There was a lot of progress until quite recently. Current retirees saw truly mind boggling changes during their lives. My mother (born in the 1940s) grew up in a house with no electricity and no running water. Now she's retired and she can browse facebook on her mobile phone. My "father in law" bought his first house when he was in his twenties, paying cash with money saved from his first job. Their generation was not exploited and abused the way young people are today. They got to work less and less and managed to retire comfortably. Then political class broke their contract with voters and next generations are significantly worse off than previous ones (less intelligent as well) but a lot of people are still living comfortably enough not to complain. The way people participate in politics also changed. Polarization won over organization. Young people try to fight but without proper structures and strategy it quickly turns into violent lashing out and nothing is achieved. Is it going to change? Probably not. People in charge will keep exploiting divisions among us to further dismantle the system.