Life Improvements Since the 1990s • Hacker News Board

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#291

Post by wazoox » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:37 PM UTC

jasode wrote: post #67

iambateman wrote: post #14

I often ask people: “if you could be 20-years old in 1991 or 2021, which would you pick?” An incredible number of people pick ‘91. Some people even ask to go back to the seventies. This article explains why I would much rather be young now rather than before.

>I often ask people: “if you could be 20-years old in 1991 or 2021, which would you pick?” An incredible number of people pick ‘91. Some people even ask to go back to the seventies. There's a podcast by Jason Feifer (was called Pessimists Archive) where the repeated theme across many episodes is the recurring fallacy of the "good ole days" : https://www.jasonfeifer.com/build-for-tomorrow/ E.g. you ask today's generat…

I was 20 in 1991 in Europe. I was flying regularly without any flygskam. The USSR was just falling and we were all sure it was an unmitigated good (we still didn't know that the Russians will die by scores and see their life expectancy drop like a rock); Germany was just reunited and we thought the EU was a great project, not a bureaucratic monster working for the oligarchy; Hell, I even believed there were nice guys and bad guys in the Yugoslavian wars. I probably even believed that voting counted. Future was bright, and open. Year 2000 was still ahead, with its wonders.

My mother was 20 in 1968, and it was the good old days. They believed the revolution was around the corner. Present was somewhat grim, but future was bright; in her years of political activity she saw the pill come, abortion rights, women rights enhanced, the end of dictatorships in Spain and Portugal, the end (in civilised countries) of death penalty, the crumbling of USSR.

My children are in their 20s; my son refuses to learn to drive because cars are evil and he doesn't want to own one, ever, because they're bad; he's hell-bent of enjoying the now because he's pretty sure that there is no future, except climate catastrophe, incessant wars, and electronically-enhanced surveillance; he thinks that democracy is a complete scam and he forgets to vote if I don't nag him weeks in advance. He's just as disillusioned as I am, but 27 years younger.

So I think the picture is more complex. The global direction of evolution is much more important than the objective starting point.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#292

Post by jayd16 » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:38 PM UTC

rthomas6 wrote: post #68

But are people happier and more fulfilled? Are they more able to have a meaning-filled life surrounded by people with whom they have close and lasting relationships? What should we be measuring when we measure improvement?

I wonder if happiness is influenced more by some absolute level of joy or is it more influenced by the rate of improvements.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#293

Post by wolverine876 » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:41 PM UTC

Schiendelman wrote: post #191

wolverine876 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, but that's too much waste for my taste.

I wonder if it’s less waste than spoiling a larger container.

Interesting question, though certainly it is less waste to buy neither.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#294

Post by nostrademons » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:43 PM UTC

I don't think the author has kids, but as a new parent the 2020s have numerous improvements over the 1990s:

Click & go stroller & carseat systems are magical. Used to be that if your baby fell asleep in the car, you'd have to wake them up to undo the 5-point harness, transfer them to stroller, buckle another 5-point harness, undo it when you get to your destination, and then deal with the screaming baby. Now the carseat base stays in the car, you unclick the carseat, pop the whole thing into the stroller, get to your night out, pop the carseat on an inverted high-chair, and the kid can sleep the whole way or join you at the table.

Cheap plastic has dramatically reduced the cost and increased the safety of toys. Also, electronic toys & learning aids are super cheap now - my kid's got a Mandarin/English pictionary where you hover the pen over the pictures and it tells you the word for it in either Mandarin or English, and it cost High-end preschools are better. There's been a lot of research on how to support children's social & emotional development that's now made its way into the classroom.

Traveling is generally better. There've been large improvements in travel cribs like the Pack'n'Play or Lotus, many hotels have them stocked, and there's the aforementioned improvements to carseats. Also airfare is cheaper. My kid went on more plane trips before he turned 2 than I did in my whole childhood.

There've been vaccines developed for many common childhood illnesses. No more rotavirus, no more chickenpox.

The big bugaboos for parents today are housing and work. You need 2 incomes to buy a house now, which makes everything else much more pressed for time. But if you can ignore that, there've been a lot of conveniences invented to help improve the efficiency of that constrained time.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#295

Post by truthwhisperer » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:48 PM UTC

He missed the elephant in the room that due to further digitisation people with less social kills came into positions with power to decide what is good and bad for society. Furthermore due to labour shortages the culture of those companies got bad

Second thing is that the quality of the universities especially in the us are declining to the woke/BLM movements

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#296

Post by SavantIdiot » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:49 PM UTC

notdang wrote: post #262

SavantIdiot wrote: post #241

> airplane flights no longer cost an appreciable fraction of your annual income12 , and people can afford multiple trips a year. I routinely flew in the 80's and 90's: shorter lines, more cabin space, and food every flight (and fewer yokels airing their stinky bare feet). I'd go back to that in a heartbeat.

So this means that people with less disposable income can afford to fly now. And the people with more income are feeling that their comfort has to suffer. So for those with more income, maybe it makes sense to pay for first class or hire a private charter plane?

Trains are nice too. Cheaper, and you get to move around and mingle at lot easier. Maybe try one of those? Busses are cheap as well, but you can't walk around as much. But I know some people think trains and busses are gross and "lower class", which is why they have so much trouble getting funding. It's a catch-22: people won't use them, so lines don't get funded, so people don't use them.

I'm quite fond of Amtrak's Adirondack. It is a lovely way to visit relatives during Thanksgiving and see the foliage. Cheaper than planes and less stressful.

https://www.amtrak.com/routes/adirondack-train.html

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#297

Post by saltcured » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:50 PM UTC

seniorThrowaway wrote: post #205

iambateman wrote: post #14

I often ask people: “if you could be 20-years old in 1991 or 2021, which would you pick?” An incredible number of people pick ‘91. Some people even ask to go back to the seventies. This article explains why I would much rather be young now rather than before.

That's almost an unfair comparison. I don't know how old you are but 1991 was an incredibly optimistic time in western history with the fall of communism in Europe. Maybe a closer comparison would be 2000 vs 2019, both years right before a big global event.

Overly simplifying my memories as a west coast US teenager in that era, the very late 1980s were a time of cautious optimism with news such as the solidarity movement in Poland and the fall of the Berlin Wall. However, 1989 in many ways felt like the peak. Soon after, such global optimism was soured by the Gulf War, Serbian civil war, etc. We weren't as aware or focused on other positive changes that may have been happening elsewhere.

Edit to add: in many ways, the apparent close of the Cold War just removed that one bilateral threat from center attention. In its place, we gained a new awareness of much more fragmented conflict scattered all over the world...

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#298

Post by denton-scratch » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:51 PM UTC

frankbreetz wrote: post #261

denton-scratch wrote: post #199

To me, the article seems panglossian ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candide ). Some of the "upsides" (e.g. improvements in patent regime) just aren't there. Some aren't as wonderful as they are described. I'm in my mid-sixties; I'm very much a candidate for the "things were better in the old days" brigade. But I do think many (most?) things have improved. Housing is better; healthcare is immeasurably better (unless…

I wonder if permanent war was around in the 60's it was just easier to keep things under wraps because of smart phones. From what I have heard the CIA has been involved in some unsavory activities since before the 60s. I also believe that life lost by war and violence have decreased dramatically since then. It might be an ignorance is bliss thing. But the music was definitely better back then!

Permawar: I don't think lives lost by war and violence have diminished. If our leaders want us to support wars, they need enemies, and we're encouraged to hate them. The number of civilians killed in just Iraq is comparable with the number of combatants+civilians killed in Vietnam. But the Vietnam war lasted about 12 years, then it ended. It was confined to Indochina. The "War On Terror" has killed huge numbers of people in Afghanistan, Iran (if you include the effects of sanctions), Libya and Pakistan.

We now make bigger, more-accurate bombs and missiles, but we sprinkle them around just as carelessly. We still have to be made to hate people if we are going to support a war; and we don't pay a lot of attention to the casualty-count of people we hate.

Music: If you're referring to the 60's and 70's, I agree - the seventies were my formative years, musically. But we're speaking of 1991, I think. [checks 1991's hits] In among the dross, there are some good tunes - Clash, Should I Stay Or Should I Go; James, Sit Down. And there was some great Acid House, which didn't make the charts (clubbers didn't know the names of the songs or the artists).

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#299

Post by toast0 » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:53 PM UTC

wolverine876 wrote: post #178

dntrkv wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And not only that, a lot of the improvements in these tools, services, and supply chains means you can design, prototype, and mass manufacture a product without buy-in from a major corp. So many of the new products I buy are designed by small teams, or in some cases, one-man operations. It's funny how we went from a single craftsman making the whole product, to massive corporations making all the products, and now th…

> And not only that, a lot of the improvements in these tools, services, and supply chains means you can design, prototype, and mass manufacture a product without buy-in from a major corp. A great point. While I'm well aware of it, is there a book or guide to how that is done? 'Global supply chain manufacturing for noobs'? I'm looking for something with real expertise and research behind it, not someone's blog post.…

Global supply chain manufacturing for noobs in two parts:

Part 1; make a compelling mockup, post to kickstarter etc and other social media

Part 2: bide your time with product update mockups until knock offs appear on Alibaba. Make a show about complaining about the knock offs and then return the kickstarter deposits.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#300

Post by dionidium » Thu, Aug 12, 2021, 4:56 PM UTC

Seeing the "War on Drugs Lost" and "War On Smoking Won" sections back-to-back highlights how much stuff like this depends on how you define success. Of course, far more people smoke cigarettes in 2021 than consume illegal drugs (or legal marijuana), but we won the battle on the former and lost the war on the latter? Second, a lot of our worst addicts now live in tents in open-air drug markets that exist on a scale that would have been unimaginable in 1991. Is this what progress looks like?