It’s real easy to understand why by looking at these simple charts.
We have been working harder and harder without wages going above the inflation rate since the 1970’s.
This cumulative inflation chart speaks for itself.
Inverse to inflation is the purchasing power of one U.S. dollar.
Want to buy a house?
How about a new car?
They always said that getting an education was the key to getting ahead in life,
In summary, work harder for the same amount of money while the price of everything goes through the roof and hope you fucking die quick without getting sick first.
Still wondering why you are dead fucking broke all the time Sunshine?
Ain’t life grand?
Bustednuckles 
And virtually every single one of those graphs is caused by the Federal Reserve and the phony money not tied to any sort of standard.
And the ones that aren’t strictly due to the phony money, like the last one, are due to the corrupting evidence of government money. (And college costs have gone up more than the medical costs in the last one, something 3x the Consumer Price Index while medical costs are 2x the CPI).
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One thing that kept standing out to me about those graphs and a lot of other ones I was looking at was that all this shit really took off in the early to mid seventies.
Right after Tricky Dick took us off the gold standard.
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The thing that gets me about Nixon is that he is viewed (by the careless) as a CONSERVATIVE icon. He was a Liberal Republican, so chock full of bad statist ideas it’s a miracle he didn’t burst!
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Off topic.. Because you wish your stereo volume could go to “12”
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I fuckin’ love you man.
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I quit the fucking system two years ago. So far, so good. Wifey is still caught in the trap though. If I could relocate over-seas, I would. That’s the prudent path for any right thinking U.S. citizen.
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When the US goes bust is probably NOT going to be a good time to be a Gringo expat. Something I pointed out to some co-workers who were planning to leave the country to escape the Y2K ‘bug’.
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Not to argue with a fella with a graph….but comeon’ man give me some solace and comfort here!!! Ha,so I realize that life is rigged (hand clasping, pearl wringing, teeth gnashing) but what can we do individually to salvage what we get paid!!??!?!?!
Personally, I’ve listened to Dave Ramsey and have been following his advice. Don’t go into debt, pay off your debt, live frugally. All the steps grandma and grandpa told you about (but you never listened, because you just knew sooooo much better)
I realize that the “club” isn’t gonna want to let this dirt farmer son into their midst. So, you/we/I need to spread some hope and knowledge amongst the hoi polloi!
Steve
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Too simple to blame one guy. Rather;
60s; destroy steel industry
70s; destroy auto industry
60s+ become “global” economy which opens economy to cheap foreign labor (taiwan/japan/korea/china) and become net importer of all those cheap goods.
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That is a big part of the equation, but not all of us are making six figure incomes. One of Dave’s big blind spots is monetary issues that are doing us all in and will at some point. Dave has admitted that both parties are bad and that people are too stupid to vote for limited government, so you are kind on your own. He does provide some good advice in plenty of other areas.
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Looking at the car price chart, we see that a new car doubled in price between 1990 and 2014. That’s 24 years. Using the “rule of 72” that I learned in Econ 101, we can easily determine the average annual rate of inflation is 3%. This is also the official rate. I don’t see the problem.
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All of this is true, but there ARE significant things you can do. One that occurred to me almost immediately is; Yes! a new car is significantly more expensive than it was decades ago. It’s also significantly more durable. Yet people are still buying a new one every three to five years. WTF?!?!?! Why would you spend that much money on a car you don’t intend to keep at least a decade?
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