https://townhall.com/columnists/johnstossel/2023/11/29/smearing-capitalism-n2631747
You must be lonely. The media say loneliness is everywhere in America.
A Los Angeles Times columnist says, “There’s a mass loneliness crisis going on.”
“Capitalism is Making You Lonely,” says Jacobin Magazine.
Vox claims, “Capitalism makes us feel empty inside.”
As usual, the media are just wrong.
In my new video, historian Johan Norberg points out that, “There’s no empirical data that actually shows that we feel more lonely now than we did in the past. … When researchers compare people with previous generations at the same stage of life, they don’t find evidence of increased loneliness.”
“But more people live alone now,” I say. “I would think that would make people lonelier.”
“What they never tell you in the reports,” Norberg replies, “is that people who live alone and spend less time surrounded by other people are also more happy with those relationships.”
In addition, “When people around the world are asked, ‘do you have relatives or friends you can count on to help you?’ People in countries (like America) where more people live alone, usually say, ‘yes.'”
But in India and China, more people say they have no one.
“It’s the complete opposite of what people expect,” Norberg says. “In less market-based societies, 20% to 40% say they have no one to count on if they need help. In the richest and most individualist societies, it’s in the low single digits.”
On a YouTube channel with 1.7 million subscribers, a socialist says, “Material incentives of capitalists isolate us from nature, each other and ourselves.”
Norberg replies, “I understand why those charlatans get an audience, because at times we all feel lonely.”
But his new book, “The Capitalist Manifesto,” points out how capitalism makes life better, including making people less lonely.
