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Adults who lived through the '70s share 10 surprising details about what life was really like

It wasn't all disco and shag carpets.

Photo credit: Canva

Please let us never go back to '70s cigarette culture.

Movies and other bits of pop culture can feel like little time machines that whiz us right back to periods we never actually lived in. Of course, these worlds, however well-constructed, offer only a glimpse into what life was like for the people who really lived through them. Even films or songs made in the actual decade only offer a limited snapshot of the time. Certain details are bound to get missed.

It’s probably one of the reasons why past decades are so easily categorized into instantly identifiable aesthetics. Take the 1970s, for instance. We instantly think of disco, bellbottoms, hippies, the “free love” movement in full force, etc. But if you ask people who were actually around in the ‘70s, you’d probably find a lot more than just that.

But never fear, we did that research for you! Thanks to a few educational videos, as well as good old-fashioned Reddit mining, here are some interesting quotes from Redditors and historical tidbits from the “Me Decade” (named for the uptick in individualism and self-help books…see, we’re learning already!)

Things were dirtier

“More litter, more air and water pollution. There were commercials and such to discourage littering, and the EPA got involved with corporate polluters.”

“The cars were stinkier, the ports were in shambles.”

“Ashtrays, ashtrays everywhere.”

“There was a big environmental push to clean up the country. ‘Acid Rain’ was not a drug but a serious environmental problem.”

As much as the '70s are known for disco, there are other music genres that had a huge impact on culture

- YouTube www.youtube.com

“Glam rock, blues rock, funk, disco, new wave and punk rock were all new and competing for our attention.”

“There was Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, and so on. All the classic rock you hear now came from the late 60's and the 70's.”

This perhaps especially goes for punk rock. Which, contrary to popular opinion, did not start in the U.K.

It's easy to forget it was a time of great political turbulence

- YouTube www.youtube.com

“I was 18 in 1974 and living in England. I remember it as a time of strikes, demonstrations, and shortages. The rise of Thatcherism saw the steel industry in my hometown decimated and violent demonstrations with miners clashing with police happened just down the road from me. The music was great and punk really caught the feeling of the times.”

“It kind of sucked to be a teenager then. It was post-Vietnam and Watergate, and we were very cynical as a result. The energy crisis loomed large, stagflation gripped a sliding economy, and crime and cities were turning to sh**. The Cold War was a pervasive threat and popular music was at its nadir; post-60's and pre-1977 and punk.”

“College had anti-war demonstrations. People were getting drafted and sent to Vietnam to die for no reason. I watched them pull my draft lottery number and fortunately, got one in the 300's.”

“I recall the feeling of ‘everything sucks, especially us.’ The USA was starting to come to grips with its history not as a patriotic parade, but the horror show it was. In the 1977 inaugural of Carter, Paul Simon sang a beautiful song containing the lyric ‘Still, when I think of the road we're traveling on, I wonder what's gone wrong - I can't help it, I wonder . . . what's gone wrong.’ AT AN INAUGURATION.”

“Hostages in the Iranian embassy.”

Living frugally was a necessity

“Everyone in my middle-class neighborhood lived frugally. My parents had one car and my mom worked nights so they could both commute. I had five pairs of shoes - dress, running, casual, work in the yard and boots. Most kids wore hand me downs - not because it was cool but because there was no money in the budget. We never went out to eat even for special days. Summer was playing in the various back yards and once in a while you got a popsicle from the neighbor. Vacations were camping or trips to relatives. When people scream about inflation today I think you haven't seen anything. But we were happier...life was simpler and everyone seemed to pull together.”

“Got my driver's license about the time gas shortages started. Imagine pulling into the station and asking for a dollar's worth of regular today.”

Things weren’t all low-tech


- YouTube www.youtube.com

Sure, there were no iPad kids or Waymos, but the ‘70s saw a ton of technological advancements, including the personal computer. It's wild to think that Apple technically came out of this time period.

You also had the rise of video game consoles, arcades, VCRs, and VHS tapes.

We know cigarettes were mainstream, but it's crazy to think about how it affected younger people

“Your mom gave you 2 bucks and a note and sent you to the store for cigarettes.”

“Smoking was allowed on high school campus in smoking areas. Smoking areas were the teachers lounge in the school for teachers only. Also, just outside of two exits for the students. Hold your breath!”

“Most adults and many teens smoked. I was allowed to smoke at home at 15. I was sooooo lucky! A small pack cost 50 cents.”

And just imagine witnessing the cultural juggernaut of Star Wars for the first time

media0.giphy.com

“Younger people have no idea what an impact it had. We had grown up on Star Trek reruns and lots of old, bad science fiction. But Star Wars inspired us like nothing else. It had special effects that had never been seen, and a story that was hopeful and uplifting in a time when everything seemed to be getting worse.”

The bicentennial—you either loved it or hated it. There was no in-between.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

For context, the United States Bicentennial was a series of celebrations and observances during the mid-1970s that paid tribute to historical events leading up to the creation of the U.S. as an independent republic. Some events included reenactments of the Boston Tea Party and Paul Revere’s ride, as well the red, white, and blue American Freedom Train, which carried historical artifacts and stopped at 48 contiguous states.

“The bicentennial was the bomb.”

“My siblings and I didn’t love the bicentennial! We were so sick of the 'bicentennial mattress sale' etc ads blaring on the tv. My sister and I wrote a song called 'We Hate the Bicentennial' that we still sing occasionally.”

“The bicentennial years seemed party-less as far as GOP or DEM - we all were just Americans. Everything was red, white, and blue. There were continuous celebrations, picnics, parties over a two year period. I think it would have made our fore father's proud, when you think back to that two year period two hundred years prior.”

The sexual revolution was fun…for men and women alike

Imagine it: Birth control and premarital sex are finally normal. Roe v. Wade offered protection for a woman’s right to choose whether or not to become a mother. Even the queer community, while obviously still facing discrimination, began to develop safe havens in places like San Francisco.

“It was still during the sexual revolution where women were not ashamed of openly exploring their sexuality.”

“This was pre-AIDS. The idea of 'catching herpes', and this being a serious problem came in around 1980. So there was a short period, more or less from 1950 - 1980, when people thought you could just get rid of STDs with a shot.”

But not everyone was on board

There were plenty of cautionary tales (particularly for women) about the dark side of the sexual revolution. Take, for instance, Looking for Mr. Goodbar, a book and subsequent movie based on the real-life murder of a woman named Roseann Quinn, who was murdered by a man she had a one-night stand with. The killer's violence was partially stirred by his feelings about his own sexual identity.

Similarly, Cruising is a ‘70s novel that follows an undercover cop looking for a homosexual serial killer in New York City.

You also had conservative activists like Phyllis Schlafly, who vehemently rallied against feminism, abortion, queer rights, and most notably, the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA).

- YouTube www.youtube.com

History is a fascinating thing. The more we learn about it, the more we realize that every era is full of contradictions. Because while life continues to march forward, there will always be a tug-of-war between the past and future.

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Millennial shuts down judgy boomers by comparing cost of 'luxuries' in 1980 vs 2025

The data backs him up.

via Canva

Millennial man says "luxuries" aren't the reason young people can't afford to live.

Millennials constantly lament the high cost of living and the fact that so-called "American dream" is out of reach for many of them. Housing prices have skyrocketed, as has the cost of a college education. Eating out has gotten drastically more expensive, and making food at home with fresh groceries is hardly any cheaper. It's just so hard, they say, to get a foothold in the modern economy. Boomers, who grew up in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, however, aren't wasting any sympathy tears.

One of the big talking points in the great American millennials versus baby boomers debate is that, yes, things are more expensive; but has the younger generation has knee-capped itself by its lavish spending habits that have prevented them from owning homes? If millennials stopped buying $14 avocado toast and $1,000 iPhones, would they be able to save enough for a down payment on a modest house?

Freddie Smith, 36, of Orlando, Florida, recently went viral on TikTok for a video in which he challenged the boomer argument with statistics from the Bureau of Labor, Federal Reserve, and the U.S. Census Bureau.

Smith believes that the older generations misunderstand millennial finances because their concept of luxury is based on 1980s economics. That's when most boomers were coming of age and buying their own family homes, and their ideas of saving up for a down payment and affording a monthly mortgage are heavily outdated.

Smith says that for baby boomers, essentials such as rent and child care were much more affordable, but items considered luxuries (TVs, CD players, computers) were much more expensive.

How is the economy different for millennials than it was for baby boomers?

"The main shift is that core essentials—housing, education, healthcare, and even food—have become more expensive," Smith said. "Housing and rent, for instance, now outpace wage growth, making homeownership feel unattainable for many. The cost of childcare has also skyrocketed, and food prices have increased.”

The home price to income ratio is currently at an all-time high. The Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University writes, "In 2022, the median sale price for a single-family home in the US was 5.6 times higher than the median household income, higher than at any point on record dating back to the early 1970s." That ratio was closer to 2.5 in 1980.

Even transportation has skyrocketed. Buying a new car now costs about as much as the median yearly salary, with entry-level vehicles disappearing rapidly and being replaced with high-tech, fuel-efficient offerings.

"As a result, I think older generations have a different perspective on luxury versus necessity,” Smith continued. “They grew up in a time when hard work typically led to financial stability, whereas today, even with hard work, many people struggle with the high costs of housing, rent and medical expenses. Basic survival used to be far more affordable, allowing people more financial room to build a stable life."

- YouTube www.youtube.com

Smith’s numbers don’t lie. For a person in the '80s to own three TVs, a CD player, a cellphone, a microwave, and a computer, it would cost them 3.5 years of rent or a 20% downpayment on the average home. So, it was irresponsible for someone in that period to purchase all of what was known then as luxuries.

However, for millennials, these "fancy toys" are a lot more affordable compared to the big ticket items of housing, childcare, and college education. Skimping out on them won't make a meaningful difference in the attempt to save up the massive amount of cash required for a down payment on a modern home. To wit:

"But if you skip that daily $6 Starbucks drink, you’ll have enough for the downpayment in 29.22 years," Yokahana joked in the comments.

"I hate that housing and transportation have become luxuries," Molly added.

"Imagine spending 3x your rent on a microwave," Donutdisaster wrote.

Older people may see millennials with multiple TVs in their home, along with iPhones and tablets, and think that money could be better saved up in service of the "American dream." But the truth is that those savings won't really help, and worse, they'll make life pretty unenjoyable in the meantime!


Why are luxury goods more affordable now than they were in the '80s?

The price of manufactured goods has steadily fallen over the last few decades due to technological improvements and trade policies that have allowed the U.S. to import goods from places where labor costs are cheaper.

"International, global competition lowers prices directly from lower-cost imported goods, and indirectly by forcing U.S. manufacturers to behave more competitively, with lower prices, higher quality, better service, et cetera," Sociologist Joseph Cohen of Queens University said, according to Providence Journal.

Even as recently as the early 2000s, a high-quality TV was likely to cost over $1,000. Nowadays you can get an equivalent, or better, television set for just a few hundred bucks.

Why are housing prices so high?

Housing prices in the US have soared due to the low inventory caused by the Great Recession, mortgage rates, and zoning laws that make building more challenging.

Rents have increased considerably since the pandemic due to low inventory, inflation, barriers to home ownership, and the fact that more people want to live alone than with a roommate or romantic partner.

Smith’s breakdown of the economic changes over the past two generations makes a strong case for the idea that millennial financial troubles have more to do with systemic problems than spending habits. The boomers got a bad deal regarding luxury items, and the millennials with necessities. Wouldn’t living in a world where both were affordable in the same era be great?

This article originally appeared in February. It has been updated.

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A tale of two pairs of boots shows how the rich get richer in ways poor people simply can't

It’s not about bootstraps at all.

Photo by Maxim Hopman on Unsplash

The Sam Vimes "Boots" Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness explains one way the rich get richer.

Any time discussions of wealth and poverty come up, people inevitably start talking about boots. The standard phrase that usually gets thrown around is "pull yourself up by your bootstraps," which is shorthand for "work harder and don't ask for or expect help." (The fact that the phrase was originally used sarcastically because pulling oneself up by one's bootstraps is physically impossible is rarely acknowledged, but c'est la vie.)

The idea that people who build wealth are able to do so because they individually work harder than poor people is baked into the American consciousness and wrapped up in the ideal of the American dream. A different take on boots and building wealth, however, paints a more accurate picture of what it takes to get out of poverty.

boots, poverty, economic inequalityA boots story shows why it can be so hard to climb out of poverty. Giphy by DurangoBoots

Author Terry Pratchett is no longer with us, but his writing lives on and is occasionally shared on his official social media accounts. In 2022, his Twitter page shared the "Sam Vimes 'Boots' Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness" from Pratchett's 1993 book "Men At Arms." This boots theory explains that one reason the rich are able to get richer is because they are able to spend less money.

If that sounds confusing, read on:

Pratchett wrote:

The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.

Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.

boots, work boots, economic inequality, rich get richer, climbing out of povertyA good pair of work boots will save you money in the long run, but only if you can afford them in the first place.Photo credit: Canva

But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that’d still be keeping his feet dry in ten years’ time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet."

In other words, people who have the money to spend a little more upfront often end up spending less in the long run. A $50 pair of boots that last five years essentially cost you $10 a year. But if you can only afford $10 upfront for a pair of boots that last six months, that's what you buy—and you end up paying twice as much over a five-year period.

There are so many areas in which this principle applies when you're poor. Buying in bulk saves you money over the long run, but you have to be able to afford the bulk cost up front. A reliable car that doesn't require regular repairs will cost more than a beater, but if the beater is all you can afford, that's what you're stuck with. You'll likely spend the same or more over time than if you'd bought a newer/higher quality car, but without the capital (or the credit rating) to begin with, you don't have much choice.

buying a car, used car, new car, economic inequalityMore reliable cars cost more up front.Giphy GIF by LSD

People who can afford larger down payments pay lower interest rates, saving them money both immediately and in the long run. People who can afford to buy more can spend more with credit cards, pay off the balances, build up good credit and qualify for lower interest rate loans.

There are lots of good financial decisions and strategies one can utilize if one has the ability to build up some cash. But if you are living paycheck to paycheck, you can't.

Climbing the financial ladder requires getting to the bottom rung first. Those who started off anywhere on the ladder can make all kinds of pronouncements about how to climb it—good, sound advice that really does work if you're already on the ladder. But for people living in poverty, the bottom rung is just out of reach, and the walls you have to climb to get to it are slippery. It's expensive to be poor.

poverty, wealth, climbing a ladder, getting out of povertyIt's hard to climb out of poverty when you can't reach the ladder. Photo credit: Canva

When people talk about how hard it is to climb out of poverty, this is a big part of what they mean. Ladder-climbing advice is useless if you can't actually get to the ladder. And yet, far too many people decry offering people assistance that might help them reach the ladder so they can start taking advantage of all that great financial advice. Why? Perhaps because they were born somewhere on the ladder—even if it was the bottom rung—and aren't aware that there are people for whom the ladder is out of reach. Or perhaps they're unaware of how expensive it is to be poor and how the costs of poverty keep people stuck in the pit. Hopefully, this theory will help more people understand and sympathize with the reality of being poor.

Money makes money, yes, but having money also saves you money. The more money you have, the more wealth you're able to build not only because you have extra money to save, but also because you can buy higher quality things that last, therefore spending less in the long run.

Thanks, Terry Pratchett, for the simple explanation.

This story originally appeared three years ago.

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Man uses the shoe aisle to explain a troubling economic trend in middle-class American life

"The thing is, most people don’t want longevity anymore. They want new."

via Canva/Photos

Remember things being built to last?

It’s been proven that over the past few years, Americans have been dealing with shrinkflation, where food companies reduce the sizes of their products while the price remains the same at the grocery store. You see this in fast food restaurants when you pick up a burger and feel like your hand has grown a few inches, and at the supermarket when you buy a box of cookies, it weighs less than it did a few weeks ago. Companies use this strategy when they think you’ll be less likely to notice a dip in quantity than a hike in the price.

Another big trend in retail is fast fashion. People are buying cheaper garments made from low-quality materials. These products last about as long as the trend, so people throw them away and buy the next hot thing. This can be a real problem because fast fashion harms the environment and leads to exploitative labor practices.

A TikToker named Tom (@SideMoneyTom), popular for making videos about consumer products, recently went viral for a video where he called out shoe manufacturers for dropping their quality while keeping prices high. “So many of you guys want to shoot the messenger, but look, it's not my fault shoes are made out of Styrofoam and oil now,” Tom says in a TikTok with over 528,000 views. “It's literally every shoe you look at now. It's not even just the cheap ones. I can find hundred dollar plus pairs of shoes all day long with glue squeezing out of their Styrofoam cracks.”

@sidemoneytom

Replying to @Oscar Magaña shoes are done #fyp #shoes #foryou

Tom notes that recently, shoes have been made with foam soles instead of rubber. Both have pros and cons. Foam is a little more comfortable, but rubber lasts a lot longer. Rubber shoes keep shape and support over time and are much more durable. Conversely, foam shoes compress over time, losing their support and comfort. When companies sell cheaper shoes that wear out more quickly, they make much more money because you must keep replacing them.

In the video, Tom adds that many companies that used to have shoes made with rubber heels, such as Carhartt and Timberland, have switched to foam. This is an interesting choice for brands that pride themselves on selling durable products.

Cora Harrington, a writer and lingerie expert, says that companies aren't entirely to blame. Americans don’t want to pay higher prices. “People don’t exactly want to pay more for all that stuff,” Harrington told Vox. "So what has to happen if everything is more expensive and the customers still want to pay the same price, something has to be cut and that’s often going to be the quality of the garment.”

“There is an entire generation of consumers at this point that doesn’t actually know what high-quality clothing feels like and looks like,” Harrington continues. “It gets easier, I think, for consumers to just not know any better.”

@sidemoneytom

Replying to @donkles #shoes #fyp #sketchers #nike

Many commenters have noticed the decline in shoe quality and praised Tom for pointing it out. "I am so happy I’m not the only one who is baffled by shoes being made of styrofoam and then being upcharged for them," one commenter wrote. "When shoes started being named some version of 'Air Light Cloud float,' my thought was it was because they went from quality rubber to cheap foam and less materials,” another commenter added.

Tom believes the decline in shoe quality is an example of a more significant trend affecting American consumers' products: quality is decreasing while prices remain the same. “The quality of everything is going to hell, and the prices are going up," Tom concludes his video. "The problem is, so many of us have just become used to it that we keep buying it, and we basically allow them to dumb down the quality of everything. Everything in our lives. These shoes are just the tip of the iceberg. Start thinking about it in your life. What are you gonna allow to be garbage quality?

This article originally appeared in March.

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