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comment by kleinbl00
kleinbl00  ·  2467 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: The World Economic Forum presents: The Death of Retirement

Strauss and Howe based their cycle on the Saeculum, the interval of time coined by the Etruscans to describe the length of a human lifetime. The Romans adopted it but decided that 110 years was the magic number, rather than 80. The Stoics definitely picked stuff up from the Etruscans.





user-inactivated  ·  2466 days ago  ·  link  ·  

110 is not a magic number if you consider it three generations, each one being just shy of 30 years. Wealth never survives three generations is a saying that has been around since ancient china.

Same thing with companies. The Founder generation pours their life into building the business. Then they retire and round two enters to take over; they remember the tough times and the bad stretches and have a loyalty to the founder's vision/name/legacy. Then the third group comes in and all they have every know is MegaCorp and don't give a shit. Ayn Rand talked about these people as the "looter generation" but she used another term for them.

The Etruscans were interesting people. I need to get back to reading about them and their influence. Origen wrote on them back when I hated reading about the minutiae of Church history. When I went back with a secular mindset I was able to appreciate these guys much more than before.

kleinbl00  ·  2465 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Historically speaking people didn't wait until 30 to have kids but yeah, there's something deep and primal in all of this, which is why I think it's so seductive.