Weak boomers create hard times

So the proposal that we raise wages on tasks that have become simpler, or that we lower costs on something that has become more in demand is not really feasible. We could absorb higher education into the public school system entirely- but creates a world where the minimum requirement to be a productive worker with a living wage is a skilled trade or a 4+ year degree.

What’s more it doesn’t eliminate the divide in status the way people seem to think it will. It merely moves the bar higher- in a world full of free public 4 year degrees and where essentially no person has any compelling reason to not have a 4 year degree- private institutions and advanced degrees beyond 4 year degrees, and more specialized or functional post grad programs will exist to offer a way to further differentiate the “elite” and create social and economic barriers.

It’s a snake chasing its own tail and somewhat nonsensical. The root issue isn’t the cost of school or the minimum wage. The issue that we have to remember we are trying to solve is a matter of making sure people have the necessities of survival and the basic foundations to have a life.

The next step beyond that is ensuring that people who want it and are willing to sacrifice for it have opportunity. The next step is ensuring that anyone with an aptitude and drive to give back be giving the ability to participate in society and reach for the full extent of their talents and gifts.

Not every asshole needs to go to college. Not every asshole who needs to go to college to reach their life goals should get a hand in doing so. But those people who would go to college as a way to give back to society and advance society, and who would then use that gift to pay forward the deed- yeah. Those people should get a ride. I dislike the current popular sentiment that we modify the while system to a “one size fits all” model- “free.” Or that ignore practical reality for idealism. Keep idealism alive so that someday we can meet the bar. Until then let’s be practical and work towards that ideal. So for starters- let’s create a system where merit based aid exists to help people achieve in demand skills, with costs offset and subsidized through an agreement to provide those skills in service to the society that made them possible.

But at the same time- costs of televisions, computers, and many other technologies have gone down ENORMOUS amounts. The smart phone is a device that at least 70% of people posses whereas in 1980, homes that even had a computer were in the single digits and now- almost 90% do.

It’s an odd thing to try to compare past to present. In 1980 affording a loaf of bread wasn’t a real concern for a minimum wage worker but owning a computer was. In 2020, people who can barely afford bread have computers. How do we compare those worlds?

What’s also telling is the average debt. It’s circular- has debt increased because more people must use credit to survive- or are people prioritizing buying non essential goods and going into debt to do it while feeding the problems?

In short- the non linear curve which makes increasing advancements have a higher overall “cost” to develop, implement, and maintain- makes it so that the “cost” of an average human cradle to grave has increased quite a bit while the actual return to society or the economy on a given human has not- and often cases has decreased. Humans in last generations could seem to have more because they overall had less. Lots f little things add up- from better options for medical treatment to nicer and more reliable appliances and furnishings and tools that have more features.

The average person born in 2000 will likely have used and discarded more high tech devices than a group of people born in 1970 would have ever touched. It gets... complex... but the phenomenon isn’t solely related to school nor is it solved there.