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John Mar Rafael

Professor Gifford
English 50 Tuesday/Thursday
The Modern Struggle
During The Great Depression zippers became widely used because buttons became too
expensive. The Great Depression began with the Wall Street Crash in October 1929. This was a
rough time for great deal of people. A large portion of the United States population were laid off
and were unable to find another job. In our recession today, we have the same issue. In the movie
Modern Times by Charlie Chaplin, he shows audiences what life was like during the great
depression. He reveals to the audiences the limitations of jobs and professions. The Great
Depression has many similarities and differences to our Great Recession as shown to us by
Charlie Chaplin in order to show audiences how much of a struggle day to day life was like, as
well as what it would take to obtain true wealth, true wealth is more than just having money.
Everyone seems to agree that our current recession is extremely similar to The Great
Depression. The main thing being unemployment rates. Although it is true that the
unemployment rate peaked at different percentages with the latter being more than double.
Charlie Chaplins movie Modern Times depicts the struggle of finding a job several times. The
first being the Gamin stealing bananas to feed herself and her family because she and her father
do not have jobs. This is just one example of the things people had to do in order to survive
during these hard times. Today, people still steal in order to survive. News broadcasts stories of
people robbing stores or banks all the time. Not only does Chaplin show us the struggle of
finding a job, but also how hard it is to keep a job. The beginning of the movie shows Chaplin
working in an industrial warehouse making some sort of metal machinery, he works so hard to

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the point where he goes crazy. This shows that those working conditions are dehumanizing; it
also shows that your hardest may not even be enough to keep a job. This is still true today. I have
a friend who was laid off because he was just too slow. Although he worked as hard as he could,
he was unable to keep up with the fast pace of the store. A big part of why he was unable to keep
up was also his working conditions, everything seemed to be so cramp and people were not able
to move around very well. How can we expect to stay sane with these kinds of issues in a work
environment?
Unlike the Great Depression, there is a wider variety of jobs and professions today.
During The Great Depression, a majority of the jobs that people would pick up demanded a great
deal of manual labor. Unfortunately, this caused unqualified or over qualified people to perform
inadequately at their jobs. With the many different advances in medical, technological,
entertainment etc. today, there is more jobs people can be interested in. Once someone is
interested enough into it, they can get skilled at it. Barry Ritholtz states in his article if you have
a good education, choose your field wisely and live in a thriving area the economys looking
pretty good to you right now (2). College students all around will agree with this, otherwise
they would not bother with college. College students are committed to earning a degree in order
to find a career they will love and to support the lifestyle they want to live. The National Center
for Education Statistics U.S. reveals In fall 2015, some 20.2 million students are expected to
attend American colleges and universities, constituting an increase of about 4.9 million since fall
2000. Even with the recession, students are still dedicated to earning a degree to find their
profession and use that profession to make money and live a wealthy life. However, this may not
lead to real wealth.

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The average person thinks of wealth as possession of a great deal of money. Real
Wealth is not about money, David Korten expresses Real wealth includes healthful food, fertile
land, pure water, clean air, caring relationships, quality education and health care, fulfilling
opportunities for service, healthy and happy children, peace, time for meditation and spiritual
reflection (2). This is what is required to obtain real wealth. Time is especially difficult to have
much of as a hard working student and or employee. Today most people dont really even believe
in meditating or spiritual reflection. One reason being because they dont have the time to do
such things they dont understand. They are too busy with working or studying to even care
about it. We cannot expect to live a real wealthy life style when it is impossible due to the society
we live in in. As long as we are restricted by the harsh requirement of having no free time
because we trying obtaining a well-paid career in order to live a life with hassle free money
issues, obtaining real wealth is impossible. This can of course change if people were willing to
work together in order to fix these issues. Unfortunately, the upper class will not work with
people to fix these issues because of greed. They love being able to live their lifestyle and feeling
special because not many other people can live like they do.
The Great Depression and the Great Recession are different and similar in many ways.
Chaplin reveals this to the audience using humor in his movie Modern times. Finding and
keeping a job in both time periods are both difficult due to its requirements and working
conditions. People need jobs in order to live a happy and wealthy life. Be that as it may, Rhitholz
expresses that you can find a great job to support yourself with a good education and living in the
right area. However, this does not necessarily lead to wealth. Korten reveals that real wealth isnt
just about money. It is much more than that. True wealth is about having healthful food, pure
water, clean air, caring relationships, quality education and healthcare, fulfilling opportunites,

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healthy and happy children, happiness in yourself and peace. Finding true wealth and happiness
in todays economy and conditions, is near impossible due to limitations by society and
government.

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Works Cited
Fast Facts. Fast Facts. Web. http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=372
Korten, David. When Bankers Rule the World. YES! Magazine. N.p., 29 March. 2012. Web. 09
Nov. 2015. <http:://www.yesmagazine.org/blogs/david-korten/when-bankers-rule-theworld>
Modern Times. Dir. Charlie Chaplin. Prod. Charlie Chaplin. By Charlie Chaplin. Perf. Charlie
Chaplin, Paulette Goddard, Henry Bergman, Stanley Sandford, Chester Conklin, Hank
Mann, and Allan Garcia. Mk2 Editions, 2003.
Ritholtz, Barry. Are You Not Feeling the Economic Recovery? This Could Be Why.
Washington Post. The Washington Post, n.d. Web.
<https:://www.washingtonpost.com/business/get-there/whether-youre-feeling-theeconomic-recover-relies-heavily-on-these-factors/2015/05/15/fc8d70fe-f8e0-11e4-9030b4732cawfe81_story.html>