Where are our visions?

[Malthus]

I think the tragedy is that people don't care about statistics showing that they are objectively better off than people who died 200 years ago.  They only compare themselves with their peers, with their parents' experience, and with their own past experience.  By this measure they may not be getting better.  Because their peers who work in the right professions are getting richer all the time, their parents can get stable jobs and afford houses with better success, etc. 

Another fundamental problem is that people expect a linear relationship between effort and reward, and there is a minimum standard of living even if they don't work.  In other words, a reasonable reward for a reasonable effort.  The reality is that the curve is somewhat flat and only goes up exponentially toward the high end, and the floor isn't as high as people expect.  In other words, winners take all.

I remember reading a paper about how people measured satisfaction, not by objective standards, but in relation to their perception of how well off others around them are.

This would mean a medieval peasant may well be "happier" than a modern urbanite. Even though the peasant is objectively worse off in every conceivable way, he or she judges their relative well-being by their fellow peasants, who are all more or less the same - not by the rare noble, whose lives they never see enacted, and whom they have no realistic chance of emulating.

The urbanite is surrounded by people, many of whom are far better off then they, and whose lives are public: hell, even in commercials and TV shows, the supposed "average person" lives a life of extreme luxury (for example, a sitcom involving "ordinary people" living in NYC may well show them living in a massive apartment no "ordinary person" could reasonably afford).

Thus, the average urbanite has a high standard of comparison as far as material wealth is concerned. To them, "average" may well be unrealistically out of reach - in my city for example the "average" couple wants a house and two cars, something that the average person cannot really afford. Add in that many lack even job security, and you get a lot of dissatisfaction.   

[Eddie Teach]

I also see it all being clean and renewably powered by self operating power systems designed by one particularly genius Power Engineer who is celebrated as the world's greatest hero.

Maybe you should be working in a lab then. 

[garbon]

I think the tragedy is that people don't care about statistics showing that they are objectively better off than people who died 200 years ago.  They only compare themselves with their peers, with their parents' experience, and with their own past experience.  By this measure they may not be getting better.  Because their peers who work in the right professions are getting richer all the time, their parents can get stable jobs and afford houses with better success, etc. 

Another fundamental problem is that people expect a linear relationship between effort and reward, and there is a minimum standard of living even if they don't work.  In other words, a reasonable reward for a reasonable effort.  The reality is that the curve is somewhat flat and only goes up exponentially toward the high end, and the floor isn't as high as people expect.  In other words, winners take all.

I remember reading a paper about how people measured satisfaction, not by objective standards, but in relation to their perception of how well off others around them are.

This would mean a medieval peasant may well be "happier" than a modern urbanite. Even though the peasant is objectively worse off in every conceivable way, he or she judges their relative well-being by their fellow peasants, who are all more or less the same - not by the rare noble, whose lives they never see enacted, and whom they have no realistic chance of emulating.

The urbanite is surrounded by people, many of whom are far better off then they, and whose lives are public: hell, even in commercials and TV shows, the supposed "average person" lives a life of extreme luxury (for example, a sitcom involving "ordinary people" living in NYC may well show them living in a massive apartment no "ordinary person" could reasonably afford).

Thus, the average urbanite has a high standard of comparison as far as material wealth is concerned. To them, "average" may well be unrealistically out of reach - in my city for example the "average" couple wants a house and two cars, something that the average person cannot really afford. Add in that many lack even job security, and you get a lot of dissatisfaction.   

Are they actually dissatisfied by that, or do they just also dream of more? I'm not dissatisfied with my urban existence but of course, would not say no to any extra cash.

[Oexmelin]

Are they actually dissatisfied by that, or do they just also dream of more? I'm not dissatisfied with my urban existence but of course, would not say no to any extra cash.

Tocqueville called it the persistent disquiet that is at the heart of the democratic condition.