So, what did happen in 2016?

[DGuller]

I can't shake the feeling that something monumental is happening, and it's happening over much of the Western world.  Trump may not just be an awful accident of history, he may be part of a trend.  When history will be written (if we survive long enough to have history written about contemporary times), it would almost surely identify the current times as the beginning of a period, at least on the scale of something like an Arab Spring.

But what is behind it?  Is it that the values the western civilization is promoting have grown to be too far out of sync with what people really are believing?  Did we just completely get surprised by the power of social media to create alternate realities, and there were no underlying tensions there until they just randomly mutated in that environment like cancer cells (with a little help from Saint Petersburg)?  Has the world been too stable geopolitically and now everyone is getting overwhelmed by pent up tension to resolve simmering conflicts?  Is the effect of globalization producing too much social instability and it manifests itself in wildly irrational and self-defeating ways?

Any thoughts?

[Josephus]

All of that yeah.

I think, too, we can't underestimate the rise of populism, the likes of which we haven't seen since the early 1930s.

[Josquius]

It will stand out as quite a watermark in the decline of work.
For years now the primary commodity hasn't been in the amount of goods you can manufacture but in consumers.
There just aren't enough consumers to support the amount of workers that we need to keep communities alive and avoid generational unemployment setting in.
The governments of the world meanwhile completely failed to learn from the last recession and rather than doing what was needed instead more fully embraced the failed ideas that led to the crash.

Even the lumpens can see there is a problem.
But they don't quite get what.
Perfect territory to blame The Others.

[Josephus]

Explain. You'd think there are more consumers today than ever before.

[Josquius]

Explain. You'd think there are more consumers today than ever before.

Industrial efficiency has got to the level where the work of 1 worker provides X for 100 consumers.
There just isn't enough "stuff"  to be built to give each of those 100 a job that lets them all buy X.  Especially considering massively unequal income distribution.

[mongers]

There are other histories besides the narrative of the 1930s.

[MadImmortalMan]

It's just part of the cycle. Stuff gets built, a shock happens and the stable part survives and the fluff falls down. Then the building starts again. It's true for societies and ideas as much as for physical stuff.

[Razgovory]

I've been kind of wondering about the malaise infecting the world in recent years as well. It certainly isn't limited to the US or even the West.  Xi seems to be taking China backwards as well.  Here in the US I keep seeing Republicans in love with Putin.  That's a bit worrying.  There is also the whole thing where our conservative friends refuse to share the objective reality as the rest of us.  Apparently, we live in a world where Obama is hated by the majority of the population of the US and the world and American are being butchered in the streets by terrorists.  Admittedly that was told to be by someone in the military with the same rank as Siegebreaker, so maybe perform they lobotomies on the enlisted men upon reaching a certain pay grade.

[Monoriu]

What people really care about at the bottom of their hearts is their economic and social status relative to the rest of the population, once the most basic material needs are met.  Globalization and technological advancement have made the income of the bulk of the population stagnate, while the elite see their wealth skyrocket.  It is only a matter of time that the masses decide to strike back in whatever way they can.  Since they have a vote, that's what they'll do.  For now.  If even that doesn't work, they'll try something else.

[Phillip V]

I can't shake the feeling that something monumental is happening, and it's happening over much of the Western world.

I just spent a good portion of tonight's party telling people to fear the new year; no optimism or even neutrality allowed.

Are you happy now? 

[Josephus]

STAY CALM
AND READ
LANGUISH

[grumbler]

Explain. You'd think there are more consumers today than ever before.

Industrial efficiency has got to the level where the work of 1 worker provides X for 100 consumers.
There just isn't enough "stuff"  to be built to give each of those 100 a job that lets them all buy X.  Especially considering massively unequal income distribution.

If you ever took an economics course, write for a refund.

The problem isn't insufficient demand; demand is infinite.  The problem is that the service sector jobs that are all that are available for a number of people in post-industrial economies don't pay well enough to support the lifestyle the people in thosse countries thinks to be their birthright.  Raising the minimum wage isn't the solution; it just encourages further automation of service sector jobs.

Probably the only long-term solution is a guaranteed income, combined with free health coverage.  Then people can work as a matter of self esteem, and can otherwise occupy themselves with hobbies/recreation, charitable work, etc.  People aren't ready for that yet, though, I don't believe.  Plus, how do you pay for such a thing?  You'd have to massively increase taxes, which would just chase away the very people and institutions whose taxes would make a guaranteed income system work.

So, the problem isn't "industrial efficiency."  "Industrial efficiency" has been with us since industry started.  The problem is that economic solutions are proposed o a national basis, and the economic problem of the post-industrial work force isn't manifested on a national basis.

So, people buy into "double down on failure to make America Great Again" because they aren't presented with the real problem.

[Maladict]

Probably the only long-term solution is a guaranteed income, combined with free health coverage.  Then people can work as a matter of self esteem, and can otherwise occupy themselves with hobbies/recreation, charitable work, etc.  People aren't ready for that yet, though, I don't believe.  Plus, how do you pay for such a thing?  You'd have to massively increase taxes, which would just chase away the very people and institutions whose taxes would make a guaranteed income system work.

A basic universal income is increasingly being discussed here, and several cities have started small-scale trials.
However, the current liberal (economic liberal) government predictably does everything possible to bury the whole idea.

[dps]

The problem is that the service sector jobs that are all that are available for a number of people in post-industrial economies don't pay well enough to support the lifestyle the people in thosse countries thinks to be their birthright.  Raising the minimum wage isn't the solution; it just encourages further automation of service sector jobs.

One thing that would help in the US would be a more rational tax policy.  The fact that someone making minimum wage may still end up paying Federal income taxes is insane, IMO.  Raise the personal exemption to, say, $50,000 and eliminate most (or all) other deductions and such, and while it certainly wouldn't be guaranteed universal income, those low-paying service sector jobs become much more attractive.  I certainly make something above minimum wage, but I'm probably pretty much the lowest-paid person here who actually has a full-time job, and I see only about 50% of my gross pay on my paycheck--granted, Federal income taxes are only part of what's withheld.  If I was only making minimum wage or just a tiny bit above it, I'd be taking home an even lower percentage of my gross pay.  Heck, when I was in management, I had people I supervised who made either minimum wage or were about 50 cents or so above that turn down overtime because any extra pay they got would just be taken in taxes.  It's obscene that the government does that to our country's lowest-paid workers.  (I will note that the complaint that any extra pay from overtime would be taken in taxes wasn't exactly accurate.  I sat down with one employee who told me that she didn't want any more overtime and compared her paystubs from a week in which she worked right at 40 hours with no OT and another week where she had about 12 hours OT.  She actually took home about $15 dollars more in the week she had OT.  So while it did technically give her more income to work the OT, $15 for 12 hours work isn't worth it.)

[Admiral Yi]

One thing that would help in the US would be a more rational tax policy.  The fact that someone making minimum wage may still end up paying Federal income taxes is insane, IMO.  Raise the personal exemption to, say, $50,000 and eliminate most (or all) other deductions and such, and while it certainly wouldn't be guaranteed universal income, those low-paying service sector jobs become much more attractive.  I certainly make something above minimum wage, but I'm probably pretty much the lowest-paid person here who actually has a full-time job, and I see only about 50% of my gross pay on my paycheck--granted, Federal income taxes are only part of what's withheld.  If I was only making minimum wage or just a tiny bit above it, I'd be taking home an even lower percentage of my gross pay.  Heck, when I was in management, I had people I supervised who made either minimum wage or were about 50 cents or so above that turn down overtime because any extra pay they got would just be taken in taxes.  It's obscene that the government does that to our country's lowest-paid workers.  (I will note that the complaint that any extra pay from overtime would be taken in taxes wasn't exactly accurate.  I sat down with one employee who told me that she didn't want any more overtime and compared her paystubs from a week in which she worked right at 40 hours with no OT and another week where she had about 12 hours OT.  She actually took home about $15 dollars more in the week she had OT.  So while it did technically give her more income to work the OT, $15 for 12 hours work isn't worth it.)

You both are overlooking how withholding works.  Those weeks she worked OT, the program calculated her withholding as if she were earning that much every week of the year.  But when she files taxes, she's going to get a lot of that back as a refund, because obviously her annual pay was less than 52 times that one week's pay.