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I completely disagree. My daughter bought a house, on her own, with a salary of $80,000 in South Salinas, when the market crashed, for $190,000. She got an FHA loan with 3.5% down, which wrapped the closing costs into the mortgage. She was working in Monterey, and could only afford Salinas. Her friends were too good for a Salinas address, but she saw the sense in buying instead of renting.
Several year later, she got a job in the Bay Area, and rented out the Salinas house, and bought another house in Oakland in the hills, but on the edge of a sketchy neighborhood, but she has a view. Bought it for $315,000. She was by then making $110,000/year. Again, she got an FHA loan with 3.5% down. FHA let her get another loan, and keep the rental, because it was so far from her last employer.
So, yes, it can be done. But, you don't get to work in Monterey and live n Carmel. You don't get to work in Berkeley and live in the Berkeley Hills.
And this was just a few years ago. Don't even think about saying, Oh things have changed since 3 years ago. So, move to Tracy. It can be done.
Well, first of all, I'm a "she."
30 years ago, okay that would be 1985. You're saying in 1985, anybody could afford to buy whatever they wanted, wherever they wanted, because the wages were so great.
In 1980, I was working in Bellingham, WA, as a single mother. I could only afford to buy a home in Sumas, WA. This was a 45 minute drive to Bellingham, on a good day. Of course, half the year, I would be dealing with ice and snow, so 45 minutes would turn into a lot longer, and a lot more stressful. And I did this with a sleeping child wrapped up in blankets in the back seat, because I was working a swing shift at a radio station, where I had to work 6 days a week. And for a woman, I was making a decent salary at the time.
There has never been a Shangri-La period in the U.S. You're using that as an excuse to sit on your butt and not do anything about it. So, sit on your butt and pay rent out the nose to live where you want to live.
Or, accept reality and move to somewhere you can afford.
You are the one defining the options here. If you are adamant that everyone in American should be able to afford the same piece of property, etc., then you are talking socialism and communism. That's not my answer. That's the option you have boxed yourself into.
We live in a capitalistic society. Supply and demand. If you can't play with the people who can afford to pay the going price, you have to move somewhere you can afford.
You figure out how to become someone with enough money to play, or you move somewhere cheaper.
Or you sit on your Mom's couch and eat her food and continue trying to convince her that she has to support you, because you have absolutely no other option on this earth.
I ain't buying your hard luck story. You get absolutely no sympathy from me.
$100,000 is not an average wage, it's quite a healthy salary. An "average wage" in California is closer to 55-60k about the same 20 years ago. During that time housing costs (including rent) have doubled and tripled. I'm sorry you don't get that. As far as your experiences "a few years ago" take a look at housing increases just in the past 12 months in some areas they have gone up over 30% in a year.
It disturbs me that you seem to think that people who want to discuss this very real problem are somehow whining or they are not as clever or hardworking as you and your daughter. I personally know plenty of people who have tried to do everything right; work hard, go to college, save money, etc. What they were not expecting was that they would be earning what their parents did 20 years ago but paying 3 times as much for rent or mortgage payments, and at the same time paying off tens of thousand in student loans. . Sorry you can't see the impact that is having on real people's lives.
I sort of got spanked by mutt for my initial response to you and thought that maybe I had over reacted, but in reading your latest post I think I was right on point.
Ok. You really just hit a point that I am tired of hearing from my own generation. What is so bad about the "pull yourself up from your bootstrap" mentality? That same mentality has led me from making $7.25 at Wal-Mart in Texas (five years ago) to where I am now about to finish my Ph.D. Why on earth would we want that type of mentality limited to just the baby-boomers?! Maybe it's the fact that we associate that mentality more with baby-boomers than us millennials that is the problem? Maybe it's because I work in schools where I see people my age every day that have little prospects, but also have no interest in EARNING prospects. My dad was a hippie. He dropped out of high school when he was 16 to go "live life." He had no prospects, and seemingly no future. It wasn't until he was 30 that he realized he could do better for himself, and started taking classes. He raised me to believe that this world will give me NOTHING, and if I just want to sit there accepting what I don't have then I will never have anything. Is California expensive? Yes. Is it worth it to live in California? That's up to you. How is it that we have become so demanding for what he have not earned for ourselves?!
Sorry. I'll get off my soapbox now.
jiloyd - I understand your perspective. And I agree that "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps" is fine. But I am always a bit of a contrarian to the concepts of "achievement" and "bettering yourself" as commonly defined.
Interesting to ponder why / how we humans have evolved to believe that our focus on the kind of education we have benchmarked as representing "achievement", and the kinds of careers we have benchmarked as "successful" are in any true sense meaningful.
You mention your father dropped out to become a "hippie". Sure, a lot of kids "drop out" to avoid the accepted framework and blueprint for a conforming life. Sometimes that is because they lack self confidence to compete.
But perhaps it is also because, somewhere inside, at subliminal levels of conscious processing, where we are asking ourselves to go, and what we ask ourselves to do in this great conformation, doesn't make sense.
I was no hippie, but I also dropped out in the 11th grade. Went to work in print shops. Joined the military. Volunteered for service in Vietnam. And during my years and tours of death and destruction, I "dropped out" all over again in new ways.
In the military I switched from drinking and whooping it up to smoking a bit of weed and dropping acid. I became mentally quieted. Simultaneously introspective and consciously expanded. When I got out of service I returned to a blue collar print graphics career, self employed mostly, running my own little shops. For the next 40 years.
I tell you this story now because: I never particularly "pulled myself up by my bootstraps" moving on to "achieve better things". I did, however, have loving relationships, friendships, the intense joy and fulfillment of raising a couple great kids, and now grandchildren, and a lifestyle that has satisfied me deeply and passionately: I love sailing and boating and I have lived on boats all these years. I consider myself very broadly self educated. And unconstrained as a product of my free style life.
This is all not to suggest everyone "tune in, turn on, and drop out". Rather I make the point that defining success and value as where a person rises to on a competitive life pyramid is a very narrow, and most often, self limiting paradigm to struggle in. No matter how hard how many try to rise to "pull themselves up by their bootstraps", through standard educational paths, through career climbing, through material acquisitions - there are always vastly more people left out than there are spaces higher and higher to fill.
That kind of "success", your kind of "success", is only achievable by a small minority. The kind of success found in self realization and pleasure in the intangible joys of simple living - is available to all.
I sort of got spanked by mutt for my initial response to you and thought that maybe I had over reacted, but in reading your latest post I think I was right on point.
Ah, sleepy. There are, we all know, folks who enjoy spankings. And those that enjoy giving them. But that wasn't my intent or meaning.
And I think I was correct in my interpretation of that particular part of NoSnow's post. She clarified it later when she wrote:
Quote:
Originally Posted by NoMoreSnowForMe
... you don't get to work in Monterey and live n Carmel. You don't get to work in Berkeley and live in the Berkeley Hills.
But I was only referring to that one issue. I think you are both expressing valid points beyond just that one statement.
Ah, sleepy. There are, we all know, folks who enjoy spankings. And those that enjoy giving them. But that wasn't my intent or meaning.
And I think I was correct in my interpretation of that particular part of NoSnow's post. She clarified it later when she wrote:
But I was only referring to that one issue. I think you are both expressing valid points beyond just that one statement.
I understand, but I don't think the discussion ever was about people having unreasonable expectations about what they can afford. It is about ordinary working people who are realizing they probably will never be able to buy a home and might well have difficulty finding anything to rent other than a shed in someone's backyard. To morph it into an argument such as the one Snow makes which seems to be that those who can only afford Salinas should not whine about not being able to live in Monterey is insulting and misses the point. And the problem with growing wage disparity is not something that only affects California, it is happening pretty much everywhere- it's just exacerbated in parts of California. If this trend continues with no commensurate increase in wages or drop in housing costs the results will not serve any of us well. We depend upon public sector employees to teach our kids, sweep our streets and put out fires. A growing number of those employees can no longer afford to live in the areas where they work and rather than suck it up and put up with a 2 hour commute to SF or Marin County they will simply work elsewhere.
Our main beef with each other is that you guys believe the state of the world is some natural cause and effect of different factor working in the market. That's a very right wing thing to think which is why you guys couch your rhetoric in vapid and empty smug moral platitudes about gettin' her done and "personal responsibility". You guys think the system is near perfect and so the entire onus just falls on the individual hence the lack of empathy for those with "excuses". Mix that all together with a little mini-success story in which y'all think your middle management job or small business is akin to being a character out of an Ayn Rand novel, so self made, that you snidely think that if you could do it so could anyone. That very narrow limited way of thinking that doesn't offer any room to understand the different eras in our economic history, leads to an utter ignorance of thought. For instance, I once had a baby boomer tell me that his grandpa did well for himself in the early twenties what's your excuse, he didn't need a New Deal. LOL. Only a baby boomer would think like that. I'm sorry NoSnow but your generation is that gullible.
I on the other hand think out nation is just as much policy driven as it is dominated by market forces. I don't subscribe to the belief that we live in a society fundamentally driven by market forces. That's why we have regulations and minimum wage, etc. So that means in my scenario one can hope outside of the forces that are out of their control. One can volunteer, donate private for initiatives to improve wages and affordable housing in my area. The little initiatives you wouldn't think would be important soon start to reach city councils like they are in Seattle. There's one here in LA county. On the national level you support progressive candidates like elizabeth warren or Bernie sanders.
So that's my way of "not complaining". I take my personal grievences to the ballot box while at the same time bettering myself by taking the personal initiative to seek out better opportunities. I make a great salary and am rising in my company. I have no real complaints like the working struggling families out there, I'm living the typical yuppie life. So I don't see how you think I'm complaining and not doing? So just cus I don't make 200k yet I'm not doing any fixing? See how your moral smugness just ends up in tatters when you really think about it, NoSnow.
There is one fact you guys cannot deny, that wages have remained stagnant while production, profits and prices have risen. You guys cannot wiggle out of that. All you guys say is, well it is how it is buddy, because to y'all the issue merely economical, can't change it. I think its political, and yes you can.
Our main beef with each other is that you guys believe the state of the world is some natural cause and effect of different factor working in the market. That's a very right wing thing to think which is why you guys couch your rhetoric in vapid and empty smug moral platitudes about gettin' her done and "personal responsibility". You guys think the system is near perfect and so the entire onus just falls on the individual hence the lack of empathy for those with "excuses". Mix that all together with a little mini-success story in which y'all think your middle management job or small business is akin to being a character out of an Ayn Rand novel, so self made, that you snidely think that if you could do it so could anyone. That very narrow limited way of thinking that doesn't offer any room to understand the different eras in our economic history, leads to an utter ignorance of thought. For instance, I once had a baby boomer tell me that his grandpa did well for himself in the early twenties what's your excuse, he didn't need a New Deal. LOL. Only a baby boomer would think like that. I'm sorry NoSnow but your generation is that gullible.
I on the other hand think out nation is just as much policy driven as it is dominated by market forces. I don't subscribe to the belief that we live in a society fundamentally driven by market forces. That's why we have regulations and minimum wage, etc. So that means in my scenario one can hope outside of the forces that are out of their control. One can volunteer, donate private for initiatives to improve wages and affordable housing in my area. The little initiatives you wouldn't think would be important soon start to reach city councils like they are in Seattle. There's one here in LA county. On the national level you support progressive candidates like elizabeth warren or Bernie sanders.
So that's my way of "not complaining". I take my personal grievences to the ballot box while at the same time bettering myself by taking the personal initiative to seek out better opportunities. I make a great salary and am rising in my company. I have no real complaints like the working struggling families out there, I'm living the typical yuppie life. So I don't see how you think I'm complaining and not doing? So just cus I don't make 200k yet I'm not doing any fixing? See how your moral smugness just ends up in tatters when you really think about it, NoSnow.
There is one fact you guys cannot deny, that wages have remained stagnant while production, profits and prices have risen. You guys cannot wiggle out of that. All you guys say is, well it is how it is buddy, because to y'all the issue merely economical, can't change it. I think its political, and yes you can.
You must spread some reputation around before giving it to radiolibre99 again
Now, I'm gonna ramble on a bit more on this topic of who gets what. I'm going to use NoMoreSnow as an example since a few folks are objecting to her opinions on this topic. I'm not defending her, I don't think she needs anyone to come to her defense. She's just a great example of this whole business of who deserves to get what and who should accept what for reality.
Having read a number of posts by NoMoreSnow over the past year, I have assembled a picture of a woman who has a decent education, is articulate, has professional skills that have worked for her at reasonably accomplished levels by society's standards. Yet she has also found herself falling into increasing poverty-level-existence. She raised a kid or two as a single mother working plenty of long hard hours. And sacrificed in all the ways typical of these common situations.
Now then, NoSnow has no real estate to call her own after all her education, work, struggles, conformation to society, and sacrifices. And she's reached retirement age range. Her ability to continue competing in California's economy has all but disappeared.
Yet, she loves California. She's tried other places but this is home.
What has she done? Cried in her beer?
Nope.
Wailed and ranted about how crappy California has become?
Nope.
Angrily protested how things need to change to accommodate her and everyone like her?
Nope.
She has studied her options and enrolled in programs for assisted housing - which programs offer her support in smaller communities away from what is considered the vibrant California coastal urban core areas.
She moved to Redding. With mixed feelings. Ultimately decided she couldn't handle that climate.
Rather than despair, she kept working her realistic options and has now moved to Crescent City. (Which town I mercilessly make fun of.) So far, she reports she loves it!
The point I wish to make, though, goes deeper than her simple practical path of accepting reality:
NoMoreSnow, through all of her posts - including rants and cracks that some like and others don't - including points she presents that I disagree with some of the time - she is clearly loving life. She is, in fact, apparently having a blast: driving around in her old beater with her little dog visiting beaches and redwood forests, and finding new discoveries, from places to thrill at nature and places to shop for bargains.
THAT, readers, is what I call a successful life.
Regardless of my disagreements with a number of her opinions, NoMoreSnow exemplifies what is achievable by anyone open enough to quit moping and kvetching long enough to take a walk on the beach with a good dog.
Sleepy and radio - I do understand the points you are each trying to make here. Your observations about how our state, and nation, are devolving economically for the middle class, are essentially correct. It is hard to swallow after being conditioned for life that the middle class American dream is the ultimate achievement.
I wish to make two points in my recent posts, neither of which are denying your observations.
1) We all are, like it or not, on a return path to a sadly neo-feudalist world controlled by a VERY small percentage of wealthy manipulators. But this isn't really a new thing. This is the way the world has been since the dawn of agriculture 10,000 years past. The brief window of a rising middle class has only existed for less than a couple hundred years in which this "dream" portrait was painted. And for all your noble desire to stand up and vote to change things - and it is noble of you to care and try - you might as well pee into the wind on the deck of a ship in a gale at sea and hope to not wet yourself.
2) In spite of the sad vanishment of the dream, personal fulfillment outside the box is always available.
Tulemutt, your assessment of NoSnow aside. You really think people can't just acknowledge that things are tougher and people have been given the short end of the stick, AND better their lot?
Why does it have to be one or the other? Is this a self help guru philosophy that if you think "negatively" like that you won't be successful? Because that to me, striving while NOT understanding the economic and political reality we live in is a bit delusional. You'll run on your hamster wheel while the people at the top change things around to make things harder for you but you'll so smugly think in your head that, "I'm tough, give me anything, take away social security, relocate the jobs in my area, don't raise wages, I'm a tough American who doesn't complain!"
Tulemutt, your assessment of NoSnow aside. You really think people can't just acknowledge that things are tougher and people have been given the short end of the stick, AND better their lot?
Why does it have to be one or the other? Is this a self help guru philosophy that if you think "negatively" like that you won't be successful? Because that to me, striving while NOT understanding the economic and political reality we live in is a bit delusional. You'll run on your hamster wheel while the people at the top change things around to make things harder for you but you'll so smugly think in your head that, "I'm tough, give me anything, take away social security, relocate the jobs in my area, don't raise wages, I'm a tough American who doesn't complain!"
That's not commendable that just being a tool.
What I think is: a person can indeed always strive to "better" themselves relative to any standard they choose to use. But that, no matter how hard they strive, they might well not be able to achieve their goals. And that a re-examination of their goals might be valuable if they want to find fulfillment in life.
And, by the way, I do not think that things have gotten tougher in any real comparison of history. No. Pilgrims and wagon trains come to mind. As do slaves and serfs working fields for the nobility of the Dark Ages. Etc.
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But that wasn't my intent or meaning.
