Charles Marohn’s latest in Better! Cities & Towns:
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The first generation of the Suburban Experiment — let’s say roughly 1950 to 1975 — was an understandable reaction to the Great Depression and a second global war. Hindsight is definitely 20:20 and we can see now how the near term prosperity horizontal growth created came with all of these massive long term obligations. …
Which is exactly what was done in the second generation of the Suburban Experiment, only this time with debt. Public debt — yes — but more importantly with private sector debt. The accumulation of debt became so important to our economy — so important to keeping the entire Ponzi Scheme going — that we actually allowed it to become predatory as we crossed over into the Suburban Experiment’s third life cycle.
