If you’re lucky, you have a companion with whom to share your misery.

The joy you once had for life has turned to drudgery and you wonder where you went wrong. The thing is, for most of us this is life now.

The weekly jaunts to a family restaurant: gone. Too expensive.

The desire to achieve greatness at work: that died with your youthful vigor.

Extended family: torn apart by tribalism.

A home to call your own: Only for the rich. 80% of Canadians believe ownership is now only for the wealth.

It wasn’t always like this. I can’t pinpoint when this all began, but it feels like everything started deteriorating at the turn of the century.

There are many causes and symptoms, but two deeply scarring events helped tip the West into decline. September 11th, 2001 cracked the veneer of trust within America. Enabled by new technologies, governments salivated at the ability to wrest control in the name of security. The surveillance state reached maturity.

The global financial crisis also gave us a peak behind the curtain of capitalism. It demonstrated how the winners and losers of capitalism were demarcated, with captains of industry bailed out while individuals were held to account. Wealth and power became inseparable, forging an impenetrable barrier beyond which most will never reach. The wealthy – still unhealthily revered by most – gained more control and extended the moat between them and the unwashed masses.

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