3 ms·

Turns out that "women can work" quickly devolved into "women must work". The curious part is that if you go further back in history, to when most of the populat

Turns out that "women can work" quickly devolved into "women must work". The curious part is that if you go further back in history, to when most of the population were peasant farmers, it was more the case of "everyone must work" (children too), and house work was nothing like today's. The average 1950's housewife did not have to kill chickens to make soup. Couple this with the fact that nowadays couples have less children in average and you start to get the picture. If now two people work (vs 1) to have one child (vs 5) that will get the same (vs better) quality of life than their parents then you have on average become poorer. I can't help but feel we have been duped.

dingnuts 3y ago
A lot of it is about lifestyle. The lifestyle you could have with one income in the 1950s would be a house that was tiny by today's standards, built shabbily, no HVAC, etc etc Anecdotally I know a family of five that survived on one income that is half of a common tech salary, while in a fairly high cost of living area. You know how they did it? Frugality, and sacrifice, of anything unnecessary. The mother keeps up the home and homeschools the kids. The dad learned to maintain cars by watching YouTube every time their old car broke down. Mom could've gotten a job, but they made a choice to sacrifice a more luxurious lifestyle for the ability to keep the kids out of public schools. It is a choice. It's just a choice most people don't want to make. They want the lifestyle that comes with two incomes, and the benefits of being a stay at home spouse, and it's just not realistic.
- darth_avocado 3y ago
  > It's just a choice most people don't want to make Buddy, in California, you need $208K of income to just QUALIFY for a mortgage for a median house. [1] No matter how much frugality people live in, most people won’t even come close to that number on a single income. Average car payments are $700+ a month and $500+ on used one. [2] Average cost of a 4 year attendance in a public college is $100k and for a private college it is $200k [3]. Average monthly premium for non subsidized health insurance for a family of 4 is around $1700, which drops to $500-$800/month with employer or state sponsored subsidies. [4] It’s very convenient to blame things on lifestyle, but the reality is that even the basics are way out of reach of a median household on single income. It ain’t the 50s anymore for a reason. [1] https://www.ocregister.com/2023/08/11/only-16-of-californians-can-afford-to-buy-home-as-mortgage-rates-rise/amp/ https://www.ocregister.com/2023/08/11/only-16-of-californian... [2] https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/auto-loans/average-monthly-car-payment#:~:text=The%20average%20monthly%20car%20loan,to%20credit%20reporting%20agency%20Experian https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/auto-loans/average-.... [3] https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college [4] https://www.anthem.com/individual-and-family/insurance-basics/health-insurance/cost-of-family-health-insurance#:~:text=Average%20Cost%20Of%20Family%20Health,four%20was%20%241%2C437%20per%20month https://www.anthem.com/individual-and-family/insurance-basic....
  - nataliste 3y ago
    (In California)
    - darth_avocado 3y ago
      Only the mortgage is from California, rest of the numbers are average in United States. People are still paying $1000 monthly payments for their trucks in Arkansas.
    - darth_avocado 3y ago
      Not really. Sure, the mortgage number is California specific, but it’s not much lower in the whole country and the rest of the numbers are for the whole country. You also should take a look at the BLS numbers I shared and you’d know it’s not pretty elsewhere either.
BillyTheMage 3y ago
I'd just like to point out that killing chickens for food is a very recent development. Chickens are usually egg factories. Only the (evil) modern industrial practices made chicken meat an viable food source.
- nataliste 3y ago
  What? Chicken as a meat has been depicted in Babylonian carvings from around 600 BC. Chicken was one of the most common meats available in the Middle Ages. For thousands of years, a number of different kinds of chicken have been eaten across most of the Eastern hemisphere, including capons, pullets, and hens. It was one of the basic ingredients in blancmange, a stew usually consisting of chicken and fried onions cooked in milk and seasoned with spices and sugar. In the United States in the 1800s, chicken was more expensive than other meats and it was sought by the rich, but by no means does this make meat-birds a novelty of CAFOs.

dingnuts 3y ago

A lot of it is about lifestyle. The lifestyle you could have with one income in the 1950s would be a house that was tiny by today's standards, built shabbily, no HVAC, etc etc Anecdotally I know a family of five that survived on one income that is half of a common tech salary, while in a fairly high cost of living area. You know how they did it? Frugality, and sacrifice, of anything unnecessary. The mother keeps up the home and homeschools the kids. The dad learned to maintain cars by watching YouTube every time their old car broke down. Mom could've gotten a job, but they made a choice to sacrifice a more luxurious lifestyle for the ability to keep the kids out of public schools. It is a choice. It's just a choice most people don't want to make. They want the lifestyle that comes with two incomes, and the benefits of being a stay at home spouse, and it's just not realistic.

darth_avocado 3y ago
> It's just a choice most people don't want to make Buddy, in California, you need $208K of income to just QUALIFY for a mortgage for a median house. [1] No matter how much frugality people live in, most people won’t even come close to that number on a single income. Average car payments are $700+ a month and $500+ on used one. [2] Average cost of a 4 year attendance in a public college is $100k and for a private college it is $200k [3]. Average monthly premium for non subsidized health insurance for a family of 4 is around $1700, which drops to $500-$800/month with employer or state sponsored subsidies. [4] It’s very convenient to blame things on lifestyle, but the reality is that even the basics are way out of reach of a median household on single income. It ain’t the 50s anymore for a reason. [1] https://www.ocregister.com/2023/08/11/only-16-of-californians-can-afford-to-buy-home-as-mortgage-rates-rise/amp/ https://www.ocregister.com/2023/08/11/only-16-of-californian... [2] https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/auto-loans/average-monthly-car-payment#:~:text=The%20average%20monthly%20car%20loan,to%20credit%20reporting%20agency%20Experian https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/auto-loans/average-.... [3] https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college [4] https://www.anthem.com/individual-and-family/insurance-basics/health-insurance/cost-of-family-health-insurance#:~:text=Average%20Cost%20Of%20Family%20Health,four%20was%20%241%2C437%20per%20month https://www.anthem.com/individual-and-family/insurance-basic....
- nataliste 3y ago
  (In California)
  - darth_avocado 3y ago
    Only the mortgage is from California, rest of the numbers are average in United States. People are still paying $1000 monthly payments for their trucks in Arkansas.
  - darth_avocado 3y ago
    Not really. Sure, the mortgage number is California specific, but it’s not much lower in the whole country and the rest of the numbers are for the whole country. You also should take a look at the BLS numbers I shared and you’d know it’s not pretty elsewhere either.

BillyTheMage 3y ago

I'd just like to point out that killing chickens for food is a very recent development. Chickens are usually egg factories. Only the (evil) modern industrial practices made chicken meat an viable food source.

nataliste 3y ago
What? Chicken as a meat has been depicted in Babylonian carvings from around 600 BC. Chicken was one of the most common meats available in the Middle Ages. For thousands of years, a number of different kinds of chicken have been eaten across most of the Eastern hemisphere, including capons, pullets, and hens. It was one of the basic ingredients in blancmange, a stew usually consisting of chicken and fried onions cooked in milk and seasoned with spices and sugar. In the United States in the 1800s, chicken was more expensive than other meats and it was sought by the rich, but by no means does this make meat-birds a novelty of CAFOs.