more on this week's parsha, Torah portion of the week

I read in a couple of "parsha pages" that Joseph's "lowered status" is said to be seen from the beginning of this parsah, but the rabbis who wrote the page didn't explain how.
I'm certainly no rabbi, but I have no problem seeing it. Yes in the first words of the parsha, Bereishit, Genesis 47, 28, "And Jacob lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years..." The famine was to last seven years, and Jacob arrived about half way through, therefore he and the family and Joseph were still there over ten years after the famine was over, after Joseph's job was suppoed to be finished.
Nu, it's 17 years already when are we leaving? hint, hint
Nu, at least when I die you'll bring me back--maybe with the whole family--hint! hint!--bury me there at least! Swear to it! And we'll all go home together..... and you know, I also spent some time, getting professional advancement and wives and kids somewhere else, then I went home. Yes, that's when your mother died, and I buried her on the way, because we were already in the promised land,
nu, maybe it's time
Ok , Joseph promised to bury his father back in the cave, but he didn't take the hint;
he stayed, and didn't even ask to return when his father died, just asked to go for the funeral
and had to beg
so obviously
his status was less
he was already enslaved, so too the family
sometimes the jails are nice
but they're still jails