The Evolving American Dream

[Gumby]

“freedom of choice in how to live one’s life” - a task made infinitely easier when you actually have some decent money. Otherwise, your choices are somewhat limited.

 

[Youngster]

Whatever the dream may be, hope it includes gainful employment so they can support my SS when I go to collect .

 

[MarieIG]

Hmm, Son #1 wasn't interested in buying a house, or saving money, however his fiancée already owns a house and has taken him in hand so . . .Sons 2 - 5 are interested in owning a house, but not yet. They are stuffing their retirement and savings accounts and looking to keep their expenses down. Son 6 isn't thinking beyond enlisting in the army.

 

[Scrapr]

Hmm, Son #1 wasn't interested in buying a house, or saving money, however his fiancée already owns a house and has taken him in hand so . . .Sons 2 - 5 are interested in owning a house, but not yet. They are stuffing their retirement and savings accounts and looking to keep their expenses down. Son 6 isn't thinking beyond enlisting in the army.

6 boys! OMG the food bill. Did you just butcher a cow each month?

 

[razztazz]

6 boys! OMG the food bill. Did you just butcher a cow each month?

You've heard of a Farmer's Market? MarieIG, was the farmers' market

 

[friar1610]

Reading this thread I'm somewhat reminded of the generation that graduated from college in the mid-late 60's through the mid-late 70's. Lots of counter-culture, burning draft cards, protesting, smoking joints, dropping acid, hitchhiking around the country with everything one owned in a backpack, not trusting anyone over 30, rejection of the then-American Dream, etc. And fast-forward 25-30 years for those folks: mortgages, jobs in finance, 3 kids and a dog, a Volvo station wagon, etc.

 

[REWahoo]

Reading this thread I'm somewhat like reminded of the generation that graduated from college in the mid-late 60's through the mid-late 70's. Lots of counter-culture, burning draft cards, protesting, smoking joints, dropping acid, hitchhiking around the country with everything one owned in a backpack, not trusting anyone over 30, rejection of the then-American Dream, etc. And fast-forward 25-30 years for those folks: mortgages, jobs in finance, 3 kids and a dog, a Volvo station wagon, etc.

+1

"History doesn't repeat itself but it does rhyme."

 

[ncbill]

My kids will be working for Uncle Sam, for several years after graduation, since he paid for their undergrad.

I doubt they'll be buying homes while getting moved around between duty stations.

 

[MarieIG]

You've heard of a Farmer's Market? MarieIG, was the farmers' market

 

[Pellice]

I've seen some captain type mansions where the families were huge and often then was some sort of business being run from the house as well. Lots of staff to man it also. Heck just baking bread meant chopping wood and bringing it into the house. I don't believe real estate was the taxable burdeon it is now either. You mostly owned it as opposed to just renting from the state as it is now.

Domestic labor was almost a given for any but the poorest (not to mention slavery in certain areas). A variety of arrangements, too. One of my grandmothers was sent at age 12 to cook for a neighboring farm family. The other was sent from her own family to live with her own grandmother because her mother wasn't well. Most of these big houses were unsustainable after even 1 generation. Now they are historical mansions owned by the public.

But the amount of "saving" of various sorts that we are supposed to do is really striking when you add it up. "Insurances" of all sorts - that's a new development. I don't even know how many types of "insurance" I'm paying out. There's the required - car, property, health (itself not that old) - then there's everything else. Extra healh insurances, LTC, travel, mobile phone, credit monitoring, password protection, maybe others. Pet health insurance and home title insurance are new things. The one thing I don't have is the most ancient insurance of all, life insurance, which used to be called burial insurance and dates back to antiquity (in Rome and Greece you paid into burial societies in order to put on a good show at your passing).

Is it even possible to be a minimalist today if you are buying these insurances? I'd be curious as to what insurances a minimalist does own. What's the most minimal insurance a minimalist could get away with?

 

[marko]

Reading this thread I'm somewhat reminded of the generation that graduated from college in the mid-late 60's through the mid-late 70's. Lots of counter-culture, burning draft cards, protesting, smoking joints, dropping acid, hitchhiking around the country with everything one owned in a backpack, not trusting anyone over 30, rejection of the then-American Dream, etc. And fast-forward 25-30 years for those folks: mortgages, jobs in finance, 3 kids and a dog, a Volvo station wagon, etc.

Right.
Everyone was going to "live off the land".
As a generation as a whole, we turned into the largest consumers in the history of the world!

 

[JoeWras]

Right.
Everyone was going to "live off the land".

There was a famous Dragnet episode that tackled this called The Big Departure. Joe had a big old speech about it too. It is both funny, and alarming.

Nice love beads on the kids, though!

 

[ncbill]

I've seen some captain type mansions where the families were huge and often then was some sort of business being run from the house as well. Lots of staff to man it also. Heck just baking bread meant chopping wood and bringing it into the house. I don't believe real estate was the taxable burdeon it is now either. You mostly owned it as opposed to just renting from the state as it is now.

IIRC, Shiller (of Case-Shiller home price index fame) is highly critical of large homes...calls it a "19th century mentality"

I grew up in a large home (~6,000 sqft) built just after WWI...most rooms were rarely used (formal living room, formal dining room, library, etc.)...

Also a relatively small kitchen, about the size of the one in my current townhouse (because it wasn't the lady of the house doing the cooking), butler's pantry for serving all meals to the formal dining room..

Nowadays everyone wants an eat-in kitchen, which the most recent owner managed to do by tearing out the kitchen, butler's pantry, two storage rooms off the kitchen, and the servant's half-bath, literally down to the wall studs/floor joists...a low-6 figure renovation just for that kitchen redesign (written up in our local paper)

 

[rk911]

...Is it even possible to be a minimalist today if you are buying these insurances? I'd be curious as to what insurances a minimalist does own. What's the most minimal insurance a minimalist could get away with?

sure. my bro-in-law passed in 2003. he owned a home so there was title insurance (can’t get a mortgage without clear title); his life, auto & medical were employer supplied. he was a single guy with no dependents and no debt of any sort. he had a company car which was his office. not many possessions and what possessions there were were second and third hand. good guy and gone way too soon at 56.

 

[mpeirce]

DWs nephew, a software developer, is moving out of a house and into a van he's converting into a camper.

He'll be parking various places in Denver. Might be a long winter.

Read about Palmer Luckey. He lived in his parents driveway in a van for a while. It was in Denver though, but Long Beach CA.

His net worth is now roughly $¾ billion...

Not saying your nephew will go this route, but you never know.

 

[Walt34]

There was a famous Dragnet episode that tackled this called The Big Departure. Joe had a big old speech about it too. It is both funny, and alarming.

Nice love beads on the kids, though!

Gee, it seems just as relevant now as it did then:

Here's the whole episode if you want to take the time:

 

[RobbieB]

I went to school in 73. Smoked pot, dropped acid, ate mushrooms and peyote, did uppers and downers, snorted cocaine and drank alcohol.

But no departure. Got a degree in Electrical Engineering and became a retired millionaire.

 

[JoeWras]

Gee, it seems just as relevant now as it did then:

It is. The "funny" part to me was talk about "instant" stuff like orange juice. Hard to find the stuff today, people prefer premixed. However, the speech is easily re-written to use "instagram" and "instant messaging." Same relevance.

The "alarming" part to me was progress on polio. We seem to be going backwards. That's a different topic.

Good old Joe. I like Joe.

P.S. Don't let Joe Friday know you are trying to grow asparagus in your instant world.

 

[UnrealizedPotential]

Gee, it seems just as relevant now as it did then:

Here's the whole episode if you want to take the time:

The big departure episode had a young Lou Wagner appear in it. Lou Wagner played Harlan on Chips 1977-1983.

 

[Music Lover]

Right.
Everyone was going to "live off the land".

I remember that being a dream of some people...I don't think they had any idea how much hard work was involved in living off the land. Grocery stores exist for a reason...

 

[Gumby]

The young wife and I have a garden at the community garden. We watch each April as enthusiastic new people sign up for their 600 sqft of dirt and start their gardens. By the end of June, half of them have completely abandoned the project, as they learn how much work it is to weed even that small space and keep it free of bugs so that they can grow something.

We have a double plot, which keeps us in vegetables all through the growing season and well into the winter (with canning, drying and freezing), but it requires that we go out and work in it for at least an hour almost every single day.

 

[JoeWras]

We have a double plot, which keeps us in vegetables all through the growing season and well into the winter (with canning, drying and freezing), but it requires that we go out and work in it for at least an hour almost every single day.

There's a reason subsistence farming is a full time job.

 

[RxMan]

I really don’t care what the latest fad millennials are latching onto as long as I don’t have to pay for it.

 

[Rianne]

The young wife and I have a garden at the community garden. We watch each April as enthusiastic new people sign up for their 600 sqft of dirt and start their gardens. By the end of June, half of them have completely abandoned the project, as they learn how much work it is to weed even that small space and keep it free of bugs so that they can grow something.

We have a double plot, which keeps us in vegetables all through the growing season and well into the winter (with canning, drying and freezing), but it requires that we go out and work in it for at least an hour almost every single day.

DH loves his garden. Spends hours out there, weeding, cultivating, yelling at the squirrels. We have pollinator plants, bees and butterflies. I'm a lucky gal. I don't like to garden, but I love the tomatoes, fresh basil, cucumbers and squash.

 

[Beststash]

Everyone was going to "live off the land".

Without the hippie movement, I don't think the US would be as free and open as it is today. The 1960's was a highly influential time and the hippies were highly influential people. After the hippie movement, African Americans, working women, homosexuals, nudity and non-traditional clothing all became more accepted. As Bob Dylan said, “People today are still living off the table scraps of the sixties. They are still being passed around – the music and the ideas.”

GOD BLESS THE HIPPIES!!! They "boldly took us where no man had gone before"