OK, maybe life in good ol' '60s wasn't so terrible

It's not often I write a second column on the same topic in a week, but after some of the reaction to Wednesday's column about the good ol' days, I thought I'd do just that.

A quick recap: The point of the previous column, which might have been a bit obscured, was to touch on times some politicians and others would like to revive, times before there were things like Social Security and Medicare, regulation of corporations, 40-hour work weeks, pensions, health insurance and such. It was more about life when.

One gentleman called about the column. He was 89 and told me about growing up in the Chicago area, when his mom could give him a dime to go get a loaf of bread, and with the 1-cent change he could get candy.

After high school, he went into the Navy, and after World War II he went to school on the GI Bill, got a good job with good pay, raised a family, they had their own home, had family vacations and ultimately was able to retire with a nice pension.

Honestly, who could ask for more? You'd be amazed at how many people would love a life just like that. For those who lived through the Great Depression and World War II, there was a period that, while not idyllic, was far better than the times before, and in many ways better than today.

Sure, there were social and cultural aspects of life during the '50s, '60s and even '70s that are truly archaic now, and to upcoming generations seem unimaginable. It really wasn't like Leave It to Beaver and Father Knows Best, or even Ozzie and Harriett. (By the way, did anyone ever really know what Ozzie did for a living?) But there are many facets of those eras that sure were enjoyable.

Granted, the economy always was shifting, as it always has and always will, but the cost of living in those days seemed better. Fifty years ago you could buy a house for $20,500, or a pre-fab house for less than $9,000. And working people could afford it.

One list I saw showed you could buy a brand new '64 Rolls Royce Silver Cloud for $16,555, or an average care for $2,250. Now, the average price of a new car is $32,000, and the average home price is $331,400.

When you went to the grocery store, you could get a gallon of milk for less than a dollar, a loaf of bread for about 20 cents and a dozen eggs for about 50 cents. Bacon was 67 cents a pound, and a sirloin steak was $1.05 per pound.

Of course, the average income in 1964 was about $6,000 with an average hourly wage of $2.50, and some folks had tough times then, too. Today's median household income is $51,371 (and dropping since 2007) with an average hourly wage of $24.48 (although I don't know anyone drawing that average pay). And even with nearly 10 times the average income of 50 years ago, it seems harder to get by now than then.

Now, if we just had today's income with 1964 prices ...

Aside from the economics, 50 years ago we had three TV channels to watch, and they went off the air at midnight, maybe a little later on Friday and Saturday nights.

We didn't have 24/7 entertainment and news (which are becoming so blended), which means if there was a wreck on a Los Angeles freeway you didn't have live coverage of it in Arkansas. Something had to be pretty serious, really odd, or just kind of funny to make national news, and of the utmost importance for a live broadcast coverage.

Folks didn't have telephones in their pockets, and they weren't in continuous communication everywhere they went. Everything wasn't instantaneous and just a button away. Everyone wasn't connected, interconnected and over connected. Information wasn't constantly bombarding folks faster than they could absorb it.

In retrospect, even though it was an era of change, the pace of life then was much slower compared to today. I know the '60s had its share of violence and upheaval and tremendous social and cultural change, and yes, families then had problems just like families now. But looking back at those days from an individual perspective, not a social one, they were good ol' days.

Even with all the cool things we have now — which I suspect have become so commonplace people can't imagine living without them — life 50 years ago sure seems attractive in many ways. It wasn't as hard as the pre-Depression times of the early 20th century, nor as hectic and tough as it may seem now. For the folks dubbed the Greatest Generation, their post-war heyday surely seems like the greatest time, too.