So what really fucking went down in America from the 1960s through the 1980s. It's a wild ride that completely transformed our society, and the effects are still smacking us in the face today.

The sixties were a pretty damn good time for the average American, at least economically speaking. No joke - the typical household saw their actual income shoot up by about 41% during this decade. The super-rich were paying their fair share too, with top tax rates sitting at 70% or higher. Meanwhile, some seriously important stuff was happening on the civil rights front. The government finally got off its ass and passed some landmark laws that made discrimination illegal, protected minority voting rights, and told racist landlords they couldn't refuse to rent to people based on their race anymore.

Workers had real power back then - about 30% of them belonged to unions. The minimum wage was worth more than it's ever been since, hitting its peak in 1968. And here's something wild - the gap between the rich and everyone else was at historic lows. The government was also rolling out programs that actually helped regular people, like Medicare, Medicaid, and food stamps. They even started Head Start to give poor kids a fighting chance in education.

The seventies threw some serious curveballs at the American economy. The whole international monetary system went to hell when Bretton Woods collapsed. Then the oil crisis hit - twice - and suddenly everyone was losing their minds about gas prices. The economy went completely sideways with this nasty combo of high inflation and high unemployment that economists called "stagflation" because apparently, they needed a fancy word for "everything sucks."

But you know what? Even with all that chaos, we still had some pretty solid guardrails in place. Banks couldn't gamble with people's savings thanks to Glass-Steagall. Rich folks were still paying high taxes. The government actually gave a damn about breaking up monopolies. And workers could still tell their bosses to shove it because they had strong unions backing them up.

Then came the eighties, and holy shit, did things change under Reagan. His administration basically took a sledgehammer to the entire system that had been building the middle class since the New Deal. They slashed the top tax rate from 70% down to 28% - yeah, you read that right. Corporate taxes? Cut. Capital gains? Cut. Instead, they shifted more of the tax burden onto regular working people through payroll taxes.

But that was just the start. They went on a deregulation spree that would make a fox guarding the henhouse blush. Antitrust enforcement? Basically dead. Financial sector oversight? Gutted. Corporate mergers? Have at it, boys! Worker protections? Who needs 'em!

The way they handled labor was particularly brutal. When the air traffic controllers went on strike, Reagan didn't just break the union - he sent a message to every corporate exec in America that it was open season on organized labor. Union membership started tanking. The minimum wage's buying power went into free fall. And corporations started treating their workers like disposable napkins.

The financial sector turned into the Wild West. They deregulated savings and loans (that worked out great - hello, massive taxpayer bailout!). Wall Street started cooking up all these fancy new financial products. Corporate raiders became the new rock stars, buying up companies with borrowed money, gutting them for parts, and leaving workers holding the bag.

The changes hit American society like a wrecking ball. The share of national income going to the top 1% started shooting through the roof. Regular workers' wages flatlined even though they were producing more than ever. CEO pay went absolutely bonkers - we're talking increases of over 900% while worker pay barely budged 10%.

The whole corporate world changed its tune. Instead of balancing the needs of workers, communities, and shareholders, it became all about maximizing shareholder value. That meant squeezing workers, cutting corners, and focusing on quarterly profits instead of long-term stability. Companies stopped sharing profits with workers and started spending money buying back their own stock to pump up share prices.

By 1989, the richest 1% were hoarding 14% of national income, up from 8% in 1980. The bottom 90% of Americans saw their share of the national wealth start shrinking like a cheap t-shirt in hot water. Your chances of doing better than your parents? Those started dropping too.

Now, it wasn't all doom and gloom. Society kept making progress on some fronts. LGBTQ+ folks started gaining more acceptance. More minorities got elected to office. Women made gains in the workforce and started breaking into more professional fields. Interracial marriage became more accepted. We started seeing more diversity in movies and TV shows.

But here's the kicker - all this social progress was happening while the economic foundation that supported the middle class was being sledgehammered into dust. The rich got their hands on the political system in a way we hadn't seen since the Gilded Age. Money in politics exploded. Labor unions lost their political muscle. And the geographic divide between rich and poor areas grew into a canyon.

Look, the changes from the 1980s didn't just disappear. They rewired how our whole economy works. The financial sector became like a giant casino. Workers lost their bargaining power. Corporate money started calling the shots in politics. And the whole system became more unstable and prone to crisis.

We're still living with the hangover from these changes. Rich neighborhoods got richer, poor neighborhoods got poorer. Getting ahead based on hard work became harder than climbing a greased pole. The gap in educational opportunities between rich and poor kids turned into a chasm. And different parts of the country might as well be living in different economic universes.

The thing is, none of this had to happen. It wasn't some natural disaster or act of God. It wasn't even purely because of technology or globalization. These were specific policy choices made by specific people. And you know what that means? We could choose differently. We could rebuild the guardrails, rewrite the rules, and create an economy that works for everyone again.

But first, we need to understand how we got here. Because if we don't learn from this history, we're gonna keep making the same mistakes.