# Was, is, or has America ever been "great?"

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-is-or-has-america-ever-been-great/761482>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [August 1, 2016, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-is-or-has-america-ever-been-great/761482 "2016-08-01T17:07:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 4

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**Author:** ![sweat209](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9fc348/32.png) [@sweat209](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sweat209)\
**Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-is-or-has-america-ever-been-great/761482/61 "2016-08-09T22:30:12Z")

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> [@XT](#):
>
> This is almost entirely backwards or just spun. Things were MUCH more expensive in the past for both food and every day items. Yes, in the past one bread winner worked, but then people had much lower expectations for goods and services in the past than they do today. A small house with a lot of kids crammed into a few rooms or even sleeping with their folks, a very limited amount of amenities by today’s standards (no air conditioning, probably limited heat, no or limited electricity, no or limited entertainment, etc etc), and very few if any luxuries like, oh, going out to dinner or seeing a movie. You could do that today if you wanted to live that way…in my own case my wife doesn’t have to work if I wanted to cut way back on my standard of living and get rid of a lot of thing goods and services we all take for granted.
> 
> And, of course, if you were a minority back in the good old days then I’m thinking you would not be so sanguine about how America was better before than today…flawed as things are today they are much, MUCH better than in the past wrt minorities of any stripe, color, religious pursuasion or sexual orientation.

I paid $50,000 for my house!!! Today it is over $500,000. I have know people who have paid $20,000 for house some even cheaper than that.

I could get candy or Hot Dog or Ice cream for under dollar back in that time line.

Only one person had to work well the wife stay at home and now both people have to work and struggle to get by.

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**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\
**Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-is-or-has-america-ever-been-great/761482/62 "2016-08-09T22:33:20Z")

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> [@sweat209](#):
>
> I paid $50,000 for my house!!! Today it is over $500,000. I have know people who have paid $20,000 for house some even cheaper than that.
> 
> I could get candy or Hot Dog or Ice cream for under dollar back in that time line.
> 
> Only one person had to work well the wife stay at home and now both people have to work and struggle to get by.

Purchasing power parity. Did you earn only 1/3 of today’s wages?

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