u/tycoon_irony

The Great Depression was interrupted by WW2, and economic conditions in the late 1940's/early 1950's in the war's aftermath were still suffering the tail end of the Depression, but people were optimistic for the postwar future. Then, in the mid 50's, the economy boomed. The economy from 1954 to 1973 was roughly on an upward trajectory the whole time aside from a micro-recession in 1958. 1973 is like 2020. 2007-2008 is like the entirety of 1929-1945 or so compressed. 2009-2013 is 1945-1954. 2013-2016 is like 1954-1963. 2016-2020 is like 1963-1973. 2020 to 2024 is the rest of the 1970's and 2024-2026 is the early 1980's.

Of course, there wasn't a war during the Great Recession, but it felt like the old world had collapsed and something new and better was coming. Like the late 40's to early 50's, 2009-2013 was optimistic people rebuilding the world. The mid 50's to early 60's are the peak, just like 2013-2016. People were optimistic and the economy was doing good. In the mid and late 60's, the economy was still excellent, but political, societal, and cultural crises were brewing. From 2016 to 2020, the economy was great, but societal crises were happening. People saw the hippies as "ungrateful" for protesting against the societal norms of the golden age of the 1950s/60s. Culture and society took a quantum leap forward in 1965-1970, while the economy was still good but people were protesting things like the Vietnam War. Similarly, cultural normalization of leftist societal aspects peaked in the late 2010s, while the economy was still good but people were protesting Trump 1.0's actions.

In 1973, the oil embargo shock made the entire economy go to shit, just like what COVID did in 2020. Suddenly, the hippies were too poor to sit around all day. The 1970s saw the continued societal tolerance of the things brought about by the 1960's cultural revolution, but the 1980 election, dissatisfaction with Carter, and the Reagan revolution caused a huge right wing societal backlash with events like Disco Demolition Night. In the same way, people in 2020-2024 carried the flame of the "Social Justice Warriors" of the late 2010s until the 2024 election caused a massive right wing societal backlash. Biden was like Carter. He inherited a shit economy and tried but failed to fix it. You could also compare the 2021 US exit from Afghanistan to the fall of Saigon and Carter's later pardon of draft dodgers in a way.

The economy was still shit in the early 1980's until Reagan's brute force trickle down economics made unemployment go down by 1984 and giving him a landslide win against Mondale whereas if his so-called economic "recovery" had lagged just a year or two behind, he would've lost. The difference is that Trump 2.0 inherited something far worse, and Reaganomics just make it worse.

before you get mad, remember you're on the circlejerk sub.