Pollack and Jenna Stearns wrote in the May issue of the Journal of Economic Perspectives: “Compared with college graduates, less-educated women are more likely to enter into cohabiting partnerships early and bear children while cohabiting, are less likely to transition quickly into marriage, and have much higher divorce rates. White people without college degrees have been rocked by the decline of marriage, as well. A Washington Post analysis explained: “The things that reduce the risk of death are now being overwhelmed by things that elevate it, including opioid abuse, heavy drinking, smoking and other self-destructive behaviours.” And the suicide rate is rising, especially among the working class. White life expectancy, although higher than it was in 1950, has declined slightly in recent years. Real wages have been stagnant for 40 years, while low-skilled jobs have been disappearing. For white people without advanced degrees and good jobs, the world is getting demonstrably worse. Fifty-six per cent of white college-educated respondents said the 1950s were worse. But the class divide in the survey is more interesting: 65 per cent of white working-class respondents said the 1950s were better than today. Predictably, whites were more likely to agree with this idea than other racial groups. Roughly half of Americans believe that the 1950s were better than today, according to a PRRI survey published in October. And in this context, 2016 was not one of those “meandering points of bewilderment” that King described, but the continuation of a troubling trend. But you do not need to be on the political extreme to perceive a world in moral decline. Mockery of the “current year” argument, especially as regularly employed by comedian John Oliver, has become a meme in some far Right circles. If you're a conservative, a member of the political Right or maybe just a working-class person who pines for a sunnier past, however, there is a decent chance you are sceptical of this concept. If you are a progressive, you probably take moral progress as an article of faith. “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice. It is a view that has been espoused in different forms by the likes of Immanuel Kant, who wrote about “man's emergence from his self-imposed immaturity”, Karl Marx, who talked about emerging consciousness, and the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. The broad assumption in the “current year” argument is that time inevitably ticks towards moral betterment. To those without deeply ingrained progressive sensibilities, it is especially grating. But they should realise that their notions of moral progress are hardly universal, and invoking the current year is a tone-deaf way to engage with anyone who does not already agree with them. They do not think any explanation is required to understand why something in the current year should be an affront to our sensibilities. Those who use it frequently fail to formulate additional planks for their arguments. The tic was especially prevalent on the Left but not exclusive to it: the libertarian magazine Reason wondered how school districts could ban Huckleberry Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird in light of what year it was.Īs common as citing the current year has become, as a rhetorical technique it is exceedingly feeble.

What's with all the sexism?” A Los Angeles Times op-ed reminded readers: “It's 2016 and the civil rights era hasn't ended.” A post at Grist marvelled: “It's 2016, and we're arguing about the constitutional validity of Roe v Wade.” And Ellen DeGeneres scolded Georgia for its “religious liberty” Bill with the tweet: “It's 2016 and we're still talking about equal rights for everyone. Looking back at 2016, it is remarkable how often the year was invoked as an argument against its own events.

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