I think the current right-wing is fighting yesterday's battles because they underestimate how much the Internet, AI, automation, and advancements in energy production and storage (like Bitcoin) are about to completely change the socio-economic landscape and upend any current calculations. Their preferred policies are about to get absolutely crushed by the facts on the ground.
For instance, we can all retire at 60. Drop that topic. Try to keep up.
Retire at 60? More likely we will all get a free pill or “vaccine” from our governments soon to end our lives gracefully, as we are not needed anymore. Kinda like what happened 5 years ago. There is historical precedent.
Why would they keep us around? Governments are afraid of people with too much time on their hands.
There are still battles to fight.
Even the damn Swedes had it in their culture to get rid of the old and “useless” gracefully. Look up the word “attestupa”. The old were expected to jump (or get pushed) off a cliff at some age, to relieve the burdens of their existence on the youngers.
It is deeply engrained into our cultures. I am hence not so optimistic about our “retirement”. lol.
At a time when scarcity should be far behind us, Governments are there to ensure it never goes away and that they stay in power as a result. Most of their efforts go into making us think that they are the only possible way of doing things - and they work very hard to make sure no competition becomes available...
This is sort of my point. Scarcity will soon be solved far enough, that humans can reduce their working years. At least, in the advanced economies.
That doesn't mean that the state retirement payouts would be generous, but they should be possible.
"Should be" is a long way from "Will be" - I think that both left and right keep power because of perceived scarcity. People have been saying since the thirties that increased productivity would mean that people could work much fewer hours per week and have more free time with no impact on the economy - which was broadly true until about 1971 but productivity and wages diverged significantly at that point with all the benefits going to business but the workers got taxed more to keep people on benefits etc. The workers are working much harder just trying to keep up but the left and right continue to fight each other because they know that if things actually got better for the people, they wouldn't need the politicians any more... People on benefits will keep voting for socialism because they know where their money is coming from and workers will keep voting for the right because they know who is going to pay for it!
I meant, for the sake of argument. We risk just looking petty and economically illiterate.
I agree with you, that they will work to construct artificial scarcity.
Governments are only afraid of idle young people.
I also think their race-based arguments make them look like retreads from 1950. The world has moved on. Get over it.
They're using race as a convenient proxy for other things. Figure out what those other things are, and promote them, instead.
If we can offload the burden of the bankers and the profligate politicians we can retire earlier than that (though the idea that we should is one that may be contentious -- financial independence seems the more laudable goal rather than sloth and idleness).
Seldom do resources get misused faster than when in the hands of politicians -- particularly those running for re-election.
The issue with most of the right is that they don't address the theft and slavery that is fiat, which is why they render themselves mostly irrelevant. The left insists on having things paid for, which at least acknowledges affordability issues, even if not the real core of the problem. A conservative agenda that doesn't recognize central banking and fiat as inherently collectivist and extractive says little more than "stop whining," and may as well be agents of that central banking establishment. When you get to pick between a socialist wing and a kleptocrat wing, and neither is willing to stand up for property rights, it's hardly a surprise that things get dysfunctional.
I'm not a big fan of the concept of state retirements, in general, as we have a welfare state that anyone who can't work should fall into and everyone who can work should probably just keep working or pay for their own breaks. There's no logical reason why reducing or eliminating your work hours should be tied to some arbitrary number of Days Spent Breathing.
But I think the argument that we can't afford it, is soon going to look pretty thin.
Yeah, both sides have a point, but only half a point. They mostly seem to exist, to tell the other half they're naughty.
