Americans say they are worse off today than 50 years ago

[ffr]

But people in these 20 countries say they’re better off



What a difference half a century makes. Especially if you’re not living in the U.S.

Are you doing better than the previous generation? The Pew Research Center, a nonprofit think tank in Washington, D.C., asked nearly 43,000 people in 38 countries around the globe that question this past spring. Residents in 20 countries said people like them were better off than they were 50 years ago. In Vietnam, 88% felt better off, followed by India (69%), South Korea (68%), Japan (65%), Germany (65%), Turkey (65%), the Netherlands (64%), Sweden (64%), Poland (62%) and Spain (60%). Overall, 43% of people in those countries said they were better off.

All told, a majority of respondents in these 20 countries said they were better off.

However, the U.S. wasn’t one of them.

The U.S. was among the other 18 countries in which people said they were actually worse off than half a century ago. In Senegal, 45% felt this way, followed by Nigeria (54%), Kenya (53%), the U.S. (41%), Ghana (47%), Brazil (49%), France (46%), Hungary (39%), Lebanon (54%) and Peru (46%). Venezuela, which has suffered from political unrest and economic turbulence in recent years, was last on the list. Some 72% people there said they felt worse off than 50 years ago (only after Mexico, Jordan and Argentina).

- Marketwatch

[bagelsforbreakfast]

1. Sounds right!

[Sneederbunk]

2. 50 years ago Vietnam.

[DBoon]

5. That's why the Vietnamese are optimistic!

nt

[Jarqui]

3. Saddens me to see it it but it does not surprise me

It was not necessary in my opinion

[tazkcmo]

4. I know I was

I was five. More dirt in my ears than cares in the world.

[OliverQ]

6. I wish there was some way for me to move to another country :(

So frustrating I have no way to do it.

[dawg day]

7. Nonsense

Let's see... 1967. Many black Americans still weren't allowed to vote. Jim Crow was still the law in much of the South. Schools in southern states were having to be forcibly integrated, with many black children being taunted and injured. Public universities in the south were segregated, and integrating them was a dangerous activity for young black students.

Women were oppressed. Marital rape was legal. Women who got married or pregnant could be (and often were) fired. Women were barred entirely from many occupations. Many state universities would not admit women.
Abortion was a "crime" and often very dangerous. Birth control was unavailable in most places.

Poverty was severe, in both urban and rural areas-- as in "no indoor plumbing" often enough.
The Mideast was blowing up, and the Arab companies were punishing us with an oil embargo.
The war in Vietnam was exploding. Half a million young men, most forced into service, were in combat.
Highways and cars were much more dangerous-- more than 50K crash deaths that year (compared to 40K now with many more drivers driving many more miles).
You were allowed one phone in your house. The phone company controlled your phone access.

On the plus side, Sgt Pepper came out that summer. Jimi Hendrix released his first album.
MLK and RFK were still alive.

--
It's better now, at least when we're not looking back through rose-colored glasses.

[Cicada]

8. Dont forget the fabulous improvement in Botswana

I saw the movie United Kingdom today about a man who became King there at age 4, who while studying in England met a white clerk at Lloyd’s of London and married her. Both the UK and those back home opposed his marriage but he stuck to his guns. He said racism was wrong and that all should reject it, on both sides. He renounced the throne but returned, entered politics, led the country to its independence, became its first prime minister and won reelection’s until his death in 1980. At first his country was the third poorest on Earth, only 7 miles of paved roads in the country. He created honest government, wise economic policies. Per capita gdp when he started was $70 per year. Now it exceeds $18,500. They still have the least corruption in Africa, comparable to Portugal per agencies which rank that. Sadly AIDS is high but medical progress is heartening. His white wife became loved in Botswana. In the Number One Detective Agency books the heroine laments so few outside her country know this great man’s name. It is Seretse Khama, probably the most successful and wise political leader in the twentieth century.