IT'S NOT LIKE THE IDEAS WERE ANY BETTER WHEN THEY WERE YOUNG:

Affluence and Its Discontents (Robert J. Samuelson, May 10, 2006, Washington Post)

To Galbraith, materialism had gone mad and would breed discontent. Through advertising, companies conditioned consumers to buy things they didn't really want or need. Because so much spending was artificial, it would be unfulfilling. Meanwhile, government spending that would make everyone better off was being shortchanged because people instinctively -- and wrongly -- stigmatized government only as "a necessary evil."

"Automobiles have an importance greater than the roads on which they are driven," he wrote scornfully. "Alcohol, comic books and mouthwash all bask under the superior reputation of the [private] market. Schools, judges and municipal swimming pools lie under the evil reputation of bad kings [government]." The book argued for more government spending and less private spending.

By and large, these ideas have not aged well. [...]

It's often said that only the rich are getting ahead; everyone else is standing still or falling behind. Well, there are many undeserving rich -- overpaid chief executives, for instance. But over any meaningful period, most people's incomes are increasing. From 1995 to 2004, inflation-adjusted median family income -- for families precisely in the middle -- rose 14.3 percent, to $43,200, the Federal Reserve says. People feel "squeezed" because their rising incomes often don't satisfy their rising wants -- for bigger homes, more health care, more education, faster Internet connections.

The other great frustration is that it has not eliminated insecurity. People regard job stability as part of their standard of living. As corporate layoffs increased, that part has eroded. More workers fear they've become "the disposable American," as Louis Uchitelle puts it in his book by the same name. Galbraith expected the affluent society to be a placid society. Giant corporations would control markets and provide safe jobs; government would regulate business cycles. Underestimated were the disruptive effects of new technologies, globalization and activist shareholders.

Ours is a post-affluent society. Because so much previous suffering and social conflict stemmed from poverty, the advent of widespread affluence suggested utopian possibilities. Up to a point, affluence succeeds. There is much less physical misery than before. People are better off. Unfortunately, affluence also creates new complaints and contradictions.

Advanced societies need economic growth to satisfy the multiplying wants -- public and private -- of their citizens. The social order depends on it.

And that economic growth, of course, depends on an economy free enough to appall Galbraith and his ilk. Meanwhile, the big difference today is that economic insecurity used to mean that you had a legitimate reason to fear you wouldn't be able to feed yourself and your family. Today it means you might have to switch jobs, delay buyng a new car, or live in a house only a quarter bigger than the one you grew up in, not a third.

Posted by Orrin Judd at May 10, 2006 1:40 PM