Taxes and death aside the only constant in life is change. It’s impossible to freeze a society or even one’s own life at a moment of perfect equilibrium. Nothing stands still.
Forty years ago Polaroid Eastman Kodak Olivetti and Smith Corona were blue-chip stocks; each maintained a dominant share in their respective markets. But today who buys film? And our kids have never even seen a typewriter.
Societies and nations are just the same: There is often no turning back the clock no matter how much we might wish to do so. In 1900 most Americans lived in rural areas and agriculture remained the most important occupation until well into the 20th century. The Jeffersonian ideal of the noble yeoman tilling the soil of his own land still had some relation to reality.
But as farming became mechanized and greater productivity around the world brought food prices down most family farms could no longer compete. Agribusiness grew but most of those who had earned their livelihood from the land moved to the cities.
