AS WE CLOSE the first quarter-century of the new millennium, the situation seems dire. Political violence, wars, and disasters abound. But zooming out from the immediacy of our moment may help us gain some footing for what’s to come.
Half a century ago, in 1975, the Vietnam War ended, Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft, and Taco Bell was beginning its ascendancy in fast food chains.
A century ago, the United States was in the thick of the Roaring ’20s, a time of opulence and optimism, of flappers, radio, and moving pictures. But the bubble of endless economic expansion was about to burst with the 1929 stock market crash and the subsequent Great Depression. The rich got richer—until society couldn’t sustain it anymore.
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