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Absolutely agreed that there are worse categories than your phone/internet/tv bills. And yet even this relatively small and apparently I Yunsignificant non-dis

Absolutely agreed that there are worse categories than your phone/internet/tv bills. And yet even this relatively small and apparently I Yunsignificant non-discretionary (or was some of it discretionary? Or all of it?) item still makes up 4.5% of your net income. That I still call significant. Once I have a house the inflation on that also doesn't affect me that much any more (sure, evaluations increase my tax bill - which btw is a NA thing that is irrelevant in Germany for example as long as you have a mortgage) but other items do.

lumost 6y ago
The underlying problem here is that one of our numbers must be wrong. The options I could see are 1. The marginal cost of housing has little to do with what individuals pay in the short-term. 2. The median income earner requires or will require substantial subsidies or raises to keep pace with the increased costs of their home. Roughly 3-4% per year assuming that housing is the only item inflating. 3. Either the median income, median rental, or tv+internet prices we've quoted are wildly off the mark. I'd bet that #2 is the correct interpretation of the statistics. While option 1 is possible, it hides low-quality substitutions and assumes that one can always make a substitution such as living with parents for longer.
- tharkun__ 6y ago
  All very fair points. I think one thing that makes a huge difference is whether you rent or own. There's obviously so many nuances to this all. I realize that we (or at least I am) also mixing up various things, even though I chose to quote a particular city's median income for the example. If you are renting and your rent goes up 10% that obviously has a large effect. If you have a house and rent goes up 10% you don't care at all. If rent goes up like that, it's probable that house/condo sale prices go up too and you have to pay more in taxes. I bet the increase in taxes makes a smaller hole in your pocket, though I might be completely wrong. But this also depends on whether we stick with the example or move on to other countries, where there's no such thing as separate municipal/school taxes or where rent control is in place.

lumost 6y ago

The underlying problem here is that one of our numbers must be wrong. The options I could see are 1. The marginal cost of housing has little to do with what individuals pay in the short-term. 2. The median income earner requires or will require substantial subsidies or raises to keep pace with the increased costs of their home. Roughly 3-4% per year assuming that housing is the only item inflating. 3. Either the median income, median rental, or tv+internet prices we've quoted are wildly off the mark. I'd bet that #2 is the correct interpretation of the statistics. While option 1 is possible, it hides low-quality substitutions and assumes that one can always make a substitution such as living with parents for longer.

tharkun__ 6y ago
All very fair points. I think one thing that makes a huge difference is whether you rent or own. There's obviously so many nuances to this all. I realize that we (or at least I am) also mixing up various things, even though I chose to quote a particular city's median income for the example. If you are renting and your rent goes up 10% that obviously has a large effect. If you have a house and rent goes up 10% you don't care at all. If rent goes up like that, it's probable that house/condo sale prices go up too and you have to pay more in taxes. I bet the increase in taxes makes a smaller hole in your pocket, though I might be completely wrong. But this also depends on whether we stick with the example or move on to other countries, where there's no such thing as separate municipal/school taxes or where rent control is in place.