What was life like in 1980?

What was life like in the US for the year 1980?

• Answer:

  In 1980 the Gas/Energy crisis from 1979 was still in full swing. There were long lines at gas stations, and limits on how much gas you could buy (at least in parts of the country). This meant you couldn't travel much and had to stay close to home. Gas stations, instead of offering a choice between Regular and Premium, gave you a choice between 'regular' and 'unleaded' (leaded gas hadn't yet been completely phased out.) Full-service gas stations were still common. The Iran hostage crisis was in full swing, and that tended to dominate the news every night. Inflation was also still a big problem in 1980. Many advertisers advertised 'inflation-fighter specials', and whole ailses at the supermarket carried off-label brands like "Why Pay More?" and "Econ-o-buy" brand. ATMs were not yet ubiquitous In entertainment, videogames were fairly new form of entertainment, and home systems were still rather rare in 1980 (except for the b&w ones that could only play some form of Pong). VCRs were also new and rare. If you wanted to watch a movie you had go to the cinema (which typically only had two screens in 1980). Or wait months and months for it to show up on HBO, if you had that (also new at the time). Movies tended to stay in theaters for months at a time, unlike today where they are gone in weeks, and end up on DVD within 2 months of initial release. Computers in the home were still a novelty, and very limited in what they could do. TVs still had the rotary-dial channel dials (with 13 channels) and no remote. You usually had a choice between watching ABC, NBC, CBS and a few independent stations. The cable-channels we know today were just getting started. AM radio for music was still popular, and music-only stations had regular breaks for news. (very rare today) In music, Disco was still popular, and music in general had become rather stagnant, until MTV shook things up a couple of years later.