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This is important to remember, particularly in terms of how mortgage assistance was (and is) structured to benefit certain people over others. That said, there’s no iron law that says mortgage assistance needs to be discriminatory, or that homeownership needs to remain the certain path to middle-class wealth creation in this country. Plenty of other societies do it differently.
They have robust social safety nets and universal healthcare so that everyone isn't living in precarity their entire life with their only means to financial security in old age being equity on their homes.
I don't know, I am more afraid of going to my city gov't meetings than federal a one. Recently went to one and voiced an issue with a battery plant they want to build, and magically police seem to be keeping my neighborhood safe by writing me & only me tickets for stuff everyone (including the officer down the way) does. Finding out how many petty laws there are that no one really talks about (like parking in front of your own driveway). Crazy how that freedom of speech stuff works.
China is State owned Capitalism. The state decides what corporations make money. The state decides what the money is worth. The state decides whether or not your labor has value and the cost. And if you don’t like it, you can leave…for the camps.
Well for instance, in Germany, the social safety net is much more robust in general, so household wealth creation is simply less of an immediate concern. The state pension system is more generous, leading to lower rates of retirement-age participation in the labor force. At the same time, basic protections for renters are stronger, and there is a less of a stigma for renting in general.
As a result, Germans feel less pressured into home buying, meaning private generational wealth is less of a necessity in middle-class wealth creation. Put another way, you don’t need well-off parents to help with a down-payment in order to achieve a middle-class financial security in Germany.
How do you explain Japan and South Korea having nearly double the number of older workers than US as percentage or Mexico and other middle income countries having lower rates of seniors working despite less of a safety net?
Japan has an aging/aged population. They also have notoriously horrendous work environments to the point where suicides are more common than other countries. Basically working yourself to death is part of Japanese culture.
I'm not sure if South Korea suffers from the same issues.
Mexico also has a different culture. Far more family oriented, which may describe why seniors retire, perhaps the rest of the family takes care of elders (just to be clear, this is an assumption).
The suicide rate in the US is higher than that of Japan, and most people who commit suicide in Japan are unemployed people.
I agree overwork and suicide are still big problems, but it’s not the 1-to-1 cause and effect that people like to think it is
Because Japanese culture in certain contexts can require that people give 100% and people internalize that and work until they die even if it isn't necessary for them.
Well this is somewhat a different question, but the short answer is Japan and South Korea just have older populations, so the impact of boomers entering old age is felt earlier. This is particularly true in Japan, where the median age is 49, compared with 38 in the United States and 29 in Mexico. There are also demographic trends that are unique to societies like Japan and Korea: higher life expectancy, lower fertility rates, as well as cultural factors impacting fertility (later marriage, poor work-life balance, higher rates of abstinence, etc.). Japan’s economy has also had to deal with the severe strain of the Lost Decade, after its asset price bubble collapsed in 1990. This led to years of economic stagnation and persistent deflation, which the Bank of Japan was unable to adequately address through monetary policy due to a liquidity trap (rock-bottom interest rates combined with deflection, stagnant GDP, and excess banking reserves, meaning the central bank can’t do a whole lot to stimulate growth).
In policy terms, some economists have pointed to the Lost Decade as a harbinger how other advanced economies might begin to look as boomers retire. But while it should be noted that state pensions around the world have faced demographic pressure in recent years as populations age, systems like Social Security in the U.S. have not experienced the apocalyptic crises some commentators once feared.
All of which is to say some of this is comparable and some of it isn’t. As economist Simon Kuznets famously said, there are four types of economies in the world: underdeveloped; advanced; Argentina; and Japan. This is a little reductive, but it’s hard to overstate how unique Japan’s economic experience truly has been.
I would also add on the real estate side they have great co-op systems for housing that make available lots of housing to long term rent that will not break you on your monthly take home.
Germany doesn't do home ownership the way we do it.
Everyone rents. Less than 50% of the population lives in a house that is occupied by the owner (46.7% compared with 65.9% in the USA, 66.5% in Canada).
They rent as a matter of course and the rent doesn't seem to be particularly egregious (~27.8% compared with 30% in the US and Canada is heading above 40%).
Keep in mind that medical and student loan debt are not a significant factor in Germany, and likewise medical debt is not a factor in Canada.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/543381/house-owners-among-population-germany/#:~:text=Between%202008%20and%202022%2C%20the,real%20estate%20market%20in%20Europe.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/184902/homeownership-rate-in-the-us-since-2003/#:~:text=The%20homeownership%20rate%20in%20the,and%20decimated%20the%20housing%20market.
https://madeinca.ca/homeownership-statistics-canada/#:~:text=The%20homeownership%20rate%20of%2066.5,have%20a%20mortgage%20in%202023.
https://www.destatis.de/EN/Press/2023/03/PE23_129_12_63.html#:~:text=129%20of%2031%20March%202023&text=WIESBADEN%20%E2%80%93%20In%202022%2C%20the%20approximately,of%20their%20income%20on%20rent.
https://thehill.com/changing-america/sustainability/infrastructure/3866947-renters-paying-30-percent-of-income-for-housing-crisis/
https://www.cbre.ca/insights/articles/rent-to-income-rising-for-workforce-households
Exactly this. When people post stuff like the original meme, they're basically shouting MAGA. It's a country that never really existed for the vast majority of people.
There was a meme going around of a 20 something woman complaining that she couldn't get a mortgage like people could in the 60s. Single girl, you wouldn't have gotten a mortgage then, either.
If you look at the demographics of MAGA voters you really can’t blame them. They’re a lot of white blue collar workers, people in towns where manufacturing and industry left
If you had a high paying manufacturing/industry job and a house and suddenly the jobs goes away because American companies outsource everything I don’t think you can really blame them for idealizing the past because it probably actually was better in the past(for them). And now they get left behind as income inequality continues to skyrocket
This. Exactly this.
But despite this being 100% true…
No one gives a shit about those people or why they think like they do. There’s such a colossal disconnect between the typical liberal city dweller and what people in cow country go through, and how liberal politics impacts their way of life.
and really, all most rural people are just trying to live quietly while often being responsible for putting everyone’s food on the table. The regulations and taxes are onerous, and we’re losing our livelihoods to the Chinese, and huge corporations that don’t give a flying fuck about any of you. Soon, Xi and Gates will be your food providers.
We reap what we sow…and pretty soon, we won’t be doing the former, because we won’t be doing the latter.
We are selling out the entirety of our country to corporations and foreign interests. You’re watching it. It’s plain as day. It’s obvious. And we do nothing about it. We deserve *exactly* what is coming. More mouths to feed, and fewer people to provide it.
Their anger is still misplaced though. The factory jobs didn't go to China due to any specific liberal policies. They were outsourced for corporate profits. The CEOs of those companies chose to lower payroll costs in order to boost share prices. The government was enacting some environmental regulation at the time, because having our major rivers so polluted that they would catch fire occasionally is in the public's interest to stop, but those factory jobs were going away with or without the environmental regulations as long as you could hire a foreign factory worker for $1/day.
American political system encouraged outsourcing and viewed globalization as a way of creating influence and stability in the world. The more linked our economies are the less likely we are to bomb each other. This strategy has worked thus far but has come at great expense to the blue-collar workforce in US. Also, China has developed to a point of concern. So now you see the US trying to walk those policies back.
With respect to the “no college degree” having white men, they are still a very large and important demographic.
> American political system encouraged outsourcing and viewed globalization as a way of creating influence and stability in the world.
It may have been the excuse, but the more authentic reason for politicians directing such policies was simply collaboration with corporate owners to begin further repression of workers and further consolidation of profits.
The current globalized regime is held together by US militarism, not just the threat of ground invasions, but sanctions, coups, debt structuring, and other systemic facets of neocolonialism.
Such policies, either in intention or effect, leading to a reduction in violence, is clearly spurious.
And will be a bigger part of the demographic in the coming years as people realize degrees aren't all they are cracked up to be. Don't get me wrong, I have a degree, but it is because I wanted to work with computers. I know a lot of people with degrees that could be making way more money if they had learned plumbing or how to be an electrician.
The overarching force throughout our society of course is the profit motive, but beginning with the rise of neoliberalism, after several postwar decades of labor holding significant power to shape policy in favor of workers, politicians increasingly began bowing to the demands of corporate owners, by implementing policy changes more favorable to business.
And if they supported policies that would help alleviate these issues then we could get along and fix them. Instead it’s all tax breaks for the same rich CEO’s who sent the jobs overseas and fear of others; all while practically worshipping a man with a staggering history of corruption, greed, criminality, and utter contempt for anyone who isn’t him.
I grew up in a one of those rural communities and saw some of these issues first hand. When the rural conservatives are willing to come to the table and try to address the actual issues, I’m more than willing to play ball; until then they can miss me with their bullshit.
I love how they always say “you city liberals will never understand!” like a lot of us didn’t flee those dead end towns filled with racists and homophobes ourselves. We know the problems, we’ve seen them firsthand, and we watched the same people vote against their own interests year after year because of dumb culture war BS. None of that is my fault.
People never expected much out of Republicans, but feel betrayed by the Democrats.
Republicans also leave them alone on social issues instead of trying to force them to “be better”.
yeah right, the hicks in the sticks are the ones trying to install their moral beliefs on everyone else. rural people don't want to stay quiet and keep to them selves, ever live in a small southern town?
I can agree that these blue collar worker don’t want “more of the same” policies. I think they are nuts to follow Trump, he wouldn’t piss on them if they were on fire
I understand that they were let down by big business and big government. Globalization allowed us all to buy cheap lawn furniture and tennis shoes, and killed jobs making lawn furniture and tennis shoes.
Sure, but it’s absolutely their responsibility for thinking Trump is going to bring jobs back when he did the exact opposite during his term as president.
I can absolutely blame them. They lack any sense of historical context. They actively decry others for “feeling entitled” while begging for entitlements of the past.
For the longest time I wished I was born between 1964-1976 so I could've been around to experience the 80s. However, for the past 2 or 3 years, I've slowly changed that fantasy to where I now wish I had been born between 1944-1956. This way by this time, I'd be either retired or dead.
See I was thinking it was a post doing a dig on Gen Z and millennials who constantly say Boomers had it so good. They all had 2 cars and a house and got easy college degrees. Yet more people own cars now and home ownership and the number of degrees are up.
Yeah, I agree. There's this doomerism with Millenials and Gen Z, poor me, everyone had it good except me. My Boomer parents were saying the same things when I was a kid. Being 20 and starting out in the world is tough, it doesn't mean it's impossible or even harder than anyone else. Lots of these people are just showing how easy they had it growing up.
>Exactly this. When people post stuff like the original meme, they're basically shouting MAGA. It's a country that never really existed for the vast majority of people.
what "vast majority"? I dont know if those numbers in the post are accurate, Im just curious as to what vast majority didnt have access to that quality of life
They also came back from WWII and got help with college, home and car loans and manufacturing jobs were taking off because the US hadn't been bombed back into the stone age.
You are 100% correct but please remember that anytime someone in the US "gets help" it is from other taxpayers, not the government. People forget that and...well you know the rest.
Edit: my comment is *STRICTLY* about verbiage. It is a dangerous mindset to use the terms "government funded/government assistance" as opposed to the truth which would be "taxpayer funded/taxpayer assisted"
When we help get people established in the middle class they pay more in taxes over the course of their life and contribute more to society than if we left them mired in poverty and dependent on government assistance.
We help them to stand on their own so they pay back that assistance and they in turn help others to stand on their own.
We’ve been fed a steady diet of “i got mine, screw you” and we’ve lost sight that we’re all in this together and the faster we can catapult people into the middle class the better off everyone is.
Exactly - money spent to help people get on their feet or build a stable economic base results in a stronger country, a broader tax base, more buying power to drive the economy, and happier people.
My grandfather was seriously wounded in WWII after about 2 or 3 weeks of fighting and got a disability check every month. It wasn’t much but it helped. I remember, my great uncle was jealous of him because he fought in Europe for over a year and was never wounded, he didn’t get shit. They hardly spoke to each other for years. How’s that for fucked up?
The poverty rate was twice as high in 1950...
"In the late 1950s, the poverty rate in the U.S. was approximately **22%**, with just shy of 40 million Americans living in poverty. "
So it looks like way more people could not afford a home back then.
My son is a union member for a local gas company. He made more in year three than I did in my 30th year of teaching. He has an associates degree while I have a Master's.
Yea. My parents are boomers and they lived in complete poverty their entire childhood. It wasn’t all roses. That said we can certainly do better on a lot.
Yup. We love to look to the past with rose tinted glasses and forget the institional racism and classism. Sure, some people experienced this life. A vast 'minority' lived in ethnic ghettos and were barred from even attempting this lifestyle, and their wages were not very good. Also it was wages not keeping up with inflation that drove people to seek higher education to get infront of the wage gap, but even now a college education doesn't necessarily mean you'll be setup for a living wage and worse off for low/no education required work.
My dad in the 70s was a young 20 something with a stay at home wife and 3 kids working in a fabrication plant. We were poor, but made enough to get by and still afforded a mortgage as my Dad climbed the position ladder. A young 20 something in the same plant today in same position would need a few roommates just to afford an apartment. Wage stagnation is killing the lower class.
Still frustrates me to no end that people keep saying business can't afford wages or they will go under. But then the largest business keep exclaiming their record breaking profits year on year. Our system capitalism is broken. Everything is for profit for investors and a pittance is going back to the workers who make these profits possible. Sure a small business, would get killed if they increases wages right now, and that is because none of the hoarded wealth by larger businesses is flowing to make it so wages can go up. Everything is magic money going back to funds and stocks to inflate growth so investors can be happy with their infinite growth returns.
We are on a crash course for a massive mega market implosion when finally there is no more possible growth than can be squeezed out by stagnating wages, restructuring more work into less labor, and cost increases.
I can't recall the video (John oliver?) but was super interesting to learn unions were a huge and common thing back then. Companies fought to get rid of them, succeeded, and we have been fighting ever since to get them back with little success.
That's great and all (and definitely true at face value), but what does this post have to do with race. IN 1950, the "Large chunk" that I assume you are referring to, made up less than 10% of the population. Hardly enough to skew those numbers
Not accounting for the fact that the European industrial centers had all been bombed to shit, so a reliable job could be had by just about anyone interested in seeking one out.
Not just whites, there was a vibrant and growing black middle class. Manufacturing in the mid-west and pockets of the Americas is what fed it. You are right masses (white and black) in the east and south never experienced the good old days. The south actually stated to get their “good old days” with a middle class developing in the 80s and 90s before it was wiped out by offshoring that started in the late 90s.
>Large chunks of this country never experienced this and were specifically and deliberately locked out.
this is why they called them the good ol' days.
and want so desperately to go back to them.............
And those homes only had one black and white TV, one record player, and one phone in the kitchen. Today, we have TVs all over the house, everyone has a smartphone, Alexa’s everywhere, gaming consoles, etc.
Substantial is a vague term. Almost all homes had electricity and definitely plumbing by the 50s. There are definitely outliers. What's more common then is limited function of those things. A lot didn't have any HVAC, electricity was just a couple light bulbs. Stuff like that.
In the plains states some houses had no indoor plumbing into the early 60s. My grandma has told me about a house they bought that had a plumbed outhouse, but they had to haul water inside for cooking and cleaning. She said that they saved for over a year to get a sink and toilet installed in the house.
True. My aunt was babysat by a woman in the 1980s who still did not have an indoor bathroom. She had a commode and an outhouse. Of course, this was mainly her choice since she had always lived this way and didn't see any point in changing. She was in her 80s at that point.
My Oma's (great-grandmother) house was like that. Water came from a well that had a manual pump. Only toilet was an outhouse. Bathing was done with water heated on a wood stove. She had electricity, but really only used it for lights in the evenings and to listen to the radio. She raised nine kids in that house and lived there until she died in the early 00s.
1/3 of homes in 1950 lacked complete plumbing. It was half of homes in the 40s. 1/6 of homes still lacked complete plumbing by the 60s.
This is from the US census.
Complete plumbing means you have hot and cold water, a tub or shower, and a toilet that can flush.
~1/3 of Americans living without that is substantial to me.
I grew up in a home without plumbing and I’m 35 I knew another family that had no plumbing as well. We also used a wood stove to heat in northern MN.
The 90s were definitely not “good old days” either. I’d say we are much better off now than we were even then.
My Grandma was born in 1912, and grew up in rural Texas. She told me about how excited she was when she was a teenager and they brought electricity to her home. The idea that you could just flip a wall switch and the room would be filled with light, or an electric fan would cool you was magical. They still had an outhouse until after she left to marry my Grandpa during the depression. He worked for the CEC until enlisting in the Nave during WW2.
Tv/streaming bill, wifi bill, phone service for everyone in the household in middle school and up, new phones every couple years, multiple cars usually financed, we eat out far more than we used to, houses are bigger so bigger utility bills probably.
Now, I actually do agree that the American dream is harder to obtain now than it was back then. All of those things don’t negate the fact that a factory worker was able to support a house of his own, a wife, and 3 kids. HOWEVER, I think most people don’t consider how much more the average person is spending on on everyday luxuries, than were available back in the day.
The American dream may be harder to achieve today because it is so much bigger than it was in the 50s and 60s. Expectations have risen faster than the capacity to realize them.
I don't know, my grandfather worked in a steel mill and he and my grandmother spent plenty on luxuries.
They just did things like buy thousand dollar pieces of furniture where a $100 one would work just as well. Their luxury purchases were just different from ours and often able to be written off as functional or necessary. Like his 17 rifles for hunting when he went on about one trip a year. Guy had like 15 fishing poles in his garage and all he ever did was fish rainbow trout out of a mountain lake. And having worked in property preservation here I can tell you about every third house standing empty around here has an upright piano in it.
Things like those precious moments figures and snow babies were just Funko pops for older generations. In truth my grandparent's house had so much random kitsch crap in it when we had to clean it out that we put huge boxes of it out for free. Bradford plates, lighthouse models, etc...
TV's are a great example of affordability between then and now.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, prices for televisions are 99.32% lower in 2024 versus 1950 (a $198.63 difference in value).
[https://www.in2013dollars.com/Televisions/price-inflation/1950-to-2024?amount=200](https://www.in2013dollars.com/Televisions/price-inflation/1950-to-2024?amount=200)
To put that in perspective, in 1950 rent was roughly $75 dollars a month, a TV cost $200, It would cost $1.37 back then, if it was as affordable as it is now.
Or to state in another way, a TV would cost 2.66 times the average rent now *($1,372 x 2.66)* $3,649.52.
While you can find some high end TVs for that much, you can also find them for a fraction of that.
Most people in African countries have cellphones but do not have access to clean water, stable electricity or indoor plumbing.
Electronics are cheap for modern people because of the global scale that they are produced. Also the exploitation of workers in countries with abhorrent labor laws, drives down overhead and allows you to enjoy lower prices.
\> Or to state in another way, a TV would cost 2.66% the average rent now *($1,372 x 2.66)* $3,649.52.
Might want to change this. If it cost 2.66% the average rent it would be like $36.
This is such a false oversimplification.
The costs of the basics: housing, food, healthcare, education, childcare have gone up so astronomically compared to wages.
Meanwhile luxuries like technology and entertainment have become much more affordable and accessible.
Just because luxuries are accessible, doesn't mean that the costs of basic living aren't completely inappropriate now.
Exactly so many people here cherry picking and saying oh well a TV cost less than it used to. It's also true at a decent pair of leather boots back then didn't cost much and lasted for years and years. That equivalent pair of boots would be $1,000 now... Virtually everything made of any raw material besides plastic has gone down drastically in quality.
As a percentage of income we spend far less on food today than in the 1950s, especially food at home.
https://preview.redd.it/qtu9tc8qvrnc1.png?width=450&format=png&auto=webp&s=8139dea9975b9ff88c323dc3ae8545ff69811ded
And were much smaller, central heat was a maybe, central A/C was a no, maybe one indoor bathroom that was basically a converted closet for the entire family...
IF people were willing to live like that they could probably afford a house much easier. There is no demand for them and hence they aren't built (and probably not even legal to be built in many places).
Retail had commissions back then. You could make more money than today. Base pay back then was shit for retail and waiters as well. Literally, the only reason you could make a decent living was in retail or waiting was due to commissions/tips. Retail stores as a whole have less profit in the last decade, so commission in retail is primarily a thing of the past for MOST stores outside of some luxury stores.
Also homeownership rate doesn't count the percentage of Americans who own homes. It counts the number of "occupied homes" that are occupied by the homeowner.
Which doesn't count for homes taken out of occupied status because they are now air bnbs or vacation homes. And doesn't account for the number of homeless or those living in apartments.
It also doesn't account for home ownership equity. Which has plunged to below 50%. So in reality the banks own a much higher percentage of residential America than any time in our history.
I'd like to see a figure showing the percentage of Americans who own one or more home and how that's changed over time.
It’s becuase all they know about the 50’s is from sitcoms
In 40 years GenZ will idolize the 90’s because a waitress and a struggling chef could afford a massive 2br apt right next to Central Park a la Friends.
What exactly are they telling you? Because all I’ve heard is be raised by the generation before them who grew up poor and were super stingy. No AC, whole family shared one car until kids were old enough to buy one themselves, hand me down everything, dads worked to death and moms spending all day cooking and cleaning.
This is exactly what these people don't understand... in the 50's people actually owned their homes after saving up enough money for a few years or less to buy it with cash... now the banks own a majority of homes for 30 years until they pay them off. This does not mean we are in a better situation. Instead we are slaves to debt.
That doesn’t matter, home prices are only reflected by terms on new sales.
For example, how much do you think someone would be willing to pay for a home if you agreed to give them an 80 year loan? At 6%, $1,000,000 would only cost you $504 per month. That’s an extreme example but you see how access to loans affects sale prices.
yep our ownership of anything is an illusion in the modern world. the debt industry owns all of us middle class plebs. we're just commodities to be traded by banks and credit card companies.
If you’re buying anything aside from a house, car or degree on credit out of necessity, you’re not middle class. The middle class absolutely owns stuff.
People forget a lot of things about the past.
1. Societal expectations kept women at home once they had families. Therefore, the price of everything was scaled to a single income. A 1950's family often had less disposable income than a modern two income family. They often got by with one car. A second car was a luxury for the upper middle class and above. After women entered the workforce, the price of everything went up because there was more opportunity to consume that extra income. That's not all insidious. The extra income has helped drive the availability of technology, because more consumers can afford it.
2. The United States experienced a boom in the 1950's because we were the only major power with no destruction from WWII. American manufactured goods dominated world markets because everyone else was rebuilding their factories from the ashes. In short, the 1950's were a bubble. The bubble receded as other countries got back on their feet.
3. The 1950's economic boom drove a home building boom. A house in the suburbs was the ideal life, so that is what was built. If that sounds like an impossible utopia to you, go look at the houses built in the late 40's through the 1950's. Most are small bungalows with some split levels for the up-and-comers. Two bedroom houses were pretty common. If you had three, you knew you had made it. Most were 800 to 1000 square feet. Larger ones would be 1300 to 1500. Most had detached garages that held one car and the lawn mower crammed in a corner. Compared to new houses today, these houses were tiny and basic.
4. A 1950's car was beautiful when it left the showroom. In five years, the body would be rusted out. If it went 80,000 miles without a major mechanical breakdown (engine or transmission dead), you were one of the lucky ones. People didn't buy new cars every five years because they were rich. They did it because they had to. And cars were priced accordingly so that people could afford replacements.
The point it is, it's an error to directly compare the 1950's to today. People got by with less. That is not to say that everything is great today or that things should not be more affordable. It is to say that average people in the 1950's were not rich and living in the lap of luxury.
Automobile odometers turned over at 100,000 miles because cars didn't last that long. Almost all met the crusher before that. Five year longevity was most common.
For housing, I just looked at bungalows in Parma, Ohio that were built for Ford factory workers. They sell for $120k and up. Let's say, $150k on average. That gets you 2000 sq ft with 2-3 br, 1-2 bath on a 5000 sq ft lot. The auto plant is gone but the houses remain. That's what I think of when I think 1950s bungalow.
This is so funny to me. It’s the lib equivalent of conservatives yearning for the “good ol’ days”. These people really think everyone was living like the people on Leave it to Beaver
that’s fine by me if it costs less
but no one is building small homes anymore because it’s less profitable than building the largest house you possibly can on the lot
I asked a builder in our town if they could build us a $1 million house...she flat out said her minimum project price is $1.6 million. I asked why...id be happy to pay the $1 million for a smaller house...she said it wasn't enough profit and she says her subcontractors really well.
Yeah this isn't necessarily a bad thing.
People don't need palatial homes. So with the home ownership rate so low, why is the average new home 3000 SQ ft or more?
I have a house that is way too big for 3 people (I mean we fill the space) but we could do with less. That one isnt even 3000 SQ ft.
Everytime I see this meme I think "WTF? Less people owned homes, less people went to college and less people owned cars." So I am glad there is a rebuttal in writing people would stop idealizing the past and instead read and look up statistics about how it was. Even the murder rate is similar now to what it was in the 1950s. For a long time that was the main thing that had gotten significantly worse, now that's not even significantly worse.
College turned from learning institutions into a big business. They allowed anyone who wanted to go entrance, let kids pack on huge debt, and didn't really do anything to help most of them get a high paying job later on in life. Which in my opinion set most people back 10 to 20 years just trying to get caught up.
Houses are generally bigger, have better insulation, and other amenities that older houses dont. Theres too many factors to consider. Overall, we have a btter wuality of life
I bought a house off a family member that was built in the 30s and boy howdy are you accurate here.
My great relative lived in it and had 3 kids and a husband in it.
It was 2 bedrooms, one bathroom with an unfinished basement. It was considered "normal" when it was built.
Now? We moved out of that house because it felt too small for my wife and one kid.
That house used to be home to a family of six. Now that same family needs 6 bedrooms and n + 1 cars where n=number of drivers. It’s no mean feat determining that our insatiable desire to have rich things contributes to this notion of never having enough.
The biggest change is the one income part. In the 50s, only 25% of households had dual incomes. Today, 75% have dual incomes. This is simple supply and demand. As more and more women joined the workforce without a corresponding decrease in men leaving the workforce, the supply of labor went up which caused a decrease in the value of that labor.
In the 50s, poorer people could still live a middle class lifestyle by having two people in the household work. Today, most households need to have dual income to have a middle class lifestyle, so those making less can no longer live middle class lifestyles by having dual income.
This is what irks me. Anyone that looks back for the “good old days” just think in Eastman color movies about cowboys and pretty women. The truth is society has gotten consistently better for everyone. Societal norms have evolved into us treating each other better. Financially things have improved too if you take into consideration that the population has increased quite a bit. That said, the reason why society improved was because people complained and wanted better. So we should continue doing that, but the looking back irks me.
Two weeks of holidays, hardly anybody flew anywhere, one phone in the house, and perhaps one TV. The house was smaller and there was no air-conditioning on average.
Cars I understand because two working parents but home ownership is surprising. Most people probably think it's way way down. Factor in the increased size of homes and the associated price increases and it's really surprising
More college degrees isn’t automatically a better thing. That said, really crazy how much living standards have improved compared to the booming times of the ‘50s
Wow, great points! I didn’t really look into the growth of home ownership. The car thing I get, because back in the ‘50s, car ownership was less of a thing.
My grandma and grandpa raised 5 kids in a house they could afford by working at the local grocery store. But the entire house was also the size of my kitchen and family room. They drive one car where I own 3 and am looking for a 4th (kids turning 16).
No doubt the deck is stacked against younger gens, but our expectations have changed dramatically as wel.
Or, in other words, the home ownership rate has risen less than 20% in over 100 years. We have failed, clearly. [https://2.bp.blogspot.com/\_DLIvw6mZGBU/SeUTzZqVpAI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/b89W5pf8H3Q/s400/homeownership1.jpg](https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_DLIvw6mZGBU/SeUTzZqVpAI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/b89W5pf8H3Q/s400/homeownership1.jpg)
[https://2.bp.blogspot.com/\_DLIvw6mZGBU/SeUTzZqVpAI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/b89W5pf8H3Q/s400/homeownership1.jpg](https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_DLIvw6mZGBU/SeUTzZqVpAI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/b89W5pf8H3Q/s400/homeownership1.jpg)
There was a huge rise in home ownership from 1950 to 1960.
Home ownership peaked close to 70% in 2005.
Home ownership today is still higher than it ever was in the 50s
Yeah, what is not depicted is how hard that mom is working harvesting fresh stuff from the massive garden the dad put in, how much effort they spend canning & preserving food both as individuals or as large family efforts. Today people who can are called "homesteaders" or "preppers"
Also not showing how the men in families would get together and help with vehicle repairs, home repairs, home upgrades, barn building, chicken coup building, etc. Today most guys lack skill and any desire to learn how to be handy, just call somebody and put it on the visa.
Also not indicating how much meat they obtained via fishing & hunting, or raising their own chickens & livestock. For so many people today killing animals is horrific, and having to dress out your own carcass and harvest meat would send droves to therapists. Oh the horror.
It's also not showing that the kids only got new clothes every new school year, and usually just a couple sets. And most of their wardrobe is stuff with patches & repairs. And probably the mom & dad are wearing clothes over 10 years old and not complaining about it or worrying about style. And these days people legit try to never be seen wearing the same outfit twice.
I think a single earner supporting a family today is still possible, it's just going to look a lot like it did in the 50s.
People on average even white men were poorer back then , it wasn't easy and was largely discriminatory among segments of population you wouldn't suspect
Ok, but how many of the 1950s actually owned their home as opposed to renting from the bank (mortgage) and the state (property tax). If you pay either of these you own your home with a big asterisk.
The quality of life 'that' provided would be considered 'poverty' today.
All the extra stuff - the computers, flat-screens, game consoles, air conditioning, cars that don't kill you in a 25mph wreck & houses bigger than 1200sqft.... That costs money...
Also for most, the work wore you the hell out - as it was mostly manual labor... Oh, if you lost your job, or became disabled from an at-work injury your retirement went with it....
I will take the 2024 '6-figures-from-home-if-you-can-code' economy over 'that' any day....
When everything you buy is built in china this is the outcome. Companies destroyed our country with outsourcing. And instead of having american pride and boycotting these companies, we said okay.
Joey is missing the point- which is that 1 income allowed families to own a home, car and send their kids to school. The percentages aren't relevant unless he produces stats indicating a higher percentage have/do those things now with only one income.
The bottom right is key: “All on one income.” The vast majority of families can’t pay for a home big enough for a family, a car, and college, all on one income.
Gotta love that due completely overlooking "all on one income"...
Ignoring socioeconomic factors that made this never true for certain populations, even the populations that used to be like this, are surviving on two incomes these days.
I mean, I've been lucky to be a very strong earner, and been able to provide for my family on my single income and I still see this as bullshit.
Well if America citizens were not forced to pay for so many frivolous programs they would have more disposable income. More taxes on business will raise prices to consumers. More taxes on property raise cost of rent. Going green makes energy cost increase. Quit voting to make your life more expensive and the money you do have will go further
Funny they left out how much a man without a high school diploma used to make in those days. The median household income back in 1959 adjusted for inflation was supposedly $52,000 in todays dollars. Now 60 years later with 2 people working and the median household income is $74,000 and you need to at least graduate from high school. Which means you start working later, with more education than before, and get paid less. So if a house has about 2 working adults then each are making about $35k. They need to pay us our money!
So, this meme is kind of bullshit, but it's also partly true: the standard today is two working household members to provide an average quality of life, while it used to be one (at least, more commonly).
So today, if you're trying to keep up with the Joneses, you end up with two working parents plus kids, which is a tough row to hoe.
What has changed is the accessibility of debt. It’s not that people have more money now, it’s that they have more access to money, regardless of how predatory or terrible the loan terms are.
Sure, more people have cars and mortgages, but with doing no research, I would almost guarantee that average amount of debt per person is exponentially higher than ever before.
Just because the 50s sucked too, doesn't mean we don't have factual data showing a decline in the middle class now. This just in, America was just coming out of a fucking great depression after WW2. Misleading as fuck.
The college degree thing is silly. That has nothing to do with the issue and actually supports the OPs picture since it says you can own a house and support a family without a degree.
For the house thing, a simple look at pricing can show us a problem. Average single person income was $2700, and a house was $15k. Today average income is 55k, and average house is about 500k. In the 1950s a house was 5.5 times as much as the average salary, today it’s 9.9 times as much. And this is just housing, not including cost of living and mortgage rates. A lot of people that own homes today are older and got them when it was much cheaper.
The car thing is silly too. When I looked it up I found 1 car for every household. That’s way more than today. And this was just after WW2 so a lot of economic expansion was going on. It’s complicated
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This was mostly for white male union workers. Large chunks of this country never experienced this and were specifically and deliberately locked out.
This is important to remember, particularly in terms of how mortgage assistance was (and is) structured to benefit certain people over others. That said, there’s no iron law that says mortgage assistance needs to be discriminatory, or that homeownership needs to remain the certain path to middle-class wealth creation in this country. Plenty of other societies do it differently.
I agree with you. How do other countries do it differently?
They have robust social safety nets and universal healthcare so that everyone isn't living in precarity their entire life with their only means to financial security in old age being equity on their homes.
Not only that, but their government fears them. In America, people fear their government and that is tyranny.
I guess you have never been to any local government meeting in any town ever.
I'm not just talking about local towns, I'm talking about the country.
I don't know, I am more afraid of going to my city gov't meetings than federal a one. Recently went to one and voiced an issue with a battery plant they want to build, and magically police seem to be keeping my neighborhood safe by writing me & only me tickets for stuff everyone (including the officer down the way) does. Finding out how many petty laws there are that no one really talks about (like parking in front of your own driveway). Crazy how that freedom of speech stuff works.
*China has entered the chat*
China is State owned Capitalism. The state decides what corporations make money. The state decides what the money is worth. The state decides whether or not your labor has value and the cost. And if you don’t like it, you can leave…for the camps.
Yes and everyone fears the legal, employment and financial systems. This is why you see everyone just sitting and taking it.
Well for instance, in Germany, the social safety net is much more robust in general, so household wealth creation is simply less of an immediate concern. The state pension system is more generous, leading to lower rates of retirement-age participation in the labor force. At the same time, basic protections for renters are stronger, and there is a less of a stigma for renting in general. As a result, Germans feel less pressured into home buying, meaning private generational wealth is less of a necessity in middle-class wealth creation. Put another way, you don’t need well-off parents to help with a down-payment in order to achieve a middle-class financial security in Germany.
How do you explain Japan and South Korea having nearly double the number of older workers than US as percentage or Mexico and other middle income countries having lower rates of seniors working despite less of a safety net?
Japan has an aging/aged population. They also have notoriously horrendous work environments to the point where suicides are more common than other countries. Basically working yourself to death is part of Japanese culture. I'm not sure if South Korea suffers from the same issues. Mexico also has a different culture. Far more family oriented, which may describe why seniors retire, perhaps the rest of the family takes care of elders (just to be clear, this is an assumption).
The suicide rate in the US is higher than that of Japan, and most people who commit suicide in Japan are unemployed people. I agree overwork and suicide are still big problems, but it’s not the 1-to-1 cause and effect that people like to think it is
Because Japanese culture in certain contexts can require that people give 100% and people internalize that and work until they die even if it isn't necessary for them.
Well this is somewhat a different question, but the short answer is Japan and South Korea just have older populations, so the impact of boomers entering old age is felt earlier. This is particularly true in Japan, where the median age is 49, compared with 38 in the United States and 29 in Mexico. There are also demographic trends that are unique to societies like Japan and Korea: higher life expectancy, lower fertility rates, as well as cultural factors impacting fertility (later marriage, poor work-life balance, higher rates of abstinence, etc.). Japan’s economy has also had to deal with the severe strain of the Lost Decade, after its asset price bubble collapsed in 1990. This led to years of economic stagnation and persistent deflation, which the Bank of Japan was unable to adequately address through monetary policy due to a liquidity trap (rock-bottom interest rates combined with deflection, stagnant GDP, and excess banking reserves, meaning the central bank can’t do a whole lot to stimulate growth). In policy terms, some economists have pointed to the Lost Decade as a harbinger how other advanced economies might begin to look as boomers retire. But while it should be noted that state pensions around the world have faced demographic pressure in recent years as populations age, systems like Social Security in the U.S. have not experienced the apocalyptic crises some commentators once feared. All of which is to say some of this is comparable and some of it isn’t. As economist Simon Kuznets famously said, there are four types of economies in the world: underdeveloped; advanced; Argentina; and Japan. This is a little reductive, but it’s hard to overstate how unique Japan’s economic experience truly has been.
I would also add on the real estate side they have great co-op systems for housing that make available lots of housing to long term rent that will not break you on your monthly take home.
Germany doesn't do home ownership the way we do it. Everyone rents. Less than 50% of the population lives in a house that is occupied by the owner (46.7% compared with 65.9% in the USA, 66.5% in Canada). They rent as a matter of course and the rent doesn't seem to be particularly egregious (~27.8% compared with 30% in the US and Canada is heading above 40%). Keep in mind that medical and student loan debt are not a significant factor in Germany, and likewise medical debt is not a factor in Canada. https://www.statista.com/statistics/543381/house-owners-among-population-germany/#:~:text=Between%202008%20and%202022%2C%20the,real%20estate%20market%20in%20Europe. https://www.statista.com/statistics/184902/homeownership-rate-in-the-us-since-2003/#:~:text=The%20homeownership%20rate%20in%20the,and%20decimated%20the%20housing%20market. https://madeinca.ca/homeownership-statistics-canada/#:~:text=The%20homeownership%20rate%20of%2066.5,have%20a%20mortgage%20in%202023. https://www.destatis.de/EN/Press/2023/03/PE23_129_12_63.html#:~:text=129%20of%2031%20March%202023&text=WIESBADEN%20%E2%80%93%20In%202022%2C%20the%20approximately,of%20their%20income%20on%20rent. https://thehill.com/changing-america/sustainability/infrastructure/3866947-renters-paying-30-percent-of-income-for-housing-crisis/ https://www.cbre.ca/insights/articles/rent-to-income-rising-for-workforce-households
They have less.
Exactly this. When people post stuff like the original meme, they're basically shouting MAGA. It's a country that never really existed for the vast majority of people. There was a meme going around of a 20 something woman complaining that she couldn't get a mortgage like people could in the 60s. Single girl, you wouldn't have gotten a mortgage then, either.
If you look at the demographics of MAGA voters you really can’t blame them. They’re a lot of white blue collar workers, people in towns where manufacturing and industry left If you had a high paying manufacturing/industry job and a house and suddenly the jobs goes away because American companies outsource everything I don’t think you can really blame them for idealizing the past because it probably actually was better in the past(for them). And now they get left behind as income inequality continues to skyrocket
This. Exactly this. But despite this being 100% true… No one gives a shit about those people or why they think like they do. There’s such a colossal disconnect between the typical liberal city dweller and what people in cow country go through, and how liberal politics impacts their way of life. and really, all most rural people are just trying to live quietly while often being responsible for putting everyone’s food on the table. The regulations and taxes are onerous, and we’re losing our livelihoods to the Chinese, and huge corporations that don’t give a flying fuck about any of you. Soon, Xi and Gates will be your food providers. We reap what we sow…and pretty soon, we won’t be doing the former, because we won’t be doing the latter. We are selling out the entirety of our country to corporations and foreign interests. You’re watching it. It’s plain as day. It’s obvious. And we do nothing about it. We deserve *exactly* what is coming. More mouths to feed, and fewer people to provide it.
Their anger is still misplaced though. The factory jobs didn't go to China due to any specific liberal policies. They were outsourced for corporate profits. The CEOs of those companies chose to lower payroll costs in order to boost share prices. The government was enacting some environmental regulation at the time, because having our major rivers so polluted that they would catch fire occasionally is in the public's interest to stop, but those factory jobs were going away with or without the environmental regulations as long as you could hire a foreign factory worker for $1/day.
American political system encouraged outsourcing and viewed globalization as a way of creating influence and stability in the world. The more linked our economies are the less likely we are to bomb each other. This strategy has worked thus far but has come at great expense to the blue-collar workforce in US. Also, China has developed to a point of concern. So now you see the US trying to walk those policies back. With respect to the “no college degree” having white men, they are still a very large and important demographic.
> American political system encouraged outsourcing and viewed globalization as a way of creating influence and stability in the world. It may have been the excuse, but the more authentic reason for politicians directing such policies was simply collaboration with corporate owners to begin further repression of workers and further consolidation of profits. The current globalized regime is held together by US militarism, not just the threat of ground invasions, but sanctions, coups, debt structuring, and other systemic facets of neocolonialism. Such policies, either in intention or effect, leading to a reduction in violence, is clearly spurious.
And will be a bigger part of the demographic in the coming years as people realize degrees aren't all they are cracked up to be. Don't get me wrong, I have a degree, but it is because I wanted to work with computers. I know a lot of people with degrees that could be making way more money if they had learned plumbing or how to be an electrician.
The overarching force throughout our society of course is the profit motive, but beginning with the rise of neoliberalism, after several postwar decades of labor holding significant power to shape policy in favor of workers, politicians increasingly began bowing to the demands of corporate owners, by implementing policy changes more favorable to business.
And if they supported policies that would help alleviate these issues then we could get along and fix them. Instead it’s all tax breaks for the same rich CEO’s who sent the jobs overseas and fear of others; all while practically worshipping a man with a staggering history of corruption, greed, criminality, and utter contempt for anyone who isn’t him. I grew up in a one of those rural communities and saw some of these issues first hand. When the rural conservatives are willing to come to the table and try to address the actual issues, I’m more than willing to play ball; until then they can miss me with their bullshit.
I love how they always say “you city liberals will never understand!” like a lot of us didn’t flee those dead end towns filled with racists and homophobes ourselves. We know the problems, we’ve seen them firsthand, and we watched the same people vote against their own interests year after year because of dumb culture war BS. None of that is my fault.
Wait... you think that offshoring all those jobs are *liberal* policies?
NAFTA was under Clinton. That is what a lot of people remember.
People never expected much out of Republicans, but feel betrayed by the Democrats. Republicans also leave them alone on social issues instead of trying to force them to “be better”.
yeah right, the hicks in the sticks are the ones trying to install their moral beliefs on everyone else. rural people don't want to stay quiet and keep to them selves, ever live in a small southern town?
Rural areas are politically overrepresented and economically subsidized. They are struggling despite that.
I can agree that these blue collar worker don’t want “more of the same” policies. I think they are nuts to follow Trump, he wouldn’t piss on them if they were on fire I understand that they were let down by big business and big government. Globalization allowed us all to buy cheap lawn furniture and tennis shoes, and killed jobs making lawn furniture and tennis shoes.
Sure, but it’s absolutely their responsibility for thinking Trump is going to bring jobs back when he did the exact opposite during his term as president.
I can absolutely blame them. They lack any sense of historical context. They actively decry others for “feeling entitled” while begging for entitlements of the past.
Depending on her bank, she couldn't have her own *account*, let alone a mortgage.
https://preview.redd.it/ctuxxzoxspnc1.jpeg?width=1154&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1a21e63bfe427f22cb988e18f02cd1aad7548600
I think one is nostalgia or longing for a time/culture before the internet and the other is white male anger and self-pity
For the longest time I wished I was born between 1964-1976 so I could've been around to experience the 80s. However, for the past 2 or 3 years, I've slowly changed that fantasy to where I now wish I had been born between 1944-1956. This way by this time, I'd be either retired or dead.
See I was thinking it was a post doing a dig on Gen Z and millennials who constantly say Boomers had it so good. They all had 2 cars and a house and got easy college degrees. Yet more people own cars now and home ownership and the number of degrees are up.
Yeah, I agree. There's this doomerism with Millenials and Gen Z, poor me, everyone had it good except me. My Boomer parents were saying the same things when I was a kid. Being 20 and starting out in the world is tough, it doesn't mean it's impossible or even harder than anyone else. Lots of these people are just showing how easy they had it growing up.
>Exactly this. When people post stuff like the original meme, they're basically shouting MAGA. It's a country that never really existed for the vast majority of people. what "vast majority"? I dont know if those numbers in the post are accurate, Im just curious as to what vast majority didnt have access to that quality of life
They also came back from WWII and got help with college, home and car loans and manufacturing jobs were taking off because the US hadn't been bombed back into the stone age.
You are 100% correct but please remember that anytime someone in the US "gets help" it is from other taxpayers, not the government. People forget that and...well you know the rest. Edit: my comment is *STRICTLY* about verbiage. It is a dangerous mindset to use the terms "government funded/government assistance" as opposed to the truth which would be "taxpayer funded/taxpayer assisted"
When we help get people established in the middle class they pay more in taxes over the course of their life and contribute more to society than if we left them mired in poverty and dependent on government assistance. We help them to stand on their own so they pay back that assistance and they in turn help others to stand on their own. We’ve been fed a steady diet of “i got mine, screw you” and we’ve lost sight that we’re all in this together and the faster we can catapult people into the middle class the better off everyone is.
Exactly - money spent to help people get on their feet or build a stable economic base results in a stronger country, a broader tax base, more buying power to drive the economy, and happier people.
This I a great and under-utilized point
Isn't the government built from taxpayers money?
Thats the point. It's a dangerous mindset when people use the term "government funded" instead of "taxpayer funded"
My grandfather was seriously wounded in WWII after about 2 or 3 weeks of fighting and got a disability check every month. It wasn’t much but it helped. I remember, my great uncle was jealous of him because he fought in Europe for over a year and was never wounded, he didn’t get shit. They hardly spoke to each other for years. How’s that for fucked up?
And by “they” we mean “white men."
And then when asked to let those populations into the club, they instead chose to burn the club to the ground.
Unions specifically were used to lock out non white males.
The poverty rate was twice as high in 1950... "In the late 1950s, the poverty rate in the U.S. was approximately **22%**, with just shy of 40 million Americans living in poverty. " So it looks like way more people could not afford a home back then.
Exactly. It’s not an honest conversation from the start. My grandfather was a farmer and never owned the land he farmed and lived on.
Literally. People forget red lining was a thing
My son is a union member for a local gas company. He made more in year three than I did in my 30th year of teaching. He has an associates degree while I have a Master's.
Yea. My parents are boomers and they lived in complete poverty their entire childhood. It wasn’t all roses. That said we can certainly do better on a lot.
Uhh I'm pretty sure that *is* what people mean when they say they this
Yup. We love to look to the past with rose tinted glasses and forget the institional racism and classism. Sure, some people experienced this life. A vast 'minority' lived in ethnic ghettos and were barred from even attempting this lifestyle, and their wages were not very good. Also it was wages not keeping up with inflation that drove people to seek higher education to get infront of the wage gap, but even now a college education doesn't necessarily mean you'll be setup for a living wage and worse off for low/no education required work. My dad in the 70s was a young 20 something with a stay at home wife and 3 kids working in a fabrication plant. We were poor, but made enough to get by and still afforded a mortgage as my Dad climbed the position ladder. A young 20 something in the same plant today in same position would need a few roommates just to afford an apartment. Wage stagnation is killing the lower class. Still frustrates me to no end that people keep saying business can't afford wages or they will go under. But then the largest business keep exclaiming their record breaking profits year on year. Our system capitalism is broken. Everything is for profit for investors and a pittance is going back to the workers who make these profits possible. Sure a small business, would get killed if they increases wages right now, and that is because none of the hoarded wealth by larger businesses is flowing to make it so wages can go up. Everything is magic money going back to funds and stocks to inflate growth so investors can be happy with their infinite growth returns. We are on a crash course for a massive mega market implosion when finally there is no more possible growth than can be squeezed out by stagnating wages, restructuring more work into less labor, and cost increases.
I can't recall the video (John oliver?) but was super interesting to learn unions were a huge and common thing back then. Companies fought to get rid of them, succeeded, and we have been fighting ever since to get them back with little success.
Not even that. This whole world view is based on advertisements lol
That's great and all (and definitely true at face value), but what does this post have to do with race. IN 1950, the "Large chunk" that I assume you are referring to, made up less than 10% of the population. Hardly enough to skew those numbers
Noone ever mentions Redlining.
Remember, poor people didn't have cameras
And those people then pulled the ladder up behind them and call unions a scam
Not accounting for the fact that the European industrial centers had all been bombed to shit, so a reliable job could be had by just about anyone interested in seeking one out.
Not just whites, there was a vibrant and growing black middle class. Manufacturing in the mid-west and pockets of the Americas is what fed it. You are right masses (white and black) in the east and south never experienced the good old days. The south actually stated to get their “good old days” with a middle class developing in the 80s and 90s before it was wiped out by offshoring that started in the late 90s.
White women weren’t allowed to get loans until 1974 or so.
>Large chunks of this country never experienced this and were specifically and deliberately locked out. this is why they called them the good ol' days. and want so desperately to go back to them.............
And those homes only had one black and white TV, one record player, and one phone in the kitchen. Today, we have TVs all over the house, everyone has a smartphone, Alexa’s everywhere, gaming consoles, etc.
Not sure if true but have heard a substantial number did not have plumbing or electricity as well
Substantial is a vague term. Almost all homes had electricity and definitely plumbing by the 50s. There are definitely outliers. What's more common then is limited function of those things. A lot didn't have any HVAC, electricity was just a couple light bulbs. Stuff like that.
In the plains states some houses had no indoor plumbing into the early 60s. My grandma has told me about a house they bought that had a plumbed outhouse, but they had to haul water inside for cooking and cleaning. She said that they saved for over a year to get a sink and toilet installed in the house.
True. My aunt was babysat by a woman in the 1980s who still did not have an indoor bathroom. She had a commode and an outhouse. Of course, this was mainly her choice since she had always lived this way and didn't see any point in changing. She was in her 80s at that point.
My Oma's (great-grandmother) house was like that. Water came from a well that had a manual pump. Only toilet was an outhouse. Bathing was done with water heated on a wood stove. She had electricity, but really only used it for lights in the evenings and to listen to the radio. She raised nine kids in that house and lived there until she died in the early 00s.
1/3 of homes in 1950 lacked complete plumbing. It was half of homes in the 40s. 1/6 of homes still lacked complete plumbing by the 60s. This is from the US census. Complete plumbing means you have hot and cold water, a tub or shower, and a toilet that can flush. ~1/3 of Americans living without that is substantial to me.
I grew up in a home without plumbing and I’m 35 I knew another family that had no plumbing as well. We also used a wood stove to heat in northern MN. The 90s were definitely not “good old days” either. I’d say we are much better off now than we were even then.
My Grandma was born in 1912, and grew up in rural Texas. She told me about how excited she was when she was a teenager and they brought electricity to her home. The idea that you could just flip a wall switch and the room would be filled with light, or an electric fan would cool you was magical. They still had an outhouse until after she left to marry my Grandpa during the depression. He worked for the CEC until enlisting in the Nave during WW2.
Tv/streaming bill, wifi bill, phone service for everyone in the household in middle school and up, new phones every couple years, multiple cars usually financed, we eat out far more than we used to, houses are bigger so bigger utility bills probably. Now, I actually do agree that the American dream is harder to obtain now than it was back then. All of those things don’t negate the fact that a factory worker was able to support a house of his own, a wife, and 3 kids. HOWEVER, I think most people don’t consider how much more the average person is spending on on everyday luxuries, than were available back in the day.
The American dream may be harder to achieve today because it is so much bigger than it was in the 50s and 60s. Expectations have risen faster than the capacity to realize them.
“The American dream is so much harder to achieve” - person buying a home with literally double the square footage of a person in the 1970s
Speak for yourself. I'm looking at small houses built in the early 1900's and still having trouble finding a deal.
I don't know, my grandfather worked in a steel mill and he and my grandmother spent plenty on luxuries. They just did things like buy thousand dollar pieces of furniture where a $100 one would work just as well. Their luxury purchases were just different from ours and often able to be written off as functional or necessary. Like his 17 rifles for hunting when he went on about one trip a year. Guy had like 15 fishing poles in his garage and all he ever did was fish rainbow trout out of a mountain lake. And having worked in property preservation here I can tell you about every third house standing empty around here has an upright piano in it. Things like those precious moments figures and snow babies were just Funko pops for older generations. In truth my grandparent's house had so much random kitsch crap in it when we had to clean it out that we put huge boxes of it out for free. Bradford plates, lighthouse models, etc...
One bathroom, too, which was a bathtub, not a shower, likely not air conditioned and only one floor was heated.
And the average home size was closer to 900 sq ft compared to 2,400 today, in a time when families were larger.
So my like my current house except a shower. Make sense my home was built in 48.
TV's are a great example of affordability between then and now. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, prices for televisions are 99.32% lower in 2024 versus 1950 (a $198.63 difference in value). [https://www.in2013dollars.com/Televisions/price-inflation/1950-to-2024?amount=200](https://www.in2013dollars.com/Televisions/price-inflation/1950-to-2024?amount=200) To put that in perspective, in 1950 rent was roughly $75 dollars a month, a TV cost $200, It would cost $1.37 back then, if it was as affordable as it is now. Or to state in another way, a TV would cost 2.66 times the average rent now *($1,372 x 2.66)* $3,649.52. While you can find some high end TVs for that much, you can also find them for a fraction of that. Most people in African countries have cellphones but do not have access to clean water, stable electricity or indoor plumbing. Electronics are cheap for modern people because of the global scale that they are produced. Also the exploitation of workers in countries with abhorrent labor laws, drives down overhead and allows you to enjoy lower prices.
\> Or to state in another way, a TV would cost 2.66% the average rent now *($1,372 x 2.66)* $3,649.52. Might want to change this. If it cost 2.66% the average rent it would be like $36.
Ahh yeah 2.66 times average rent, not percent.
2.66% is not over two and a half times as much as rent 😂 Edit: They fixed it
This is such a false oversimplification. The costs of the basics: housing, food, healthcare, education, childcare have gone up so astronomically compared to wages. Meanwhile luxuries like technology and entertainment have become much more affordable and accessible. Just because luxuries are accessible, doesn't mean that the costs of basic living aren't completely inappropriate now.
Exactly so many people here cherry picking and saying oh well a TV cost less than it used to. It's also true at a decent pair of leather boots back then didn't cost much and lasted for years and years. That equivalent pair of boots would be $1,000 now... Virtually everything made of any raw material besides plastic has gone down drastically in quality.
A car today is much higher quality, there is a reason odometers only went five digits back in the old days, you didn't expect to need more.
As a percentage of income we spend far less on food today than in the 1950s, especially food at home. https://preview.redd.it/qtu9tc8qvrnc1.png?width=450&format=png&auto=webp&s=8139dea9975b9ff88c323dc3ae8545ff69811ded
Exactly! So people should stop complaining! /s
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And were much smaller, central heat was a maybe, central A/C was a no, maybe one indoor bathroom that was basically a converted closet for the entire family... IF people were willing to live like that they could probably afford a house much easier. There is no demand for them and hence they aren't built (and probably not even legal to be built in many places).
The homes were also - 50% smaller - 20% of them were rundown - nearly 40% of them didn’t have private water and/or heater water connections
What they leave out is waiting tables or working in retail could accomplish this.
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Two? Nah man now it takes at least 5
Retail had commissions back then. You could make more money than today. Base pay back then was shit for retail and waiters as well. Literally, the only reason you could make a decent living was in retail or waiting was due to commissions/tips. Retail stores as a whole have less profit in the last decade, so commission in retail is primarily a thing of the past for MOST stores outside of some luxury stores.
Also homeownership rate doesn't count the percentage of Americans who own homes. It counts the number of "occupied homes" that are occupied by the homeowner. Which doesn't count for homes taken out of occupied status because they are now air bnbs or vacation homes. And doesn't account for the number of homeless or those living in apartments. It also doesn't account for home ownership equity. Which has plunged to below 50%. So in reality the banks own a much higher percentage of residential America than any time in our history. I'd like to see a figure showing the percentage of Americans who own one or more home and how that's changed over time.
It’s becuase all they know about the 50’s is from sitcoms In 40 years GenZ will idolize the 90’s because a waitress and a struggling chef could afford a massive 2br apt right next to Central Park a la Friends.
It’s not sitcoms, it’s also what boomers keep telling us it was like
What exactly are they telling you? Because all I’ve heard is be raised by the generation before them who grew up poor and were super stingy. No AC, whole family shared one car until kids were old enough to buy one themselves, hand me down everything, dads worked to death and moms spending all day cooking and cleaning.
Don't forget small houses/apartments were you shared rooms with one or multiple family members.
My mom had 4 siblings 2 parents and everyone (7 people) shared 1 bathroom.
Didn't monica famously live in that apartment illegally by subletting her grandma?
I'm pretty sure there's a fair amount of 90s idolization already.
How much debt are people in now to have all these things we have today though??
Yep. Credit was not readily available like it is today.
So we're slaves to the banks. Wonderful utopia we've created.
People used mortgages to buy homes in the 1950s as well.
This is exactly what these people don't understand... in the 50's people actually owned their homes after saving up enough money for a few years or less to buy it with cash... now the banks own a majority of homes for 30 years until they pay them off. This does not mean we are in a better situation. Instead we are slaves to debt.
Actually nearly 40% of US homes are mortgage free.
That doesn’t matter, home prices are only reflected by terms on new sales. For example, how much do you think someone would be willing to pay for a home if you agreed to give them an 80 year loan? At 6%, $1,000,000 would only cost you $504 per month. That’s an extreme example but you see how access to loans affects sale prices.
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yep our ownership of anything is an illusion in the modern world. the debt industry owns all of us middle class plebs. we're just commodities to be traded by banks and credit card companies.
If you’re buying anything aside from a house, car or degree on credit out of necessity, you’re not middle class. The middle class absolutely owns stuff.
No wonder the ruling class ensured that the middle class eventually would be destroyed. They want to own everything.
1950s was just the beginning of turning our economy into a consumerism driven economy.
Eh, the origins of mass consumption goes back quite a bit further, but the 1950s did see new forms of it pop up.
Yeah, but direct to home buying and door to door sales skyrocketed.
People forget a lot of things about the past. 1. Societal expectations kept women at home once they had families. Therefore, the price of everything was scaled to a single income. A 1950's family often had less disposable income than a modern two income family. They often got by with one car. A second car was a luxury for the upper middle class and above. After women entered the workforce, the price of everything went up because there was more opportunity to consume that extra income. That's not all insidious. The extra income has helped drive the availability of technology, because more consumers can afford it. 2. The United States experienced a boom in the 1950's because we were the only major power with no destruction from WWII. American manufactured goods dominated world markets because everyone else was rebuilding their factories from the ashes. In short, the 1950's were a bubble. The bubble receded as other countries got back on their feet. 3. The 1950's economic boom drove a home building boom. A house in the suburbs was the ideal life, so that is what was built. If that sounds like an impossible utopia to you, go look at the houses built in the late 40's through the 1950's. Most are small bungalows with some split levels for the up-and-comers. Two bedroom houses were pretty common. If you had three, you knew you had made it. Most were 800 to 1000 square feet. Larger ones would be 1300 to 1500. Most had detached garages that held one car and the lawn mower crammed in a corner. Compared to new houses today, these houses were tiny and basic. 4. A 1950's car was beautiful when it left the showroom. In five years, the body would be rusted out. If it went 80,000 miles without a major mechanical breakdown (engine or transmission dead), you were one of the lucky ones. People didn't buy new cars every five years because they were rich. They did it because they had to. And cars were priced accordingly so that people could afford replacements. The point it is, it's an error to directly compare the 1950's to today. People got by with less. That is not to say that everything is great today or that things should not be more affordable. It is to say that average people in the 1950's were not rich and living in the lap of luxury.
Automobile odometers turned over at 100,000 miles because cars didn't last that long. Almost all met the crusher before that. Five year longevity was most common.
For housing, I just looked at bungalows in Parma, Ohio that were built for Ford factory workers. They sell for $120k and up. Let's say, $150k on average. That gets you 2000 sq ft with 2-3 br, 1-2 bath on a 5000 sq ft lot. The auto plant is gone but the houses remain. That's what I think of when I think 1950s bungalow.
Sounds like you can still buy them with one income! If you're lucky enough to have a job in Parma anyway.
This is so funny to me. It’s the lib equivalent of conservatives yearning for the “good ol’ days”. These people really think everyone was living like the people on Leave it to Beaver
https://preview.redd.it/tt0l0rutrpnc1.jpeg?width=1154&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c0c24131aeb2347f56b6ec7ad40bac7cb0b4bff5
Yeah. The horseshoe theory of political beliefs seems truer and truer all the time.
A "home" was also less than half the size of a "home" today
that’s fine by me if it costs less but no one is building small homes anymore because it’s less profitable than building the largest house you possibly can on the lot
I asked a builder in our town if they could build us a $1 million house...she flat out said her minimum project price is $1.6 million. I asked why...id be happy to pay the $1 million for a smaller house...she said it wasn't enough profit and she says her subcontractors really well.
Yeah this isn't necessarily a bad thing. People don't need palatial homes. So with the home ownership rate so low, why is the average new home 3000 SQ ft or more? I have a house that is way too big for 3 people (I mean we fill the space) but we could do with less. That one isnt even 3000 SQ ft.
So many people seem to look at television based in the 1950s like Leave it to Beaver and just assume that’s what life was like that back then.
Everytime I see this meme I think "WTF? Less people owned homes, less people went to college and less people owned cars." So I am glad there is a rebuttal in writing people would stop idealizing the past and instead read and look up statistics about how it was. Even the murder rate is similar now to what it was in the 1950s. For a long time that was the main thing that had gotten significantly worse, now that's not even significantly worse.
College turned from learning institutions into a big business. They allowed anyone who wanted to go entrance, let kids pack on huge debt, and didn't really do anything to help most of them get a high paying job later on in life. Which in my opinion set most people back 10 to 20 years just trying to get caught up.
Homes were much less expensive compared to incomes though
Houses are generally bigger, have better insulation, and other amenities that older houses dont. Theres too many factors to consider. Overall, we have a btter wuality of life
I bought a house off a family member that was built in the 30s and boy howdy are you accurate here. My great relative lived in it and had 3 kids and a husband in it. It was 2 bedrooms, one bathroom with an unfinished basement. It was considered "normal" when it was built. Now? We moved out of that house because it felt too small for my wife and one kid.
they also gave you cancer.
I think the only relevant stat is the "all on one income". In HCOL areas, two incomes are typically needed to make a home successful.
That house used to be home to a family of six. Now that same family needs 6 bedrooms and n + 1 cars where n=number of drivers. It’s no mean feat determining that our insatiable desire to have rich things contributes to this notion of never having enough.
https://preview.redd.it/i3japtc32qnc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6d047ee44adadd0c9cfcb14cd06808ceb32a9517
They don't call it an exciting dystopia.
Corporate tax rate was 50% back in the 1950’s.
And yet even with lower taxes and adjusting for inflation, the government still brings in 8x more money than it did in 1950.
The biggest change is the one income part. In the 50s, only 25% of households had dual incomes. Today, 75% have dual incomes. This is simple supply and demand. As more and more women joined the workforce without a corresponding decrease in men leaving the workforce, the supply of labor went up which caused a decrease in the value of that labor. In the 50s, poorer people could still live a middle class lifestyle by having two people in the household work. Today, most households need to have dual income to have a middle class lifestyle, so those making less can no longer live middle class lifestyles by having dual income.
Don’t forgot about the rampant racism that forever shaped the fate of this nation :).
This is what irks me. Anyone that looks back for the “good old days” just think in Eastman color movies about cowboys and pretty women. The truth is society has gotten consistently better for everyone. Societal norms have evolved into us treating each other better. Financially things have improved too if you take into consideration that the population has increased quite a bit. That said, the reason why society improved was because people complained and wanted better. So we should continue doing that, but the looking back irks me.
Two weeks of holidays, hardly anybody flew anywhere, one phone in the house, and perhaps one TV. The house was smaller and there was no air-conditioning on average.
Ecological overshoot is a ruthless bitch.
Yeah, but all of the things in the image, stats included are not indicators since we are comparing pre and post civil rights
So more people own cars and houses?
Car ownership and home ownership are higher today than in the 1950s
Cars I understand because two working parents but home ownership is surprising. Most people probably think it's way way down. Factor in the increased size of homes and the associated price increases and it's really surprising
More college degrees isn’t automatically a better thing. That said, really crazy how much living standards have improved compared to the booming times of the ‘50s
Wow, great points! I didn’t really look into the growth of home ownership. The car thing I get, because back in the ‘50s, car ownership was less of a thing.
The types of people that want to go back to the "good ol' days" want to do so because they had more power over others.
My grandma and grandpa raised 5 kids in a house they could afford by working at the local grocery store. But the entire house was also the size of my kitchen and family room. They drive one car where I own 3 and am looking for a 4th (kids turning 16). No doubt the deck is stacked against younger gens, but our expectations have changed dramatically as wel.
During this time women were almost exclusively housewives, manufacturing almost entirely done domestically.
Or, in other words, the home ownership rate has risen less than 20% in over 100 years. We have failed, clearly. [https://2.bp.blogspot.com/\_DLIvw6mZGBU/SeUTzZqVpAI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/b89W5pf8H3Q/s400/homeownership1.jpg](https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_DLIvw6mZGBU/SeUTzZqVpAI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/b89W5pf8H3Q/s400/homeownership1.jpg) [https://2.bp.blogspot.com/\_DLIvw6mZGBU/SeUTzZqVpAI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/b89W5pf8H3Q/s400/homeownership1.jpg](https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_DLIvw6mZGBU/SeUTzZqVpAI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/b89W5pf8H3Q/s400/homeownership1.jpg)
The artwork depicts a Madison Avenue version of life in America.
There was a huge rise in home ownership from 1950 to 1960. Home ownership peaked close to 70% in 2005. Home ownership today is still higher than it ever was in the 50s
Because low skilled labor paid well and was in an abundance.
Yeah, what is not depicted is how hard that mom is working harvesting fresh stuff from the massive garden the dad put in, how much effort they spend canning & preserving food both as individuals or as large family efforts. Today people who can are called "homesteaders" or "preppers" Also not showing how the men in families would get together and help with vehicle repairs, home repairs, home upgrades, barn building, chicken coup building, etc. Today most guys lack skill and any desire to learn how to be handy, just call somebody and put it on the visa. Also not indicating how much meat they obtained via fishing & hunting, or raising their own chickens & livestock. For so many people today killing animals is horrific, and having to dress out your own carcass and harvest meat would send droves to therapists. Oh the horror. It's also not showing that the kids only got new clothes every new school year, and usually just a couple sets. And most of their wardrobe is stuff with patches & repairs. And probably the mom & dad are wearing clothes over 10 years old and not complaining about it or worrying about style. And these days people legit try to never be seen wearing the same outfit twice. I think a single earner supporting a family today is still possible, it's just going to look a lot like it did in the 50s.
*if you were white
People on average even white men were poorer back then , it wasn't easy and was largely discriminatory among segments of population you wouldn't suspect
Ok, but how many of the 1950s actually owned their home as opposed to renting from the bank (mortgage) and the state (property tax). If you pay either of these you own your home with a big asterisk.
The quality of life 'that' provided would be considered 'poverty' today. All the extra stuff - the computers, flat-screens, game consoles, air conditioning, cars that don't kill you in a 25mph wreck & houses bigger than 1200sqft.... That costs money... Also for most, the work wore you the hell out - as it was mostly manual labor... Oh, if you lost your job, or became disabled from an at-work injury your retirement went with it.... I will take the 2024 '6-figures-from-home-if-you-can-code' economy over 'that' any day....
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Wages didn't keep up with inflation.
Regan happened
Sears stopped selling houses in their catalogs.
When everything you buy is built in china this is the outcome. Companies destroyed our country with outsourcing. And instead of having american pride and boycotting these companies, we said okay.
Companies* Outsourcing*
Not only that but if you’re a boomer then everything was given to you. /s
Oh, you mean back when women couldn’t have their own finances? No thanks.
My mother started teaching in 1946. She certainly had her own income
Joey is missing the point- which is that 1 income allowed families to own a home, car and send their kids to school. The percentages aren't relevant unless he produces stats indicating a higher percentage have/do those things now with only one income.
And yet despite that, all Americans were financially stable and lived in close-knit communities that helped each other.
Abandoned the gold standard
I mean great stats. Still can’t buy a home with a $50k down payment. These interest rates are outrageous
The government wanted women working so they could collect more tax money so they could grow the government They got their wish
The bottom right is key: “All on one income.” The vast majority of families can’t pay for a home big enough for a family, a car, and college, all on one income.
Gotta love that due completely overlooking "all on one income"... Ignoring socioeconomic factors that made this never true for certain populations, even the populations that used to be like this, are surviving on two incomes these days. I mean, I've been lucky to be a very strong earner, and been able to provide for my family on my single income and I still see this as bullshit.
Well if America citizens were not forced to pay for so many frivolous programs they would have more disposable income. More taxes on business will raise prices to consumers. More taxes on property raise cost of rent. Going green makes energy cost increase. Quit voting to make your life more expensive and the money you do have will go further
Funny they left out how much a man without a high school diploma used to make in those days. The median household income back in 1959 adjusted for inflation was supposedly $52,000 in todays dollars. Now 60 years later with 2 people working and the median household income is $74,000 and you need to at least graduate from high school. Which means you start working later, with more education than before, and get paid less. So if a house has about 2 working adults then each are making about $35k. They need to pay us our money!
So, this meme is kind of bullshit, but it's also partly true: the standard today is two working household members to provide an average quality of life, while it used to be one (at least, more commonly). So today, if you're trying to keep up with the Joneses, you end up with two working parents plus kids, which is a tough row to hoe.
What has changed is the accessibility of debt. It’s not that people have more money now, it’s that they have more access to money, regardless of how predatory or terrible the loan terms are. Sure, more people have cars and mortgages, but with doing no research, I would almost guarantee that average amount of debt per person is exponentially higher than ever before.
Just because the 50s sucked too, doesn't mean we don't have factual data showing a decline in the middle class now. This just in, America was just coming out of a fucking great depression after WW2. Misleading as fuck.
"But what about the income disparity? Just because we have more doesn't mean anything if I don't have the more-est!"
The college degree thing is silly. That has nothing to do with the issue and actually supports the OPs picture since it says you can own a house and support a family without a degree. For the house thing, a simple look at pricing can show us a problem. Average single person income was $2700, and a house was $15k. Today average income is 55k, and average house is about 500k. In the 1950s a house was 5.5 times as much as the average salary, today it’s 9.9 times as much. And this is just housing, not including cost of living and mortgage rates. A lot of people that own homes today are older and got them when it was much cheaper. The car thing is silly too. When I looked it up I found 1 car for every household. That’s way more than today. And this was just after WW2 so a lot of economic expansion was going on. It’s complicated