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A broken system will eventually collapse and have a reset. Higher education costs, healthcare costs, debt levels, lack of personal responsibility/accountability, government waste (all sides), etc. The overall system has been trending down for some time now. Best you can do is prepare by avoiding debt, having a relevant employable skill-set that is in demand, and try to live in a lower COL area. It surprises me how many working professionals I know that are obsessed with their high salary, but live in a very high COL area and are barely taking anything home at the end of the day.
My wife has never worked, all by design (raise our son was/is her job). I make less than $125k, have a very nice 4 bedroom house (2400sqft/on about an acre, all brick built in 2004), 2 cars, and the list goes on.
I put money away every month....live with our means and we still get just about everything we need (notice I said need, not want, with some wants in there)....
...and if you lived in the big a large coastal city, a home like yours would be worth about a one million dollars, and you on your $125k income would be desperately trying to make the mortgage and property tax payments.
Your anecdote is in complete denial of actual reality of why most families are struggling. But, who am I to expect anyone on the internet to examine actual facts, statistics, numbers. Everything is about how they "feel" or how they perceive things around them, and usually then interpreted in a way that makes them feel superior to someone else. It's sad how thick headed people can be.
My anecdote is this: My dad had junior college education, managed to get a job that supported owning a home, 2 cars that we kept for 10 years, a new TV every 10 years. He paid for most of mine and my siblings state college tuition (which was relative peanuts). He had a pension in a private company. He had 5+ weeks of vacation, cheap medical coverage. My mom only worked part time when we got older and she got bored. A solid, middle class lifestyle with no higher education.
Move forward 30+ years, my wife and I both have graduate level educations, we are in the top 5% of US earners combined. We lead a more upper middle class lifestyle then I did growing up, but considering we are both working and have graduate level educations we are really only a notch above where my family was. I keep my cars for 8-10 years. Little difference there. I still have the spendthrift mentality of my dad, but I'm well aware that a $500 TV purchase that represents .22% of our income has very little material impact compared to: Health insurance for $5K a year that's increasing beyond pay increases, property taxes going up the same, car insurance, utilities, and the GIANT LOOMING BURDEN of college education, even state schools, at $20K+ per year per kid. We'll be fine, I'll be retiring in 10 years no problem and everything will be paid. This isn't about ME (try it some time), I'm thinking about the family making $80K in my area...with kids..."middle class" going through hell just to make ends meet. The guy who could have been my dad 30 years ago.
But you have to really have blinders on..complete myopia, single minded narcissistic purpose to pat yourself on the back to not see how things have changed for the worse.
It's because looking at these facts conflicts with their narrative. No matter how you cut it, Americans are significantly worse off than they were 50 years ago. Better get used to it, because it is only going to get worse.
Why can´t most families live on single income anymore?
Because back when most families lived on a single income, they were in small apartments or 1,300 square foot houses with no air conditioning, a small furnace, and a fireplace. And they either had one simple car or they took buses. And they wore Keds, jeans that would last years, one jacket for winter, hats they knit themselves, Mom made the girls' dresses etc. And the phone was a simple device with a dial that sat in the kitchen or living room. And the fanciest utensils in the house were a toaster, a glass percolator, a hand-cranked meat grinder, hand-cranked pencil sharpener, and maybe a 15" black&white television. And steak was a VERY rare item on the menu, meatloaf was more common, pancakes and oatmeal and homemade bread more usual.
Today people whose Dads did the same work as before and produced the same value, now demand a separate $60/mo phone for each family member above 10 years old, $300 sneakers, boutique jeans chemically treated to look 20 years old that yesteryear's families would have (finally) thrown in the trash, a 2,000+ sf house with air conditioning that costs hundreds to run in the summer, two or three cars with fuel injection, thousands of dollars worth of airbags, beams in the doors, superurethane bumpers, and stereos that would power a rock concert. Some of those features are actually good and increase safety... but they aren't free. Three 56" televisions, $200/mo in cable bills, home wi-fi, enough kitchen appliances to sink a battleship... and a government larger than the entire U.S. Army from WWII. All supposed to be supported by Dad's same level job from 60+ years ago.
Catch my drift here?
The question isn't why we can't get by on one income. The question is how we manage to make do with only two, or more.
Yes, it does affect your point about the Sears catalog. You were trying to make the point that electronics were more expensive back in the day and took a larger share of the family income. Because today we can buy a cheap flat screen for $500.
However, the cheap flat screen is comparable to the cheap 19" TV, from back in the day. Whereas the expensive TVs you were referring to in the catalog, are equivalent to the $3,000+ 4K TVs, not the $500 entry level flat screen.
The standard in my neighborhood growing up was a 25 inch console. The standard in my neighborhood now is a 65 inch LED. Those are $1K and under. A $3K TV now is equivalent to giant projection screen tvs from the 80's...those cost a lot more than 24 inch consoles.
To do this exercise you actually have to try to be OBJECTIVE.
Why can´t most families live on single income anymore?
Because back when most families lived on a single income, they were in small apartments or 1,300 square foot houses with no air conditioning, a small furnace, and a fireplace. And they either had one simple car or they took buses. And they wore Keds, jeans that would last years, one jacket for winter, hats they knit themselves, Mom made the girls' dresses etc. And the phone was a simple device with a dial that sat in the kitchen or living room. And the fanciest utensils in the house were a toaster, a glass percolator, a hand-cranked meat grinder, hand-cranked pencil sharpener, and maybe a 15" black&white television. And steak was a VERY rare item on the menu, meatloaf was more common, pancakes and oatmeal and homemade bread more usual.
Today people whose Dads did the same work as before and produced the same value, demand a separate $60/mo phone for each family member above 10 years old, $300 sneakers, boutique jeans chemically treated to look 13 years old that yesteryear's families would have (finally) thrown in the trash, a 2,000+ sf house with air conditioning that costs hundreds to run in the summer, two or three cars with fuel injection, thousands of dollars worth of airbags, beams in the doors, superurethane bumpers, stereos that would power a rock concert. Three 56" televisions, $200/mo in cable bills, home wi-fi, enough kitchen appliances to sink a battleship... and a government larger than the entire U.S. Army from WWII. All supposed to be supported by Dad's same level job from 60+ years ago.
The question isn't why we can't get by on one income. The question is how we manage to make do with only two, or more.
Catch my drift here?
Not reading anyone posts that conflict with your narrative, apparently.
I think that is exaggerating a little. Most middle class families had comfy lives for the time period. They didn't need cell phones or internet because it wasn't real then. They did dream of a space age future, this dream wasn't chaotic or degenerate as the reality is turning out to be - it was more Star Trek and less and Porn Hub and gaming addiction. Things are leaning more toward the dystopian sci-fi of that time than their fantasies of a better world for everyone as a result of technological progress. I don't think they foresaw a future where one income households would be so difficult to achieve, things were supposed to get easier with tech.
It does seem like the wealthy, not just the billionaire level wealthy but upper middle class is hogging a lot of resources and pricing everyone else out. I think we are raising nervous, uber competitive kids that have to keep pushing themselves to keep up. Now competing globally to make it even more difficult. Yes they expect luxuries for this hard work, but sometimes this pressure takes its toll on happiness and quality of life. And it affects how our society works, if you are not a winner, you are a loser. Very little middle ground anymore. Scary.
The affordability for the middle class family to even live in the same cities as the parents and grandparents is slipping. For example, middle class income earners who work in San Francisco, can no longer afford to actually live there. The same goes for many big cities, they are becoming places where a person earning a median family income can longer afford to live in.
I don’t know why people are sending their children to expensive universities they can’t afford.
A flagship in-state public university usually costs much less then a private university or an out of state university. You have to be smart about these things or otherwise you end up spending a whole lot of money for no reason.
I AM talking about public schools. A private school is 40k+ a year, not 20. My god....
Only you were smart enough to figure out that state schools are better deals. You should write a book, "smart dad, dumb dad".
I don’t know why people are sending their children to expensive universities they can’t afford.
A flagship in-state public university usually costs much less then a private university or an out of state university. You have to be smart about these things or otherwise you end up spending a whole lot of money for no reason.
Uh, a public university in most states...a decent one...will still cost 20K or more all told with room and board and tuition and books. Maybe more. Grad school even more. And without grad school, a decent income is much more difficult.
So, yeah, maybe they will get by with only 150K in debt instead of 200 or 250K. Then they can default on that.
In 1990 a private college was 30K just for tuition. These days it is closer to a total of 50K for a good one.
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