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There's a great graphic that shows what goods/services are more and less expensive now vs 1998. https://cdn.howmuch.net/articles/price-changes-in-usa-in-past-2

There's a great graphic that shows what goods/services are more and less expensive now vs 1998. https://cdn.howmuch.net/articles/price-changes-in-usa-in-past-20-years-947e.jpg https://cdn.howmuch.net/articles/price-changes-in-usa-in-pas... TVs are definitely more affordable, but Hospital Services and College is really not. Somewhat surprisingly it looks like Housing is more affordable (rising, but less than average earnings). I think these longitudinal studies of the wage/cost relationships are really valuable as they provide a lot of insight into what people feel about the economy and where things are going.

lotsofpulp 8y ago
Income, potential to increase income, and income security is so location dependent, that I don't think one can easily compare housing costs throughout the years. The places that are expected to grow in the future have rapidly increasing housing costs, whereas the places that are expected to decline have shrinking housing costs.
nickjj 8y ago
I'd like to see that same graph but going back to 1980. Back in the early 80s you could buy a house in an expensive state (NY) for about 50-60k but today a similar house goes for around 400k. But a lot of people in the 80s and early 90s made equal or more money than they do today, like a legit dollar for dollar amount more. Certain industries paid 35k-40k a year back then but pay 30-35k today, which is a massive difference considering how much more things are today than back in the 80s.