More accurate caption: Someone saw a movie about some people who expected a bonus and didn’t get one. And from that they got the weird idea that most people in the 80’s got bonuses.
I don’t know what movie that’s from, but sorry to tell you as someone who was there: No, most people in most jobs didn’t get bonuses in the 80’s or any other time. It was the same as today–only certain kinds of management types or financial sector types got bonuses. I’ve had some pretty decent jobs and never got a bonus and no one thought they’d get one.
Edit to Update: Yes, of course I know that some jobs gave bonuses. My point is that the post’s entire raison d’etre is the incorrect assertion that bonuses were something that everyone, or most people, routinely expected to get in the 80’s and that those people sure had it easy compared to people today. That is not the case at all. Most jobs didn’t give you a bonus back then either.
And BTW kids, this isn’t the first time there’s ever been inflation either… Look up inflation rates in the mid-late 70’s and early 80’s. A lot worse than now.
Not to call you a liar directly, but I don’t get how “you were there” but you didn’t recognize National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. The movie was no. 2 in the box office only behind Back to the Future Part 2. The various National Lampoon movies have been ran on TV countless times during the 90s.
Not all people watch movies. Some people had four kids and are lucky to have 5 minutes to themselves while they shower.
Clark is a well paid employee. Upper class. He approves and oversees food additives. He’s near the executive level but not an executive. He’s close enough to walk into the office of the company president and feel bad about the gift he brought with him. He’d be expecting a Christmas bonus.
That’s the movie.
I’m not making a point beyond Clark would be expecting a Christmas bonus at his job. Joke might be bad, the movie was accurate.
A better joke might be pointing out Clark was a ditz in the movies but had a high paying job. However he was also very imaginative in the movies so that might be why he’s successful in research and development.
They are complicated movies lol
European here, I get a nice bonus every year. But then, my job is unionised, maybe that’s the difference?
I had a union job in the 80’s. We didn’t get bonuses. Possibly some of the upper management may have.
I imagine “is the position union or not” is far from the only factor deciding whether you got a bonus or not.
I get a “profit sharing” bonus as a factory floor welding press operator.
It’s, like, eighty bucks.
"Ya don’t get extra teefs just because it’s tha end of tha year, git! Get ta krumpin’, NOW!
Lol, yeah, as another older guy I must always laugh when “the youth” paints this “rainbows and unicorns” picture of the 80s. It was fucking dark. Constant fear of total annihilation. Reagan. Thatcher. Mass layoffs everywhere. Housing crisis. Most unemployed ever. Mass demonstrations every month/week. Stop the bomb. Stop the layoffs. I want a place to live. I just want to live. Credit crisis. (15% on your mortgage? Yeah man, that’s just how it is.) Or lets talk about drugs. Or rather… … Let’s not. The police was losing control everywhere. That’s when carpenter thought “escape from new york” up. And that wasnt the only movie with that theme of complete anarchism in the streets.
Just really listen to the music of the 80s. Really listen to stuff like 99 luftballons. Dancing with tears in my eyes. Land of confusion. Really look at the movies. Why do you think that Terminator was so god damn popular? Mad max was thought up in that era. (late 70s and 80s) Don’t you think alien /aliens products of their time? Corps which literally kill their workers, fuck them over only for a better percentage? Gordon Gecko… When was he thought up? Ever red “red storm rising” ? Sure, great book. But… What’s it about? Red October? Same.
Movies and music are a window to that time. Sure you also had the bright colors of miami vice. But what was the theme of that series: criminals everywhere and heavy handed cops to get back at them.
No man. The 80s where bleak. Glad that’s over. We got a little taste of the 80s back in 08-12. Just a little.
Do we have problems now? A lot. Sure. But I don’t live under the constant fear of a Russian nuclear missile strike. There are almost no terrorist cells active anymore (RAF, IRA, Those basks and the Indonesian train hyjackers in Holland.)
I dare to say: these days are better by a mile then back then.
Be careful for what you wish for. And know the past so you can learn from it.
Glad to see someone else on Lemmy who knows how shitty it really was in the 70’s and into the 80’s, from economics to violence to corruption. I think it’s natural to want to believe that the past was a golden age where the previous generation had it so good and then ruined things for the younger generation. Doesn’t every generation think that? Mine did too, though of course we knew about the Great Depression and WWII that our grandparents went through and our parents were kids in.
There have been good and wonderful things, and also bad and terrible things throughout time. Which things are which vary over time, but it’s always a mix. There were always the rich assholes and the poor people struggling to get by in every generation. Read Ecclesiastes. There’s nothing new under the sun.