LIFE WAS MUCH BETTER IN AUSTRALIA 30-40 years ago than today.
For a start, your parents were probably together and reasonably happy whereas most kids parents these days can't work it out (or don't want to put the effort in) or are separated, divorced etc.
Mum worked very hard at home being the best mother she could. Cooking cleaning and using her nouse to manage our finances. Mum also had a network of friends that she socialised with while dad was at work.
There were no iPads, Wi's etc back then so kids were generally healthier in mind, body and soul. The music wasn't full of filth and smut like the vast majority of hip-hop is today. A friend was someone that you actually saw in person instead of an electronic entity on a facebook list.
You needed a 40% deposit to get a home loan. You could achieve this because one mans wage was enough to support a wife and family. Dad generally worked in manufacturing where apprenticeships were abundant.
Back in the day the unions were strong and morality wasn't a dirty word.
But along the way somewhere greed set in and destroyed all the good things that unions and morals had achieved. Corporations decided that large profits were not big enough, they had to make massively obscene profits at the expense of everything INCLUDING ....
TAKING AWAY THE PURCHASERS ABILITY TO PAY FOR THE PRODUCT
And then it started, Mum just HAD to leave looking after the house and kids and work so we could get that colour TV and afford next years holiday. Stress in mothers rose exponentially. Kids became less respectful. Both parents were under duress. Divorce rates screamed skyward.
It got progressively worse from there as credit was extended further.
The average kid now has two sets of (on average) somewhat emotionally damaged parents. And kids have learnt that relationships are easily dispensed with. They also know that the chances of them having a 'partner for life' are EXTREMELY THIN!
SOME SAY THE UNIONS ARE GREEDY! Executives benefits now averaging about 300 times the average workers benefits, in 1980 it was 40 times ... It's bloody obvious where the extreme greed critique should be laid.
AND TO MAKE MATTERS WORSE these same executives have been systematically moving your jobs over to places like China, Thailand, Taiwan etc because they can pay a 12yo $5 a day to do the welding without any of your hard fought union benefits like 'personal protective clothing & equipment' and not have to worry about that 12yo child becoming a blind 16yo child.
Shareholders are ALSO to blame for this because we have done nothing to stop this from occuring ... why? ... because we benefit from rising share prices ... GREED
