Compound that with the percentage of income 30 year olds spend on housing, education, health care and child care compared to their parents and we have a recipe for disaster.
Don't forget student loan payments and smart phones.
Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
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Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
Price per square foot for housing has remained remarkably constant over time. People are spending more on houses than they used to because they are buying bigger houses.
Real house prices are currently up 44% since the nineties. https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OOfzxFgh8YE/WD2XUyaZeqI/AAAAAAAAp... That is not accounted for by sq footage. Interest rates are a much more likely culprit.
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Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
If the 0.1% can successfully convince people to blame their grandparents and magical robots for stealing all of the country's wealth then this trend is likely to continue.
It's not their fault we make less, but they should have personal responsibility for their own retirement, especially since the massive amount of growth in housing value and the stockmarket over their lifetime.
Social Security lifted the responsibility of saving for their own retirement. It's not much use to blame them for following incentives.
Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#84This is WSJ red meat political controversy stuff. The story devolves into the usual "tax the rich" and anti-welfare state debate as any other political click-bait. I thought HN wasn't doing that for a week... I actually agree with the premise and many of the conclusions, and if it popped up on Drudge or Breitbart or whatever I'd be fine with it, but why here? Why must every popular site devolve into either a virtual…
> I thought HN wasn't doing that for a week
We weren't, but since a week turned out to be longer than needed and I was worried about the cost of continuing, we ended the experiment early: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13131251. So it's back to the normal guidelines now.
(The worry about continuing was because there was evidence that some people thought the change was permanent, and that was not the intention.)
Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#85People who will have children ("eventual parents" for the purpose of this comment) are healthier, smarter and wealthier than people who will never have children. If the question is whether things have gotten harder for the average person, it is misleading to compare a group consisting only of eventual parents with a group composed of both eventual parents and non-parents. A better comparison would be 30-years-olds of…
This sounds like complete bunk to me, even contrary to every trend I've heard of.
Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#86What makes me upset is that the economic realities do not match what is taught in large swaths of America. We are taught (at least in my community, and I am 30 now still living within 20 miles of where I grew up) that a very achievable ideal is a middle class existence with one parent working, and a small house in the suburbs. I am in the top 1% income earners for my generation and do not even come close to this. I t…
You must be exaggerating or living in New York/San Fran. Here in the midwest is is very reasonable for a top 20% income for 30 yr old age bracket to have only one parent work. If you're top 1% you can definitely afford a house in the suburbs and have one parent stay home.
Living near NYC/SF does include "large swaths of America".
Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#87People who will have children ("eventual parents" for the purpose of this comment) are healthier, smarter and wealthier than people who will never have children. If the question is whether things have gotten harder for the average person, it is misleading to compare a group consisting only of eventual parents with a group composed of both eventual parents and non-parents. A better comparison would be 30-years-olds of…
> People who will have children ("eventual parents" for the purpose of this comment) are healthier, smarter and wealthier than people who will never have children. I can't read the article, as it's behind a paywall. Does the article say that? If not, where does that claim come from?
Under the title click the web link. The top result should give you a non-paywalled version of the article.
Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#88About half earn more, about half earn less. Wouldn't that imply that the average earnings are about the same? If so, I don't know that I'd complain because that indicates stability.
> About half earn more, about half earn less. Wouldn't that imply that the average earnings are about the same? Actually no, though this is a fairly standard misunderstanding of statistics. For an easy counter-example imagine generation one being [0, 100] and generation two being [1, 2]. Average wealth goes down, while every element is higher than 50% of the previous generation.
This depends entirely on the underlying distribution of the data. In your example, the distributions are not at all similar, so it makes sense that you can't compare medians or averages between those populations.
I suspect that the distribution of incomes in the US remains fairly similar to what it was 40 years ago. Thus, if the median has remained the same, then the average probably also has.
Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#89What makes me upset is that the economic realities do not match what is taught in large swaths of America. We are taught (at least in my community, and I am 30 now still living within 20 miles of where I grew up) that a very achievable ideal is a middle class existence with one parent working, and a small house in the suburbs. I am in the top 1% income earners for my generation and do not even come close to this. I t…
> We are taught that a very achievable ideal is a middle class existence with one parent working
I'm pushing 40 (upbringing: United States, middle class, medium-sized city) and have never, ever heard of this dream of a single-income household.
Re: Barely Half of 30-Year-Olds in the U.S. Earn More Than Their Parents Did at 30
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is only going to get worse with software eating the world and automation of every possible task that we can. It has already started with companies like Amazon (in their warehouses) using robots extensively.
Up until we finally get our collective heads out of our asses and implement something like Basic Income.
That isn't going to happen easily. My experience: I've talked about this to many people (highly educated, smart people) - most of them are adamant on the idea that human beings absolutely have to work to deserve anything, even food and water. This might very well be anecdotal, but very few people get ideas like Basic Income intuitively. It would likely take tremendous amount to first make people understand, then accept radical ideas.
I'm all for doing work, but never understood worship of hard work for hard work's sake.