| It might be closer to you than you think. How far from the nearest Walmart Superstore do you live? Ask the cashier/clerk there and at your local gas station if if they can afford to live anywhere but with their parents or a handful of roommates. Visit a chain food establishment where a lunch for two costs less than $40, and talk to the back-of-house staff; the ones washing dishes and cooking food. Ask them about retirement fund plans and employee provided health insurance options. If you're fortunate enough to live farther away from these parts of the American economic realities, I would expect that 20 to 40 minutes drive on a freeway can get you pretty close to it. If you don't go to those places; ask your Door Dash or Uber Eats driver about why they drive instead of working at those stores... and pay them with a C-note for taking the time to help broaden your perspective. Try looking at the view of current America through the eyes of someone who is non-white, non-male, non-tech or tech-adjacent. It's a stark contrast to the sanitized view from the isles of Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, Erewhon, or PCC and from Sweetgreen, Cava, and the True Food Kitchen. Im not talking from a small sample set of anecdotal observations over a short period of time, but from a wide consensus of travel, first hand interactions, and living experience. In different states, over a 35 year working history, in a variety of situations, and direct relationships with a much larger than average network of family members. I have over one hundred cousins - not counting spouses, their children and grandchildren, on each of my patriarchal and matriarchal sides. Not joking, my ancestors have been here, on the ground, since the Clovis era (between 9000 and 13000 years ago in the Rocky Mountains) and the early 1630's - one of my direct forefathers was a Colonel who reported directly to Washington. So I have every reason to wish the country was living up to it's stated intentions and potentials. It simply isn't, not recently, but also not for a VERY long time before now. The conditions I describe are the lived experience of many Americans, and appear to have played an outsized role in the results for the nation today. Maybe, I'm wasting my keystrokes - username trollbridge might be the clue that this is an argumentative tone question without any real intention of truthful discourse. In that case, consider this response for the benefit of the broader HN community. We all need get outside our own bubbles, and find ways to uplift the people who do the work we rely on and provide support for the community in ways which are not being delivered by the system. It's not ok to pretend to not need a functioning society to thrive in. |