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In reply to the discussion: The Man Who Predicted Nazi Germany [View all]erronis
(14,955 posts)25. "Why American and Britain are Self-Destructing" - great piece via Eudiamonics
How The Death Spiral of a Rich Society Begins With Austerity, and Ends With Poverty, Despair, and Collapse
https://eand.co/why-american-and-britain-are-self-destructing-a8693ebb097
Theres a simple fact thats not noticed or remarked on nearly enough. The worlds two large English speaking societies, America and Britain, are collapsing. And they are collapsing in eerily similar ways, for eerily similar reasons, too. Yet in these societies, this basic point doesnt seem to be understood much, if at all. And yet its not really a matter for debate. Its a simple empirical fact.
There are only two societies in the rich world where life is getting shorter, poorer, meaner, and more hopeless fast. Where life expectancies, incomes, and savings are all falling. America and Britain. Where middle classes have imploded, people live hand to mouth, and upward mobility has all but vanished. Where the idea of living a better life is somewhere between a joke and a distant memory. Where entire generations of young people at last count, three, Gen X, Millennials, and Get Z live worse lives than their parents and grandparents. Just two such societies where trust, happiness, and purpose have all imploded catastrophically while depression, rage, anxiety, and suicide are all surging.
In fact, there are just a handful of societies with those grim statistics anywhere in the world Venezeula, perhaps, Russia, North Korea, war torn African shells. Failed states, in other words. That is what America and Britain are becoming.
In a failed state, progress has become regress. Thats what happened to these societies. They are self-destructing. America, of course, is further down that road. But Britain is catching up fast. So how did they get here?
America and Britain have entered a vicious cycle, a death spiral. Its a novel and bizarre phenomenon for a modern, rich society, unseen since Weimar Germany. It goes like this. In the 1980s, America began decades of underinvestment in public goods and social systems. It privatized whatever there was to privatize. The idea was that whatever it was healthcare, education, finance the private sector could do it better. The Reagan Revolution was in full effect as a backlash to the advances civil rights made in the 1960s and 1970s, the good white American using choice as a shield to protect themselves from ever having to invest in or mingle with those dirty, filthy subhumans. All that was called neoliberalism. Let markets sort it all out! Translation: let the strong survive, and the weak perish.
There are only two societies in the rich world where life is getting shorter, poorer, meaner, and more hopeless fast. Where life expectancies, incomes, and savings are all falling. America and Britain. Where middle classes have imploded, people live hand to mouth, and upward mobility has all but vanished. Where the idea of living a better life is somewhere between a joke and a distant memory. Where entire generations of young people at last count, three, Gen X, Millennials, and Get Z live worse lives than their parents and grandparents. Just two such societies where trust, happiness, and purpose have all imploded catastrophically while depression, rage, anxiety, and suicide are all surging.
In fact, there are just a handful of societies with those grim statistics anywhere in the world Venezeula, perhaps, Russia, North Korea, war torn African shells. Failed states, in other words. That is what America and Britain are becoming.
In a failed state, progress has become regress. Thats what happened to these societies. They are self-destructing. America, of course, is further down that road. But Britain is catching up fast. So how did they get here?
America and Britain have entered a vicious cycle, a death spiral. Its a novel and bizarre phenomenon for a modern, rich society, unseen since Weimar Germany. It goes like this. In the 1980s, America began decades of underinvestment in public goods and social systems. It privatized whatever there was to privatize. The idea was that whatever it was healthcare, education, finance the private sector could do it better. The Reagan Revolution was in full effect as a backlash to the advances civil rights made in the 1960s and 1970s, the good white American using choice as a shield to protect themselves from ever having to invest in or mingle with those dirty, filthy subhumans. All that was called neoliberalism. Let markets sort it all out! Translation: let the strong survive, and the weak perish.
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Seriously? The people have known about this theft and have never, ever had recourse to get it back.
ancianita
Dec 2019
#7
One would think c-h would be supported by our military, but they don't see us as their paymasters.
ancianita
Dec 2019
#14
The cracks/openings are small -- ignored, denied and delayed by controllers of the hegemony.
ancianita
Dec 2019
#20
Could you link it? Thanks.Also, shell company layers are as many as shells in the sea. Shells should
ancianita
Dec 2019
#23
I wonder how they were revealed. They probably work through Brit.Virgin Islands
ancianita
Dec 2019
#28
I added more stuff above about Tom Clancy that you might not have read. Bad edit, I know.
ancianita
Dec 2019
#30
Nice chart. So many ways to subvert information flows. Sometimes the smallest org is the most
erronis
Dec 2019
#27
It's not going to be that pleasant inside those armed gated communities. Maybe buy a decade or
erronis
Dec 2019
#12
Filthy rich. Yes, I remember people using that term. Nowadays, I call them billionaire
PatrickforO
Dec 2019
#13