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And a computer in 1970 would've been way more expensive and far crappier than a hundred dollar Android tablet today. It's not exactly in dispute that there has

And a computer in 1970 would've been way more expensive and far crappier than a hundred dollar Android tablet today. It's not exactly in dispute that there has been technological development between 1970 and 2025. But it's also not the central issue. In America the personal vehicle is a necessity in the vast majority of the country, and it's relatively more expensive today. As are many other necessities. (If you want we can quibble further and say a 17k used Rav 4 or Tacoma would be more reliable than a 1970 F-100 anyway blah blah blah blah the increased lifespan and availability of used cars causes new cars to have to go more upmarket blah blah blah... but the hedonic treadmill is also real and if you would've been living it up with a new car and a nice home with a 30min commute in the 70s, but today have a 10 year old car and an apartment with a 70min commute, you're not gonna feel good.)

WillPostForFood 8mo ago
Yes I agree they are MUCH more expensive relatively. But they are more expensive entirely by choice, not because of inflation or stagnant wages. People want better cars, and that costs more. The government demands lower emissions, that costs more. Safety costs more. There is no world where you get all that for the same percentage of income. you would've been living it up with a new car and a nice home with a 30min commute And you be killed or paralyzed after a fender bender. Death rate per 100,000,000 miles dropped from 5 in 1970 to 1.4 in 2023.
- majormajor 8mo ago
  > People want better cars, and that costs more. The government demands lower emissions, that costs more. Safety costs more. There is no world where you get all that for the same percentage of income. Hell, we did it with computers. Let's figure out how to do it in more places. Isn't that supposed to be the main job of the economy? Increase productivity? So that we all get more for less? Make the pie bigger, don't just make your own slice bigger? If there's "no world" where all that can happen, most of the "taxes will hurt innovation, actually" arguments fall EXTREMELY hollow. Let's connect a few dots: - Streets are in disrepair - You can't afford the lifestyle you used to (by "choice") - It's far harder for people, especially the young, to find a job (many end up hiding on disability and such that didn't exist much several decades ago in the first place) - The wealthy have more money, and proportionally more money, than any time in the last century Maybe instead of choosing the more expensive car we should start choosing to put some of that money to use repairing our basic infrastructure and trying to increase whole-society productive output instead of bottom-line ROI.
  - WillPostForFood 8mo ago
    It is happening with cars too, it just that features are being added even faster than the price can come down. If you wanted Ford F-150 in 1970, you could do most of it, but it would have been a multi-million dollar car. You get all that for 50k. You are getting a lot more per dollar. This reminds me the housing discussing - a part of the affordability problem is that houses have gotten much bigger. And have air conditioning. And have to comply with strict building codes. And have to be fire safe.
    - thayne 8mo ago
      > houses have gotten much bigger Which is a problem. I know a people who would be happy with a smaller house, but there just aren't enough on the market, and the scarcity of them leads to bidding wars that drive the price up. Meanwhile huge houses sit on the market for months, because no one can afford them.
    - oivey 8mo ago
      I don’t think this is true. Advancements in technology often make things possible that previously were not at any price. Engines, for example, are better than ever in part due to computer modeling that would have been impossible in the 70s. Same deal with aerodynamics, safety features, and a million other things. In the 70s, you couldn’t have those things for any price. They required decades of development in other sectors to open possibilities for automobiles.
      - WillPostForFood 8mo ago
        Most technology on cars existed years or decades before the became commonplace and affordable enough to use outside racing or exotic cars. Airbags were patented in the 1950s. Modern ABS in 1971. Fist electronic fuel injector in 1957. You could take the Formula 1 level technology of 1970, and with enough money, apply it to a pickup truck. It would be shockingly expensive - and not as good. T hat's my point! You are getting so much more for your dollar today, even though prices have risen faster than inflation. You are getting a multi-million dollar truck for $50k.
- thayne 8mo ago
  > There is no world where you get all that for the same percentage of income. There is if we are comparing 2026 to the 70s. Technology has increased productivity overall. If those gains were distributed more evenly, it is more likely that the cost of, say a car, would be similar to the same percentage of income.
  - WillPostForFood 8mo ago
    Productivity is up ~3x since 1970, but the car price has gone up 25x. It is driven by the massive increase in features/complexity on cars, and that means it will cost a bigger percentage of income. There is no possible redistribution of gains that would have driven income up 25x to match the car prices.
- danaris 8mo ago
  > There is no world where you get all that for the same percentage of income. This is only true because real income has barely budged since the 1970s. If real income had tracked productivity during that time, we would have plenty. But it didn't. All the increases have been siphoned off to feed the ultra-wealthy, in a variety of ways.
  - WillPostForFood 8mo ago
    real income has barely budged since the 1970s This is not true. Real income has more than doubled since 1970. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=o1gV https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=o1gV All the increases have been siphoned off to feed the ultra-wealthy No, the productivity gains are eaten up by expensive items with low perceived value. You don't think about the $1000 catalytic converter in your car, or $5,000 set of airbags. You just think you are paying more to do the exact same drive to work that you could have done in a $2,000 1970s car. And that's true! Nonetheless, there is real added cost and value to the car.
SpicyLemonZest 8mo ago
I don't think this is an example of the hedonic treadmill. People who believe that a new 2026 Tacoma is the hedonic equivalent of a new 1970 F-100 are simply wrong, in the same way that people who imagine taking all the flights they take today with the level of service provided on 1970s passenger planes are wrong. The extreme increase in reliability and build quality has shifted the dynamics of the car market, with essentially all new vehicle sales pushed upscale as budget-conscious buyers have no reason to buy new with even an infinite time horizon. My $15k used car with 100k miles on it is just as reliable, just as stylish, and sparks just as much joy in me as the new cars my grandparents could have bought in 1970.

WillPostForFood 8mo ago

Yes I agree they are MUCH more expensive relatively. But they are more expensive entirely by choice, not because of inflation or stagnant wages. People want better cars, and that costs more. The government demands lower emissions, that costs more. Safety costs more. There is no world where you get all that for the same percentage of income. you would've been living it up with a new car and a nice home with a 30min commute And you be killed or paralyzed after a fender bender. Death rate per 100,000,000 miles dropped from 5 in 1970 to 1.4 in 2023.

majormajor 8mo ago
> People want better cars, and that costs more. The government demands lower emissions, that costs more. Safety costs more. There is no world where you get all that for the same percentage of income. Hell, we did it with computers. Let's figure out how to do it in more places. Isn't that supposed to be the main job of the economy? Increase productivity? So that we all get more for less? Make the pie bigger, don't just make your own slice bigger? If there's "no world" where all that can happen, most of the "taxes will hurt innovation, actually" arguments fall EXTREMELY hollow. Let's connect a few dots: - Streets are in disrepair - You can't afford the lifestyle you used to (by "choice") - It's far harder for people, especially the young, to find a job (many end up hiding on disability and such that didn't exist much several decades ago in the first place) - The wealthy have more money, and proportionally more money, than any time in the last century Maybe instead of choosing the more expensive car we should start choosing to put some of that money to use repairing our basic infrastructure and trying to increase whole-society productive output instead of bottom-line ROI.
- WillPostForFood 8mo ago
  It is happening with cars too, it just that features are being added even faster than the price can come down. If you wanted Ford F-150 in 1970, you could do most of it, but it would have been a multi-million dollar car. You get all that for 50k. You are getting a lot more per dollar. This reminds me the housing discussing - a part of the affordability problem is that houses have gotten much bigger. And have air conditioning. And have to comply with strict building codes. And have to be fire safe.
  - thayne 8mo ago
    > houses have gotten much bigger Which is a problem. I know a people who would be happy with a smaller house, but there just aren't enough on the market, and the scarcity of them leads to bidding wars that drive the price up. Meanwhile huge houses sit on the market for months, because no one can afford them.
  - oivey 8mo ago
    I don’t think this is true. Advancements in technology often make things possible that previously were not at any price. Engines, for example, are better than ever in part due to computer modeling that would have been impossible in the 70s. Same deal with aerodynamics, safety features, and a million other things. In the 70s, you couldn’t have those things for any price. They required decades of development in other sectors to open possibilities for automobiles.
    - WillPostForFood 8mo ago
      Most technology on cars existed years or decades before the became commonplace and affordable enough to use outside racing or exotic cars. Airbags were patented in the 1950s. Modern ABS in 1971. Fist electronic fuel injector in 1957. You could take the Formula 1 level technology of 1970, and with enough money, apply it to a pickup truck. It would be shockingly expensive - and not as good. T hat's my point! You are getting so much more for your dollar today, even though prices have risen faster than inflation. You are getting a multi-million dollar truck for $50k.
thayne 8mo ago
> There is no world where you get all that for the same percentage of income. There is if we are comparing 2026 to the 70s. Technology has increased productivity overall. If those gains were distributed more evenly, it is more likely that the cost of, say a car, would be similar to the same percentage of income.
- WillPostForFood 8mo ago
  Productivity is up ~3x since 1970, but the car price has gone up 25x. It is driven by the massive increase in features/complexity on cars, and that means it will cost a bigger percentage of income. There is no possible redistribution of gains that would have driven income up 25x to match the car prices.
danaris 8mo ago
> There is no world where you get all that for the same percentage of income. This is only true because real income has barely budged since the 1970s. If real income had tracked productivity during that time, we would have plenty. But it didn't. All the increases have been siphoned off to feed the ultra-wealthy, in a variety of ways.
- WillPostForFood 8mo ago
  real income has barely budged since the 1970s This is not true. Real income has more than doubled since 1970. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=o1gV https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=o1gV All the increases have been siphoned off to feed the ultra-wealthy No, the productivity gains are eaten up by expensive items with low perceived value. You don't think about the $1000 catalytic converter in your car, or $5,000 set of airbags. You just think you are paying more to do the exact same drive to work that you could have done in a $2,000 1970s car. And that's true! Nonetheless, there is real added cost and value to the car.

SpicyLemonZest 8mo ago

I don't think this is an example of the hedonic treadmill. People who believe that a new 2026 Tacoma is the hedonic equivalent of a new 1970 F-100 are simply wrong, in the same way that people who imagine taking all the flights they take today with the level of service provided on 1970s passenger planes are wrong. The extreme increase in reliability and build quality has shifted the dynamics of the car market, with essentially all new vehicle sales pushed upscale as budget-conscious buyers have no reason to buy new with even an infinite time horizon. My $15k used car with 100k miles on it is just as reliable, just as stylish, and sparks just as much joy in me as the new cars my grandparents could have bought in 1970.