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What makes me upset is that the economic realities do not match what is taught in large swaths of America. We are taught (at least in my community, and I am 30

What makes me upset is that the economic realities do not match what is taught in large swaths of America. We are taught (at least in my community, and I am 30 now still living within 20 miles of where I grew up) that a very achievable ideal is a middle class existence with one parent working, and a small house in the suburbs. I am in the top 1% income earners for my generation and do not even come close to this. I think it's important for young parents to start breaking this cliche that economic prosperity is an American standard. Instead we should be teaching that life is hard and you should count your lucky stars if you are able to afford anymore more than an apartment.

refurb 10y ago
very achievable ideal is a middle class existence with one parent working, and a small house in the suburbs I guess it depends where? There is a large swath of the mid-West where this is true. Near a big city? Probably not.
rubidium 10y ago
You must be exaggerating or living in New York/San Fran. Here in the midwest is is very reasonable for a top 20% income for 30 yr old age bracket to have only one parent work. If you're top 1% you can definitely afford a house in the suburbs and have one parent stay home.
- sp332 10y ago
  Living near NYC/SF does include "large swaths of America".
  - kevinstubbs 10y ago
    I guess it depends how you define "large swath". Is it a certain amount of landmass or population, a percent of total landmass or population, or some other metric? I think this line is needlessly pedantic. It's reasonable to interpret rubidium's comment as just meaning "the expensive housing in the NY and SF areas are too expensive to be feasible for top 20% earners, as the OP said, but by and large, a middle class existence is possible for most land in America." Population centers with expensive housing may be inaccessible for the regular middle class (when top 20% income earner means only 60k/year or so based on 2010 data[0]). This isn't really the right data to use, because the pay for people in SF is different than say, somewhere in Missouri. With that being said, it seems clear that the American dream of a middle-class existence with only one working adult, isn't realistic everywhere for everyone. I might be meandering here, but I think this reasoning is actually flawed or biased, because it was never true to begin with. A factory worker could never afford to live in the upscale street, right? The only difference now is that instead of a factory worker not being able to live on the upscale street, there are whole neighborhoods, downtown areas, and maybe even suburbs that are unaffordable to a typical middle-class family. I haven't looked for data to support these ideas, and am very open to points for and against. [0]: http://whatsmypercent.com/ http://whatsmypercent.com/
- flukus 10y ago
  In more affordable places are there a lot of jobs that would put you in that 20%?
  - Broken_Hippo 10y ago
    I'm from Indiana - and that is exactly the problem. Sure, housing is affordable. But wages are a fair amount lower and a fair amount of jobs are low-paying. This is really a major problem with people looking at economic recovery - wages haven't caught up for a fair amount of folks. That all said, it might actually be easier to get to that 'dream' if you plan correctly and are willing to let a few things go: Alternatively, for some it might not be a choice because of the costs of childcare and transportation.
- was_boring 10y ago
  I live about 30-40 miles outside of D.C. The only people I know who have a house earn significantly more, or are dual income top-tier earning households.
djKianoosh 10y ago
>> I am in the top 1% income earners for my generation and do not even come close to this. what? how is that even possible? what are your debts? how long have you been in the top 1%? something doesnt add up. most of the people I know are making way more than their parents, and are able to move out of big metro areas and live in the suburbs just fine.
- vvanders 10y ago
  The tech sector is this nice bubble where we've seen lots of economic prosperity. If you look at the statistics you'll see that's not the case for a large swath of America.
  - aetherson 10y ago
    Top 1% of income for a 30 year old (in the USA, in 2016) is, per this calculator, $188,000. https://dqydj.com/income-percentile-by-age-calculator/ https://dqydj.com/income-percentile-by-age-calculator/ In overwhelmingly most parts of the country, that's plenty of money to own a house and support a family.
    - AbrahamParangi 10y ago
      The people earning that much are (very) disproportionately distributed in those areas which are also the least affordable.
      - dsfyu404ed 10y ago
        That's what the market in those locations will bear. Rich people, high prices. It's no different than a tourism economy.
    - was_boring 10y ago
      Generation isn't the same as age. Being 30 means I'm part of the "millennial" generation which only takes $106,500 to be in the top 1%.
branchless 10y ago
Life is not hard for the rentiers extracting labour for your right to exist in said apartment. Where is all your labour going? Food? No. Transport? No. Energy? No. Rent? Bingo. Why is this happening? Because we came off the gold standard and there is no limit to the expansion of fiat money, therefore it expands via mortgage lending to mop up all productivity gains. Get the women out to work! Land prices up. Efficiency gains? Land prices up. We bid for land. The more we have available after basic living costs the more we can pass over to the rentiers. We need land value tax to suppress rentier activity.
- nsxwolf 10y ago
  A lot of us landlords barely cover the mortgage with how much we can charge in rent. We don't simply get to increase prices and expect tenants to keep paying.
  - branchless 10y ago
    But at the end of it you get a free house for hardly any labour. Yes you have to do a bit now and again but it's hardly a full time job that your tenants have to do to cover your mortgage. I never understand why you guys are doing it if you don't gain. You are doing it because it is easy money, an easy way to extract labour. What are you expecting anyway in terms of an ongoing income stream from this endeavor? It's very low skill, to borrow you need a pulse and a job. To administer you need basic numeracy. Hardly any labour required, certainly not skilled. Sounds like minimum wage for the basic admin required, so what, a few hours a month? The only "value" here is the ability to borrow to exert monopoly control over other wage earners in order to force them to give you a portion of their labour. That is the main ingredient in the majority of cases. Yes we need a rental sector but as I said it's low skill and the rewards should reflect this instead of dividing society into have and have-nots.
    - Hondor 10y ago
      The rewards roughly do reflect this. Ordinary investing isn't clearly better or worse than investing in property. The problem is that ordinary investing requires many years of self discipline while paying a mortgage has the bank holding a stick over you to keep you from wasting your income on lattes and holidays.
brandonmenc 10y ago
> We are taught that a very achievable ideal is a middle class existence with one parent working I'm pushing 40 (upbringing: United States, middle class, medium-sized city) and have never, ever heard of this dream of a single-income household.
- marssaxman 10y ago
  I am 40, and it was a nostalgic conservative thing among my parents' generation. For my parents and their fundamentalist subculture, it was almost a religious obligation, tied up in ideas about gender roles.
- dikdik 10y ago
  Where did you grow up? I'm more than a decade younger than you and grew up in a single income family, lots of children, solidly middle class, and neither of my parents had beyond a high school education. My dad was a straight C student through school and neither of my parents could help me with my math homework by the time I was in junior high...so hard working people, but not book smart by any means. Lots and lots of my school mates families were similar.
  - brandonmenc 10y ago
    Northwestern Pennsylvania. Rust belt, Great Lakes region. Anecdotally, more than half of my peers had both parents working. My mother and both grandmothers had jobs. The attitude was that two incomes are better than one in an age of economic uncertainty - an era that kicked in no later than the 70s.
greydius 10y ago
> we should be teaching that life is hard and you should count your lucky stars if you are able to afford anymore more than an apartment Interestingly, my father did his best to instill this lesson with his persistently defeatist and pessimistic outlook on everything. I now (in my 30s) make more than both of my parents combined.
thescriptkiddie 10y ago
One thing to consider is that a growing portion of Americans (perhaps a majority, soon) do not want the small house in the suburbs with a white picket fence, 2.33 kids, a stay at home mom, and a 50 minute commute that the baby boomers' parents wanted. People are starting to remember that the reason we created cities is that city living is desirable, and they are willing to pay a premium for that.
ryhamz 10y ago
No way you're top 1% when normalized to location.

refurb 10y ago

very achievable ideal is a middle class existence with one parent working, and a small house in the suburbs I guess it depends where? There is a large swath of the mid-West where this is true. Near a big city? Probably not.

rubidium 10y ago

You must be exaggerating or living in New York/San Fran. Here in the midwest is is very reasonable for a top 20% income for 30 yr old age bracket to have only one parent work. If you're top 1% you can definitely afford a house in the suburbs and have one parent stay home.

sp332 10y ago
Living near NYC/SF does include "large swaths of America".
- kevinstubbs 10y ago
  I guess it depends how you define "large swath". Is it a certain amount of landmass or population, a percent of total landmass or population, or some other metric? I think this line is needlessly pedantic. It's reasonable to interpret rubidium's comment as just meaning "the expensive housing in the NY and SF areas are too expensive to be feasible for top 20% earners, as the OP said, but by and large, a middle class existence is possible for most land in America." Population centers with expensive housing may be inaccessible for the regular middle class (when top 20% income earner means only 60k/year or so based on 2010 data[0]). This isn't really the right data to use, because the pay for people in SF is different than say, somewhere in Missouri. With that being said, it seems clear that the American dream of a middle-class existence with only one working adult, isn't realistic everywhere for everyone. I might be meandering here, but I think this reasoning is actually flawed or biased, because it was never true to begin with. A factory worker could never afford to live in the upscale street, right? The only difference now is that instead of a factory worker not being able to live on the upscale street, there are whole neighborhoods, downtown areas, and maybe even suburbs that are unaffordable to a typical middle-class family. I haven't looked for data to support these ideas, and am very open to points for and against. [0]: http://whatsmypercent.com/ http://whatsmypercent.com/
flukus 10y ago
In more affordable places are there a lot of jobs that would put you in that 20%?
- Broken_Hippo 10y ago
  I'm from Indiana - and that is exactly the problem. Sure, housing is affordable. But wages are a fair amount lower and a fair amount of jobs are low-paying. This is really a major problem with people looking at economic recovery - wages haven't caught up for a fair amount of folks. That all said, it might actually be easier to get to that 'dream' if you plan correctly and are willing to let a few things go: Alternatively, for some it might not be a choice because of the costs of childcare and transportation.
was_boring 10y ago
I live about 30-40 miles outside of D.C. The only people I know who have a house earn significantly more, or are dual income top-tier earning households.

djKianoosh 10y ago

>> I am in the top 1% income earners for my generation and do not even come close to this. what? how is that even possible? what are your debts? how long have you been in the top 1%? something doesnt add up. most of the people I know are making way more than their parents, and are able to move out of big metro areas and live in the suburbs just fine.

vvanders 10y ago
The tech sector is this nice bubble where we've seen lots of economic prosperity. If you look at the statistics you'll see that's not the case for a large swath of America.
- aetherson 10y ago
  Top 1% of income for a 30 year old (in the USA, in 2016) is, per this calculator, $188,000. https://dqydj.com/income-percentile-by-age-calculator/ https://dqydj.com/income-percentile-by-age-calculator/ In overwhelmingly most parts of the country, that's plenty of money to own a house and support a family.
  - AbrahamParangi 10y ago
    The people earning that much are (very) disproportionately distributed in those areas which are also the least affordable.
    - dsfyu404ed 10y ago
      That's what the market in those locations will bear. Rich people, high prices. It's no different than a tourism economy.
  - was_boring 10y ago
    Generation isn't the same as age. Being 30 means I'm part of the "millennial" generation which only takes $106,500 to be in the top 1%.

branchless 10y ago

Life is not hard for the rentiers extracting labour for your right to exist in said apartment. Where is all your labour going? Food? No. Transport? No. Energy? No. Rent? Bingo. Why is this happening? Because we came off the gold standard and there is no limit to the expansion of fiat money, therefore it expands via mortgage lending to mop up all productivity gains. Get the women out to work! Land prices up. Efficiency gains? Land prices up. We bid for land. The more we have available after basic living costs the more we can pass over to the rentiers. We need land value tax to suppress rentier activity.

nsxwolf 10y ago
A lot of us landlords barely cover the mortgage with how much we can charge in rent. We don't simply get to increase prices and expect tenants to keep paying.
- branchless 10y ago
  But at the end of it you get a free house for hardly any labour. Yes you have to do a bit now and again but it's hardly a full time job that your tenants have to do to cover your mortgage. I never understand why you guys are doing it if you don't gain. You are doing it because it is easy money, an easy way to extract labour. What are you expecting anyway in terms of an ongoing income stream from this endeavor? It's very low skill, to borrow you need a pulse and a job. To administer you need basic numeracy. Hardly any labour required, certainly not skilled. Sounds like minimum wage for the basic admin required, so what, a few hours a month? The only "value" here is the ability to borrow to exert monopoly control over other wage earners in order to force them to give you a portion of their labour. That is the main ingredient in the majority of cases. Yes we need a rental sector but as I said it's low skill and the rewards should reflect this instead of dividing society into have and have-nots.
  - Hondor 10y ago
    The rewards roughly do reflect this. Ordinary investing isn't clearly better or worse than investing in property. The problem is that ordinary investing requires many years of self discipline while paying a mortgage has the bank holding a stick over you to keep you from wasting your income on lattes and holidays.

brandonmenc 10y ago

> We are taught that a very achievable ideal is a middle class existence with one parent working I'm pushing 40 (upbringing: United States, middle class, medium-sized city) and have never, ever heard of this dream of a single-income household.

marssaxman 10y ago
I am 40, and it was a nostalgic conservative thing among my parents' generation. For my parents and their fundamentalist subculture, it was almost a religious obligation, tied up in ideas about gender roles.
dikdik 10y ago
Where did you grow up? I'm more than a decade younger than you and grew up in a single income family, lots of children, solidly middle class, and neither of my parents had beyond a high school education. My dad was a straight C student through school and neither of my parents could help me with my math homework by the time I was in junior high...so hard working people, but not book smart by any means. Lots and lots of my school mates families were similar.
- brandonmenc 10y ago
  Northwestern Pennsylvania. Rust belt, Great Lakes region. Anecdotally, more than half of my peers had both parents working. My mother and both grandmothers had jobs. The attitude was that two incomes are better than one in an age of economic uncertainty - an era that kicked in no later than the 70s.

greydius 10y ago

> we should be teaching that life is hard and you should count your lucky stars if you are able to afford anymore more than an apartment Interestingly, my father did his best to instill this lesson with his persistently defeatist and pessimistic outlook on everything. I now (in my 30s) make more than both of my parents combined.

thescriptkiddie 10y ago

One thing to consider is that a growing portion of Americans (perhaps a majority, soon) do not want the small house in the suburbs with a white picket fence, 2.33 kids, a stay at home mom, and a 50 minute commute that the baby boomers' parents wanted. People are starting to remember that the reason we created cities is that city living is desirable, and they are willing to pay a premium for that.

ryhamz 10y ago

No way you're top 1% when normalized to location.