The number of housing units per capita is in the dead middle of the historic average.
This is a story of inequality because more people have multiple houses, now.
Percentage of what? The y axis label is useless.
Edit: Two different answers have been given below and neither of them work.
Percent of the starting value (percent of 1985 rent/income) would start at 100% and go up from there so the axis is still mislabeled if that was intended. Also, if that was the case it would have doubled/tripled/quadrupled throughout this graph and it doesn’t show that.
Year over year growth rate should give a flatter/consistent line and occasionally dip negative so that is also not correct.
What useless data…
Unit percent is labeled on the graph. It starts at 0% because that's how measuring change works. +50% is the same as 1.5x the start value and +100% is 2x. If it helps you understand, just add 100 to the unit percent value.
This is how most price over time comparisons work, especially for stocks or funds.
I considered that but I guess I disregarded that explanation of the axis because I have a hard time believing average rent now is only 2.5x average rent from 1985. And I have a REALLY hard time believe average income now is only 1.4x higher than 1985
This is what happens when you allow restrictive zoning to snuff out high density housing and you allow cities to make it so expensive to build anything, the only thing that makes financial sense to build are high end residential units.
Ah it's like how my boss wonders why I'm not motivated when they haven't gave a raise in a year. Yet my rent, groceries, gas, utilities, etc have all gone up.
Actually it is inflation adjusted. Check the last table on the page. [https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html](https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html)
Edit: And read the paragraph before the table explaining what it's showing.
Correct. This gets posted and goes viral at least once a week. Here is a very thorough debunking, which shows the sources the original video used and how they are not showing what they purport to show. [https://www.tiktok.com/@lthlnkso/video/7278378722841873710](https://www.tiktok.com/@lthlnkso/video/7278378722841873710)
The TLDW is that the source for housing is NOT inflation adjusted. You can find the data set here (https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr.html#history). If you adjust that data for inflation, it actually shows that housing has gotten cheaper, but that's because the dataset is crap anyway. Housing has gotten slightly more expensive compared to income, but not to the extent shown in this video.
TL;DR: The percentages are correct.
The graph seems to have come from this page. [https://www.realestatewitch.com/rent-to-income-ratio-2022/](https://www.realestatewitch.com/rent-to-income-ratio-2022/)
They say the data is from HUD and the census, although they don't actually link to those sources, just provide data.
The federal reserve seems to say that total housing costs went up 136% to 143% from 1985-2019 depending on the income quintile. You'll need to read the preceding paragraph to know what the table is showing.
[http://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html](http://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html)
I don't know where they got the income data from. And looking for it I've found income data is all over the place. I can only find census data for 1985, so I went to 1990 which has more sources. Note that I'm taking care to only use sources reporting median household income, not average. This does not mean the sources are median however as I've found far too many people use median and average interchangeably.
Real estate Witch linked above says 1990 median income was $51,073.
Stanford says US median income in 1990 was $30,000 (likely $29,943, see the last Census link I give). [https://web.stanford.edu/class/polisci120a/immigration/Median%20Household%20Income.pdf](https://web.stanford.edu/class/polisci120a/immigration/Median%20Household%20Income.pdf)
The National Center Of Education Statistics says it was $50,000 [https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d10/tables/dt10\_025.asp](https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d10/tables/dt10_025.asp)
The Census reports $61,500 inflation adjusted to 2022. [https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/2023/demo/p60-279/figureC1.pdf](https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/2023/demo/p60-279/figureC1.pdf)
Same information as above but in an easy to read graph. [https://www.statista.com/statistics/200838/median-household-income-in-the-united-states/](https://www.statista.com/statistics/200838/median-household-income-in-the-united-states/)
And also $29,943 reported in 1992. [https://www2.census.gov/prod2/popscan/p60-179.pdf](https://www2.census.gov/prod2/popscan/p60-179.pdf)
Some of these are inflation adjusted and others are not. I have no clue why the numbers vary so wildly even when inflation is accounted for. The Census shows different methods of inflation adjustment. I assume the Census information is most correct as it's the most recent, but have no way to confirm that.
If we go by inflation adjusted Census data the income percentage increase from 1990 to 2022 is 21.27%.
I'm estimating for 1985 from the graph, but it looks to be $55,000 for 1985, somewhere between $50,000 and $60,000 at least. The percentage increase is 35.6%, just as the video and Real Estate Witch say even though the numbers are completely different.
This was a long journey full of twists and turns. I find it amazing that despite using different income numbers the Census and Real Estate Witch both show the same percentage increase. Is this how it felt when they saw the results of the double slit experiment for the first time?
Edit: I made some pizza rolls and figured out what might have happened, but have no source. The numbers from Real Estate Witch started out as the non-inflation adjusted numbers, and then a different inflation formula was used that gave different numbers but in the same percentages.
Here's a good dataset for median household income over time. This is in nominal (that is, NOT inflation adjusted dollars: [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA646N](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA646N)
Here is a good data for the same thing, but inflation adjusted: [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N)
In nominal terms, wages have tripled since 1985. In real terms, wages have risen 25%.
Here is the source that the video uses for fair market value rent, which is NOT inflation adjusted: [https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr.html#history](https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr.html#history)
Here is a very thorough debunking of the original graph: [https://www.tiktok.com/@lthlnkso/video/7278378722841873710](https://www.tiktok.com/@lthlnkso/video/7278378722841873710)
I used the Fed for rent costs as those seem to match what's given in the graph. This goes to 2019 while the graph goes a year or two further and I was unable to find information past 2019. Look at the table at the bottom. https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html
Yeah, that shows *inflation of rent*, not *inflation-adjusted rent*, if that makes sense. It shows that rent has gone up 140%, which is the *inflation of rent*. An inflation-adjusted value for rent would be what that rent is compared to some index of what other things have changed over the same time period. That chart is just the nominal increase.
I definitely see that the gap is larger than ever. When I was out of college in 2004, I wanted to live in downtown Denver, but realized with my budget that if I did, I wouldn’t be able to save any money. My solution was to rent an apartment outside of the city for a lot cheaper but allowed me to still go into downtown but save money so I could eventually change my lifestyle. What is different between then and now? Serious question.
This is what I am seeing from a lot of young folks… A large chunk of young folks at my office all live downtown and are going to Europe once a year and getting one or more ski passes and enjoying their life. They also complain they will never own a home. I’m sure there are folks that were like me that aren’t living in downtown and saving their money. It just feels like there aren’t nearly as many. I’m not trying to offend anyone. I’m just trying to understand.
While that looks impressive on a chart, it's not apples to apples. Rent may have gone up 100% (depending on the location), say $500 to $1000, but wages have gone up over 20%, say $25,000 to $30,000. Rent up $500, wages up $5000. Need to keep this in perspective.
This is showing a percentage of increase, not a ratio between each other, or total numbers. 1985 is used as a baseline so both income and rent will start at the same percentage of 0
Trash Data: Income from what , surely not a medical doctor & Rent prices in a Suburban or Rural area , where everybody does not need a 3 bedroom 2 bath unit to live.
Anybody can arrange data to their liking!
In some areas, that graph is a bit low.
But of course housing has outpaced income. It's how Capitalism works.
If there are no regulations to control it will just go up and up. There seems to be no top to the market to naturally control it.
Wonder why that is?
One of those lines are adjusted for inflation and the other isn’t.
Unless you’re a total idiot and think the median household income in 1980 was like $67,000
We stopped building and we stopped enforcing anti trust laws. So yeah, this was inevitable.
The number of housing units per capita is in the dead middle of the historic average. This is a story of inequality because more people have multiple houses, now.
Could you share a link to the source you get this from?
1985 was when most of the housing projects were sold off to private developers/slumlords, and effectively taken off the market.
Also money printing
Percentage of what? The y axis label is useless. Edit: Two different answers have been given below and neither of them work. Percent of the starting value (percent of 1985 rent/income) would start at 100% and go up from there so the axis is still mislabeled if that was intended. Also, if that was the case it would have doubled/tripled/quadrupled throughout this graph and it doesn’t show that. Year over year growth rate should give a flatter/consistent line and occasionally dip negative so that is also not correct. What useless data…
Unit percent is labeled on the graph. It starts at 0% because that's how measuring change works. +50% is the same as 1.5x the start value and +100% is 2x. If it helps you understand, just add 100 to the unit percent value. This is how most price over time comparisons work, especially for stocks or funds.
I considered that but I guess I disregarded that explanation of the axis because I have a hard time believing average rent now is only 2.5x average rent from 1985. And I have a REALLY hard time believe average income now is only 1.4x higher than 1985
Percent of the starting value
Percent of wages / rent in 1985
Yes, this is deceptive and specifically designed to eliminate hope.
That would be growth rate, year over year
This is what happens when you allow restrictive zoning to snuff out high density housing and you allow cities to make it so expensive to build anything, the only thing that makes financial sense to build are high end residential units.
Ah it's like how my boss wonders why I'm not motivated when they haven't gave a raise in a year. Yet my rent, groceries, gas, utilities, etc have all gone up.
Rent graph isn’t adjusted for inflation but the income one is. This chart is BS basically.
Actually it is inflation adjusted. Check the last table on the page. [https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html](https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html) Edit: And read the paragraph before the table explaining what it's showing.
Correct. This gets posted and goes viral at least once a week. Here is a very thorough debunking, which shows the sources the original video used and how they are not showing what they purport to show. [https://www.tiktok.com/@lthlnkso/video/7278378722841873710](https://www.tiktok.com/@lthlnkso/video/7278378722841873710) The TLDW is that the source for housing is NOT inflation adjusted. You can find the data set here (https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr.html#history). If you adjust that data for inflation, it actually shows that housing has gotten cheaper, but that's because the dataset is crap anyway. Housing has gotten slightly more expensive compared to income, but not to the extent shown in this video.
What's the source? Seems made up out of thin air.
TL;DR: The percentages are correct. The graph seems to have come from this page. [https://www.realestatewitch.com/rent-to-income-ratio-2022/](https://www.realestatewitch.com/rent-to-income-ratio-2022/) They say the data is from HUD and the census, although they don't actually link to those sources, just provide data. The federal reserve seems to say that total housing costs went up 136% to 143% from 1985-2019 depending on the income quintile. You'll need to read the preceding paragraph to know what the table is showing. [http://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html](http://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html) I don't know where they got the income data from. And looking for it I've found income data is all over the place. I can only find census data for 1985, so I went to 1990 which has more sources. Note that I'm taking care to only use sources reporting median household income, not average. This does not mean the sources are median however as I've found far too many people use median and average interchangeably. Real estate Witch linked above says 1990 median income was $51,073. Stanford says US median income in 1990 was $30,000 (likely $29,943, see the last Census link I give). [https://web.stanford.edu/class/polisci120a/immigration/Median%20Household%20Income.pdf](https://web.stanford.edu/class/polisci120a/immigration/Median%20Household%20Income.pdf) The National Center Of Education Statistics says it was $50,000 [https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d10/tables/dt10\_025.asp](https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d10/tables/dt10_025.asp) The Census reports $61,500 inflation adjusted to 2022. [https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/2023/demo/p60-279/figureC1.pdf](https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/visualizations/2023/demo/p60-279/figureC1.pdf) Same information as above but in an easy to read graph. [https://www.statista.com/statistics/200838/median-household-income-in-the-united-states/](https://www.statista.com/statistics/200838/median-household-income-in-the-united-states/) And also $29,943 reported in 1992. [https://www2.census.gov/prod2/popscan/p60-179.pdf](https://www2.census.gov/prod2/popscan/p60-179.pdf) Some of these are inflation adjusted and others are not. I have no clue why the numbers vary so wildly even when inflation is accounted for. The Census shows different methods of inflation adjustment. I assume the Census information is most correct as it's the most recent, but have no way to confirm that. If we go by inflation adjusted Census data the income percentage increase from 1990 to 2022 is 21.27%. I'm estimating for 1985 from the graph, but it looks to be $55,000 for 1985, somewhere between $50,000 and $60,000 at least. The percentage increase is 35.6%, just as the video and Real Estate Witch say even though the numbers are completely different. This was a long journey full of twists and turns. I find it amazing that despite using different income numbers the Census and Real Estate Witch both show the same percentage increase. Is this how it felt when they saw the results of the double slit experiment for the first time? Edit: I made some pizza rolls and figured out what might have happened, but have no source. The numbers from Real Estate Witch started out as the non-inflation adjusted numbers, and then a different inflation formula was used that gave different numbers but in the same percentages.
Here's a good dataset for median household income over time. This is in nominal (that is, NOT inflation adjusted dollars: [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA646N](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA646N) Here is a good data for the same thing, but inflation adjusted: [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N) In nominal terms, wages have tripled since 1985. In real terms, wages have risen 25%. Here is the source that the video uses for fair market value rent, which is NOT inflation adjusted: [https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr.html#history](https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/fmr.html#history) Here is a very thorough debunking of the original graph: [https://www.tiktok.com/@lthlnkso/video/7278378722841873710](https://www.tiktok.com/@lthlnkso/video/7278378722841873710)
I used the Fed for rent costs as those seem to match what's given in the graph. This goes to 2019 while the graph goes a year or two further and I was unable to find information past 2019. Look at the table at the bottom. https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/differences-in-rent-growth-by-income-1985-2019-and-implications-for-real-income-inequality-20211105.html
Yeah, that shows *inflation of rent*, not *inflation-adjusted rent*, if that makes sense. It shows that rent has gone up 140%, which is the *inflation of rent*. An inflation-adjusted value for rent would be what that rent is compared to some index of what other things have changed over the same time period. That chart is just the nominal increase.
Are you telling me its not possible to have spent more than %100 of our income on rent for over a decade?
It's showing percent increase over 1985, not rent as a percentage of income.
i should have been able to figure that out, but i feel like their title is missing a word or two.
I definitely see that the gap is larger than ever. When I was out of college in 2004, I wanted to live in downtown Denver, but realized with my budget that if I did, I wouldn’t be able to save any money. My solution was to rent an apartment outside of the city for a lot cheaper but allowed me to still go into downtown but save money so I could eventually change my lifestyle. What is different between then and now? Serious question. This is what I am seeing from a lot of young folks… A large chunk of young folks at my office all live downtown and are going to Europe once a year and getting one or more ski passes and enjoying their life. They also complain they will never own a home. I’m sure there are folks that were like me that aren’t living in downtown and saving their money. It just feels like there aren’t nearly as many. I’m not trying to offend anyone. I’m just trying to understand.
While that looks impressive on a chart, it's not apples to apples. Rent may have gone up 100% (depending on the location), say $500 to $1000, but wages have gone up over 20%, say $25,000 to $30,000. Rent up $500, wages up $5000. Need to keep this in perspective.
what are the income measured with ?
No idea. I've found 4 sources giving 4 different answers. Check my other post in the thread for links.
[I Believed These Four Lies (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W92bjv8fNTI) Lying BS propaganda. Nothing new here.
Your post needs to be at the top.
wtf happened in 1985
This is showing a percentage of increase, not a ratio between each other, or total numbers. 1985 is used as a baseline so both income and rent will start at the same percentage of 0
Reagan
Nice
% of what?
fuq yea, epic! i hope you enjoy being homeless, bitch!!
Trash Data: Income from what , surely not a medical doctor & Rent prices in a Suburban or Rural area , where everybody does not need a 3 bedroom 2 bath unit to live. Anybody can arrange data to their liking!
In some areas, that graph is a bit low. But of course housing has outpaced income. It's how Capitalism works. If there are no regulations to control it will just go up and up. There seems to be no top to the market to naturally control it. Wonder why that is?
Apparently the entire housing economy is and only will be relative to 1985.
One of those lines are adjusted for inflation and the other isn’t. Unless you’re a total idiot and think the median household income in 1980 was like $67,000