2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Fifties were a better time. We need to return to a better Democratic Party. [View all]Corporate666
(587 posts)People had a lot less because everything cost a lot more.
Today, the average person has a laptop, iPad, smart phone, high speed internet, Netflix. In the 50's, entertainment meant the whole family gathered around the radio to listen because they couldn't afford a TV and more than one radio would be a luxury. Going to the movies was a special occasion.
In the 50's, a family would have one car if they were doing pretty well, and people would carpool because it was expensive buying gas to drive to work. Today, we drive everywhere without even thinking about it.
In the 50's, you took the family on vacation by driving the family car a couple of states away to some national park or monument. You drove because it was what you could afford. Today, people fly on vacation to the furthest parts of the USA and the world, and they take cruises to the Caribbean. Such trips would be lavishly expensive in the 50's and only the very wealthy could have afforded them.
In the 50's, you worked until you were 65, and you died before you were 70. You hopefully had enough to live on in retirement, but to achieve that you had to save all your working life and not spend much. Today, people expect to live until 80 or longer, and to have 15-20 years to enjoy retirement. That would be an unthinkable luxury in the 50's.
There is so, so, so much more that is better about life today than the 1950's.
I think if each of us had a button we could press that would teleport us back to the 50's... we would come back in about a day or two and never go back. It is human nature to romanticize the past and to believe it was all happiness and care free living. The reality is totally different. People who pine for the past aren't thinking very well.