Ever since the Great Recession and financial crisis of the late 2000s, the American economic model of building large suburban housing developments with cheap credit and sometimes even cheaper building materials and standards has been called into question. Setting aside all the jobs generated in construction, banking, and other financial intermediation, municipal governments also depend on growth for taxes to pay for not just future development, but often times previous build out phases that did not meet their financial projections. With recent examples of cities such as Jackson, Mississippi and Flint, Michigan failing to cover the maintenance costs of their municipal drinking water, this financial crisis has turned into a health crisis. Tonight, I am joined by returning guest Dark Enlightenment to examine just how widespread these problems are, and potential strategies for getting you and your family away from them.
Myth of the 20th Century – Episode 246 – Suburban Redevelopment – The Growth Ponzi Scheme
— Brought to you by —
very special guest Dark Enlightenment
— References —
– The Last Valley, Clavell (1971)
– The Growth Ponzi Scheme, Marohn (2011) – https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme/
– Return on investment for government projects, Adam Smith Institute (2012) – https://www.adamsmith.org/blog/tax-spending/return-on-investment-for-government-projects
– Capital in the Twenty-First Century, Piketty (2013)
– The Highest Return on Investment for your City is not Where you Think, Quednau (2017) – https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/5/10/highest-return-on-investment-city-not-where-you-think
– San Francisco – where drug addicts outnumber high school students, Matier (2019) – https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/philmatier/article/San-Francisco-where-street-addicts-outnumber-13571702.php
– Return on Investment: Transportation Projects Can More than Pay for Themselves in Benefits, Glover (2021) – https://ciitr.tti.tamu.edu/2021/02/23/return-on-investment-transportation-projects-can-more-than-pay-for-themselves-in-benefits/
– A Letter from Joe Minicozzi, Minicozzi (2022) – https://www.urbanthree.com/blog/a-letter-from-joe-minicozzi/
– Jackson, Mississippi, water crisis – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson%2C_Mississippi%2C_water_crisis
Myth of the 20th Century 
Okay, I’m done with this woke circlejerk.
For starters, can this bumbling retard have enough respect for a program he likes so much to have a coherent train of thought? I got 7 minutes in and had to call it quits because there was nothing to follow and Adam seemed a combination of bored and annoyed.
DE has hung around on the fringes of every fake right program spouting the latest big think “rightwing” talking point meme as if he is the only voice of reason in a world gone mad. We get it bro, you actually want to address the REAL PROBLEMS. Sadly, your idea of SERIOUS BUSINESS is always based on worn out axioms about the state of civilizational decay. “We need more white babies/good infrastructure/state enforced morals/scientific progress/walkable cities/#RealCulture” BLAH BLAH BLAH…
Just accept that the western civilizational model has been a dead end. If we tell ourself that we find truth in biological realities, then let’s also accept the truth that biological organisms are subject to selection based on their environment. You can’t create an environment that selects for one type of being and hope that “human will” selects for what you want to see in the world.
Let’s take a look at the state of other species on this planet since the predominance of civilization. We have seen mass extinction, dramatic falls in populations, replacement by domesticated species, and a huge rise in semi wild species we like to call vermin and parasites. Huh, looks like same types of humans have also increased. Huge masses of human cattle being ruled over by a parasitic elite.
Instead of trying to change civilization from a system that breed these types to an unorganized system subject to traditional natural selection, you lament the decay of the current system, blame it on maliciousness and incompetence, and claim that fixing it requires…. good paying factory jobs? more economic production? middle class white people having 3+ kids? An authoritarian leader? Good roads? Sending people to space?
What nonsense this all is. You guys are practically middle age living your entire lives on the internet and in your heads, always concerned with what the swarming masses around you are doing. Do you really go outside and see everything civilization has given us and say “wow, this is being run into the ground but I can work with this?” When was the last time any of you were in a fight for existence? Do you even have a conception of your existence that isn’t relative to the hundreds of millions of people that live in this country?
I could go on forever but I’ll cut this short.
Tl;Dr politics are fake and gay, society is fake and gay, space is a religion for nerds, collectivism is a psychological cope for being disconnected from the power process, and civilization needs to die and have its corpse twerked on.
Go have children.
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>civilization needs to die
But I like nice things, like running water, electricity, etc.
Smokey, you must admit the internet is pretty good–you’re on it!
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Smokey is a male prostitute’s name. Who paid you to sh*t this out your front hole?
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The mere mention of walkable cities makes Americans boil with rage.
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I’m with SMOKEY! LETS GET THIS GUY! YEAAAAAAHH!!!!
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I enjoyed the show. Thank you for doing it! Talking about the suburbs and how there are only a few really still standing is gutsy. First show of it’s kind I think.
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lol lmao
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With respect to the infantile outburst above, critical of this show: Shove off.
Try talking intelligently in detail about any topic unrelated to work for more than 2-3 minutes.
I appreciate each of these episodes. I take them as conversations, not polished productions, not didactic sessions. Conversations. The crew at Myth of the 20th C. invites us into their own conversations which are some of the most edifying & often hilarious still on the internet. For free. There is very little left openly on the internet of this nature, in case you haven’t noticed.
Five years on and going strong. I thank & salute you, gentlemen.
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It’s easy to take a peek into your mind just by seeing your user name. SHMUEL GOLDBLATT-WONG. I’m sure you offer deep and insightful posts about the nature of society and state of cilization.
I appreciate your inability to provide a counter argument to anything I’ve said. All people like you offer is an ideology, a way of thinking, but never a way of life, a way of living.
I appreciate the education on many subjects that the Myth guys have provided me over the years. I just have to put my foot down when it stops being educational and starts being an ideological hype movement. It’s been that way for a while now. I’m tired of hearing about how the big bad system is oppressing the poor ol middle/working class and society is being mismanaged yadda yadda yah.
I just can’t identify with a group of people who see a future for their family as working in a factory for 40 years with good pay and social services. It would be preferable to see it all die and live more like our ancestors.
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I agree with you wholeheartedly on your final point.
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Reblogged this on Calculus of Decay .
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My dual ethnicity is irrelevant.
But your response to the tedium of ‘ideology’ is… death. Death of it all, in your words. Maybe you need to take a short break. Or stop the cannabis.
And then if you still feel that way, then tell your mystic ancestors about how you find it all so tedious and have a plan to let all their posterity die, so you can be ‘more like them’. See what the reaction of your ancestors is to that.
Or, if you prefer, you can keep this yawning stupidity to yourself, quietly work through your struggles, and don’t leave negative rants on programs that haven’t met your exceptional standards
Shalom
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Still don’t see any arguments outside your WOW JUST WOWing. Everything you like is gay. Your ideology is gay. Your memes are gay. Your values are gay.
How about you say what you believe in and we can comment on it? I’ve already said my piece. The mic is all your pal.
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Some posters just want to watch the comment section burn.
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Anyone know what happened to Banned Hipster?
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He got banned.
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The blackpill is strong with these ones.
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I listened to more coherent drunk crackheads, definitely worst show yet
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Agreed. This was pointless and unlistenable.
To be frank though, for the better part of the last year I only tune in for Nick really.
This show used to be so damn good.
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What part of TWICE A MONTH do you dipsticks not remember saying? Credibility lost!
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