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The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

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Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#611

Post by mattcaldwell »

PaulStatezny wrote: post #304
leetcrew wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

presumably GP and their wife did not go on to both earn minimum wage after getting their degree(s?). even today when a bachelor's degree is worth less than it once was, the median wage for college graduates at their first job is around $48k. only about 2% of people with any amount of college education actually make minimum wage. it's pretty rough living on minimum wage, but paying off student debt is very rarely a co…

You're right. It was about [REDACTED FOR PRIVACY - but much much less than parent's 48k medium income per person for college grads] before taxes, both with college degrees. I'm sorry lapcatsoftware if it sounded like I was making light of poverty. Poverty is terrible. But at least in the US, there is _so much_ opportunity to not be stuck on a minimum wage salary. Resigning to the idea that, "Well, I guess I just have…

SOMEBODY has to do that minimum wage job though, no? So even if we're looking at the median, there are tons of people who aren't being counted.

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#612

Post by contravariant »

dcolkitt wrote: post #246

> Housing is more expensive for them than prior generations I harp on this constantly. But housing is not more expensive in the majority of American metros. Adjusted for inflation the median cost per square foot of new housing is almost exactly the same as it was in 1990. (This doesn't even take into account that mortgage rates are drastically lower since then.) We get skewed on this for two reasons. One is because h…

Is this the median per metro? Because if so then I'd very much like to know what % of the population lives in a 'cheap' (i.e. below median) metro.

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#613

Post by [deleted] »

dcolkitt wrote: post #246

> Housing is more expensive for them than prior generations I harp on this constantly. But housing is not more expensive in the majority of American metros. Adjusted for inflation the median cost per square foot of new housing is almost exactly the same as it was in 1990. (This doesn't even take into account that mortgage rates are drastically lower since then.) We get skewed on this for two reasons. One is because h…

[deleted]

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#614

Post by xyzzyz »

scarmig wrote: post #283
School-Cotton wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to nitpick but the social isolation and massive unemployment are being caused by our response to the pandemic, not by the pandemic itself. Lockdowns are a choice, with tradeoffs.

This is not true. Sweden experienced a spike in unemployment, despite not having a lockdown. "People are too afraid about getting sick and dying to go outside" is pretty much directly attributable to the pandemic.

Sweden experienced a spike from ~7% to ~9%. US has experienced a spike from ~3% to ~14%. Sure, some of it might be attributable to social attitudes, but I don't think that such a big discrepancy can be explained by this. I think it's mostly lockdown policies causing this.

Sweden: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LRHUTTTTSEM156S US: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/UNRATE

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#615

Post by gonehome »

kelnos wrote: post #586
gonehome wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure how irrelevant it is (though Covid may change that). If I wasn't engaged I would have gone home to WFH immediately during the pandemic, it would have been nice to spend time there and be with family (rare opportunity for easy ability to work remotely and spend time with family on the east coast). That said, most of the successful people I know moved out to areas with more opportunity and those that staye…

> Why live in Palo Alto and waste lots of money on rent because of stupid housing policy when you don't have to? When you can't go out and do stuff? I hear sentiments like this a lot lately, and it feels short-sighted to me. COVID restrictions are not going to be around forever. There are financial, professional, social, and other costs that come with moving somewhere else. For people who genuinely don't like it in $…

Sure, then you can move back - maybe mid to end of 2021?

Still a year or so where it's not worth it.

Maybe that's not enough for some people to be worth the effort, but if your lease was ending and you don't have a ton of stuff it's pretty easy to do.

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#616

Post by compiler-guy »

watwut wrote: post #391
nickff wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the parent is arguing that those numbers are (only slowly) increasing because: 1) They are skewed by a few 'elite' metro areas (which are best avoided by those without very high-paying jobs). 2) The houses are nicer and have more 'features', which cost money. And that if you remove the high COL areas, and control for the amenities, you will find costs are flat or decreasing.

But people can not buy theoretical smaller cheaper house with no AC if that one is not on sale.

But given the choice between smaller and cheaper houses and larger and more expensive ones, they almost always choose the larger, more expensive ones.

The university in town is over a hundred years old, and many of the dorms are that old too. Most have no air conditioning, and have insufficient power for a resident to add a window air conditioner without special approval.

And the parents and students describe them as, "practically unlivable", "bad for the students' education, and all of that. There are numerous schemes around to get that special permission. And many scheme to move out ASAP. These are folks borrowing tens-of-thousands of dollars to go to school, and yet still go even deeper into debt for better housing, when the cheap option is right in front of them.

100 years ago no one would have thought twice about the exact same conditions. I doubt anyone would have thought twice about it even 50 years ago.

People just expect a certain level of amenities, and are willing to pay to get them.

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#617

Post by krakatau1 »

zzapplezz wrote: post #275
dcolkitt wrote: post #246

> Housing is more expensive for them than prior generations I harp on this constantly. But housing is not more expensive in the majority of American metros. Adjusted for inflation the median cost per square foot of new housing is almost exactly the same as it was in 1990. (This doesn't even take into account that mortgage rates are drastically lower since then.) We get skewed on this for two reasons. One is because h…

Sure, but post-WWII the federal government injected billions (in 2020 dollars) into the pockets of mostly white veterans to build millions of homes. The federal government also provided generous home loans and unemployment insurance. Today, these policies would be viewed as socialist by the very people who benefited from it the most.

USA in 1945 was 91% white so it kinda makes sense that government did it. Homogeneous countries have no political issues with welfare because everyone is alike.

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#618

Post by jiveturkey »

Philip-J-Fry wrote: post #94

I'm my early 20s and in the UK. I earn more than my Dad who is in his 50s. He managed to get a house, have money left over for an expensive hobby, decent car, the odd holiday etc. I'm a 90th percentile earner. Will 95+ percentile earner in a few years time. Yet it feels like I am not as well off as I should be. I don't live in an expensive area either. Yet I need to save so much money to even have the opportunity to…

You're comparing yourself to the wrong baseline. The opportunities now are different than they were 30 years ago. You also might be comparing yourself to a specific data point (your dad), vs statistically.

> I'm a 90th percentile earner. Will 95+ percentile earner in a few years time. Yet it feels like I am not as well off as I should be.

You should correct your attitude then, don't you think? You are a 90%ile earner. I don't know what "should" implies, but put it in terms of where you "are". You'll be happier.

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#619

Post by TuringNYC »

leetcrew wrote: post #389
TuringNYC wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Actually the median 401k balance at retirement is only around 60k, so that alone would quadruple their retirement savings. You are comparing apples and oranges. You are comparing today's values at retirement to future values at retirement. It is almost certain that $200k 40yrs from now will not be worth $200k in today's dollars. Inflation accrued over 40yrs -- however low and however faked -- is absolutely going t…

I got the $200k figure assuming a 6% rate of return, which is basically the inflation-adjusted rate of return for the S&P 500. both the $200k and $60k are 2020 dollars.

>> both the $200k and $60k are 2020 dollars.

This is the problem. $200k in 2020 dollars wont mean much 40yrs from now. Similarly, $60k sounded like a huge figure in 1980 for retirees planning for 2020. For a proper comparison, you'd need to compare purchasing power of $60k to a retiree today vs $200k to a retiree in 2060 -- i'll bet it is about the same!!!

Inflation is a huge unknown here. My parents' home in 1981 was $35,000. The same exact house today is over $1,000,000. Rent used to be $150 to $200/mo. The same rent today is over $3500.

I re-ran your numbers here: https://www.investor.gov/financial-tools-calculators/calcula...

I did a monthly $100 contribution at 6% assuming tax free comounding for 40yrs and came up with your figure of $200k. That is right -- you'll have $200k at this rate. But in the year 2060 that might be just a year of rent and you're broke!

Re: The majority of 18- to 29-year-olds in the US are now living with their parents

#620

Post by dylanh »

dcolkitt wrote: post #413
babelfish wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Two is that we're highly skewed to a handful of elite metros, whose housing markets are not representative of the country as a whole Right, but what matters is the housing price where people are. It doesn't matter what the housing market looks like in South Dakota if I don't want to live there. While houses in South Dakota may be 1/10 the price of houses in NYC (likely cheaper, honestly), they also have 1/10 the po…

> Right, but what matters is the housing price where people are. We're not talking about houses in the middle of nowhere. These are major urban population centers. The Houston metro area has 7 million people. The Phoenix metro area has 4.9 million people. Tampa metro has 3.1 million people. Houston and Phoenix are both larger than the Bay Area metro is currently. Tampa's just shy of the size of Seattle. Nor is it the…

Pretty much everyone I know is being priced out of market in the tampa bay area. Rent under $1k/mo means looking on the extreme periphery and suffering a long commute.
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