141–150 of 493 posts
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From reading these comments you’d think that human beings were miserable and incapable of any happiness or meaning until someone invented air conditioning and sewage systems. Yes, life used to be more difficult. No, that doesn’t mean such a life was without meaning.
Perhaps you confused my comment with another comment chain?
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Right, but staying on topic in terms of available material goods and income, I don't think available goods and resources was as bad as this thread was making it out to be
Are antibiotics and vaccines and other healthcare “available material goods”? I had two great grandmothers that lost the majority of their children as babies/toddlers. I think a lot of people are not accounting for the costs of risks during that time. If everything went well, the rain was on time, no other nations attacked, no one fell ill, there were no birthing complications, then life was okay. But nature usually…
The sole question is can you on 100 dollars a month today live in a manner similar to what the average person in the 20s did
The empirical questions are what does 100 a month buy you today and what was the average lifestyle of a person in the 20s in terms of how much would it cost to buy that lifestyle today
Questions of how we got feminnism and better medicine since then is irrelevant and trying to distort a simple empirical analysis into a political one
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> It's interesting how quality of life baselines have increased so much in the last century. From John Maynard Keynes, "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren" (1930): > > Now it is true that the needs of human beings may seem to be insatiable. But they fall into two classes --those needs which are absolute in the sense that we feel them whatever the situation of our fellow human beings may be, and those which…
Yes, which is why I don’t think any “post-work” society will ever happen on a mass scale. People will invent jobs if they feed a social need.
A "job" is not a spontaneous effect of a desire, its not a natural thing, but simply a formalization step in capitalism for the sake of exchanging labor for pay.
"Post-work" generally doesn't mean "nobody can work anymore," its more "nobody needs to work anymore." People will always "work" insofar as that just means to live, learn, and share fruits of our skill and creativity.
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> It's interesting how quality of life baselines have increased so much in the last century. From John Maynard Keynes, "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren" (1930): > > Now it is true that the needs of human beings may seem to be insatiable. But they fall into two classes --those needs which are absolute in the sense that we feel them whatever the situation of our fellow human beings may be, and those which…
Yes, which is why I don’t think any “post-work” society will ever happen on a mass scale. People will invent jobs if they feed a social need.
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Then make it a thousand dollars a month. $12,000 a year is still way below anything most people consider a normal modern income. Again; you’re missing the bigger point entirely and fixating on specific numbers that I threw out as a quick example.
Sure, and you are willing to forego the services of any healthcare professional? Because most people consider being able to go to the emergency room as “normal”. My point was to dispute this overly simplistic assertion: >but with the nature of marketing and social pressure, almost no one is willing to make that kind of sacrifice today.
You’re trying very hard to completely miss the broader point and are instead nitpicking something that I didn’t even claim. This is entirely a waste of time.
It’s also why discussion culture has gotten so terrible on the internet, because instead of making obvious assumptions about my intent, people insist on critiquing little irrelevant pieces of it.
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I think life in the 1920s, while having downsides, was a lot better than many people imagine.
I mean if you lucked out and were born wealthy in an urban area it was probably ok. But half the population lived in urban areas and only half of those people had electricity. So 50:50 you end up on Schrute Farms with no electricity and an outhouse. Not even mentioning race here.
Most of the rules don't even make sense outside big cities, but we obey them because we are generally forced to. It costs a lot too. I think it's absurd, but it will take a few decades to realize this.
No has mentioned that the initial assertion is incorrect? The US Government sent troops to remove native inhabitants. Then they gave the land away. Having an army clear the land ahead of time makes a lot of homesteading possible.
I suppose a similar sense of menace applies to some of the options on the linked inventory, but my first interpretation of the task was to think of places sufficiently remote/economically-irrelevant as to be uncontested.
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>I am somewhat surprised that there aren't more cheap-living communes in the US. A few thousand dollars could probably pay the living expenses of a few dozen people – assuming they are all on-board with such a materially minimalist lifestyle. A monastery of nuns or monks is something like that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enclosed_religious_orders Even though the members live a minimal lifestyle of near-poverty, ma…
One thing everyone forgets is that the Amish people benefit from police and national defence, like everyone else. Their simple, peaceful life would not be possible if they comprised their own sovereign nation in a region surrounded by hostile actors. With no military of their own, they’d be annexed instantly. This means they aren’t truly independent. They’re dependent in a way they could never afford to pay for thems…
Leaving aside the dubious benefits of police, Amish pay the same taxes as everyone else- with the exception of Social Security and workers' compensation, which they pay through their church. Those taxes entitle the Amish to their share of the national defense buff.
https://marketrealist.com/p/do-amish-pay-taxes/
> This means they aren’t truly independent. They’re dependent in a way they could never afford to pay for themselves.
That would seem to describe most, if not all, citizens of contemporary societies. Could you name someone who you consider truly independent? As the saying goes, "No man is an island."
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Thanks! I would say the loneliness because of the stigma of both how I live, and my mental illness. Even when I am out on the BLM land with people with other campers the fact that I live in a minivan is looked down upon. And since I have to drive around so much to follow the weather It’s very hard to have long-term meaningful friendships. The other thing is lack of stable healthcare but I am slowly weaning myself off…
What do you consider to be the ideal solution?
But even a mess of a studio costs $800 a month which I can’t afford.
even if I had a place to park that was stable I wouldn’t mind either. Just something close to a town with food and place to shower, etc.