Back then you probably couldn’t afford even a horse, plus if your feet got a little scratch while walking you might have just died of infection a week later. Come on, any claim that antiquity had better living standards is absurd on its face.

Clearly the living standards were better, but I imagine there definitely were less things considered to be chores. Gathering food hardly gets boring if you're hungry.

That said I highly doubt if that's a preferable state of affairs.

Driving to work doesn't fit with the others--it can be replaced with riding the subway to work. The automotive status quo is tragedy and farce.

I find taking the bus to work quite relaxing. I can put on my noise cancelling headphones and rest for the whole trip