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[-] peaceful_world_view@lemmy.world 39 points 1 day ago

and every time the rich get richer, funny that.

[-] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 108 points 2 days ago

It starts to make sense when you realize that each of those events is basically a fire sale for billionaire investors.

Just look at income inequality before/after each of those events.

[-] ameancow@lemmy.world 46 points 2 days ago

This is the truth.

The economic crisis's have all been real, they all really have been huge events that have restructured life for everyone, it's just that they're not accidental, they're not unforseen consequences of policy decisions nobody could have imagined... they're engineered, or foreseen with great clarity.

And every time, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and the so-called middle-class shrinks even more. Prices go up, we all have to work a few more hours in the week, we get less in return, our future dreams dwindle, and we plug into social media and AI slop and drugs and alcohol to placate us while we say "I just gotta save up enough so I can..."

And those savings NEVER increase. There is always some event, some family crisis, some medical problem or a car breaks down or your parent dies or the company you work at gets bought out and your 6 years of experience only makes you a liability for the new management team who wants to make a culture of "young, energetic pioneers." (who they can pay less.)

The wealthy are at their happiest and strongest when they exist as they have for centuries, land-owners up high, living off the hard work and struggles of thousands of people beneath them, shaving a bit off everyone's pay, offloading their problems to people who are already struggling. They want to run around in the manor and keep getting wasted and banging winches while we serfs toil in the fields we don't own.

[-] DarkFuture@lemmy.world 10 points 2 days ago

I wish upon a star that we could be a generation that takes power back for the average worker and uses our strength in numbers as leverage to have a better quality of life by making the wealthy pay their fair share.

But it's looking like our historic legacy is going to be that of a fool generation that votes against their own interests and refuses to stand up for themselves.

A very embarrassing time to be an American.

[-] ameancow@lemmy.world 10 points 2 days ago

we could be a generation that takes power back

The bigger problem right now is that unlike revolutions of old, this time there are millions of people who adore and cherish their overlords and would literally fight to the death to protect them for no other reason than ideological.

Even if it all went down tomorrow, even if we all locked arms and marched on Washington and installed a group of compassionate leaders who want to make sure all people are treated fairly and that we all had basic rights... we would still have to share this land with the millions of people who hate us for wanting better outcomes. There would still be hostile, evil forces twisting the minds of the stupid into hating their neighbors.

It's such a larger problem than the wealthy hoarding all the money. We're facing the absolute limit of human capacity to mitigate outside influence, we have every possible entity, commercial or political, trying to make us feel a thing, make us think a thing, make us serve them. We are attacked all day from every side with malicious lies and narratives meant to make us be quiet and hide. Even if it doesn't work on most of us, if it only works on a fraction of a fraction of the people, we still have millions who hate you and want you dead simply because you might think that your tax money should go into making all our lives better equally.

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[-] grrgyle@slrpnk.net 28 points 1 day ago

Crisis seems like the natural operating mode of c*pitalism

[-] tehn00bi@lemmy.world 40 points 2 days ago

I don’t think boomers are very good at running things.

[-] nocklobster@lemmy.world 18 points 2 days ago

They grew up in a for the most part prosperous time, middle class had 2 cars in the driveway, jobs were easier to obtain, it's no wonder alot of them think the way they do.

[-] skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de 17 points 1 day ago

Think about it this way: They were literally the most spoiled highest quality-of-life group of humans to ever exist on Earth in any timeline.

  • Ubiquitous access to healthcare and vaccinations for longer life.
  • Access to pensions and retirement options no longer available where the employer did all the legwork to ensure they had a future post-work so they didn't have to learn a thing about investing or retirement savings.
  • Infrastructure that was borne from the Great Depression, so they had roads, bridges, dams all built up to last their lifetime with no care about maintenance, as they figure, "oh it was always there, it will always be there," so no money was committed to maintenance we are now having to do, freeing that money up to live like kings and queens in the short-term.
  • Easy to access jobs, homes, boats, cars with little to no education or financial acumen. Just that "walk in and hand them a resume" trope they love to perpetuate.
  • The most modern travel technology and geopolitical climate to go on vacation pretty much anywhere on the planet, and access to time to have vacation.
  • Relatively calm planetary climate so they didn't have to worry about things like today's weather weirding with tornadoes where they shouldn't be, hurricanes going inland, hail everywhere, and on and on, all the while driving their 5 MPG giant SUVs all over the country while tossing their food wrappers on the side of the road.
  • Cheap (during the majority of their lives) to relocate anywhere in the US or abroad if they wanted to work or live somewhere else, or be "snowbirds" when they're too wimpy to tolerate the winter in their home states.
  • The same geopolitical climate prevented them having to grow up in war-torn anywhere.
  • Access to any kind of entertainment imaginable any time anywhere.
  • Artificially post-world-war inflated US economy that took some decades to spin down (that "Great Again" they fap to) - which only happened because the US joined so late and had few losses ourselves. The war never happened at home, so we got out for minimal effort/casualties/infrastructure loss.
  • And they got to adult in an age of computer technology that enables them as olds to not have to drive their car, pick up food, or do any errands they don't want to do themselves, all without having to learn any technical skills because the tech was designed for idiots.

No human generation before or after them got to, or likely will ever, experience such a prosperous story-arc. They should consider themselves damn lucky and act like it, while supporting future generations to have a sliver of what their spoiled asses were able to enjoy.

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[-] Rivalarrival@lemmy.today 7 points 1 day ago

Boomers grew up in a world with a 91% top-tier income tax rate that drove businesses to spend their excess income on products and services, which became their parents' paychecks.

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[-] N0body@lemmy.dbzer0.com 228 points 2 days ago

And the wealthy manage to come out on top every single time.

[-] BestBouclettes@jlai.lu 114 points 2 days ago

When you're the ones manufacturing the crisis, it's easier to prepare and profit from it

[-] SaharaMaleikuhm@feddit.org 15 points 2 days ago

When they should really come out 6 feet under.

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[-] Clinicallydepressedpoochie@lemmy.world 23 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

If it worked to funnel money to the wealthy the first time why not the second? Or third... and so on.

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[-] ScrotusMaximus@lemm.ee 57 points 2 days ago

Don't forget - you were also BORN into a once in a generation economic crisis: The savings and loan crisis of the 1980s and 1990s was the failure of approximately a third of the savings and loan associations in the United States between 1986 and 1995. These thrifts were banks that historically specialized in fixed-rate mortgage lending.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savings_and_loan_crisis

[-] HaiZhung@feddit.org 44 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

It’s the same crisis, in various stages of escalation. The rich are squeezing more and more of the lower and middle class all over the world, and there is almost nothing left to squeeze.

The next few years will bring a massive collapse in government services (the USA is starting) for ordinary people, because that is one of the last things that the rich can still squeeze out.

After that, there will be only the ultra rich and the destitute poor left; and the ultra rich will only be able to take from each other.

This will mean war, and they will send you all into it.

Unless we stop it now. Tax the rich.

[-] Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world 13 points 2 days ago

After that, there will be only the ultra rich and the destitute poor left; and the ultra rich will only be able to take from each other.

It's already starting to happen. Half of consumer spending in the US is done by just the top 10% of earners. For an economy built on consumer spending this means that you get more economic growth by giving those rich people more money to spend, not by lifting up the other 90%.

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[-] LMurch@thelemmy.club 30 points 2 days ago

I don't mean to be that guy, but look which US political party was in charge for each of those dates...

[-] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 58 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

2002 - Bush II, Republican

2008 - Bush II, Republican

2020 - Trump, Republican

2025 - Trump, Republican

Cheat sheet.

[-] OmegaLemmy@discuss.online 19 points 2 days ago

Trump approves, "The economy does better under Democrats than the Republicans"

Donald Trump, 2004, on the CNN Show 'The Apprentice'

[-] EFrances@lemmy.eco.br 18 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

what did you expect? You were born in 1984 ;)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four

edit: added link to book

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[-] chiliedogg@lemmy.world 32 points 2 days ago

This hits too hard. I was born in 83, so even the ages line up.

[-] bitjunkie@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago

82 here and obligatory fuck this timeline

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[-] massive_bereavement@fedia.io 94 points 2 days ago

This message is brought to you by the Storm of the Century and the hotest year in history. Available to you every year.

[-] jballs@sh.itjust.works 11 points 2 days ago

I know there have been people predicting they live in the "end times" for all of humanity. But I can't help but feel like our generation isn't crying wolf like the others.

[-] tacosanonymous@lemm.ee 20 points 2 days ago

I was going to say I live in a "50 year flood plain" and I’ve seen 3 floods in the last 16 years.

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[-] Rusty@lemmy.ca 17 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I don't know who came up with this "once a generation" bullshit, but you can see that economic crises were more often than once a decade in 20th century https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_economic_crises#20th_century

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[-] RizzoTheSmall@lemm.ee 76 points 2 days ago

Don't worry tho, because although everyone's broke as shit, the houses you bought in the 90s when you were a young child are worth like 10 times as much now!

[-] jaybone@lemmy.zip 34 points 2 days ago

I bought houses as a child?

[-] P00ptart@lemmy.world 46 points 2 days ago

What, you didn't use your 1994 influencer money to buy houses?

[-] D_C@lemm.ee 19 points 2 days ago

Pffft, I used money from delivering the morning papers to buy my first house. When I was 11, ELEVEN!!
However it was the delivering of milk that really helped me afford my first yacht! Every morning for months I got at 4am to deliver it. That was a hard 3 and a half months I can tell you!

You guys should just pull yourselves up by the avocados, and stop eating so many bootstraps!!

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[-] surph_ninja@lemmy.world 22 points 2 days ago

Capitalism cannot continue to exist without it begging for socialist bailouts.

Just proves that socialism is superior. It can even float a shit system like capitalism as it continues to fail.

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[-] MeatPilot@lemmy.world 51 points 2 days ago
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[-] DarkFuture@lemmy.world 16 points 2 days ago

I'm tired, boss.

[-] Bloomcole@lemm.ee 44 points 2 days ago

You start noticing this pattern after some decades.
Always accompanied by "we need to temporarily tighten the belt now to keep our properity for the following generations".
The period before is sold as a great economic time, despite that they called it a crisis back then and also 'needed' austerity measures to get back to the prosperity of the previous period.
The western standard of living has been destroyed bit by bit since the post WW2 period with this tactic, not for the multinationals, banks, stock folks OC, that's where the stolen money goes to.
The ones in power telling us in their paid press how great 'the econonomy' is doing bcs stock line go up and BS GDP up.
In reality that means more billions in the pockets of a few oligarchs while income equality is growing.

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[-] LovableSidekick@lemmy.world 9 points 2 days ago

Sounds like it's time to stop believing the way headlines and pundits phrase things.

[-] Derpenheim@lemmy.zip 33 points 2 days ago

2002: We lost the house 2008: got evicted from apartment 2020: dad died from covid 2025: let's see how it goes this time

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[-] Grandwolf319@sh.itjust.works 16 points 2 days ago

Wait, I miss this, did a new recession just drop?

[-] vfsh@lemmy.blahaj.zone 31 points 2 days ago

If it hasn't yet it's about to. 1-5% daily drops across the stock market for the past month pretty much and now with a 10%+ minimum tariff on all imports means everything is going to get way more expensive. I'll chew a brick if we're not in a recession by the end of the year

[-] Grandwolf319@sh.itjust.works 15 points 2 days ago

At that point, is it a recession or should we just call the 2020s: depression part 2 AI boogaloo?

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[-] mmddmm@lemm.ee 19 points 2 days ago

Not officially, no.

But yes, it's already here.

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[-] takeiteasypolicy@lemmy.world 9 points 2 days ago

Well, if US attacks Canada, Greenland, Panama, Greenland and Iran, then we will see once in 10 generation stuff !

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this post was submitted on 03 Apr 2025
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