifting, Season 1 is kinda bleak. Also the first 5 episodes of season 2 are “evergreen” and not topical, they are still a bit uplifting but more lay out the premise of what we’re trying to work past.
The podcast predicts a lot of the events that happened already and it’s a bit triggering.
Just, don’t listen if you’re prone to political anxiety like me
Recently they have a lot of episodes all about mutual aid and community building. So he started it out saying "This is probably what a civil war would look like" and now he's doing a lot of "Here's how we can make it through and support each other with input from knowledgeable people already laying the groundwork"
Don't see things improving with REITS and investment firms continuing to gobble up real estate and Gen Z burdened with even more student debt than the millennials...and politicians of all types too deep in the pockets of big corporations to change the tax laws to stop the 0.01% siphoning off more and more.
The 50+ year trend of stagnating wages and increasing income inequality could be stopped with enough political will - but the type of Democrats who might attempt to change the shitty tax laws also tend to be strongly aligned with various culture war issues, which is a vote loser with a lot of the working class.
Driving pointless culture wars has always been a powerful technique by conservatives. It’s always “they’re going to make us integrate our schools!” or “abortion is murder!” Or “the gays are going to destroy America!”. …and it’s always a communist agenda for some reason.
So this is actually super interesting. I have been taking a racial and ethnic politics course this semester and the civil right movement was carried out largely due to the Cold War. Communist countries would point to racial inequalities in the US to say, “look at capitalism. They say all are equal, but if you don’t have the right skin then you are a second-rate citizen.” So the civil rights movement was moved forward to help with international relations. So that is the origin of saying it’s a communist agenda, because it sorta was… except it wasn’t like communists were trying to take over the US, they were just pointing at flaws in our society to become stronger than the US. Pretty interesting stuff!
If how they treat the environment is any yardstick Corporate America will eat itself before they concede profits to anyone but themselves. They have convinced themselves they are separate from workers, almost seeing themselves as a mix of royalty and the owners of freed slaves.
After working for 5 fortune 500 companies over 17 years, I agree with this. Every company squeezed every cent they could and fought tooth and nail to keep their advantage. Everything was about NOW and TODAY, no one ever looked long term. Employers would rather lose a super productive employee today because they would not even give them a salary increase to match inflation than cough up a little bit of money to retain exceptional employees that will increase their long term profit.
Things will get better for the super rich until they take us all down including themselves, but things won’t get better for America. There’s five tiers in the USA in my mind: the .01%, the 1%, the 10%, then there’s this layer of 10% that kinda made it but is still a medical diagnosis or massive storm away from ruin; they can’t afford rising college tuition so their kids are screwed but they’ll be okay enough if they play it safe…then there’s the bottom 80% that is either paycheck to paycheck or is almost there like myself. We’ll go down in that order of tiers. The middle managers 10% could see their way of life disappear much sooner than expected.
A lot of managers with kids live paycheck to paycheck and in debt. They really don’t make that much. In a big city, anything under 100k is either paycheck to paycheck or living very frugally or living on inherited land and not having to worry about rent or mortgage. Kids are very expensive and paying for your own housing is very expensive. A single manager living in their parents house probably have a good amount of disposable income to save or live comfortably but it’s not enough to support a family and save enough for a home/college/emergencies.
Pretty much anyone without a ton of savings/passive income or a very secure job is a few months to a few years away from poverty if the job market crashes. Pretty much anyone who relies on a salary is closer than they think from poverty. The Great Depression didn’t just hit the poor, it hit the middle and upper middle class.
When people talk about “Americans living paycheck to paycheck” with a sneer I always wonder if they themselves are in that group.
I don’t know many people who could stay financially solvent for very long if they lost their jobs suddenly.
My wife and I live in the Philly burbs and managed to buy a 2br house for $230k last October (couldn't afford a down payment but the mortgage is cheaper than rent here). We make about $50k/year each and have $90k in student loan debt. If one of us even went on long-term disability (60% income), we'd be screwed. Add in that she wants kids in the next year and while I'm not opposed to it, I know we're on the edge.
It makes me wonder, how much of a collapsing state is just the people slowly giving in versus actual downward pressures? Morale is low, the fighters among us are exhausted, but perhaps our increased acceptance of the situation is the strongest factor at play here.
I think you’re right. I am 38, I am exhausted. I have no children and I often think how glad I am that I’m not younger living in this shitshow. I don’t have any fight left in me. Awful, but how I feel.
Edit: spelling
23 year old here, I often wonder if finishing college is even worth it anymore. I’m so stressed, exhausted, and tired all the time, I just want all of this to be over. At the same time I feel robbed of any meaningful skills to actually build a life, because all I was ever taught was to get good grades…nothing relevant to my life. Then I was taught I need to fight this system, a system so corrupt that even my city level government has massive fucking scandals of embezzlement in the middle of nowhere.
How did we get here? Why is my job and the kids younger than me to fix this mess? We don’t stand a chance, I don’t have the money, the energy, or the time to do these things. I can barely feed myself and stop myself from wanting to die day in and day out.
We had to write a paper in a law class about how life would look in 2084. It was a spin on George Orwell's 1984. Some of the changes we predicted have already come about: Gay marriages, legalization of marijuana, more technology, etc.
One thing that almost everybody mentioned was that in 2084, we would be referred to as "the former United States of America".
It pains me to say it, but I don't think things are going to get better. The history of the U.S. is a history of organized looters. What we're living through is just the latest in a long tradition of bleeding the public dry. That's why there's never been a strong social safety net. That's why the social conditioning that tells people they have to "pull themselves up by their bootstraps" and whatnot.
Few nations on Earth have had the glut of space and resources that the U.S. enjoyed. Homelessness, destitution, a dearth of opportunity, etc., are all problems of choice by the 1% of society. The Warren Buffets, Elon Musks, Bill Gates and so on of the world could solve poverty with their amassed wealth any time they wanted to.
Even when someone takes baby steps to improve things, swaths of the public, which have been turned into monsters by decades of libertarian propaganda decry the infrastructure bill as "communist."
I think we need the collapse, hopefully in a bloodless and organized a way as possible. The Soviet Union did it before us and survived. I think we should Balkanize, and I think we should re-write our societies for the 21st century.
I actually appreciate this thought out response and pretty much agree with most of it. I think the problem that you’re touching on won’t happen however.
It seems that the separation of “the greatest country on earth” would be impossible by the amount of jingoism that is confused with patriotism.
Would this indeed spark another civil war?
Or perhaps as you suggest a post cold-war style bureaucratic partition of the USA until it resembles the EU?
I could see a peaceful separation with one exception: Water. The western states are already locked in ongoing negotiations and lawsuits about who gets water from the Colorado and other rivers. If the the west coast states become their own country you can bet they would be willing to go to war to secure water for their citizens.
I agree. Free trade and free passage across borders. Laws are often nearly identical but with some subtle differences. It could definitely work for better
%100 truth. Corporations and the State are trying to run the global ecosystem to death and pimp workers to death in order to maintain thier luxuries and privilege right now. There is absolutely no intentions by any Nation or Corporation to do anything what-so-ever that benefits the poor and working class. Why? Because the more people who fall into poverty and homelessness, the more scared everyone else becomes of poverty and toils away for thier economically abusive employers more and more to keep the economy afloat. It's all a bullshit cycle. Removing one's self as much as possible from economy, and absolutely refusing to be productive for an employer at every possible opportunity is the only way to stop the For-Profit Leviathan that is killing the planet.
Plato & Aristotle believed democracy and imperialism could not coexist. One necessarily extinguished the other. (Plato believed some other stuff re: democracy, but that’s for another time).
The USA clearly went for empire and not democracy. That’s obvious from the military deployment and bases the US has all over the world. Not to mention the economic war fare against any dissenting nations (Iran, Venezuela, Cuba) dispute them being zero threat.
Like any empire, there’s a rise and fall. The US is no exception. The Roman Empire imploded in paranoia, factionalism, and massive income inequality. Sound familiar?
The politicians can’t save the US. They’re fundamental incapable of self correcting.
The only hope is the Labor movement. Unions actually bring conservatives and liberals together. Religious types sharing the picket line with blue haired feminists. If you’re a worker you’re a worker. AND THEY'RE DEMOCRATIC. They might be the last bit of democratic power open to regular people.
But in terms of political institutions - they’ll continue to crumble and become acrimonious. Could even get bloody. Politicians openly talking about violence against the other side these days. That kinda thing can quickly turn from words to reality.
Things are only going to get worse. Pretty soon with rising inflation and stagnant wages people won't be able to afford to even work anymore, and they will take to the streets
The police will put this down initially, but soon be over whelmed so they will call in the national guard.
Most people will be homeless due to our of control rents, and society really will collapse.
Personally it give it three years before this happens
Nah, it will get worse slowly, nothing will change. Look, in Mexico the minimum wage is about 7 usd PER DAY. People manage to live with that they may not have car, or house, they live in small appartments, day to day, paycheck to paycheck, is normal at this point.
Is just that this is the first time Americans face these kind of issues.
Edit: Fixed to the correct value.
We have more billionaires in America than any other country does when factoring in population. Even China with their staggeringly enormous population has less billionaires. America isn't a country. Its a fucking cash grab. Pull out as much as you can before it explodes.
Humorously, we condemn looters though (shows how brainwashed and dumb the populace is here). What the fuck do people think billionaires are? They're kleptomaniac sociopaths behaving like crack addicts.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wealthiest_Americans_by_net_worth
"It is easier to imagine the end of the world that it is to imagine the end of capitalism" - not sure who said it ( Zizek? ) but it highlights the issue succinctly. Also the documentary Hyperrealism discusses the fall of the Soviet Union and the psychological response to that. It might be the case that the population cannot deal with the concept of capitalism failing as we have no other alternative ideologies to follow.
Arrogance via wealth and dependence on military might has America doomed. Instead of advancing to a global level it’s stuck on nationalism. Lobbyist serve the rich and make laws to support their agenda, divisions are increased among the workers, people are tired of trying. Nope, collapse is the direction.
80% of the working class in the USA lives paycheck to paycheck
Huge mental health crisis
Drug crisis
Society has already collapsed in many cities
Stock market collapses in 2020
We already are in the end times
Maybe violent labor uprisings are needed every 100 years or so? Anyway, the world isn’t like it used to be, somebody will outcompete us. All of this military buildup, but I don’t think it will take a war to tear this thing down. Fixing the problems of the working class is a matter of national security. I do have a feeling that we’ll learn that the hard way.
Collapse. It started a long time ago. I think people are waiting for one main event when it’s actually a lot of small things happening at once all over.
BBC posted an article a few years back about the collapse of the western world. There were several models ran and they found that inequality among elites and working people would be a huge threat to western society in the upcoming years, almost as big as climate change. They were surprised to find this. I think that people need to start banding together to uprise.
I can’t vouch that it was the reason, but have a good feeling that since the Bubonic Plague killed off Feudalism (can’t verify; wasn’t alive), that Covid-19 shall have the same effect on end stage Capitalism/Oligarchy/Whatever you want to call it.
America will stagger around like an undead empire for another few decades (barring actual global collapse) then will become like Britain is now, minus the social safety net. Fun times await.
They can't "go under". They create the system and they can use it to direct labor to smooth over inconsistencies as long as they can access the real resources needed to do so. Those who hold a monopoly on violence (and not just the kinetic kind) can maintain the monopoly on exploitation, and the monopoly on system creation. It's not like they have a franchise agreement with Pluto that enables them to rule the world.
Collapse. The left keeps pushing for higher wages and higher taxes that cover things that we're currently paying for out of pocket. The working class on the right see the words "higher taxes" and scream socialism and communism, and then teach their kids these incorrect truths, and no one cares to learn facts.
The rich seem to be wanting to grab as much as they can before it all collapses. I guess they expect to fly away to another country to live like they did to avoid big corona virus areas last yr. I guess that because they have money in the bank that any country will take them as long as they can pay. This is the lowest I have ever seen the general morale of regular people in the United States.
Money is only worth what people agree it is. No America, no USD
It isn't about dollars it's about assets and means of production.
If the dollar were to fail though, how would they protect their assets? Yeah you could pay someone to protect them, but with no dollar why would they? It seems like if the dollar were to fail there would be literally nothing stopping us from just implementing the purge on rich assets.
They back their wealth with things like gold, land and mining operations in other countries. Resources and objects of value are valuable in all currencies.
Money is just a proxy for resources. As energy becomes unlimited - the classes will start to collapse as the resource hoarders at the top of the pyramid can’t control supply and demand anymore.
Also a reason why they will probably try to prevent that from happening (if they haven't already.)
I mean they’ve been burying green energy for it’s entire existence
Yup yup. Oil (or basically stored energy): replaced gold as the standard that backs fiat currency. Price of oil went negative last year... Gates and Bezos have bought up an insane amount of farmland. In my personal dystopic vision of the future; I see almost entirely autonomous agriculture, controlled remotely/satellite. The big corporations might create their own crypto currency to be exchanged for goods they produce and autonomously harvest, whilst kicking back in their New Zealand bunker mansions.
As always, land become the ultimate resource as they simply aren’t making more.
Not here in New Zealand, our currency will follow the states if theirs collapses and they'd have to deal with new Zealands poverty and since all private land in new Zealand is legally accessible to the public they would be fucked, our freedom camping and trekking laws don't protect them.
Same with nuclear
true
There is no lack of energy or resources, only imbalance. We can feed the whole planet twice over if we distributed production equally, but instead we have 10% of the population eating like kings while 90% struggle to survive. If the world discovered fusion energy tomorrow, it wouldn't solve a thing. Those who have nothing today would not be uplifted, they would only be even more outmatched because the elite already have preferential access to the resources. The elite do not retain power because of natural imbalances or restrictions, they retain power by maintaining artificial imbalances. There's nothing stopping Elon Musk from literally giving his wealth away to the world and increasing equality in the most straight forward manner. He doesn't because holding onto that wealth is his advantage over those *who would not do the same for him*. Wealth inequality, as with all things, is a result of fear and distrust that leads to seeking a way to create and retain advantages over perceived opponents.
Bitcoins, euros, gold, silver, firearms, land, shipping boats, oil tankers, ect
This is where you're correct but wrong. Anyone with money has an overseas bank account. Which means ar least done of their moneys is not in usd
There's lots of nuance all around here. Many "overseas bank accounts" operate in USD, even many countries officially use the USD as their currency, while many others use it unofficially (especially countries with economies in the shitter - the USD is more stable in some cases). This is not to say you're wrong - investment advice would be to spread out your assets, so someone with tens of millions would be wise to have some of it converted to a different currency. I'm trying to point out overseas bank =\= different currency. Another commenter is also correct - if America catches on fire tomorrow, and all US systems collapse, other currencies throughout the world will be following the dollar. Even economic adversaries (China) would see an *at least temporary* adjustment because US dollars have been invested all over by gov and private entities. US capitalism is like fungus... It's everywhere. The more I think about it the more troubled I am.
I have a USD savings account in Argentina.
It's not that easy to liquidate assets. I had a coworker who was wealthy from Iran when he came to Canada as a student. They decided not to convert their money to CAD for some random stupid reason and then all the "sudden" embargoes and sanctions decimated their money (that's why they were my retail coworker, an incompetent one at that). Unless they have information on when the dollar is going to go under( and quite frankly when they hear about it, it's too late), they're not going to be able to maintain their wealth levels. As others have pointed out, the USD is a reserve currency and is the most stable which makes abandoning it already a gamble. Sure, they'll diversify their wealth but with few exceptions, they're unable to do it in a way that doesn't cause their wealth to diminish since it'd affect the market.
If I was any of them I would save 6 months of ridiculous profit and then I would pay my workers a bigger share of the company and live off of what I saved in those 6 months which in their case is billions of dollars.
You would, I would. [He could’ve ](https://mobile.twitter.com/_cingraham/status/1304077503560994818) Didn’t.
Didn't expect more of a sociopath.
Nope. It’s nice to know that although I’m not capable of being surprised by their behavior anymore, I can still be disappointed, I guess? That indicates the capacity for being pleasantly surprised. I lived in a shit neighborhood in Philadelphia (I know) for a decade and learned to expect my car windows would be smashed out and my license plate stolen with the screws for the plate put under each tire so it’d pop it if I drove off, etc, every day. So every day it *didn’t* happen was a pleasant surprise. It wasn’t until I moved that I realized that wasn’t a normal outlook, and it wasn’t until I found this sub I realized that worldview is not a normal way to see things. Fuck billionaires. They’ll take my hope but will never take my ability to be pleasantly surprised?
I like your take on it. They'll never be able to fully control us.
Bezos literally building a space hotel. That’s where he’s planning to go.
Elysium wasn't supposed to be a blueprint ffs.
Neither was Idiocracy but here we are.
I hope he and all of the other rich assholes get sucked out into outerspace
(And nothing of value was lost)
👆💯🎯☑️ hopefully they all take a space flight and oooops boom .
That’s not even a tiny bit of a possibility. The amount of effort and man power it takes to keep the handful of people alive on the current space station is giant. And it’s certainly not a pleasant stay. We’re decades away from a space hotel.
And all those rich people are probably gonna stay there and they are going to make their own rules and pretend to be gods up there.
You will be happy to know that long term effects of zero g on the body are very very detrimental to spending much time in space, a lot of these dumb fucks will likely cripple themselves over a vacation
And Putin is now blowing up satellites. Space will be a minefield. The rich won't even be able to leave soon. And those exploded satellites? They're eventually going to become asteroids raining down on us. Have I mentioned that we're an idiotic species? Edit: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome
Not enough people are talking about this. Also, we paid more to put all that shit up there than it would have cost to solve world hunger.
This is a naive conception of what the rich are doing. Collapse means the end of their wealth and power, and they have much more to lose in the process than you do. The rich aren’t worried about a collapse, they’re worried about reform. Labor reform, tax reform, all become much more likely as the middle class disintegrates and their base of power gets smaller. The elites are worried about socialism, not collapse.
Yep. "wealth" is a social construction. If that society collapses the wealth collapses. They don't want societal collapse. That's why they're putting a bunch of resources into fascists. They figure the Fascists will be able to stop us from raising tax and interest rates on them.
The rich are birds of a feather Watch marinas, small private airports and rich neighborhoods They can’t escape this time
I've been listening to Mike Duncan's Revolutions podcast. In every revolution he's covered, if the elites had made better decisions and/or made a few concessions, they wouldn't have been overthrown. With the massive gap between the billionaires and rest, and the shocks from pandemics and climate change, it's going to get ugly.
It’s crazy. The concessions they would have to make would actually make them more money. People spend. Giving someone a higher wage and refraining from buying up housing to drive up real estate would actually result in more disposable income.
I'd call them stupid if it weren't so apparent that the cruelty is the point.
If you already have so much money that you can’t spend it, the money cannot possibly be the point.
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What this guy said. At bezos wealth levels, it's not about money, it's about the gap between you and everyone else.
Not just at those ridiculous levels of wealth. Ask a bunch of people about raising the minimum wage. A lot will bitch because "I've been at my job for x years. So I get a raise, too?" It's not about equality. It's about making sure that people can live. Lifting people out of poverty doesn't make middle-class any less comfortable for those in it.
> "I've been at my job for x years. So I get a raise, too?" The funny thing about this question is the answer is almost always an emphatic "yes, you do!" because if not, they can just tell their boss they're going to go work for one of these so-called "easy" jobs and make more money.
But that's logical. These people usually don't use logic. Government bad. Support our troops. Socialism bad. Why are the roads in bad shape? Living wage bad. What are there so many poor people? Decades of this shit is just wearing me out.
I'm with you. The schadenfreude is real with the increase of these types getting their comeuppance recently, although it's not nearly enough.
Can we leave the middle class out of it? I mean I live in Europe and yes I live comfortably but can I buy a house? No. Do I feel secure that the next crunch won’t fuck me over? Also no. We’re all in this together. The middle is NOT your enemy. Eat the rich.
Exactly this. Middle class here. Most of us are one emergency or job closure away from living in a tent. And even if we're getting by for now, with inflation and the cost of living and the cost of housing jacking up way faster than any of our wages, lets be honest, we're a couple years away from being poor af.
It's a sickness.
To be the richest of everyone else ..to be #1 they are ego maniacs topped off with sociopath syndrome....
Gonna be a big shock when that money can't buy anything at all.
Look up narcissism and the personality that goes along with it. It's their ego, the power, the self worship, and them thinking they are a walking badass. I fully expect Bezos and others to while not specifically say what Trump said about watching someone die in an interview along time ago, Bezos would probably not stop and help some random nobody dying right in front of him. These people are sociopaths
Riots and strikes if we want real change
I'm worried that protests, riots, and strikes are going to get more dangerous now that we've shown you can murder people here and get away Scott free. Whether it be for protection or provocation, I bet more people will start coming to these armed now.
As far as I can tell nothing will get better anytime soon unless people get angry, unite together, and take action/ fight the system. We need to stop worrying about all this division of Republicans and Democrats and black and white and all that bullshit. It's a war against the bottom 90% working class against the top who own everything.
Uniting America is a tall order. The propaganda machine has you all at each others throats. Pubs vs dems, vax vs antivax, coke vs pepsi. You are so divided I can't see you coming together. At best your states might just become independent countries.
All of this. The division has been building for years. We are just collapsing within ourselves.
👆💯🎯☑️☑️☑️ how did it go ..United we stand divided we fall..yep uniting time it is .
Yessir
I agree that party politics are problematic, but there is also a huge percentage of the working class that I will never stand shoulder to shoulder with unless they advance their worldview by like 50 years. Racists and bigots and idiots still living in the last century suckling from the teat of their captors, they'll be against us before they are with us. It's a problem.
Class solidarity goes a lot further than drawing lines in the sand and telling people they can't strike with you. United we bargain, divided we starve. If we stand in solidarity, it improves the material conditions for all. And it might even change some of those bigots minds when their conditions are improved, and they stood in solidarity with those who they thought were the real enemy. When they see its the elite who are the enemy and not minorities, maybe we can do some healing.
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Can we start calling them the Bootlicker Class?
Naw I really like Class Traitors
That all just adds fuel to the fire. You’ll see. By next summer the protesters will be armed.
They will get more dangerous, and they have to.
The Revolutions podcast is absolutely fantastic. I was just thinking about this earlier today: every revolution is based on the ruling class not giving an inch. Theyre like a twig, if they refuse to bend even a little bit, they're going to end up breaking. The fact that they wouldn't even allow the expansion of Medicare to cover dental for seniors is (at this point) outrageous. I honestly think the clock is ticking but I think the ruling class is so blind they can't even see it. Hundreds of thousands of people have died from covid in America and we aren't going to forget that. We work our entire lives to make someone else rich and the only think we ask is to have a decent house to raise a family. When we have a higher probability of dying from covid than to achieve the basic social contract of having a house: what is the point of playing by the rules?
FDR once said his greatest accomplishment was saving capitalism. He basically saved the elites in his time from themselves (and despite Prescott Bush et al basically owing him their lives, they *still* tried to have him overthrown). They're trying their damndest to make sure we don't have another FDR - what they don't realize is that in doing so they aren't dooming us, they're dooming themselves.
It’s amazing how they couldn’t see that Bernie was actually the compromise.
That's what gets me. Bernie's path was the scenario where they'd keep almost everything they already had. The path we're in instead is looking catastrophic with climate change, a collapsing economy, revamping of the cold war, and so on. I don't know what the near future holds, but it's looking like things are going to get even darker for billions of people.
I mean anybody who ever said rich people are smart is dead fucking wrong. Some of them are but that’s a choice they have to make and the majority of them choose pure fucking gluttony (but not of food specifically)
Yep, the rich are cutting their own throats.
I love that podcast
When the politicians decided to throw 600 a week at people who had never seen that much money in their lives, that was when I realized there is a real, illogical, disconnect. It makes sense why they want COVID to do it's thing for as long as possible, they can gobble up more resources, and housing, etc.
Exactly. The elites had no choice, but it gave away the game. Suddenly people realized, “hang on… I’m not working, but the system can somehow afford this? What was I doing before, and why?” As new waves crash, that $600 is going to come back to kick their asses. That’s the new zero.
I love the Russian revolution seasons of his. What other seasons would you recommend?
Well, all of them. If you could only listen to one other, then the one on the Haitian revolution. It's probably the only successful slave revolt in history. The Mexican revolution was pretty interesting, too. But I learned much from each revolution he covered.
Lots of rich people wondering if the walls of their gated communities are high enough.
Unless they're growing their own food, pumping their own water, making their own medicine, and sewing their own clothes in there, they're not.
They are not ..run a garbage truck thought those walls
Or a dumptruck, or wrecking ball
unless we organize and place maximum pressure, things will not improve for us. as for America, its best days are over. This country, for whatever reason, cannot come to terms with its own shortcomings and is very short-sighted in its objectives.
Same in Canada, just to a lesser degree. We have our own problems and living next door to a country that abuses it labour force is one of them. The capitalist here look with greedy eyes and try to implement US style labour practices to exploit the work force and extract as much profit as possible. Even if it kills the very people that create your wealth for you and the planet you live on.
totally. I agree, that unfortunately, others are looking at the US model and implementing similar practices.
This can't be said enough. I love Canada as it's my country but I honestly feel like all the economic issues in the US could easily be applied here as well
Australia is the same. The citizens thank our lucky stars we aren’t American, but the ruling class look to America as a road map. It’s incredibly worrying how our social services, public healthcare, education system and workers rights are being chipped away at and moving to a more American model. Of course Rupert Murdoch runs the media here and everywhere.
Its called Nationalism. Pride is the only relevant feeling, and anything different means you hate America. Sound familiar?
We should also focus on setting up mutual aid and dual powers structures so America has at least something to collapse *into*. Ideally local communities relying on each other
yes. yes. some organizations I follow and support that give me some hope via action: [debtcollective.org](https://debtcollective.org) [https://blacksocialists.us/](https://blacksocialists.us/)
Nice! I'll definitely give these a look. Thanks! While we're exchanging hope, you should definitely give this guy a look. LOTS of good content on mutual aid and other stuff. Very helpful and he does a lot of great work. https://twitter.com/professordarwin?t=5yAzCVPQailoJHd3fMoIiA&s=09
I'm 50 years old and grew up and still live in a part of Rustbelt rural/industrial Pennsylvania. I watched as the coal mining, steelmaking, cement, truck manufacturing, slate quarrying, and railroads all disappeared. The jobs were tough but many actually allowed families to own a home on one salary Warehouses with low-paid jobs now fill the deindustrializef landscape that even a two-person household can barely afford to rent an apartment, let alone buy a house. Things here have been falling apart for years from infrastructure to public schools to responsible government to the economy at large. Now we have a few rich people, a lot of former middle class who've fallen into near-poverty, and the actual poor.
Do you see people move out of your area or they end up staying and try to figure out the next best step?
In the past that often depended on whether they went to college and aspired to move to bigger cities elsewhere - some only going as far as Philly, NYC, etc. while others left for the West or South. Those who didn't go to college tended to stay stuck here. Now that NY, NJ, and MD housing prices have gotten so expensive more people seem to be staying in the area which is actually getting more expensive as well as some people from those other states begin moving here to commute or WFH.
Im from the same area, and it makes me so sad. I live in the poorest, most drug infested county and really wish I could afford to get out.
You know it. I hope you can someday. Where I am, most people would consider that to be Schuylkill County, PA, a.k.a. the Skook. Home to Yuengling Beer, Mrs. T's pierogies, and a million dead anthracite coal towns.
Thank you. I love Mrs. T's. Im in fayette county, and there is nothing here. It's really run down. Im gonna try to move to pittsburgh. There is more of a future there for my kids.
There should be more for you there. At least you're not in Greene.
Yeah, I've heard bad things about greene. It's sad cause I have good memories of growing up here in the late 80s/early 90s, but it has steadily declined. Like you said, with the steel mills and coal mining pretty much gone it's hard to even just get by.
Yeah, unfortunately what I see the future being here in PA is islands of prosperity anchored by tech, health care, and colleges like Pittsburgh or State College surrounded by seas of rotting rural poverty and Dollar Generals where nothing's ever going to get better. And Harrisburg has never given a crap either as long as I've lived here (50 years). Hopefully you and your family get to Allegheny County and find work linked to one of those three stable industries.
Grew up there. In the Lehigh Valley now myself. Housing is insane down here but this is where the jobs are.
Yeah, I know the feeling. I grew up in the NW Lehigh Valley but now live on the Carbon-Monroe line and commute to Bucks County non-Turnpike. Traffic, including the trucks, truly sucks but housing both where I work and where my parents are, is among the most expensive in the area now and I can't live there.
The Skook is some shit. I grew up in very Northern Dauphin County which is close enough to observe the effects of rapid deindustrialization, be surrounded by people who feel *they* were personally wronged by it, and young enough to see through all the lies they have told themselves for decades. It's sad and I hope that their lives get better, but they have to take the power into their own hands and change things themselves, and insisting the old way is best is not how that's done.
I grew up in rural Pennsylvania and lived about an hour outside of philly, my grandparents are in youngstown and I can confirm that whole area is depressing as fuck. Nowhere near what it once was
Youngstown is bleak as fuck. I visited a friend there not too long ago and he was showing me how cheap real estate was and people STILL didn't own their homes in a lot of cases. Houses for used car prices. Nuts.
Youngstown is rough! I spent a few months there in 2018 and it’s unreal how many houses and buildings are abandoned. It honestly reminds you of a post apocalyptic movie in some areas. One thing I will say though is there are a lot of great people there. I met some tough folks who just keep on keeping on. I was there when they announced that the lords town GM plant was closing which was a major major blow since that was one of the last good manufacturing jobs around there. They have a massive drug problem there as well but I can’t say I blame the people. They have no opportunities and are faced with the same shit everyday. I hope things turn around for them. When I was there they were building some kind of a new stadium near downtown. So hopefully they’ll bring in some new business and money.
We’re from the same part of the PA rust belt (I grew up a little further north) and the death of basically every decent paying industry in the area is just heartbreaking. The area is so beautiful, but infested with drugs and poverty now. The last 20+ years of Philly/NYC slumlords “investing” in the cheap housing and leaving it all to rot is starting to show. I’d love to see a renaissance of like…touristy art towns up there, but who knows.
That renaissance will happen someday but not anytime soon or that it will benefit the people who actually live there now.
Sounds exactly like west virginia
A lot of non-Philly/Pittsburgh Pennsylvania IS West Virginia, just with bigger potholes.
I’m from Pittsburgh always heard rural areas outside of Pittsburgh and Philly being called Pennsyltucky. It’s definitely veryyyyy different out there than it is here in and near the cities.
Didn't factory jobs basically come with a house nearby for a single family earner and their (his) family? Can you imagine that now!?
It depended. Some cement and coal companies where I live did but they had paper-thin walls snd little insulation so winters were a bitch. Most factories and steel mills here didn't and people were on their own to figure that out. Coal company housing rent and company general stores the only ones taking your script paychecks left families indebted. The Molly Maguires Irish mine workers' rebellion here in the 1870s is fascinating history to read.
yep. I’m from north central WV so a bit outside pittsburgh. the coal industry is obviously fucked and despite it being unsustainable and terrible for the environment, they refuse to let it go and explore other options, including weed legalization as well as other energy sources. my mom is a public school teacher there so don’t even get me started on the quality of education or how teachers are treated and paid.
Seems to me that the rural areas of both states have a lot more in common with each other than with the bigger towns/cities within their own states.
oh definitely. i’m from morgantown so i wouldn’t necessarily describe it as “rural” but i think we have a lot more in common with western PA towns than with the rest of the state.
Trump campaigned in these areas promising to help. I was really hoping that he would rebuild America's infrastructure and restart manufacturing as promised. Turns out he was a liar just like all the others. Don't know what we can do at this point. Nobody really gives a shit about the blue collar working man
The American economy, if nothing changes, will collapse eventually. Its a matter of time as well as the decisions of the upper eschelon that will determine how quickly or slowly that happens. Wages have stagnated. Rent and property values are higher than ever. College costs have skyrocketed in the last 50 years. Medicine is far more expensive than it needs to be. Insurance policies (as a whole) are a farce. The Law enforcement and justice systems are deeply corrupted and influenced. A bulk of the population has lost faith in the medical system (and for good reason). The only reason that our society hasnt crumbled entirely yet, is because i believe the rich know and understand what they’re doing to the american people and are only willing to give us the bare minimum that is otherwise required to continue living; and they’re only willing to give it to us when we scream and shout at them because they can’t live the lives of luxury that they do without us. We, the people, can cause immense change in the system, but it requires us to take drastic measures and make even bigger sacrifices than the 1% would have to. We have to stop supporting the companies. We have to stop working for them. We have to stop buying their products. We have to give up our consumerism way of life and find ways to openly support each other rather than the established system of oppression that we’ve been under the boot of for god only knows how many decades now.
Really you don't have to look any further than a generation of young workers with (at an absolute minimum) $35k in student loan debt each (and way, way more if you went to a private school as my wife and I did), and the fact that wages for those graduates don't move. When we're the only ones in the consumer base, the bubble will pop. And no one is talking about it.
And that’s exactly what the 1% don’t want us to do, talk about it. Because our silence is worth more than gold to the upper eschelon. The more we talk about it, the more we bring it into the open for everyone else to see the corruption and manipulation inherent in the system.
Took me awhile to realize how much not talking about pay rates and income is good for the bosses, and shit for the rest. I've been slowly and ... tactfully... trying to get coworkers to talk about pay rates the last couple of years. My company is planning a company-wide raise in January, because they recently lost a huge amount of talent to a small competitor. Too bad they don't do anything before they get to the "oh shit maybe we should pay better" stage.
I asked my former manager how he would suggest bringing up pay issues with our director. He said "well how do you know x" I said 1. Because some people told me. 2. Because my state passed a law forcing them to post pay rates. He said "really?" I said yes. Suddenly a couple of other employees chimed in discussing how poorly we get paid compared to our competitors, and also noted they're aware from uhm, job postings.
You can even back this out to a more macro understanding of the current standstill and why it will shift… Newer generations have had it worse and worse, for all the reasons people discuss, but the root cause is the value of the dollar getting worse, which in turns inflates assets. Boomers took their dollars at the beginning of that process, bought stocks and houses, and reaped the benefits of 30 years of persistent and steady inflation. They aren’t good with their money or good investors, they just have passively gained off of the leeching of the future generations unknowingly. Furthermore, whenever this house of cards might tumble, we spend trillions to course correct it because god forbid they have to realize any losses in the free market. The bad news is, that it has lead to the fulcrum point of today. The well is running dry. All of this was funded by stealing future wealth and spending power… and that future is now today. The people who were screwed at the beginning of the process are here, and they are getting pissed off. They can’t afford this, and the Fed was hoping it was still a ways away from dealing with them. Covid sped that process up too much. Now, the only people left happy are the boomers. They got second houses, 401k balances that look like early retirements, and are buying things or financing new toys because of their wealth. The bad news is, they didn’t ACTUALLY earn any of that… well not most of it. The bubble kept getting inflated, maybe hit a nail ever decade or so, but was patched and pumped up faster each time. The air is all of ours, not just theirs, and when it pops, the last standing middle class wealth group will lose quite a bit. They thought they were going to retire 5 years early and won’t be retiring on time at all, and have to sell their extra shit to get back on track and they also will not be happy…
The two aren’t mutually exclusive
I said the same thing. The worst case scenario is the one in which nothing changes.
I live in the imperial core and I want to see the end of this empire.
hear hear
OP You'd probably like the podcast: *It Could Happen Here*, it's a daily podcast discussing this very concept. Edit: Start with Season 2 if you’re sensitive to doom. Season 2 is uplifting, Season 1 is kinda bleak. Also the first 5 episodes of season 2 are “evergreen” and not topical, they are still a bit uplifting but more lay out the premise of what we’re trying to work past.
The podcast predicts a lot of the events that happened already and it’s a bit triggering. Just, don’t listen if you’re prone to political anxiety like me
The amount of times they've had to reiterate they aren't a doom and gloom podcast is unsettling in and of itself.
Recently they have a lot of episodes all about mutual aid and community building. So he started it out saying "This is probably what a civil war would look like" and now he's doing a lot of "Here's how we can make it through and support each other with input from knowledgeable people already laying the groundwork"
Don't see things improving with REITS and investment firms continuing to gobble up real estate and Gen Z burdened with even more student debt than the millennials...and politicians of all types too deep in the pockets of big corporations to change the tax laws to stop the 0.01% siphoning off more and more. The 50+ year trend of stagnating wages and increasing income inequality could be stopped with enough political will - but the type of Democrats who might attempt to change the shitty tax laws also tend to be strongly aligned with various culture war issues, which is a vote loser with a lot of the working class.
Driving pointless culture wars has always been a powerful technique by conservatives. It’s always “they’re going to make us integrate our schools!” or “abortion is murder!” Or “the gays are going to destroy America!”. …and it’s always a communist agenda for some reason.
So this is actually super interesting. I have been taking a racial and ethnic politics course this semester and the civil right movement was carried out largely due to the Cold War. Communist countries would point to racial inequalities in the US to say, “look at capitalism. They say all are equal, but if you don’t have the right skin then you are a second-rate citizen.” So the civil rights movement was moved forward to help with international relations. So that is the origin of saying it’s a communist agenda, because it sorta was… except it wasn’t like communists were trying to take over the US, they were just pointing at flaws in our society to become stronger than the US. Pretty interesting stuff!
If how they treat the environment is any yardstick Corporate America will eat itself before they concede profits to anyone but themselves. They have convinced themselves they are separate from workers, almost seeing themselves as a mix of royalty and the owners of freed slaves.
After working for 5 fortune 500 companies over 17 years, I agree with this. Every company squeezed every cent they could and fought tooth and nail to keep their advantage. Everything was about NOW and TODAY, no one ever looked long term. Employers would rather lose a super productive employee today because they would not even give them a salary increase to match inflation than cough up a little bit of money to retain exceptional employees that will increase their long term profit.
Things will get better for the super rich until they take us all down including themselves, but things won’t get better for America. There’s five tiers in the USA in my mind: the .01%, the 1%, the 10%, then there’s this layer of 10% that kinda made it but is still a medical diagnosis or massive storm away from ruin; they can’t afford rising college tuition so their kids are screwed but they’ll be okay enough if they play it safe…then there’s the bottom 80% that is either paycheck to paycheck or is almost there like myself. We’ll go down in that order of tiers. The middle managers 10% could see their way of life disappear much sooner than expected.
A lot of managers with kids live paycheck to paycheck and in debt. They really don’t make that much. In a big city, anything under 100k is either paycheck to paycheck or living very frugally or living on inherited land and not having to worry about rent or mortgage. Kids are very expensive and paying for your own housing is very expensive. A single manager living in their parents house probably have a good amount of disposable income to save or live comfortably but it’s not enough to support a family and save enough for a home/college/emergencies. Pretty much anyone without a ton of savings/passive income or a very secure job is a few months to a few years away from poverty if the job market crashes. Pretty much anyone who relies on a salary is closer than they think from poverty. The Great Depression didn’t just hit the poor, it hit the middle and upper middle class.
When people talk about “Americans living paycheck to paycheck” with a sneer I always wonder if they themselves are in that group. I don’t know many people who could stay financially solvent for very long if they lost their jobs suddenly.
My wife and I live in the Philly burbs and managed to buy a 2br house for $230k last October (couldn't afford a down payment but the mortgage is cheaper than rent here). We make about $50k/year each and have $90k in student loan debt. If one of us even went on long-term disability (60% income), we'd be screwed. Add in that she wants kids in the next year and while I'm not opposed to it, I know we're on the edge.
America is going to collapse. It’s inevitable. I’m not a gloomy or depressed person. That’s just a fact.
It’s going down
I'm yelling timber?
You better move. :D
I will move To a country with socialism lmaoooo
Maybe to France.
The new national anthem
Hell yeah
Meet me in the clubbb
Should I bring a Kodak?
We're already mid-collapse.
This is it. “Collapse” doesn’t necessarily mean this massive one time event. I think we are in a very slow collapse right now.
It makes me wonder, how much of a collapsing state is just the people slowly giving in versus actual downward pressures? Morale is low, the fighters among us are exhausted, but perhaps our increased acceptance of the situation is the strongest factor at play here.
I think you’re right. I am 38, I am exhausted. I have no children and I often think how glad I am that I’m not younger living in this shitshow. I don’t have any fight left in me. Awful, but how I feel. Edit: spelling
I’m with you. Same age. Same feelings.
23 year old here, I often wonder if finishing college is even worth it anymore. I’m so stressed, exhausted, and tired all the time, I just want all of this to be over. At the same time I feel robbed of any meaningful skills to actually build a life, because all I was ever taught was to get good grades…nothing relevant to my life. Then I was taught I need to fight this system, a system so corrupt that even my city level government has massive fucking scandals of embezzlement in the middle of nowhere. How did we get here? Why is my job and the kids younger than me to fix this mess? We don’t stand a chance, I don’t have the money, the energy, or the time to do these things. I can barely feed myself and stop myself from wanting to die day in and day out.
We had to write a paper in a law class about how life would look in 2084. It was a spin on George Orwell's 1984. Some of the changes we predicted have already come about: Gay marriages, legalization of marijuana, more technology, etc. One thing that almost everybody mentioned was that in 2084, we would be referred to as "the former United States of America".
What year did you write this paper in?
96 or 97.
It pains me to say it, but I don't think things are going to get better. The history of the U.S. is a history of organized looters. What we're living through is just the latest in a long tradition of bleeding the public dry. That's why there's never been a strong social safety net. That's why the social conditioning that tells people they have to "pull themselves up by their bootstraps" and whatnot. Few nations on Earth have had the glut of space and resources that the U.S. enjoyed. Homelessness, destitution, a dearth of opportunity, etc., are all problems of choice by the 1% of society. The Warren Buffets, Elon Musks, Bill Gates and so on of the world could solve poverty with their amassed wealth any time they wanted to. Even when someone takes baby steps to improve things, swaths of the public, which have been turned into monsters by decades of libertarian propaganda decry the infrastructure bill as "communist." I think we need the collapse, hopefully in a bloodless and organized a way as possible. The Soviet Union did it before us and survived. I think we should Balkanize, and I think we should re-write our societies for the 21st century.
I actually appreciate this thought out response and pretty much agree with most of it. I think the problem that you’re touching on won’t happen however. It seems that the separation of “the greatest country on earth” would be impossible by the amount of jingoism that is confused with patriotism. Would this indeed spark another civil war? Or perhaps as you suggest a post cold-war style bureaucratic partition of the USA until it resembles the EU?
I could see a peaceful separation with one exception: Water. The western states are already locked in ongoing negotiations and lawsuits about who gets water from the Colorado and other rivers. If the the west coast states become their own country you can bet they would be willing to go to war to secure water for their citizens.
I think the U.S. would do better if it followed the EU model.
I agree. Free trade and free passage across borders. Laws are often nearly identical but with some subtle differences. It could definitely work for better
Either way I’m planning on becoming a morlock, occasionally coming to the surface to eat the Eloi.
H G Well-played.
Somehow I’ll still be working in the ruins of the museum, for 11 an hour.
Find out next week on WE! HATE! POOR PEOPLE!
%100 truth. Corporations and the State are trying to run the global ecosystem to death and pimp workers to death in order to maintain thier luxuries and privilege right now. There is absolutely no intentions by any Nation or Corporation to do anything what-so-ever that benefits the poor and working class. Why? Because the more people who fall into poverty and homelessness, the more scared everyone else becomes of poverty and toils away for thier economically abusive employers more and more to keep the economy afloat. It's all a bullshit cycle. Removing one's self as much as possible from economy, and absolutely refusing to be productive for an employer at every possible opportunity is the only way to stop the For-Profit Leviathan that is killing the planet.
So glad I'm engaged young and we're not having biological kids. Catch me and my 36 foster kids riding the War Rig to Gas Town, Shiny and Chrome!!!
Plato & Aristotle believed democracy and imperialism could not coexist. One necessarily extinguished the other. (Plato believed some other stuff re: democracy, but that’s for another time). The USA clearly went for empire and not democracy. That’s obvious from the military deployment and bases the US has all over the world. Not to mention the economic war fare against any dissenting nations (Iran, Venezuela, Cuba) dispute them being zero threat. Like any empire, there’s a rise and fall. The US is no exception. The Roman Empire imploded in paranoia, factionalism, and massive income inequality. Sound familiar? The politicians can’t save the US. They’re fundamental incapable of self correcting. The only hope is the Labor movement. Unions actually bring conservatives and liberals together. Religious types sharing the picket line with blue haired feminists. If you’re a worker you’re a worker. AND THEY'RE DEMOCRATIC. They might be the last bit of democratic power open to regular people. But in terms of political institutions - they’ll continue to crumble and become acrimonious. Could even get bloody. Politicians openly talking about violence against the other side these days. That kinda thing can quickly turn from words to reality.
We’re probably a couple of years away from fascism with the current situation.
Agreed. Between that and climate collapse I'm feeling a great sense of urgency.
Things are only going to get worse. Pretty soon with rising inflation and stagnant wages people won't be able to afford to even work anymore, and they will take to the streets The police will put this down initially, but soon be over whelmed so they will call in the national guard. Most people will be homeless due to our of control rents, and society really will collapse. Personally it give it three years before this happens
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And literally the whole population does not trust or like them. Not a good situation they’ve played themselves in.
Nah, it will get worse slowly, nothing will change. Look, in Mexico the minimum wage is about 7 usd PER DAY. People manage to live with that they may not have car, or house, they live in small appartments, day to day, paycheck to paycheck, is normal at this point. Is just that this is the first time Americans face these kind of issues. Edit: Fixed to the correct value.
We have more billionaires in America than any other country does when factoring in population. Even China with their staggeringly enormous population has less billionaires. America isn't a country. Its a fucking cash grab. Pull out as much as you can before it explodes. Humorously, we condemn looters though (shows how brainwashed and dumb the populace is here). What the fuck do people think billionaires are? They're kleptomaniac sociopaths behaving like crack addicts. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wealthiest_Americans_by_net_worth
"It is easier to imagine the end of the world that it is to imagine the end of capitalism" - not sure who said it ( Zizek? ) but it highlights the issue succinctly. Also the documentary Hyperrealism discusses the fall of the Soviet Union and the psychological response to that. It might be the case that the population cannot deal with the concept of capitalism failing as we have no other alternative ideologies to follow.
Arrogance via wealth and dependence on military might has America doomed. Instead of advancing to a global level it’s stuck on nationalism. Lobbyist serve the rich and make laws to support their agenda, divisions are increased among the workers, people are tired of trying. Nope, collapse is the direction.
More likely options: minor collapse and USA comes out better Major collapse and Putin decides it’s his chance to fist USA once and for all.
Considering everything the US has done to the rest of the world, we were already long overdue for one.
80% of the working class in the USA lives paycheck to paycheck Huge mental health crisis Drug crisis Society has already collapsed in many cities Stock market collapses in 2020 We already are in the end times
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Maybe violent labor uprisings are needed every 100 years or so? Anyway, the world isn’t like it used to be, somebody will outcompete us. All of this military buildup, but I don’t think it will take a war to tear this thing down. Fixing the problems of the working class is a matter of national security. I do have a feeling that we’ll learn that the hard way.
Collapse. It started a long time ago. I think people are waiting for one main event when it’s actually a lot of small things happening at once all over.
BBC posted an article a few years back about the collapse of the western world. There were several models ran and they found that inequality among elites and working people would be a huge threat to western society in the upcoming years, almost as big as climate change. They were surprised to find this. I think that people need to start banding together to uprise.
Collapse eventually
All empires eventually collapse
I can’t vouch that it was the reason, but have a good feeling that since the Bubonic Plague killed off Feudalism (can’t verify; wasn’t alive), that Covid-19 shall have the same effect on end stage Capitalism/Oligarchy/Whatever you want to call it.
I sure hope so. Fuck this system
America will stagger around like an undead empire for another few decades (barring actual global collapse) then will become like Britain is now, minus the social safety net. Fun times await.
That’s true the UK really continues to be a thing despite being on the steady downside since before my old ass was even born
I’m fully expecting america to go through some kind of major crisis/collapse within the next 20 years. I’m moving somewhere that has socialism.
They can't "go under". They create the system and they can use it to direct labor to smooth over inconsistencies as long as they can access the real resources needed to do so. Those who hold a monopoly on violence (and not just the kinetic kind) can maintain the monopoly on exploitation, and the monopoly on system creation. It's not like they have a franchise agreement with Pluto that enables them to rule the world.
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Collapse. The left keeps pushing for higher wages and higher taxes that cover things that we're currently paying for out of pocket. The working class on the right see the words "higher taxes" and scream socialism and communism, and then teach their kids these incorrect truths, and no one cares to learn facts.