I am 83 years old and my grandfather's great-grandfather came to America in 1812. That was not so long ago in terms of almost every country on the globe. Back then there were basically no job descriptions -almost everyone was a farmer. When I was a kid we had a 1/2 acre garden and grew all the vegetables we needed for the winter months. What we did not grow we got from relatives who had chickens, geese, pigs, cows, etc. We had a couple of grocery stores in town, but we never bought much there. That's where we bought salt, sugar and other staples. When I was in grade school I listened to the Lone Ranger on the radio (sponsored by Cream of Wheat). I was 14 before I ever saw something like a TV.
So how did we get to where we are today with our mega-mass society with advertising everywhere - thick as a London fog? The book, "When Old Technologies Were New" lays out the process - where it started, how it developed and how technology gets introduced into every part of our lives today. It also illustrates how. in many significant ways, the US economy is different from about every other place in the world.
No, the book is not a perfect work, but the author's point is in many ways astonishing. It shows that an economy where the developers of new technologies, as major supporters of new products and services, can become a major influence in the adoption of advanced products and services with high value in society. Those that are higher value than just better, faster, cheaper - in fact, small revolutions, that cumulatively, can improve the overall quality of life.
Downsides? That is for another book to be written on why such advances as electrical lighting in homes have negatively affected the quality of life in the U.S. Yes, "off the grid" is fashionable today, but when I was growing up, most of the people I knew were off the grid. It was common but not fashionable.
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