How did our country become so greedy?

[Tim01]

When did stuff like shiny cars become more important than neighbors? I grew up in a very average working class family. I don't remember my parents ever being obsessed with "stuff" like so many people are now. We had a small house, cars suitable to get to work. My mom read and my dad fished. Mom had a Pinto, dad had a F-150 which he kept as long as he could.

I just don't remember the obsession with "stuff" people have now.

[FSogol]

1. Reagan told everyone it was noble to be selfish and greedy. n/t

[devilgrrl]

4. +1

Everything counts in large amounts.

[ThomWV]

33. Nope - Parents showed their children it was noble to be selfish an dgreedy. n/t

[leftstreet]

2. Stop blaming the working class

Jeez...when did the Ruling Elite become so greedy?

[devilgrrl]

5. Perhaps the working class should stop voting against their best interests.

Since most of them seem to vote GOP. :popcorn:

[leftstreet]

8. Er...there's someone to vote for who's interested in our interests?

:-)

[Echo In Light]

21. The name of the one who fits that bill, and who I voted for, twice, is Ralph

Our presidential "elections" are a complete sham and waste of time/energy/$. Big to-do over zip i.e. corporate interests will get the figurehead they want every time

[DailyGrind51]

30. Damn right! Look how many voted for Bush in 2004 out of fear of terrorists and gay marriage!

Forgetting that Bush was pushing for privatization of Social Security and cutting Medicaid.

[Maru Kitteh]

3. When taken as a whole, human beings are greedy. They always have been.

[devilgrrl]

6. Ever notice that people with the most don't seem any happier than the rest of us?

eom

[Maru Kitteh]

29. If you believe that, you've never been a truly poor (economically poor) parent.

Money cannot buy happiness but it can purchase food security and material comfort - and it is only until you have had to watch your child do without those that you can truly understand how just a few dollars can leverage one person's future from desperation to simple dignity.

[dixiegrrrrl]

31. Actually, that seems to be correct, sorta.

I am reading "Richistan" about the new rich.
Seems the same game goes on.
the people with 5 million strive to be the people with 10 million who are unsatisfied until they get to be worth
20 million, etc. There are stories of who has the biggest yacht ( Larry Ellison, with a 495 foot monster, at press time).
who has the most houses, and even most expensive watch ( 500,000 for a..watch!!!).
Same game, more expensive toys and ways to show off.

btw....for those looking for a job? Apparently managing houses for the rich is a booming business with a worker shortage.

[SmileyRose]

37. Money CAN buy happiness.

There are an awful lot of life's frustrations that are much more easily dealt with when one has the money to do so.

There is an ENORMOUS difference in a person who was forced by poverty to spend 15 years in their prime at home caring for a disabled aging parent (or spouse or child) and a person who could afford to purchase assisted living for a beloved parent (or spouse, or child) or else a full time live in caretaker.

This same principle applies to every one of life's difficulties........

[Dappleganger]

7. Everything changed in the '80's, from what I can tell. nt

[ThomWV]

34. Then you have to ask yourself what caused that to happen

And one thing you must keep in mind is that whatever happened in 1980 started before 1980.

[Zomby Woof]

9. Ever read Tocqueville?

"Democracy In America". Even in the 1830's, it was always about the $$$.

The country was founded by private property-owing wealthy elites to protect their interests, who disguised it as a "republic" so that the rabble would sign on.

[arcadian]

10. +1

Wealthy landed gentry who's notions of liberty included owning human beings as live stock. And don't give me that bullshit about "they lived in different times" either. Freed men in the US had much higher status during British colonial rule, that status declined rapidly in the 19th and 20th centuries.

[Tim01]

15. Then most likely........

I only remember the nice people my parents hung out with, and they didn't tell me about the people they didn't like. Something like that.

[misanthrope]

40. BINGO!**nm

**

[KansDem]

11. Haven't you heard? "Greed is good"

From 1987:
Greed is good

The movie:
Wall Street

[PufPuf23]

39. Ivan Boesky - "Greed is Good"

"The character of Gordon Gekko in the 1987 movie Wall Street is based at least in part on Boesky, especially regarding a famous speech he delivered on the positive aspects of greed at the University of California, Berkeley in 1986, where he said in part "I think greed is healthy. You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself"

Actually two speeches at Cal -- Fall 1985 in 155 Dwinelle Hall and at Haas School of Business 1986 commencement in the Greek -- sandwiched in between was a Johnny Carson Show appearance where Boesky also said, "Greed is good".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Boesky

Edit to add: Ivan went to prison, suffered massive fines, and was barred from the securities industry.

[GentryDixon]

12. REAGAN.

And they want to put his face on the $50.00 bill. I just hope the Dems do not roll over on that push.

[Blue Owl]

13. I think it's the top 1 percent fueling the greed

You know, the have-mores -- a.k.a. Bu$h's Base...

And the millions they spend on their privately-owned M$M networks which broadcast subliminal greed 24/7...

[Syntheto]

14. Look no further than...

... the sophisticated and ubiquitous multimedia advertisements that point out that you're a LOSER if you don't buy THIS ONE THING, which ranges from a particular brand of deodorant to a certain kind of vehicle... that includes feeling good about buying hybrid cars and other 'green' tech. It's the advertising/entertainment/'news' complex's job to separate us 21st Century folks from our hard-earned wages, just as surely as the snake-oil peddlers of the 19th and early 20th Centuries did... in fact, they've never disappeared, they've just adopted new tactics and technologies...

[Tim01]

18. We got rid of TV for this very reason.

That and the fact that I have a hard time walking away from the thing if it is on. But mostly because of the advertising.

[Syntheto]

25. Amen...

... you have a witness... In fact, the absence of commercials is the main reason that some, er, 'friends' of mine download documentaries and such that you could easily find on the Military Channel, History International, as well as Science and Discovery. I was glad when Geico dropped the 'caveman' schtick, but I'm mighty sick of seeing the Geico Gecko, as well as 'Flo' of Progressive Insurance fame... I seldom watch cable anymore, that is, my 'friends' don't, although their younger kids like the Cartoon network and some of the movie channels.

I'm coming up on 54 this year and some of my earliest memories involve television commercials: "Hamm's the Beer Refresher... Winston tastes good like a cigarette should... Pearl Drops, it's a great feeling (oh, you bet it is!)... I can't believe i ate the whole thing... it's Shake and Bake and I helped... Plop, plop, fizz, fizz, oh, whadda relief it is.. Ford has a better idea... static, static, static... out beyond the solar system, out into deep space where a listening station set up by a race of intelligent octopods gathers the radio and television transmission waves, amplifies them and cleans them up... even the most accomplished of them, an aged female, is baffled as to their meaning and she waves her tentacles in frustration... her pigmentation changes rapidly as she holds forth before the Grand Council of her people... Red stripes, blue polka-dots, then yellow stars followed by purple concentric rings...

"We have no idea as to what the purpose of these images mean - coloration is static, forcing us to conclude that the variations in the vibrations we detected in the sublight spectrum serve as the bipedal beings mode of communication."

The Sergeant at Arms flashes a barbershop red and white striped alternating pattern to be recognized. The Grand Dame acknowledges him. "Yes, you have a question?"

"Yes, I am curious... the utility of several of the images appear to be that of food or modes of conveyance, however, what is the consensus concerning the little tube stuck in the biped's orifice, then ignited with a combustion-producing device, only to release a cloud of smoke afterwards?"

The Grand Dame looks off into the middle distance before replying... a complicated pattern of muted grays and sepia.

"We don't know... perhaps we'll never know."

[The2ndWheel]

16. You need shiny cars more than neighbors today

The cheaper the energy, the less you need other people. The more expensive the energy, the more you need other people. Obviously there are more complexities and variables involved in the whole thing, but that's the basic equation.

Oh, and if you want to see greed, wait until "green"(whatever the hell that means) energy is limitless. Then you'll see a show.

[Wizard777]

17. Give me a billion dollars and I'll tell you.

[Ozymanithrax]

19. The final shift to full consumerism occurred in the mid seventies to early eighties.

You can trace the ascendancy of consumerism with the rise of credit cards. As the percolated down through the social levels and expanded in number the culture changed.

Growing up in the 60's, except of a house or a car, few people bought things on credit. This changed dramitically in the 70's. By the 80's, it was over.

[butterfly77]

20. Notice how it is never enough..

for Republicon they write books just to lie and make more money. Some of them write books over and over like Hannity they are saying the same thing just changing the titles who buys that shit..

[damntexdem]

22. Hey, our country isn't greedy -- if it was, the majority wouldn't have let a small minority ...

grab all the wealth. ;-)

[Tim01]

24. That's part of the brainwashing.

"If you work really really really hard you will get all kinds of stuff.Unless welfare moms take it from you." That's really pretty much it. And people believe it.

[Duer 157099]

23. Considering the role of the media/film industry, I'd have to go with the "Wall Street" quote

There's no question that so many in our society are heavily influenced by the entertainment industry, so I have no doubt that when Michael Douglas, er, Gordon Gecko, said "Greed is Good" that huge segments of our population took it to heart.

It seems like a trivial explanation, but I believe it.

[Tsiyu]

26. Everyone isn't greedy

There are millions of people in this nation who care more about people than stuff.

The corporations fuel the need for sparklies, to answer your question.

Its up to us to seek out and befriend those individuals who see past corporate sparkly. :)

[spanone]

27. when the republicans instituted the notion of self regulation....

[Nay]

28. I'm with ya, Tim. We didn't do that in the 50's and 60's, either. My

parents were messed up (dad an alcoholic, mom a depressive), but they didn't get whacko over stuff. They liked cards, to have friends over, go to the beach to cook hot dogs over a fire, etc.

[Stuart G]

32. Media/ TV/ Ads...you gotta have "more"...nt

[blindpig]

35. Capitalism

It brings out the worst in people.

[TwilightGardener]

36. Expectations soar ever upward. My former neighbor mocked me

for building a two-car garage instead of of three-car garage (which is what he built--it was bigger than his actual house--we called it the Garage-Mahal). "If you're going to sell, people expect a three-car garage nowadays," he said. Well, we will only ever have two cars. And when my kids get their own cars, they can park 'em in the driveway. But apparently the fear of not having enough garage for each car is now intolerable for much of middle-class America.

[timtom]

38. I remember quite clearly

One night, in Berkeley, CA, in 1970, I dropped some acid and took a stroll up on Telegraph. I remember thinking, "Something has changed. Whatever the hippies had going is now gone. There is a preoccupation with self."

It was a bit later that the term "me generation" came into popular parlance.

I don't know precisely how. I do know when.

[OnionPatch]

41. I think part of it was the Reagan-greed era

but there has always been an aspect of "get-rich-quick" in our culture, starting with European explorers who first came here looking for gold and treasures, continuing through the gold-rush days, the gilded age and through the Reagan "climb the corporate ladder" era. It's grown to overshadow what I believe is the more noble aspect of our economic culture.....the idea that people who would otherwise be "peasants" in their old country could live a decent, middle-class life here. The corporatists have managed to morph the second into the first, for their own advantage.