I definitely expect the west to embrace fascism because that's the natural evolution of the capitalist system in a crisis. The problem the west has right now is that it allowed itself to be deindustrialized, and it's heavily dependent on the rest of the world for a lot of essentials. This problem doesn't really have an easy solution as you can't just flip a switch and create a domestic industrial economy out of the whole cloth. And as western influence continues to shrink the west will loose access to cheap commodities they've been extracting from the rest of the world. We're seeing a perfect example of this happening with Niger asserting its sovereignty and kicking France out. All of a sudden France lost access to effectively free uranium that it was robbing Niger of. Having to deal with other countries on equal terms means higher input prices for western industries, and that will only heighten the economic crisis.

In and out, a quick adventure.

Entirely likely unfortunately.

Yeah, it's not all lost yet for sure. The left really does need to shape up fast though. I think the key reason the right is becoming so popular is precisely because they were the only ones who took an anti war position from the start. The left shat the bed by aligning with liberals.

The most obvious way is that productive resources are being directed towards Ukraine rather then being invested domestically. For example, if a country chooses so open a factory to produce artillery shells instead of building hospitals, then this has an impact on the standard of living. The less direct impact comes from the economic war with Russia where western economies are starting see sever economic blowback. Europe in particular has seen a huge increase in energy prices, and this translates into the economic problems we're currently seeing. The rise of BRICS and dedollarization also have an impact as this shrinks dollar based economy.

How is our standaed of living connected to this war?

In the EU at least, believe me we're fucking feeling it (in energy and fuel prices, which are themselves impacting food prices, etc.). Though the war isn't the only factor of course.

I saw things immediately shoot up in price when I go out to get groceries. What might have cost me €20 just 2 years ago, often now steps above €30. The lack of Russian-produced foodstuffs (which were often cheaper) also means there's no competition.

In contrast, the wages have had less of an effect than trying to divert an EF-5 tornado with your jizz.

I wonder if destroying the nordstream pipelines and the cheap natural gas from Russia has any impact on the EU economy and electricity prices, and the resulting de-industrialization? How about the massive unprecedented sanctions on one of the largest resource exporters on Earth? How about the destruction of the grain production center of Europe and the associated infrastructure and ports? This is all not even taking into consideration the global de-dollarization move that is making non-western countries increasingly sovereign and able to resist western neo-colonialism, which increases prices for those in the core as it gets harder to extract from their colonies.

Oh yeah, and sending several hundred billion dollars to Ukraine to get blown up instead of using that money on domestic development. China could have made a thousand new factories with the money that the west has squandered in Ukraine.

gas prices went up $2/gal last year. they came down some over time, but i mean, there's an example