As the U.S. economy slides toward recession in this Thanksgiving season, some grumps may note little for which to give thanks. Hundreds of thousands of homeowners are facing the loss of their homes, and more people are likely to be out of work in 2008 than in 2007. But despite the other financial stresses felt by many, we still have much to be thankful for.
I don’t argue, like Voltaire’s Dr. Pangloss, that we live “in the best of all possible worlds.” Our society has problems that are real, families that suffer. But we must keep this in perspective. Even as economic conditions worsen, our nation as a whole is in an enviable position.
Let’s start with comparisons from economic history. Most people in the United States have higher incomes and more comfortable, secure lives than their parents or grandparents. Yes, millions still live below the poverty line. Yes, in some occupations, real incomes have not risen in decades. And yes, many low-wage families struggle each week to meet their basic needs.
But while poverty still exists, it is not as raw as a generation ago. In 1968, as a young Army soldier, I traveled from Fort Benning in western Georgia to Fort Bragg, where tidewater North Carolina transitions to the Piedmont region. A few weeks later, the day after Martin Luther King was killed, my squad was guarding a half-looted liquor store on South Capitol Street in Washington, D.C. Take it from me, poverty in the rural South and in urban ghettoes was more widespread and grinding four decades ago than it is now.
Even in rural Minnesota there were many poor back then, including widows whose husbands had died before Social Security existed. Some eked out a living sewing blouses for 50 cents if you brought them the material. There were the farmers who had never gotten beyond renting an 80-acre farm with a house that still lacked running water.
There still are poor, but even a shrunken safety net provides more help than what was available when I was a child.
Studying other economic systems yields other insights. Even the poor in the United States have material standards of living above 5.5 billion others in the world and greater opportunity for economic advancement.
We do face politically hard choices about priorities. Indeed, current economic problems stem in large part from willfully ignoring glaring imbalances for too long. But the structural problems we face are not as fundamental as those of France, Italy, Japan or even Germany. Getting back to a more balanced, sustainable economy need not be traumatic, although listening to ongoing presidential campaigning is not encouraging. Candidates from both parties still talk around important questions.
Finally, we need to keep financial reverses in perspective. In 1974, economist Richard Easterlin, using survey research, found that once basic needs were met, happiness rises very little with income. Some scholars do challenge his methodology. Others retort that if they’re going to be unhappy anyway, they’d rather be unhappy earning $75,000 per year than earning $25,000.
Money may not guarantee happiness, but life is easier in practical ways at higher incomes than at lower ones. But as economic prospects for the near future grow darker, we must keep in mind that even a severe recession is not the end of the economic or social world.
Indeed, many who lived through hard times like the Great Depression remember a sense of heightened social solidarity in the midst of financial hardship. The same is true for Europeans who survived peril in World War II or the true deprivation of the “hunger winters” of 1945-46 and 1946-47.
Some dismiss such memories of closeness among family and community as a figment of nostalgia, a way of coping with trauma by denying it occurred. I am not convinced. I don’t yearn to be put to the test myself but know there are worse things that can happen beside financial hardships.
Despite two world wars and numerous other conflicts, North America has largely escaped the ravages of war for more than a century. The destruction of 9/11 was so shocking because it was so unfamiliar. But we need to remember that devastating war remains in the memories of many people still living across Europe, Asia and much of Africa. Any hard times the United States has encountered pale in comparison to the death and destruction survived by many.
We don’t live in Eden. There still are crying injustices and glaring unmet human needs in our society. Much could be done to make our economy more equitable, sustainable and efficient. Nevertheless, there are many things for which we should be enormously grateful.
© 2007 Edward Lotterman
Chanarambie Consulting, Inc.