Fascinating thing about america 50 years ago was it seemed to work 24/7. In Finlandia it was illegal to work after 16:00. Then we got a nazi government who decided that small shops and kiosks can extend their hours upto 18:00.
Worst thing was that there was no bank services outside 8:00-16:00. This was a blessing sort of, because Finland was the only country you could get bank services with a modem in 1970's. In 1983 you could do exactly all banking with your own Teletype. This included realtime stock exchange and that modern scheiße.
At least HN's downvoting team works 24/7.
Excellent.
"Seemed" meaning through the media you watched while living in Finland? And you think that gives a good representative view of what the US was like in the 1970s? The news and shows you watched from the US were mostly made in large cities in California and New York.
Parts of the US in the 1970s certainly had blue laws similar to what you mention.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_laws_in_the_United_States mentions that "Maine was the last New England state to repeal laws that prohibited department stores from opening on Sundays. The laws against the department stores opening on Sundays were ended by referendum in 1990." and that in North Dakota it wasn't until 1991 that most business were allowed to be open on Sunday, and 1988 for Virginia.
For that matter, TV stations would stop broadcasting during the late night, with about 6 hours of dead air, not the 24/7 of modern stations. Fall asleep watching Carson and you might be woken up by the national anthem played just before shutdown.
No doubt your exaggerations cause the downvotes. It was not illegal to work after 16:00, even in Finland. Who ran the restaurants? The buses? The power company? The phones? The hospitals? The hotels?
This 1979 travel guide for US tourists, at https://archive.org/details/fieldingseurope10000fiel/page/28... , says shopping hours in Finland (or at least Helsinki) at that time were "Weekdays, 8:30 A.M. to 5 P.M., plus 8 P.M. on Monday and Friday; Saturday 8:30 A.M. to 4 P.M. in winter, with 3 P.M. closings in summer."
A long time ago my retort when someone would claim California's government was oppressive was; I can walk into the grocery store Sunday morning and buy hard liquor.
Erh. What? I bicycled across America in 1984. Never seen in any other country that a food store can be open at midnight.
As regards 1979 Finland, this was far after beforementioned reforms. I remember I almost died
on a 100km sunday trip in 1966. Not even kiosks were open in Porvoo. I drank water from a ditch and got instant diarré. Fainted couple of times, but some trucker eventually saved me.
A few pages earlier, it says hairdressers are generally open 8AM to 5PM.
It seems like a pretty good nightlife scene. On page 412, "Always go late to savor Helsinki nightlight (except to Espilä which wraps up the evening at 1 A.M.) The gear shifts of merriment seldom mesh into overdrive before 11 P.M. - and from then onward, they're off and racing."
Earlier on the same page it also mentions "Prayer Sundays" - four Sundays of the year where there is no public entertainment between 6pm Saturday and 6pm Sunday.
Worst thing was that there was no bank services outside 8:00-16:00. This was a blessing sort of, because Finland was the only country you could get bank services with a modem in 1970's. In 1983 you could do exactly all banking with your own Teletype. This included realtime stock exchange and that modern scheiße.