Editor’s Note: This piece has been in the works for the better part of 2020. I work on it, set it aside, work on it some more, get distracted, rinse, repeat. Our general thesis here is that relationships contain expectations. Sometimes these expectations are articulated, other times they reside in our subconscious as something we feel the effects of, but can’t articulate without deep introspection or outside assistance. Conscious or unconscious, all relationships are impacted by our expectations of them. This includes the relationships we have with our institutions. Part two is intended to explore three such institutions, and how our relationship (and thus, our expectations) of them has evolved over time.

Also, here’s Part 1 for those who missed it:
https://returntoreason.locals.com/post/133107/in-defense-of-riots-part-1-what-is-a-riot-in-the-world-of-public-school-behavior-supp

Three Institutional Shifts

Between 1933 and 1939, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt implemented a set of programs, policy, and legislation, that would forever change the relationship between the federal government and the citizenry. Prior to The New Deal, the question people grappled with was “Should the federal government get involved in X?” After The New Deal, the question became “What will the federal government do about X?” Citizens had previously turned to their communities, churches, mayors, and state officials to help them work through their issues. But despite a steady recovery from the stock market crash of 1929, the voters were ready for change. FDR promised that change. He rode to a sweeping victory on the unpopularity of Prohibition, coupled with general dissatisfaction at the Hoover administration’s response to the Great Depression. FDR ushered in a new era of government programs, bureaucracy, and social safety nets. A few decades later, President Lyndon Baines Johnson would enact a similar set of programs, this time under the banner “The Great Society.” Piggybacking on the ethos of The New Deal, The Great Society would introduce programs such as food stamps, Medicaid, Medicare, and welfare.

Debating the efficacy, sustainability, or general wisdom of these programs is not the purpose of this essay. My point is simply that The New Deal, coupled with the surge of post-WWII patriotism and American pride, led to a subconscious national shift in how US citizens viewed their relationship with Washington DC. It’s worth noting that FDR was also the first president to be seen on television, making our collective relationship with Washington seem that much more personal. In essence, The New Deal and The Great Society shifted our thinking about government, and its role in “solving problems.” The Civil Rights Act is one example of a successful federal intervention that helped bolster that notion. Where some state authority failed (Jim Crow), federal authority would intervene and take care of things. Our once novel interactions with the powers of Washington DC had become normal.

In 1929, federal spending constituted >3% of our nation’s GDP. Following the Great Depression, it began to rise. Within five years (and one year after FDR had taken office), it had more than tripled, to just under 10% of GDP. As of 2019, federal spending sits at almost 21% of our national GDP, and after all of the Coronavirus “Stimulus” is over, it will undoubtedly be much higher than that. After all, “solving” everyone’s problems can get expensive.

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On November 2nd, 1920, KDKA made the first commercial radio broadcast in US History. The chosen day and circumstances for such a historic event was no accident, and perhaps set the stage for the media's role in politics to this very day. KDKA chose November 2nd for a very simple reason: it was election day. They wanted to beat the newspapers to coverage of the Harding-Cox election, and they did. A novel device that had previously been used for 1-to-1 communication and occasional transmission of the sounds of record players, had now become something else entirely.

As radio grew in prominence, print media struggled to remain relevant to the average citizen. In fact, the widely-publicized 1938 ‘War of the Worlds’ panic is not considered to be a largely overblown hoax orchestrated by some in print media as a way of delegitimizing radio, in hopes of reclaiming some of their former readers. Like the first radio broadcast itself, this nearly century-old example of media’s competition for your eyeballs perhaps can be seen as foreshadowing the mire we’re in today. More on that later. Radio would find its time at the top to be short-lived, however. As the The Buggles put it in their 1979 hit: “Video killed the radio star.”

Television would permanently change how we got “the news.” Post-WWII America, The Cold War, The Civil Rights Movement, the assassination of JFK & MLK, The Vietnam War, Apollo 11, Watergate, The Challenger explosion, ‘87 Stock Markey Crash, Tiananmen Square, the fall of The Berlin Wall, Rodney King, OJ, Clinton Impeachment, Y2K, 9/11, and so on. The most important people and events would no longer be distant abstractions; but rather things we could engage with from our own living rooms. Many historians credit the end of the Vietnam War to Walter Cronkite’s monologue in the aftermath of the Tet Offensive. Despite Tet being what was essentially the last gasp of an exhausted Vietcong, Cronkite’s editorializing proved more convincing than the fact given by our military leaders. This should come as no surprise, as events such as the U-2 spy plane incident and the embarrassing Bay of Pigs fiasco had given the public plenty of reason not to trust their government. Less than a decade after Cronkite’s monologue, Watergate would serve to confirm that governmental distrust to such a degree that its effects are still felt to this day.

Television brought the news directly to us, and the introduction of the 24-hour news cycle created a monster whose hunger threatens to consume us at this very moment. Up until a few decades ago, News networks were like beer brands: there were only four of them, and they all pretty much tasted the same. The idea was to appear as unbiased and bland as possible, so as to maximize appeal to the largest possible group of viewers. With the end of The Cold War, News networks lost their “boogeyman” that kept viewers tuned in. Keeping people up-to-date on an imminent threat turned out to be a fantastic business model for creating repeat customers. But what do you do once the dragon has been slain, and your boogeyman is no more? Find a new dragon, of course.

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As ubiquitous as higher education has become today, it wasn’t always like that. During the first half of the 20th century, pursuing education past high school was rather novel. And that’s assuming one had even completed high school in the first place. Anecdotally, my grandfather had an 8th grade education, and my grandmother stopped a year later. In those days, it was more common for a child to go to school until they had mastered the basics- “readin, writin, and cipherin,” as Abraham Lincoln put it. After acquiring these base-level skills, many would drop out to go help with the family farm or family business, as was the case with my grandparents. To do otherwise was so novel, there was even a name for someone (typically a young man) who decided to pursue education after high school- “Joe College.”

Following World War II, the GI Bill, postwar economy, Space Race, and Cold War, helped shift “Joe College” from an anomaly, to the norm. Suddenly there were more fields of study that one could pursue in higher education besides teaching, law, and medicine. As WWII was coming to a close in 1940, approximately 5% high school graduates went on to acquire a college degree. By 2019, the percentage of the US population that had finished at least four years of college rose to 36%.

The appeal of higher education went beyond newer, expanding, and exciting fields of study, such as Aerospace and Engineering. There was also a strong financial incentive to obtain a college degree, a fact that persists to the present day. As of 2017, the weekly income of those who possess only a high school diploma is around $712. For those with a 4-year bachelor degree, the average weekly income jumps to $1,173 per week. If one goes on to obtain a Master’s Degree, they average $1,401 per week, almost double than those without any degree at all. Moreover, the unemployment rate of those with a Master’s Degree is approximately half of those with no degree whatsoever.

As our economy evolved in the Post-WWII/Cold War Era, so did the American Dream. At the start of the 20th century, it was both common and admirable for the younger generation to follow in the footsteps of their predecessors. Children would often apprentice the trades and skills of their family members, or those in their community. These apprentices would either take over the business, expand it, or take their craft to a nearby community that needed the services they had to offer. In the latter half of the 20th century, it became less admirable and less popular to stay home and follow in the footsteps of your parents as a plumber, farmer, mechanic, or whatever. The American Dream now contained a new component in its unarticulated blueprint: work hard, go to school, get a degree, get a job, settle down, have a family, retire.

The older generation passed this message to the younger generation, largely beginning with the baby boomers. Every generation wants the next one to have it better than they did. The new American Dream blueprint was how they saw that happening. A college degree quickly became synonymous with “a ticket to the Middle class,” a message that exists to the present day. But not all degrees are the same, and thus not all degree “tickets” represent the same destination.

What would you do if a flight you thought was destined for Hawaii, actually dropped you off in North Korea? What happens when those you expect to tell you the truth, lie to you instead? How do we handle unmet expectations? Well, why do people in presumably monogamous relationships take issue with infidelity, and how do those situations typically conclude?

Continued in Part 3: From Great Expectations to Simmering Frustrations