And right you are, alas...

You and I can thank Feminism for this.

What does Feminism have to do with this ?  Allow me to explain.

The year is 1950, and we could be in Rome as in Anywhereville, KS.

Jack and Jill are highschool sweethearts, they graduate and find themselves a job.
When Jack's position is secure and looks rosy, Jack and Jill marry, settle down, Jack gets a (small) raise, Jill resigns her job, stays home and becomes a housewife.
They have a family, children grow, go to school etc., but whenever they come home there's Always "Mom" to look after them.

Come the 1970's

Jack Jr and Jill Jr are high School sweethearts, they graduate and find themselves a job.
When Jack's position is secure and looks rosy, Jack and Jill marry, settle down, but Jill wants to be a career woman and continues to work.
Their landlord knows they both work so the rent goes up, to the point they are actually encouraged to consider a mortgage and live in their own house.
Morgages become more and more common, gradually easier to get, ho house prices go up.
Jack Jr and Jill Jr realize they will have to wait 5, 6, maybe more years before they can consider having a family.

Come the year 2000

Jack III and Jill III are high School sweethearts, they graduate and take on a college loan because nobody has any hope to land a decent job without College Education.
However, Jack's position is wobbly because of the volatile market, and Jill finds a better job but needs to relocate.
Eventually, Jack and Jill do marry and settle down, but Jill needs to continue her job to maintain an acceptable lifestyle.
They need to pay the college loan(s) and the mortgage, and overall expenses are such they realize they just can't afford to pay for a nanny or a babysitter,
so having babies is a luxury that will just have to wait...

Meanwhile, old and White-haired Jack and Jill realize they might never get to see their great-grandchildren because life has gotten so very expensive...

Now...

Rewind to the 1970's...

The Flowerpower Revolution never really caught on, and ladies are quite happy to be treated as ladies,
and in the family everyone has their place and knows their place, and the family lives quite decently on Dad's income alone.

Unemployment is low because, short of nurses and schools, there are precious few jobs aimed at the female population, but then, who wants to waste their time
commuting on crowded trains or on congested freeways when Hubby can take care of it all and you can have time to spend with your friends?

I mean... anyone go ask your own mothers (if they're still alive, mine is 76) how many times they regretted being a housewife,
and how many times they were thankful for not having to put up with all the "stuff" we have to put up with on a daily basis?

My reasoning may appear biased or opinable, but it's not necessarily my only reasoning. It is a mere hypothesis on a "what if" scenario.

During the 50's life was peachy, as you described, yes.

During the 70's the individual wage earner was not enough. Women had to work and now the couple supported the household which really skewed the data because now you had two incomes for one household.

This continued into the late 90's but now people began borrowing money they weren't able to pay back.

Such is my problem. I am 32 and seeing a girl I met in February.
I don't want kids until I am sustainable. I am not sustainable. Meanwhile, in the ghetto of New Britain I see women, who just happen to be of an ethnicity other than caucasian, who are 20-25 with 4 kids already.

Now, the system is strained, my taxes go up to provide public services beyond sustainable means, and I grow further from my goal.

A few people reached out to me last year - I was having a time. I didn't know if I'd be able to keep my house when my, then, girlfriend moved out. I was doing ok... until my taxes went up 90 dollars a month. I began operating at a loss. I had cut my bills dramatically. I was paying more for "delivery services" than kWh's on my electricity bill. I mean, I REALLY slashed costs across the board. I don't have TV, only internet, etc.

I was only surviving by accident and good luck:
My Health Savings Account deposit got screwed up, so the company cut me a personal check
I got my tax return.
I eventually started looking for another job and when my company heard they offered me a raise to stay. I'm not greedy, I just want to be sustainable.

I derailed a little with the person insight but my point is this: How am I supposed to win this rigged game? I'm making the "right" choices. I went to school. I have two degrees. I show up to work on time everyday. My first year here I didn't even take a vacation. I work hard, how do I win this game?
I can't be sustainable if every ghetto scum bag is popping out 4 kids each. It's not a sustainable plan. I can see this, why can't they?

The best comparison is the opening sequence of the movie Idiocracy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icmRCixQrx8


--Steve

[quote} Where do Muslims come into this picture ?  ... [/quote]

Well in a post, a while ago,
you bragged about, your countries, (free), 'Health Care'.

Well, guess who is using it now.

If if the time comes, YOU need it,
Guess What !

Sorry, Near not Hear, Lufkin Texas?

I haven't been a part of this discussion until this last page.  I see the family economic problems being primarily do to our increased wants and appetites for stuff.  I'm 68, and when I was a kid in the 1950s, and an only child, we had one car, not 2 or 3.  We didn't have a boat, never took but one or two vacations that I can recall.  My parents both worked just to make ends meet, and both rode the city bus to work and back.  We ate out on birthdays only, not 4 or 5 times per week.  I never had a real steak dinner until I was in college.
I was fortunate enough to go to college, and I worked my way thru, never borrowing a dime.  I took my 5 years to do what should have been a 4 year degree, but I'd trade that extra year again to graduate debt free.  I lived at home with my widowed mother ( my dad died when I was in my junior year of high school), never lived in a campus apartment, never partied with other students, I just worked.
Then, I got married and went to law school at night, for 4 and 1/2 years, holding down a fulltime job at the same time.  My wife worked as well.
We had our only child after we had been married 9 years.
We are still married 44 years later.
And, how many families see their finances ruined, or at least severely compromised by divorce?  I used to do domestic law in my practice, and no middle class family ever emerges from a divorce without a real drop in their financial status.  In the 1950s, when the divorce rate was a lot less than now, this disaster didn't happen nearly as often as now.

justin_o_guy2 wrote on 05/19/15 at 12:09:13:

I went to the library today, and checked out a copy of the Koran
rather than believe either side on their word, I'm gonna read the fool thing