Well, in non-Western societies one guy in the extended family is expected to get a good education (or alternatively be the biggest plunderer in the neighborhood) and support everyone who can claim the merest drop of blood relatedness.

They come here, they recognize at once that that onr guy's name is the welfare state.

But you know the very strange thing that's happening now in America? Both the communists and the re-emerging traditionalists are demonizing individuality; demanding conformity and submisison to a common good.

Our Founders, they were more genius than we can even comprehend. The enemies of liberty pop up where you least expect them.

But to your point about soft times--they breed malignant boredom too. It used to be that you had to be able to knit and whittle or else. Now we call essential life skills "hobbies" and good luck finding sets of grandmas and grandpas who can hand down practical talents. And you end up with a society choking because people just don't know what to do with their hands.