Individual presentation:
• Harriet Fraad:
The Impact of the Falling American Empire on US Personal and Family Life
(60 min)

Abstract:

The US Empire is declining. Our deficit, national debt, equals our entire GDP. The nation’s credit rating has slipped. We have lost our last three wars against poorer nations, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan which do not even have an Airforce. We are currently losing our proxy war in Ukraine. We are held at bay in our war against Iran. As the US Empire declines, personal support, such as family, romance, marriage and social connection, decline. The stable jobs and families white Americans experienced are transformed. That stability was never available for most Black Americans.

The presenter will look at the economic and social causes of US transformation in personal life, romance, marriage, family, work and social connections. She will emphasize the mutual causation and interaction of economic, social and personal life in America.

Marriage is now rejected primarily by women. Our population is declining as women opt out of bearing children as well.

These changes are global. They relate to the worldwide necessity of women working outside of the home as well as within it placing unbearable burdens of unpaid care work in the home and the necessity of paid work outside of the home. These developments are global; however, they have accelerated in the United States. Other nations have tried to create stability through powerful labor unions, multiple active political parties presenting choice of economic and political systems as well as different candidates. The nations reduce the devastating effects of some of those changes, but the changes remain.

Transformations in economic and personal life have particularly effected American men who commit virtually all our mass murders (98%) which happen more than once a week. swill also discuss new forms of personal and social life which may help Americans ameliorate some of the damage and create better personal, economic and social lives.

Keywords: American empire, capitalism, family life, gender roles, personal life, political economy, psychohistory, social psychology

Short Bio:

Harriet Fraad is a mental health counselor and hypnotherapist in practice in New York City. She is a founding member of the feminist movement and the journal Rethinking Marxism. For 40 years, she has been committed to transforming US personal and political life. Part of Harriet’s intellectual contribution is in the field of psychohistory. She proudly served as President of the International Psychohistorical Association (IPhA) for several years and published much her work in the Journal of Psychohistory. Harriet specializes in speaking and writing about topics in which psychology, economics, and politics overlap. These topics remain loaded with taboos, confusion, ignorance, and fear preventing us from asking big questions and daring to discuss big answers. By analyzing issues where psychology, economics, and politics collide, we can better analyze our society and our individuality as well.  htt(ps://www.harrietfraad.com/). Her current podcast is called “Capitalism Hits Home.” Her latest book co-authored by Stephen Resnick and Richard Wolff and edited by Graham Cassano is Class Struggle on the Home Front. She can be reached at .