Turning the clock back to the 1950s

[Chernosoth]

That is usually spun into rants about bigotry, old fashioned family values, or whatever you thought of when you saw the thread title. The part not often mentioned is lower energy consumption. The population then was less suburban. Walking, biking, and riding public transit to work, school, stores, etc. was more common. Most people had radios, some had televisions, and nobody had internet or video games. Since our energy consumption will decline over the next few decades, with possibly a sharp drop in the near future, what people did in previous decades with less energy consumption may get some revival.

 

[phrodeau]

The world population has tripled since 1951.

 

[ll74]

Nobody wants the 1950s except idiots and racists.

No more same day shipping, availability of goods is local only, cars got horrible gas efficiency, nothing to watch on TV, no video games...movies in black and white

Energy use can be lowered by r&d

 

[Chernosoth]

Nobody wants the 1950s except idiots and racists.

No more same day shipping, availability of goods is local only, cars got horrible gas efficiency, nothing to watch on TV, no video games...movies in black and white

Energy use can be lowered by r&d

Or the 1970s, with gas rationing and funky clothes. Energy consumption will eventually get much lower without fossil fuels, like an 1820s level, maybe in the next century. There are many R&D possibilities, such as anything briefly tried in the 1970s then abandoned when energy became cheap again in the 1980s.

Cars were bloated then, but they were used less. Less TV and no video games are positives to many people who don't want to be hypnotized, tranquilized, and lobotomized by electronic entertainment.

 

[JohnnySavage]

Fossil fuels are not going away. Not in my life time, not in your life time, not in your children's life times, not in your grandchildren's lifetimes, not in your great......great (ect) grandchildren's life times. Fossil fuels will outlast humanity.

It's prudent and economical to use renewables where possible, along with nuclear, coal, cogeneration, gas, oil... ect. Everything has a use.

 

[ll74]

Or the 1970s, with gas rationing and funky clothes. Energy consumption will eventually get much lower without fossil fuels, like an 1820s level, maybe in the next century. There are many R&D possibilities, such as anything briefly tried in the 1970s then abandoned when energy became cheap again in the 1980s.

Cars were bloated then, but they were used less. Less TV and no video games are positives to many people who don't want to be hypnotized, tranquilized, and lobotomized by electronic entertainment.

Lord, you seem to have a negative view of entertainment. Videogames are fun, geesh.

 

[The_Trouvere]

The decade of the 1950's was the Golden Age of the American White Working Class. Computer technology and automation had not yet begun to replace blue collar jobs. The Second World War had destroyed the factories of our trade rivals, while leaving ours intact. This gave American manufacturers a buyers' market for natural resources, and a seller's market for what they produced. However, because of the Immigration Reform Act of 1924 and the Great Depression fewer people were entering the job market every year. Consequently, employers had to compete for employees. They had to offer generous wages and benefits.

Moreover, because of the reforms of the New Deal two decades earlier more of the economic growth went to white men without college degrees.

 

[ll74]

Shocker on that take

 

[The_Trouvere]

Immediately after the end of the Second World War, and for years after, the average house in the United States cost twice the average year's salary. It was much easier back then for a white blue collar worker to buy a house and support a wife who did not need to work.

 

[oggbashan]

Shopping was a pain. In the UK we didn't have supermarkets. You had to go to the butchers, the greengrocers, the general grocery store and food products didn't keep well because few UK people had a fridge. At best they might have a cold larder and meat safe.


My mother used to go shopping every day from Monday to Saturday. Milk and butter were delivered by the milkman, and if left too long on a doorstop could go off.


In Melbourne, Australia, the first shopping mall was opened by Myers at Chadstone in 1959 - the first in Australia.


Home laundry was also a pain. A wealthy family might have a twin tub but front-loading washing machines were rare and temperamental. Tumble driers were unknown. After mangling the clothes were hung outside, or if the weather was bad, on a lazy Susan suspended from the kitchen ceiling or on a wooden folding airer in front of the coal fire.

Most homes were heated by open fires. A coal boiler, if there was one, was for hot water only or else there was the fearsome device the gas Ascot over the bath (if you had a bathroom). Many 1950s UK houses didn't have bathrooms or indoor toilets.

 

[Chernosoth]

Progress is a religion now. Seeing an end of progress and beginning of regression is heresy. Progressives must insult and attack heretics to maintain their beliefs.

And yes, life will be harder, with more manual labor. Washboards, washtubs, tumblers turned with leg power, and similar devices will replace electric washing machines. People will be making and repairing more of what they use instead of buying new items. Dairy farmers will be making more salted butter and cheese for shelf stability. Assuming we can avoid such a future because we don't want it can be funny, but after the laughs, there is still the pile of laundry and maybe the ingredients homemade soap.

 

[Sean Renaud]

Energy consumption is not going to go down in the forseeable future. So the rest of this is not insanity, its stuff that will get catastrophically bad if it comes to pass.

 

[ll74]

Progress is a religion now. Seeing an end of progress and beginning of regression is heresy. Progressives must insult and attack heretics to maintain their beliefs.

And yes, life will be harder, with more manual labor. Washboards, washtubs, tumblers turned with leg power, and similar devices will replace electric washing machines. People will be making and repairing more of what they use instead of buying new items. Dairy farmers will be making more salted butter and cheese for shelf stability. Assuming we can avoid such a future because we don't want it can be funny, but after the laughs, there is still the pile of laundry and maybe the ingredients homemade soap.

If regression didn't mean putting people back in the closet without rights or shackled in chains, then it might be less of a problem

 

[YDB95]

In Melbourne, Australia, the first shopping mall was opened by Myers at Chadstone in 1959 - the first in Australia.

It's still there!