Further reading:

Erich Fromm, To Have or To Be?
Thorstein Veblen, The Theory of the Leisure Class
David Graeber, Bullshit Jobs: A Theory
David Frayne, The Refusal of Work: The Theory and Practice of Resistance to Work

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My grandma who was a black woman born in 1939 had a house, 4 kids, and retired at age 55. She had an 8th grade education and worked at the state school. She was able to support herself and her kids when her husband passed away. That’s impossible today

The happiest slaves are those that don’t know that they are slaves.

Couple everything you've said here with the fact that modern employment is literal hell. Barely livable wages, no buy-in from coworkers or pride in their work anymore. And if you happen to be a high achiever/hard worker you will be given more and more responsibility without earning more until you burn out. Only to have the slackers remain behind and ruin the company from within..

It was always an illusion. The idea that you could work like a dog for 30-40 years and arrive at retirement emotionally or physically equipped to enjoy any of it was a myth, at best.

Don’t exaggerate! You should be able to put that down payment on a house by your 120th birthday! 125th tops!🤣

Capitalism is modern day slavery, just with the illusion of a salary

Poverty exists not because we cannot feed the poor, but because we cannot satisfy the rich.

Love this one. Somewhere in the last few years (I'm 54 now) I lost all interest in buying things. Just completely don't care. Not sure what shifted but it is absolutely gone. Wish it had come earlier as I spent my whole life competing with the Joneses and aquiring piles of nonsense. Is it depression, realization, acceptance, some combination or something else entirely? The intangibles are now the most important... Time, peace, quiet...

Makes your blood boil thinking about what they've done

I’m retiring soon as a butcher in a supermarket and I am the last person to get a pension, the rest of the people have a 401k. Apparently pensions went the way of the typewriter. We’re talking thousands of employees.

I remind myself that "comparison is the thief of joy" anytime I feel down that I am not as conventionally 'successful' as many of my peers. One of my friends is envious of my childfree lifestyle where I can literally pick up and move to wherever I want (within reason) just for a change of scenery. On average, I move once every 3 years, and I try to keep my material possessions down to the basics.  I try not to let my things own me.  My freedom is almost 'priceless,' and that (and my health) is my prosperity.

I’m willing to live without billionaires.  More than happy to sacrifice them.

Honestly, realizing you don’t need more stuff to feel like you’re moving forward can be more freeing than making more money.

The griefs only just getting started, major depression on its way, within a year or so.

'There was this fairly widespread idea, you worked hard and you played by the rules, there was suppose to be something waiting for you at the end of all of it.' - Sounds like religion to me.

I’m 46 and I know for a fact  I’ll be homeless living in my car after i can’t work anymore.

Those in charge are expecting us to give up.  All part of their plan.

My mom retired from a company she loved and people were happy at in the early 90s and she started at the bottom after a divorce and worked her way up, She had a good retirement that kept in he a home, new cars and lots of travel. If you worked hard you would be rewarded even if it was a factory. That is gone. The last generation that had a retirement retired 9  years ago.

It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.
It is no measure of wealth to be well adjusted to a profoundly impoverish society.
It is no measure of happiness to be well adjusted to a profoundly sad society.
It is no measure of success to be well adjusted to a profoundly failed society.
It is no measure of performance to be well adjusted to a profoundly dysfunctional society.
it is no measure of decency to be well adjusted to a profoundly degenerate society.
It is no measure of virtue to be well adjusted to a profoundly vicious society.
It is no measure of warmth to be well adjusted to a profoundly cold society.
It is no measure of sanity to be well adjusted to a profoundly insane society.
It is no measure of normalcy to be well adjusted to a profoundly abnormal society.

P.S. It doesn't mean only society, it's every group from family to friends to community and to humanity overall. The world is not as it should be. It’s filled with distortions, and those who would exploit it, namely every person not just the powerful elites.

Inspired by the philosophy of Krishnamurti.

“Is society healthy, that an individual should return to it? Has not society itself helped to make the individual unhealthy? Of course, the unhealthy must be made healthy, that goes without saying; but why should the individual adjust himself to an unhealthy society? If he is healthy, he will not be a part of it. Without first questioning the health of society, what is the good of helping misfits to conform to society? … To help the individual to fit into a society which is ever at war with itself – is this what psychologists and analysts are supposed to do? Is the individual to be healed only in order to kill or be killed? If one is not killed, or driven insane, then must one only fit into the structure of hate, envy, ambition and superstition which can be very scientific?”
― Jiddu Krishnamurti, Commentaries on Living Series 3 (1960)