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The Change In Cost Of Living Since 1938
The drip-drip-drip of Fed-induced inflation is hardly felt by most Americans even on an annual basis; but take a step back over a generation of currency debasement and it becomes clear. As the following image shows, the cost of living since 1938 has, simply put, exploded. With incomes up just 30x in those 76 years, the cost of a home has risen 70x, the cost of bacon has risen 100x, and the biggest of all, the cost of a Harvard education has risen 142x. Insidious... "the road to poverty is paved with small inflations."
h/t @History_Pics
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Mises Economic blog provides some more color on where America is heading... The Road To Poverty Is Paved With Small Inflations...
The value of Venezuela’s currency plummeted to record lows on the black market last week, with 100 ‘strong’ bolivars exchanging for $1 (ten times lower than the official rate), and annual price inflation reaching 63%. Chavez’s successor Nicolas Maduro, continuing to denounce the “capitalist economic war” on his socialist regime, now blames airlines for trying to collect ticket revenues the government isn’t able to pay. Meanwhile, the Venezuelan economy is showing symptoms of a rapidly forming crack-up boom: shortage of basic amenities, power outages, depletion of dollar reserves by 30%, and looming debt default. As people scramble to exchange paper money for anything and everything that can still be found on store shelves, “over there”—say their Columbian neighbors just across the border—“there’s no food.”
The ‘final and total catastrophe of the currency system’—as Mises called the terminus point of any sustained inflation—was in fact brewing in Venezuela long before Maduro’s regime, and the country experienced even higher price inflation in late 1990s. But because people held the belief that prices might fall at some point in the future, and continued to increase or maintain their cash balances, the earlier stages of the inflationary process were drawn out over many years. However, two Caracas entrepreneurs have warned that it is now too late for the government to salvage anything: “people clearly haven’t had confidence in [the bolivar] for decades; and even less now… It doesn’t look like the market has much confidence in the government’s ability to get things under control”.
While Maduro’s regime is leading its people to poverty in a quick, conspicuous manner, other governments are more willing to wait and conceal their intentions. Moderate price inflation has been simmering for decades in Western economies, where central banks make it their official mission to keep prices increasing at an annual rate of 2%—which means doubling them over the course of 30 years. Beneath this goal of ‘price stability’, central banks’ balance sheets quadrupled by 2012 and brought about a global financial crisis. However, this produced no rampant commodity price inflation, and no flight into real goods is likely to happen in the foreseeable future.
But does that really mean that we’re a world away from Venezuelan-like problems? As Mises pointed out, not necessarily:
If you talk about a catastrophe of the money, you need not always have in mind a total breakdown of the currency system… [Price] changes are not the same, nor [do they occur] to the same degree in various countries. But one should not exaggerate the difference in the effects brought about by the greater inflations as against the smaller inflations. The effects of the “smaller inflations” are also bad. […] If the government destroys the money, it not only destroys something of extreme importance for the system, the savings people have set aside to invest and to take care of themselves in some emergency; it also destroys the very system itself. Monetary policy is the center of economic policy (Mises 2010, 31-2)
[W]hat we have to realize, what we have to know when we are dealing with money and monetary problems, is always the same… the increase in the quantity of money, the increase of those things which have the power to be used for monetary purposes, must be restricted at every point (Mises 2010, 24)
Great or small, inflation hurts the masses, leading to the destruction of savings, as well as unemployment and overall impoverishment, while concentrating wealth in the hands of elites privileged by their position in the monetary hierarchy. If inflation doesn’t stop, the breakdown of the monetary system—whether fast or slow—will also bring about the destruction of the social division of labor. From this point of view, the difference between inflation ‘over here’ and inflation ‘over there’ is only a matter of how quickly we become poor.
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End the Fed--it is costing you your life.
"It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning." -Henry Ford
End the reserve currency/petro dollar status and the dollar will be trading 1000 to the bolivar.
Well, if you get paid in US Dollars....then you better be praying that the reserve currency/petro dollar lasts as long as you do.
Everyone must remember that if I get paid 100k per year and the average house is 200k - is theoretically equal to being paid 10k a year with the average house at 20k.
This phenomena is not the problem. The problem is howyou went from 10k to 100k. and you went there through a steady system of FED induced counterfeiting....and counterfeiting enriches all the 'first spenders' of that cash (i.e. New York, Big Bankers, Mega Corporations (first borrowers at ultra low rates), government employees, military defence industry) all at the expense of ultimately rising prices on the masses. But those prices haven't risen when the counterfeiter hits the street. It's always delayed.
So...if inflation were bottom up....e.g. occuring because we just mail every American $200 per/month in an envelope, then there would be no systemically negative consequences to inflation. But that doesn't happen. The counterfeiting happens with record numbers of billionaires popping up all over the country....every single damn one of which is a primary recipient of massive amounts of FED cash. (yes...GoPRO IPO is pumped with easy money....so even hardcore "capitalist" can be huge beneficiaries of FED Policy counterfeiting.....which also fuels the margin accounts for every damn trader on the planet.
When you compare your "average" house of 200k to your average salary of 100k, you still get the ratio of 2.
However these days the average salaray is closer to 50k and the average house is closer to 250k, a ratio of 5. The net effect is that we now have to work a lot longer for the house (and other thigs). Wages have failed to keep up, by design.
Alright you goldbugs, here is your chance; convert those numbers using silver coins as the currency, match it to current prices, and report back. 10c for a gallon of gas is 1.21 at current silver prices. If silver was about 3 times its current price, a price we saw not long ago, it would be more or less par.
I suspect many prices, in terms of traditional monetary metals, haven't moved much, its just the fiat currency (denominator) is heading to zero ...
Regards,
Cooter
1938 New House Price= 214 ounces gold.
214 ounces of gold will buy a pretty nice house in most parts of the country today.
1938 New House Price= 40 Dows, for 40 Dows you get an even better house today .... and Wall St wins again!!!
200 and something year inflation chart... very stable until 1913 and then the Fed came and the wars never stoppped...
http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/InflationChart.p...
1938 cost of living multiplied by ___ = today's cost of living
House multiply by 65
Average Income multiply by 17
Average rent multiply by 30
Gee. Why are there so many renters? Why are there so many 2-parents-working households?
When I was a boy my momma would send me down to a corner store with $1 and I’d come back with 5 potatoes, 2 loaves of bread, 3 bottles of milk, a hunk of cheese, a box of tea and 6 eggs.
You can’t do that now… Too many fuckin’ security camerasEither you are older than dirt or you're from another country. What year are you quoting and where?
Facetious, did I hear someone be facetious? NO ONE has a sense of humor any more....
What a clown....
Good citizens of Metropolis! I want to tell you something. I'm pushing fifty, and I don't have a pot to piss in. Sad but true. Somebody please shoot me. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest.
Make museic..life gets better, vibrationally ;-)
The cost of making museic has not changed.
We can all still whistle if we want.
Sing in the bathroom.
Stay positive...
http://aadivaahan.wordpress.com/2014/10/04/some-museic-reprized/
Harvard tuition.. $420.00/year..
..way f’n overpriced.. just look at Larry Summers.
HaHa funny Ass, thought the last thing on the list was gonna be $1 but that woulda spoiled the punch line
Alright ill explain the joke to you: He stole all of that stuff.
Hey AssFire, Thanks for the badly needed weekend humor! I'll grin every time I think of that one!
Yes those were good times. Before familys had a second car Moms would send their boys to do errands. Remember one hot summer day when my friends, Horace Smith and Danny Boy Wesson, fetched a pound of twenties from the bank.
in4mayshun:
Not quite. 1938 gold price was fixed at $31.50/oz. ($35.00 fine gold) Pre-1933 price was $18.00/oz. (assuming .900 fine gold pieces in circulation).
Thus, in 1938 the house would go for 123 ounces, not the pre-1933 gold price. Inflation had already hit the American pocketbook with both barrels.
That would buy a $146,456. house today, which would cut you out of most metropolitan areas.
2centswurth:
Not quite.
Since, in 1938, all gold had been confiscated, and it was illeagle to posess gold coins; the only gold being used were the paper claim checks on gold, held by the tressury. These new claim checks where based on $35 per oz gold. However, as fractional reserve banking would have it, these claim checks were only backed by 40% gold. However, all the while, the gold was still valued at $35 per oz.
1939 changed things a bit further, but we were only talking up to 1939; President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued an executive order to recall all gold and gold certificates in 1938. In 1939m Congress passed the Gold Reserve Act which devalued the dollar. President Roosevelt then proclaimed that the dollar would be reduced in value t 59 percent of what was established by the Gold Standard Act of 1900. This essentially made a dollar worth 0.59 cents, or worth less than its printed value.
Interesting thought experiment with a surprising conclusion... 3600 Morgan dollars to buy a house. Even with $17 / oz. silver you will not be able to purchase one for under $25 unless it's been run over by a train.
So, 3600 x $25 is $90,000 dollars. On this same day, you can't "buy" a St. Gaudens Double Eagle for less than $1,200. Both metals are suspected to be heavily manipulated, which I believe is true. Silver is definitely the red headed step-child. This helps me personally, as I have been tossing between a 50 gram Valcambi gold bar or 100 ASEs. I'm going with the gold - Bitchez.
And that 50k comes with a boatload of taxes and government fees that didn't exist in 1938. Measuring after tax income would push the ratio even higher than 5.
You ever notice how the folks crying the most about taxation have never seen a war they didn't want to throw trillions at?
I keep waiting for them to connect the dots, if not between taxes and war then between war and debt, but they never do.
The people that I know that are crying about taxation are those that are consistently voting the same candidates into office. What is the definition of insanity?
Mises Institute Article: 758 words of brainwashing; with nothing new.
“It's discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit.” - Noël Coward
Let’s try in 411 words
Meléndez: Then do you think that there is a possibility for another libertarian revolution?
Chomsky: I think so. But you know that it took about 50 years of preparation and various attempts so that the revolution was in the minds of the people and when the opportunity arose they only did what was already in their minds.
That is, it is something like the reconstruction of capitalism in Europe after the Second World War. Germany was devastated but its reconstruction did not take long because they knew what they were doing. Germany was objectively in the same situation as Central Africa but its different level of consciousness and understanding about what had to be done made it a great power, like Japan.
It was the same in Spain. The poor peasants, concerning whom various works have been written and they are very moving, knew exactly what to do. We can see it concretely when, right now for example, part of the state capitalist project is to finance the economy. They reinforce the financial institutions in order to undermine other institutions.
So General Motors is dismantling its factories while it receives tax breaks that make it richer than ever. This is the nature of today’s capitalist state. It is the dismantling of these factories that is destroying the labor force of the communities like Detroit, at the same time that other industrial cities are also collapsing.
Meanwhile, Obama’s Secretary of Transportation is in Spain using the money from the federal stimulus package, designed to stimulate the economy of the United States, to sign contracts in Spain for the construction of high velocity trains which the United States needs so badly. However, those factories that are being dismantled could build these trains.
They could rebuild the rail system while giving employment to trained workers and so on. But since there is nothing in it for the banks, they go to Spain to do this. But what about the labor force itself?
That is, if they become conscious of themselves and obtain support, they could simply seize the factories and begin to produce what they need. They may encounter some opposition at first but if they obtain popular support, it could happen. What is needed is consciousness raising and organization, and this is what they lack. But I do not think that this is something remote, it is right under the surface and could be developed. So, yes, there could be another libertarian revolution.
This interview with Noam Chomsky was conducted on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, by Jorell A. Meléndez, graduate student in History.
https://libcom.org/library/interview-noam-chomsky-spanish-revolution-jor...
I agreee. As someone famous said "They're only wolves because we act like sheep...."
Chomsky is an assclown.
That only counts if you consider 'controlled opposition' and 'Gatekeeper' being euphemisms to 'assclown'.
"However these days the average salaray is closer to 50k "
Thats not correct. I can't find the figure for the "Average salary" but the median income per "household" is about 50K. I belive almost all households include atleast two people. The Median salary, "per person" is about $25K is is probably closer to salary of the "avarage american", or about half of the amount you stated.
Absolutely. I'll bet a freeloader on the dole clears $30k, while a low skilled person with the drive to actually try clears $25k ($20 after taxes). It seems foolish for them to even try on paper, but I applaud every single one that has the determination to grind through it the old fashioned way... If it's even possible to work your way up the ranks these days.
It's not just the purchase price of a home that saps your income (and given that you only have a limited number of years to work - your life), it's the confiscatory property taxes that go to fuel the cycle of DemocRAT / union corruption. In RAT run states the property taxes literlly account for any increase in the assest value. Who's property is it? It might have your name on the title but it's the unions and RATs who get a monthly income stream from it. You just get to maintain it for them. It's time for another REVOLUTION!
Wish we could have a Constitutional amendment to outlaw property taxes
Good points but referring to the last Presidential election we were informed that the Federal Government is already mailng out in all probability $2000 to $3000 per month to 47% of the population targeted for vote buying.
What would happen to the Venezuelan economy if CIA, IMF, USAID, World Bank, and all the other tentacles of the Corporate Goon Squad stopped their operations?
At least 50% of Americans live off of federal and state government programs that require those that work and any future mules, some yet to be born, to keep them living comfortably. With all due respect, anyone planning a revolt would need to battle not only the government, at all levels, but would also have to do battle with the free shit army.
the people who benefit most from government borrowing are the banking mafia i.e. the same people who run the counterfeiting fraud known as central banking and the same people who use some of the profit from their various scams to buy the politicians and media.
And this is how the gov won. Nearly 50% on some gov payments plan, with all the big biz, wall st, defense, green energy getting just as much. Wake up everyone is on the take from the gov. We are all addicts.
Until we are willing to starve to death before taking a gov handout...it won't change. We are programmed for path of least resistance. And once you into free Money fiat, there was only ever one way for this to end. We all want free shit, stimulus and services. Every last one of us.
We had a tin can. Navy in 1938. That wasn't true by 1945.
We had an income tax of about 70%, wage and price controls...real labor power and ZERO defaults.
All run with fiat money.
There was inflation then...this is true. "Hence wage and price controls." Yet we understood QULITATIVE differences and not just "quantitative" (easing) as an approach to spending taxpayer dollars.
There was zero unemployment...100% welfare. Wall Street was regulated.
Bwhahahahahaha. "Libertarians are the solution." We already have the libertarians running things you morons.
hey, disabledmind, where are these supposed libertarians who are running things?
do you just not understand what the word libertarian means?
maybe your PTSD is acting up, causing you to lose touch with reality. they have a pill that helps with that nowadays, you know.
yep, since 2004 I have a bumper sticker on my rear bumper that reads "FED UP" and under that how to get your PM's.
world_debt_slave - What is the the best source for purchasing PMs?
Many like the anonymity of the local coin shop. I use APMEX. Any private Mint will guarantee the authenticity of their bullion, but I buy products I can test with the Fisch coin balance system. If we ever need to barter it should prove beneficial to be able to show someone basic authentication of your metals.
Thanks
In Fed related news, Ben Bernanke can't refinance his house...
http://money.cnn.com/2014/10/03/real_estate/bernanke-refinance/index.htm...
Let's hope the fucker gets foreclosed...
A more accurate titles for the article: "The cost of government lying"
We are not quite at -99% but we are getting there fast. I just think cents instead of dollars and feel better.
1938 - $50 to buy a politician's vote, 2014 - $50,000 to buy a politician's vote.
Corruption suffers from price inflation, too.
If gold was $20 per ounce in 1913, at 99% devalue gold should be at $2,000.
You know things are bad when an old-timer says, "When I was your age," and then proceeds to tell you all about how much easier life used to be.
You know things are bad when you tell your employees when you were their age, gas was $2/gallon, cigs $2.10 and you could get a pizza with everything on it for the family for $16 with tip.
And your employees are not that much younger than you.
"You know things are bad when you tell your employees when you were their age, gas was $2/gallon, cigs $2.10 and you could get a pizza with everything on it for the family for $16 with tip.
You know things are bad when you tell your employees when you were their age, gas was $2/gallon, cigs $2.10 and you could get a pizza with everything on it for the family for $16 with tip."
I guess that makes me an old fart. I remember in 1998 paying about $0.89 per gallon of gasoline. In the early 1990's a large pizza with four or five toppings cost about $8. I never smoked so I don't recall the price of cigerettes. I believe in 1997-1998 the cost of a movie ticket was about $7 and the cost of a new car was about $17K. Homes were under $200K and a full 4-year degree cost about $25K (including tuition and board).
we got married in 98. gas was under a dollar. i could afford a new car on a new guys salary. we bought a used house that we were able to maintain. i can barely maintain it now. oh, and I gave 10% to retirement. now i give nothing. i bought an new accord in 2000. i think it was around 15k or 16k. we paid 135k for the house, college was no where near 25k. I was in about 15k a year (state shool, out of state tuition).
regardless, i make 3x what i first made right out of college, but couldn't come close to doing what we were able to do then. salaries have been incredibly destroyed when compared to the cost of living. I feel bad for the people that bought after we did. our friends all got married and bought houses after us... some time in the early 2000's when prices went full-retard. those poor suckers are all stuck with high payments and no ability to get out from it, meanwhile the gov is blowing a huge stagflation bubble. screw the gov. i wonder if i can emigrate anywhere... iceland? seems kinda depressing. lots of sheep and no economy. at least they had morals, and said screw the bankers.
If the road to poverty is paved with small inflations, the road to enslavement wil be built with just about everything you see going on these days.
Some of these prices were still close in the 50s. My mother used to send me
to the store with 25 cents for a loaf of bread. Gas was 18 -22 cents.
Been to 25 cent movies. American made appliances were not cheap but were repairable.
You could liberate oil by drilling down a few hundred feet in certain parts of Pennsylvania. Compare that to now.
By the way, the doctor came to my house when someone was ill.
it cost $36,000 to get your appendix out... that's 6 days in the hospital. 6k a day. One day in the hospital is now the equivalent of 6 months in my house.
And that list has the origins of the problem. shoulda never offered that Haaavard tuition at $420 per year for people who will never produce nothing useful like the other things on that list and go on become the parasites.
The hound dogs done dead boys. To many ticks hanging off it, sucked the lifeblood bone-dry..
Yeah, but the homoerotic greek fraternity love comes for free!
postage stamps a relative bargain compared to the other items, up "only" 15x for first class. just saying.
That's why the post office is bankrupt.
Could you imagine spending 90 cents to $3 per stamp? I'm one of the only people in Amerika who still mails his bills the old fashion way, but I think I would switch to direct payments if it were that high.
Then--> tutition at harvard was less than the average salary. Easy to work your way through school, if you weren't busy doing something else to survive.
Now--> tutition of the average state university is far greater than the average salary.
This speaks volumes with respect to the entrenched interests of the U.S.
When I went to college two decades ago, I was still able to work my way through school and graduate with zero debt. Just for shits and giggles, I looked up the tuition of my alma mater last year, and it now costs over $9000 a semester. And this is a state university, mind you, not a private college. I've already told my kids that I will gladly pay for trade school, but if they want to go to college, they better find a sugar daddy or woman to keep them, because there is no way in hell I am signing my name on the dotted line of any debt that will cost more than my home and cannot be discharged. Fuck that noise.
It won't need to be discharged.... They will forgive ALL OF THE DEBT if you go to work for Uncle Sam...All this outrageous tuition crap is simply a monery laundering operation to get big dollars to the places that spit our whiny PC liberals by the busload.
i have an image of a crosshair on one of those - truely the enemy from within(change and hope, to contol your liberty). yup, pretty damn simple stuff, dot connecting for dummies.
so i calc that at about 5.3% annual inflation.
seems a bit above the 2% FED target rate
Terrorist!
Put him up against the WALL!!!
REPORT him to Homeland Security. Collect an award$$$. Buy a new GM vehicle, then go kill yourself.
Shhhhhh..... they are fighting deflation.
heh, Federal Reserve root of deflation
QE/ZIRP is disinflationary
not denying inflation occurring, just that fedgov responsible for allowing many sectors to operate under crony capitalism
take health care ... $100 for drug across border ... yet $10,000 in US? ... have surgery done in india for 1/3 the cost of in US? ...
That ain't the Federal Reserve
Bell...
good point, here is my story: two new TKAs (total knee arthroscopy)--new knees in USA was quoted $180,000 to me by local docs with a "discount" of $10k if I paid cash. Oh, please. Yes, two new knees, all in.
The operation would be performed by a semi-qualified surgeon on his 12th or 17th knee replacement surgery. I opted out, flew to Chennai, India and had both knees replaced for $14k all in. You can do one at a time (preferred). 1/10th the cost.
My Indian surgeon is worth a Google:
Dr. Vijay Bose, Asian Joint Replacement Institue, Chennai, India. The guy is one of the best orthopods in the world---knees, hips, etc. My knee job was complicated and he pulled it off beautifully. I was his 5700th knee job.
I return home to USA and get accused of "being un-American" by the local Medical Mafioso. Schmucks.
Yes, everyone on ZeroHedge loves to make fun of the "FSA-Free Shit Army." They are just jealous they do not have decent medical. After all, who IS THE REAL BENEFICIARY OF FSA? You got it---overpaid American medical docs, surgeons, the whole vertically integrated EXTRACTION Industry. Nurses making $125k, wtf?
Only in USA where one is guilty of growing old, infirm or getting sick. Other countries consider their citizens assets, not America. Time to saddle up and ride OUTTA DODGE. Before the gates swing shut. Capital controls are coming quicker than most people realize.
Boneheads who promote American medical as the best have flat out never traveled outside of the continental USA.
Based on average income $50k and gas price $3.2, both come out to 4.5%
example: 1731(x)^75=50000
yeah, I used average household income, figuring one salary in 1938 was probably the only income. most women didnt' work. also, gas is up and down. too volatile to use. But the house... that's pretty stable. If you take both the salary and the house, their about 50 times the 1938 values. 1.053^76 = 50.
And, yet, somehow, life is way the hell better now than it was in 1938.
"And, yet, somehow, life is way the hell better now than it was in 1938."
Says you.
I dunno. Do you want 1938 medicine? Polio was still killing kids, for TB you went to a sanitarium and hoped. Heart attack? You're dead. Cancer? Fuggedabowtit. And 9 out of 10 doctors smoked.
Do you want 1938 cars? No airbags or crumple zones. No air conditioning except an open window. No sound system except an AM radio. No independent suspensions, wide tires, rack and pinion steering (i.e. couldn't be driven hard).
Do you want 1938 highways? No interstates, most roads just pounded dirt outside of the cities. NYC to Atlantic City took nearly a day.
Do you want 1938 media? Hardly any TV, no interwebs, and outside of the big cities, one daily paper your only source of news. No satellites, so no live coverage of events in Europe/Asia.
Do you want 1938 phones? $5/minute (in 1938 $$!!!) to call London from NYC? Most of rural America on party lines. No cell phones outside of Dick Tracy.
Do you want 1938 airplanes? No trans-Atlantic or trans-Pacific service. Hugely unaffordable, and far less safe than today.
Do you want 1938 houses? No air conditioning, no central heating in many (just a wood stove in the kitchen). One bathroom, often not in the house.
Do you want 1938 jobs? 8-5 Mon-Fri, plus Saturday morning for many. 2 weeks a year vacation.
Nostalgia's a fine thing, but I'd much rather be living now, with all our problems, than back then.
How about a 1938 community where everyone knows everyone?
How about a 1938 family that eats every meal together?
You only focus on the superficial "gains" of TV, internet, medicine. Yeah, even medicine. Kids died from polio? Have some more. Who do I need to talk to in London and why do i need to get on an air-o-plane? I got my family and friends right here on my homestead every single day... couldn't ask for much more.
Do not feed the troll. Hopefully he knows better than to claim we couldn't have all those technological advances without inflation and debt. The technological advances in life cannot be "undiscovered" and do not depend on the FED and their money printing. Just think how they must have suffered in 1938 without an empire to maintain and no NSA/TSA/EPA etc etc etc etc. The horror! In 1938 we didn't even have a war to fight! What did people do for fun?
Yep and the rich actually paid taxes for our country to go to war. I'm sure all you folks nostalgic about 1938, typing from your computer, won't be getting any of them new fangled cancer treatments if'n you should get the cancer that is. Cause all y'all are men of principle. You realize how much of a drag that puts on society.
Looking at the amount of R&D dollars spent on cancer therapies versus the mortality extensions from those therapies, I'm not sure many people would say it's worth it. Unlike cardiovascular disease and perhaps the blood cancers, many cancers remain stubbornly fatal in about the same timeframe that they were in 1938. Except in 1938, there was less cancer. . .
You have no idea what you are talking about either and the only intervention to treat cancer in '38 was surgical and that was limited only to certain larger-sized tumors that could be physically cut out without the patient dying while under.
In 1938 there were no interwebs to visit Zero Hedge to post comments on, so this argument is moot while using this media.
Home ownership rates weren't even 45% in '38 and you had people living in more denser areas so just by fact you will have a higher chance of getting to know people. Commutes for work were almost unheard of too.
10:1 if you keep you kids on the 'homestead' they will flee at the first chance they get when they are old enough too.
do you ever - ever - provide a fucking citation, baby?
dunno. Do you want 1938 medicine? Polio was still killing kids, for TB you went to a sanitarium and hoped. Heart attack? You're dead. Cancer? Fuggedabowtit. And 9 out of 10 doctors smoked. ( that is when Big tobacco was king was it not? And then continued to lie for decades was it not?} Far as polio/TB and heart medicine advances? Well we got new induced medical problems like diabetes type 2, GMO induced illness, early onset Alzheimers and more kids and adults on meds than ever seen in history. Forget bad sanitaion for illness we can now conveniently look to Agri-conglomorates and Pharma to not only create the disease but the "symptom" money trail remedy.
Do you want 1938 cars? No airbags or crumple zones. No air conditioning except an open window. No sound system except an AM radio. No independent suspensions, wide tires, rack and pinion steering (i.e. couldn't be driven hard). So maybe people were driving safer and not on cell phones. WTF you tout air bags? How about that now nobody needs to parallel park for themselves let alone soon nobody needs to really pay attention when applying makeup or texting. People actually knew how to drive.)
Do you want 1938 highways? No interstates, most roads just pounded dirt outside of the cities. NYC to Atlantic City took nearly a day. First you say (above) 1.e. couldn't be driven hard....now you say that WAS a problem. I say ; Do you know how to drive a car? And I say further what is your rush?
Do you want 1938 media? Hardly any TV, no interwebs, and outside of the big cities, one daily paper your only source of news. No satellites, so no live coverage of events in Europe/Asia. Yeah but guess what? The media was not owned by corporate zero-heads with their own propoganda/censor agenda. At that time public radio and infant TV were supported by the government; not being defunded as fast as possible to massage the info. There was competition amongst broadcasters and great pride focused on journalism. Remember that? Freedom of the press and investigative reporting?
Do you want 1938 phones? $5/minute (in 1938 $$!!!) to call London from NYC? Most of rural America on party lines. No cell phones outside of Dick Tracy. Who gives a fiddle? Commerce was accomplished. Communications worked. Who told you that life depended on "instant messaging?" Instant messaging is an illness all it's own.
Do you want 1938 airplanes? No trans-Atlantic or trans-Pacific service. Hugely unaffordable, and far less safe than today. So what?
Do you want 1938 houses? No air conditioning, no central heating in many (just a wood stove in the kitchen). One bathroom, often not in the house. I am now thinking you live with your Mom and Pop. Do they make your bed too?
Do you want 1938 jobs? 8-5 Mon-Fri, plus Saturday morning for many. 2 weeks a year vacation. What do many people outside the minimum wage category work now? More frigging hours than ever.
Nostalgia's a fine thing, but I'd much rather be living now, with all our problems, than back then. I think your Mom is calling you for dinner....go complain upstairs that you Wi-Fi is slow and she needs to upgrade so your porn downloads faster.
And there were no dishonest politicians in 1938 and the news media was owned ONLY by honest people. No such thing as propaganda back then.
Meanwhile you're sitting at a fucking computer typing this shit. If 1938 was so fucking great and all of modernity is so bad why are you on the Internet??
Let me ask a question ... Do you take meds for cholesterol, diabetes or high blood pressure? Do you have a cell phone? Do you watch TV? If you found out you had cancer would you get treated for it?
If you answer yes to one or more of these questions then you're a hypocrite to act like 1938 was so much better than now.
It's great to idealize a time that you most likely did not live in or if you did you were probably no more than an infant. From what my grandparents told me, life during that time was pretty tough. So unless you're about 90 or so I doubt you have any ability to tell us if living in 1938 was better than it is now.
That isn't to say that some aspects of living back then were probably simpler and maybe even more enjoyable. But to think that things were just awesome back then is just fucking ridiculous.
might be a bit geography dependent. would have been a bitch to be Polish in '38.
Be careful what you speak of. Diabetes per 100,000 Americans is WAY up since 1938. Yes, many therapies have advanced considerably, BUT cancer and diabetes rates per 100,000 were significantly lower then. With the exception of blood cancers, cancer mortality hasn't changed much since 1938. Large improvements in cardiovascular disease therapy has contributed the most to longevity and improved mortality between 1938 and now. Lung cancer incidence is also lower, due to the reduction in # of Americans that smoke. It's not as clear as you portray it, in terms of healthcare then versus now. And dont even get me started on quality of care. . .
1. Utter stupidity and foolish responses. Average life span of a male in the US was 61.9 years in '38 and 64.3 years for a female. Life expetenxcy today is 77.3 years for a man 81.8 for females. There was no concept of retirement because most people simply worked until they either dropped dead or were physicially unable to work anymore. Child morality rate was also 500% higher under age 5.
2. More stupidity. Rate of automobile deaths in '13 in the US was 1.13 per million passenger miles. In '38 it was 11.46.
3. Completely revisionist history and more garbage. Public radio funded and supported by the gov't didn't even exist in the US until '67. There were more newspapers in towns including a morning and evening edition but ownership was highly concentrated and in corporate (private hands).
4. ugh. Yeah we should go back to having logistics based on what was available in '38.
5. Hope you don't want to travel then.
6. He is pointing out basic facts and the average home in the US did not yet have inpoor plumbing including a bathroom or toilet in '38. That didn't occur until well into the 50s. Ditto electricity.
7. Original writer is wrong and the 40-hour work week was only mandated in '37 due to the Fair Labor Standards Act. Outside of the industries that were specifically included in the Fair Labor Standards Act, it was more common to work a 40-hour week including a full shift on Saturdays. There was also no law mandating paid vacation time(still isn't) and 2/weeks a year vacation is also inaccurate. Generally the only time paid off for the majority of American workers was a limited number of very specific holidays including Christmas. Basicallly if you didn't work, you didn't get paid.
Worker's comp wasn't available in every state until '49 either. In most Southern states and some Western states, if you got hurt or crippled on the job that was your and your family's problem.
How about average miles/person, probably evens it out somewhat. Still, that's a really interesting number.
Overall I'd rather be here now than then, um, plus or minus ebola. I tend to think the inflationary figure from then to now is somewhere in the area of 100x, plus or minus 10.
How many cars per person were there in 1938 as compared to today, though? That skews the numbers big time. Hell, even when I was growing up it was very rare to be a two car family. Nowadays it is very rare to not be a two car family. And most families have four and five cars if they have teenagers and young adults at the house.
Those "old" cars from the year 2000 have depreciated so much that even one on an $8 an hour job could afford one in 2014.
Back in the 80s, the "old cars" were from the sixties.
Cars from 2000 can generally get about 200,000 miles out of them. Cars from the 1960s... they had 5-digit odometers for a reason, lol.
I'll get a downvote by some guy who drives a classic and brags about how long they last, nevermind the fact they are the only one on the freeway driving one.
I love 2014 medicine. If you go to the hospital for a minor procedure, you acquire a nosocomial infection such as MRSA that will try its best to kill you. And then you get the bill, and you wish the MRSA had killed you, because your insurance will only cover $8000 of that $18000 bill because you have to pay your outrageous deductible before the insurance kicks in. (And this is after paying $6000 in premiums, mind you.)
We don't have to worry about polio any more, so sorry 1938. Now we have the aforementioned MRSA, MDR tuberculosis, a resurgence of bedbugs, enterovirus D-68, and eeeeeebooooollllllllaaaa.
1938 cars were awesome. They couldn't go that fast so you didn't have to worry about some drunk moron hitting you head-on at 90 miles an hour. You could fix them yourself in your front yard without an engineer degree and a computer science degree. You didn't have to take out a 72 month loan at 10.9% interest to buy one.
1938 highways were nonexistant, because the highways were built for the US Army for WWII. So to get anywhere, you had to take your time. This meant that most people shopped locally, lived at their place of business, and didn't blow a shit-ton of petrol on going to Chinamart five times a week. Sounds pretty good to me.
1938 media...hmm, that's a toss-up. 1938 media was still trying to polish the turd of the Great Depression and was publishing state-sponsored propaganda. 2014 media is trying to polish the turd of the Greater Depression and is publishing state-sponsored propaganda.
1938 phones. How I wish we had those back. Then, the only person listening to your phone calls was the nosy switchboard operator. Now our own fucking gubmint listens to and records your every burp and twitch on the phone. Since phone calls were so expensive, people spent time talking to one another in person or wrote letters. Imagine that. People communicating without a distance between them. I go out to eat these days, and every person in the restaurant except me is glued to the little attention hog in their hands, thumbs texting furiously. The only sounds in the place are the screaming kids whose parents are too busy updating their status on Fuckbook to do actual parenting.
1938 airplanes. If we still had those, Thomas Eric Duncan would have died on the ship crossing and been dumped at sea long before he reached our shores. Do I really need to say more?
1938 houses. Ah, wish I had one of those. Built not from particle board and styrofoam, but bricks and rocks and mortar. Windows that went floor to ceiling so you could properly circulate the air in the summer. Woodstoves so you could cook and heat with one easily obtainable fuel. No crappy pipes that freeze in the winter and flood your basement. Attics that could actually store more than a handkerchief and a duffle bag. The people who built your home, if indeed you didn't build it on your own, took pride in their work and were master craftsmen. Compare this to the construction crews of today, where the foreman needs to speak at least five languages (none of which are English). And even if all the workers can understand the words of the foreman, the work is still half-assed and fucked up.
1938 jobs? If you were lucky enough to have a job, you worked your motherfuckin' ass off. 2014 jobs? If you are lucky enough to have a job, you sit at your desk playing Angry Birds on your iCrap and hope the boss doesn't catch you and make you do some actual work.
Give me back 1938. I'd rather have the knowledge that every person back then had commonly, than know how to program a computer or hook up a home theater system. I'd be able to grow my own food, fix my own shit, build my own shit. I'm learning all that now, but damn, to have grown up learning that and have it be second nature at my age...
Cast iron pipe doesn't freeze either than current PVC piping? Wood stoves are terribly inefficient as a primary heating source and homes were overwhelming using coal and to a lesser degree heating oil in '38. Windows were also horribly inefficient and the glass was a huge heat sink in older houses in the winter. Most houses were 1-story and didn't have attics or basements.
YouBizzaro. Cheers!
Nice post Capt'n.
You have comments on here on that are mind-numblingly stupid at times. Yeah there are some things that aren't made as well today largely because they are made overseas and we have swapped out price for a reduction in quality/durability.
This guy's comments about building materials are nonsense though. Windows from the 30s more efficient than today? Cast iron pipes (or even fired clay pipes) that didn't freeze more easily than current plastic ones today? Wood stoves as an economically efficient energy source to heat an entire house? Imagine he just either doesn't know shit about building a house and/is a fool.
Compare a 2 x 4 from today versus 1938. BAck then, that board was 2 inches by 4 inches, and the grain was tight. Compare the thickness of an interior wall using lathe and plaster (1938)versus drywall. Compare the relative abilities of these 2 modalities in terms of noise dampening and NRG efficiency. Compare a nail in 1938 to its modern equivalent. Compare the craftsmanship of a 1938 double-blind window to its modern equivalent. NRG efficiency has improved dramatically on the window thru time, but we paid more for the 1910 single-pane imperfections in the glass that we have in our current (old) home. We place storms over the old windows for efficiency. On heating efficiency (AC wasn't around in 1938), while modern standards are much higher, homes are much larger, so it would be interesting to see whether the total NRG to heat an average sized home in the winter is higher or lower today versus 1938. Cast iron pipes will burst in the winter, but so will PVC and even PEX. The benefit of cast iron or copper rests in lack of audible noise when liquids pass through versus PVC. I'd raise the issue of plastinators that get into the human body from a number of sources, including (perhaps) PVC/PEX. I doubt these are a positive for health, and MAY contribute to the age-adjusted increase in all-cause cancer diagnoses we see in this country. Since you appreciate negatively judging others knowledge based on their posts, let me the first to suggest you need to go though the process of adding onto an old home. Your insight into this topic might improve your post quality.
I just spent a month ago a good two weekends knocking down lathe and plaster walls in an old row house I own in Reading, PA (grandparents home built in '22). What a debacle and there are much simpler, quicker, and cheaper ways to insulate for sound/noise reduction than putting up incredibly thich walls of plaster. Ditto improving NRG efficiency.
Nails probably due have lower standards but it depends on what you are comparing and in '38 they mostly would have been iron nails vs steel today. Stick with the cheaper steel ones.
Not sure what you point about the windows is except that you apparently like the artisanal value of them. Certainly aren't more efficient.
NRG isn't even a comparison to an old oil burner or the comon source -coal burner in a standard home. Not to mention all you to deal with all of the ash and soot from coal. I'll take a natural gas or electric unit any day of the week and forced central air than a radiator or baseboard forced heat system especially if the later fails/bursts.
Iron/copper (my preference) are quieter but is that really that big of a concern to you? As for freezing, cast iron pipes suck. The issue with new PVC/PEX pipes failing in temperature conditions they shouldn't have is because the manufacturing was done in China and they purposably either didn't do QC properly or put out a shit product to skimp on costs. Why I will go out of my way to pay extra for a nunber of things to avoid a number of things in China. Just become harder and harder especially over the past 10 years. Internet has helped but you often hit language and shipping barriers/difficulties.
About the only thing I would agree with you on is that the quality of wood is almost inevitably better in old homes because they used better source material (try building with oak or other similiar woods today) and as long as it was taken care and not exposed to water it holds up quite well.
well it is 2014 and i don't have air conditioning in my home.
no tv
no great sound system (did have one in the past tho)
never use my air conditioning in my car....
don't really care about the radio in the car
....
um 1938 phones would be kind of cool....
like old classic cars so a 1938 would rule !
Boil it down and make it nice and simple - would you on average trade 15 years of your life for that tradeoff?
until the point when it very suddenly becomes very not better
We have a generation of young adults that have no real world skills, unless of course you count being able to use a cell phone.
Gasoline was 10 cents a gallon. Well a Silver dime right now is listed at $1.20 in value. Where in hell can I buy a gallon of gas for $1.20?? Either Gas is to high or Silver is to low. Me thinks Silver is to low!
What part of your gas price in 1938 was gov't taxes (including the premium extracted by OPEC and others)?
Today the average income is 50k and average home price is roughly 250k.
Then the average income was 1700 and average house was 3900.
So has income not grown or are houses way overpriced? Or both?
Apples and Oranges?
The ratios are still the same. However, the taxes are much, much higher.
". . . ratios the same . . ." Say what?
50/250 = .20
17/39 = .43
So then the average hous was 2.3 years of the average salary.
Now the average house is 5 years of the average salary.
I can tell you that tuition at Harvad is much much more than 50k.
Not even close and you have no idea what you are talking about:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/rankings-2014/affordable-...
Good to see facts still get voted down on ZH time and time again.
ZH has become infested with moronic sheeple who have taken the blue pill but are certain in their feeble minds it was red. They are only capable of thinking in the broadest stereotypes and certainly not outside any box that they have been herded into.
Pretty much. This article is pure click-bait and without comparisons to today although other benchmarks it is essentially meaninglesss. Yes inflation generally is a bad thing but withouth any context it is almost meaningless.
Infowars is the same way.
It's nice having NoScript because I can't see their stupid comments anymore on their click bait articles.
Chanting nine eleven is an inside job over and over again and blaming globalists and eugenics for all of the world's problems gets a bit silly.
They act like they are the "awake ones" because they chant slogans and repeat buzzwords they heard from a talk show.
InfoWars was always a pure crap site not even worth the time. Alex Jones couldn't get people to his site until '08 and would always post ridiculous hyperbole after ridiculous hyperbole without a single retraction or admittance he was wrong because that would never suit his model. Also tell all kinds of doom porn to his readership too through the product promotions. The most the mainstream media ever got to such garbage was Beck rolled out his 'Doom Bunker' in '09 which made Fox News a laughinstock and was quickly halted.
There is a lot of crap on here and most of the op-ed posters suck but there are some decent financial articles from time-to-time and other select topics that have good commentary. Just have to stay away from the Clickbait ones and I couldn't help myself with this one.
Misleading way to look at it and a much better method would be per sq foot. Average 1-story bungalow in the 30s had a square footage of 600-800 sq feet total. Average US house built last year was 2,679 sq feet. That is 330-450% smaller.
You also have to look at housing ownership rates too. Home ownership rate was only under 44% in '38 and over 65% last year. There seems to be this BS perception that home ownership has been a constant in American history but it simply isn't true and was always below 50% until the 1950s.
You don't "own" it until it is paid off, and even then it can be stolen from you by the state for not paying exorbitant taxes.
I wish they built smaller well constructed homes that were affordable the way they used to; wood and brick, copper pipes, decent size yard.
Today we have fiberboard shacks with PVC plumbing crammed together complete with a bullshit H.O.A. - or the plaster palaces and Mc Mansions on 1/4 acre.
Who the hell uses plaster to build houses anymore and I not sure exactly what HOA and zoning laws have to really do with it.
Stucco? Mud? Flaky crumbly crap slathered over particle board?
Flimsy drywall from China with toxic adjuvants?
A home, not a 30 year hotel stay.
Apples, oranges, pears, and kiwis. Yeah they are all fruit but what is your point about building materials?
*sigh*
I guess poster MeBatzarro would tell you the modern home is worth a multiple because it's SOOO much better.
When ass wipe is no longer for sale a society has a problem.
Who is this ass wipe? And why is he for sale?
Inflation benefits only one class of people. Take a guess which/what class that is.
Back in 1938 home cost of $3,900 divided by median income of $1,731 = 2.25 (a home was 2.25 times yearly income)
Current median of income of $30,932 divided into median home price of $188,900 = 6.10 (home now is 6.10 times yearly income).
This forces people into mortgages and debt, and enriches banks.
It has inflated housing prices, and made people debt slaves.
That is the plan.
Great post!
Thanks. Something I forgot to add:
Inflating home prices increases the taxes paid to the state.
You're paying a tax that is 6.10 times your income, versus 2.25 times your income.
That's why the FED and the rest of .gov are in bed with the banksters on this one.
debt is the banking mafia's version of heroin
Yes it is however,
You cannot deny the need for shelter.
You have to acknowledge that all creatures have this instinct to protect their young and as such "to nest".
Women display this characteristic by exhibiting a desire/need for security to raise their young. Hence housing is seen not as an "investment" but as a requirement for security and propogation of the species.
Price of 4 walls and security have no price that is applicable except to men dedicated to making money as opposed to making life.
Debt is the banker's way to "redistribute wealth".
Long time ago was told "don't play harder; just play smarter".
Much as I dislike focusing my mind on fiscal matters....I have a 2 X annual income mortgage presently. I also have it hedged with gold. My Plan? well just guess. And if that gets f**ked for too much longer? Well just pay it off.
2 years annual income maybe translates (now and then) into a 10 year locked in mortgage that is less than rent for me.......gotta crunch the numbers.
But would rather flip the bastards off with as few oz. of gold as I can manage.
End the 30year mortgage! Then see what happens to home prices.
Or end the mortgage interest tax deduction. Talk about an policy induced mis-allocation of capital.
Houses would continue to soar...we have the 40 year now...
End the Real Estate Agent cartel laws while we're at it.
I could care less about what things cost in '38 versus what is the current PPP today of the dollar and/if there have been profound improvements in quality, efficiency, durability, etc.
Any economist who solely focuses on price or measures of price to evaluate something are fools yet this is what you get at even PhD programs today in economics. I had to go through this crap including through health econ where price is a horrible and almost useless criterion to evaluate quality of care.
I'm have to call a T/O (time out)... no so fast - "Folks".
1. We are merely seeing a subset of price changes on what is based on fiat currency, not based on hard-money.
2. We are not seeing the flip-side of the effects of Elastic Currency: Wages, now and then.
These numbers are only meaningful if we have both (a) prices + wages, and (b) their indexing to hard money (gold!). Show me both prices and wages when priced in gold -- then an now.
Otherwise we're wasting time.
Elastic currency, is that like a rubber check?
I'm beginning to doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion.
Measuring is only worth doing if you have a known value to measure agianst. Fiat is like a busted scale that always rips you off twice. When you buy and again when you sell. An energy backed coin measured in btu should actually function very well over many generations. No matter what value energy has.
We have seen a 100 years of this, just think what a 100 years of that would bring?
Imagine the benefit if you were a person who could live forever. Buy a house in 1938 for $3000, and sell it in 2014 for $300,000. Imagine too if you could never go to jail, didn't pay taxes and couldn't be drafted. Imagine the power too if you could make unlimited campaign contributions.
Imagine if you were a corporation...
.
Brilliant!
Excellent point even though the article suggests a 1938 $3000 house = 2014 $300,000 house. Difference is the illusion of inflation and debasement of currency.... but yeah, big corporations suck.
But what chaps my ass is the traffice fines, penalities, and other civil assessments from the government never seem to have a problem keeping up with inflation, $500 speeding tickets, etc...
And conversely, we peons get slammed the other way when .GOV hasn't raised the $10,000 limit for "suspicious" cash transactions, ever, and it should be about $25,00 today. Soon everybody will get "suspicious transaction report" for a trip to Wal-Mart.
So, a galon of milk in '38 was twice as much as a movie ticket? Hollywood got the jump on us!