[timthelion]

We eat less fresh food, we are less healthy, we are less happy, we are less able to go out in the woods or to the beach, because the woods have been logged or otherwise privatised in such a way that they are no longer accessible . The products we own and buy are of lower quality, they break more quickly. But that lower quality has not caused their price to drop tremendously. There are fewer Americans with the capital to sustain themselves, aka fewer small business owners who are able to make a living without having to find employment from some larger firm. And that directly results in reduced freedom for everyone, because there is less choice both in the employment sector and in the sector of choosing who you buy from.

And the only thing you have to offer is shitty cat videos with 30 second advertizements before 2 minutes of user created content.

Oh, and your stupid GDP. You know what the GDP measures? It is value transfer economics. It measures how many times money passed back and forth between two parties. If there weren't taxes you and I could spend all day passing $20 bills back and forth and our collective GDP would be higher than that of Switzerland. Completely meaningless number.

[greedo]

Ah nostalgia. Lower quality products? Let's just look at cars: the Pinto, the various AMC junk heaps; even my beloved first car, a VW Beetle (1969). All were horrible compared to what is available for today.

Let's look at PCs. I bought an Apple ][c in 1984 for $1400. That's almost $3300 adjusted for inflation. And that was a POS compared to what you can get for $300 today.

Culture? Let's look at what most people considered culture; TV. There were 3 main channels, all showing the same type of monolithic news, and sitcoms that were horrible. Today we have a multiverse of shows that inform and entertain. Yes, there's still crap on the tube, but you have far more options.

Education? When I graduated, college was for the highest achievers. Today, everyone is expected to go, and it's far easier to attend.

Race relations? We have a long long way to go, but compared to the early 70's? Racism was just the way things were then; America was extremely whitebread.

Acceptance? I had a friend hang himself in high school because he couldn't deal with the pressures of being in the closet. Today, we still have a long ways to go with LGBTq affairs, but we've progressed a lot.

Nostalgia is warm and fuzzy, but it puts blinders on us.

[leereeves]

People today eat less fresh food and are less healthy largely by choice.

People like to sit around, watch TV, play video games, and eat junk food. No one has to force us to do those things.

[timthelion]

I dissagree. I know of a number of famillies who used to have a small business, grow their own veggitables, and sell some vegitables on the side. However, the price of food, and the simple services of that these people provided has dropped, due to mass production, and those famillies were forced by lack of money, to change their lifestyles. They had to either sell land or take up a full time job elsewhere which meant that they no longer had time to live the way they used to.

[timthelion]

And even if it is caused by choice, I still think that it is better to look at reality than to look at choice. For example, during the totalitarian "comunist" state in the Czech Republic (I live here now) there were many free or low cost oportunities to join youth groups and play sports, go sking ect. and yet people still felt very restricted in their ability to do activities they enjoyed. It was illegal to "gather" in any more than a small number of people, and so planning a hiking trip with your friends could get you a visit from the secret police. Isn't it mearly a matter of choice that many people chose to skirt the law, rather than taking advantage of the many publicly planned youth outings?

[leereeves]

No doubt the economy has been hard for small farmers, but that's not why people aren't eating fresh food or exercising enough.

As you said, the price of food has dropped, and exercise is free.

[timthelion]

The price of food has dropped, but the price of fresh food has risen.

If you live in LA, unless you have the time to go out to one of the farmers markets, its not even possible to buy fresh food. The "fresh" food in the stores isn't fresh. It is usually weeks or even months old. Sometimes it has been on a ship across the ocean stored in a special atmosphere, maybe it "looks fresh" but it isn't. I grew up in Seattle, things are a bit better there, but you still have to drive out of your way to find fresh food. The concept of fresh and the concept of supermarket are just incompatible.

[leereeves]

But as you said, fresh food is available in farmer's markets. And if the price of fresh food has risen, it should be possible to make a living growing and selling it.

Except that the majority of people don't seek out fresh food.

[timthelion]

It might be possible to make a living growing and selling it, but it is actually quite unrealistic that a sizable portion of the population could choose to start doing so. %100 of the land in the US is owned now. Its not like the fronteir days when anyone who wanted to start a farm could just go out west. If 1 million americans wanted to start a fresh foods farm within driving distance of a city, that wouldn't be possible. The price of land would skyrocket. And that would only be one third of one percent of all Americans. Not even a significant shift. What if 20 or 30 million Americans wanted to make that transition. Is that economically possible in todays world? What if the government were to give anyone who wanted to start a familly farm a million dollars to buy land. Would it be possible then? I don't think so. I think that it isn't about choice. I think that it is litterally impossible for our society to change without the fundamental ideas regarding property rights or urbanization changing.

[agumonkey]

No one likes to die after years of diabetes either. Our brains aren't the best compass, and society relies on shifting it as much as possible.

[leereeves]

Not many people make decisions today based on what's best for them in the long term.

Certainly society could impose choices on people that would be better in the long term, but is that compatible with freedom?

[agumonkey]

Freedom in today's society is pretty laughable. You don't have time to know, learn or experience a lot; how can you choose ?

[leereeves]

How does that make freedom laughable?

You can't do everything (you never could), but you can choose what to do.

[agumonkey]

Because it's a very narrow vision of freedom fed to you from an biased third party.

[timthelion]

Oh, and American capitalism has promised us hoverboards, moon colonies, AI that can talk to me and make me feel loved, and a cure for cancer. None of that has come about.