I found an interesting surprise this past week in one of the paperback books at my house, a surprise that truly shows how much the world has changed.

It’s a 1976 motel receipt for a room at the Fresno Hilton. It’s from a complete stranger, but the interesting part was the bill. It came to only $22.26.

In those days you could have gotten a room, utilities, water service and I would guess a chance to try out the pool all for what in 2024 is hard to imagine.

Now you can hardly get a restaurant meal for the same total. It’s from almost a half century of corporate profit taking, constant price increases for the sake of making the rich even more rich.

History shows that the world became more equal with economic reforms until the 1970s. Then something changed. Suddenly greed was good. Everyone zoned out on Dallas and Dynasty and had misguided dreams.

We had conservative national leadership the whole time. Maybe in the 1980s they had reforms that were needed to prevent entrenched government. At some point if went beyond those basics.

Now aging baby boom retirees tend to oppose anything that increases their taxes. It’s so hypocritical. Their parents, the Greatest Generation, gave them in many cases free college education so they could realize their dreams.

Now they squawk about proposed reforms to deal with the high cost of student debt. I’m not talking about everybody, but there’s a high percentage who think only of their own bottom line.

Many of them suffered from failed marriages and foolish mortgages. They didn’t think like the Greatest Generation. They couldn’t sacrifice for a few years to eventually be secure, either professionally or personally.

My little motel bill is a reflection on them. It’s a reflection of how they didn’t have to always trade up on houses, how they didn’t need expensive vacations, and how they didn’t have to continually spend money.

I should again emphasize that I’m not talking about every baby boomer. There are many who lived within their means, who had modest but nice retirements by staying in their ramblers or split levels.

When you look at overall trends, however, there’s been much more of a willingness to have debts. People want luxuries immediately rather than later. They pay a large amount of money in debt service.

When people freely spend it leads to price hikes. It comes down to supply and demand. If people refused to spend money on something there would have a be steady or even reduced prices.

When a bag of Doritos retails for more than $6 at a convenience store, I start to think prices are getting out of hand. I don’t feel bad about the price of Doritos. They aren’t an essential food item. If necessary we can all deal with not buying a favorite bag of chips.

It’s more of an issue when the goods relate to basic needs; when we’re talking about bread, milk, home heating, everyday clothing and many other essential items.

For those, prices should stay in line with household incomes. If they don’t, it reduces the standard of living for average people. It especially affects senior citizens on fixed incomes and working class people who are raising children.

There’s a need for sustainability. Sometimes that’s a term that gets negative reactions. It gets associated with the idea of minimalism, with denying oneself many of the consumer goods that most people consider necessary.

Someone can be sustainable without being a minimalist. All sustainability signifies is that we have to somehow live within our means.

From that standpoint it’s hard to oppose sustainability. If people spend and borrow in ways that aren’t sustainable, they’ll at some point not be able to pay their debts. They’ll become tax burdens. They’ll be unable to support themselves, the exact opposite of the American Dream.

The idea of saving and investing needs to start at an early age. Teenagers should shop around when it comes to college options and should think twice before choosing a costly university.

It should carry over into housing decisions as adults. It’s good to consider an affordable mortgage that will result in savings. Eventually it pays off.

We live in a free society, which means that the government doesn’t mandate how people live. Economically everyone is free to succeed or free to fail. There’s a need for good decisions.

— Jim Muchlinski is a longtime reporter in southwest Minnesota