How'd we do it???

In the golden era of this country,I was middle class. My wife didn't work, she took care of and taught values to our children.The first thing we looked for when house hunting was a good parochial school. Public transportation, and living close to the job. The school was two blocks away. The high school was almost a mile. Where we lived it was almost impossible to be un employed. You couldn't get a mortgage that was out of reach, the banks wouldn't lend you the money. Credit cards? Sure 1000 buck limit,about 4% interest [ only the mafia charged more than 10%].Taxes, sure we paid them, but the deductions were many, auto interest,home mortgage, state taxes, fuel taxes, Most of us maxed our social security deductions.Many times I worked 60 hour weeks to aford my fishing spending. I've owned various boats for 50 years. Two paid homes.So whats changed? The middle class has shrunk, taxes have gone up,and the price of education has gone out of sight.The only thing that is the same, the CUBS have still not been in the world series! My first 5 vechicles cost less than my scaled down truck does now.I have never lived more than 15 miles from a lake or river.At the very end of my employment I drove 40 minutes to work,and that was alittle more than 30 miles.Do you think these are the years?

[QUOTE=kygorski;495880]In the golden era of this country,I was middle class. My wife didn't work, she took care of and taught values to our children.The first thing we looked for when house hunting was a good parochial school. Public transportation, and living close to the job. The school was two blocks away. The high school was almost a mile. Where we lived it was almost impossible to be un employed. You couldn't get a mortgage that was out of reach, the banks wouldn't lend you the money. Credit cards? Sure 1000 buck limit,about 4% interest [ only the mafia charged more than 10%].Taxes, sure we paid them, but the deductions were many, auto interest,home mortgage, state taxes, fuel taxes, Most of us maxed our social security deductions.Many times I worked 60 hour weeks to aford my fishing spending. I've owned various boats for 50 years. Two paid homes.So whats changed? The middle class has shrunk, taxes have gone up,and the price of education has gone out of sight.The only thing that is the same, the CUBS have still not been in the world series! My first 5 vechicles cost less than my scaled down truck does now.I have never lived more than 15 miles from a lake or river.At the very end of my employment I drove 40 minutes to work,and that was alittle more than 30 miles.Do you think these are the years?[/QUOTE]

Greed and a corrupt government got us here.

[QUOTE=kygorski;495880]In the golden era of this country,I was middle class. My wife didn't work, she took care of and taught values to our children.The first thing we looked for when house hunting was a good parochial school. Public transportation, and living close to the job. The school was two blocks away. The high school was almost a mile. Where we lived it was almost impossible to be un employed. You couldn't get a mortgage that was out of reach, the banks wouldn't lend you the money. Credit cards? Sure 1000 buck limit,about 4% interest [ only the mafia charged more than 10%].Taxes, sure we paid them, but the deductions were many, auto interest,home mortgage, state taxes, fuel taxes, Most of us maxed our social security deductions.Many times I worked 60 hour weeks to aford my fishing spending. I've owned various boats for 50 years. Two paid homes.So whats changed? The middle class has shrunk, taxes have gone up,and the price of education has gone out of sight.The only thing that is the same, the CUBS have still not been in the world series! My first 5 vechicles cost less than my scaled down truck does now.I have never lived more than 15 miles from a lake or river.At the very end of my employment I drove 40 minutes to work,and that was alittle more than 30 miles.Do you think these are the years?[/QUOTE] you have to be thankful that you got to enjoy that day and time, today's generation will never know what that side of life is like.