Live data from Hacker News

The death of partying in the USA

derekthompson.org

171–180 of 756 posts

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#171
post #28

This article isn’t wrong, but it neglects to mention real estate, transportation, and lodging. A party needs a venue, and it needs guests. And the guests need a way to get to and from the venue. If they stay a long time, they need a place to sleep. People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes. It’s kind of hard to throw a big party witho…

>People these days don’t own real estate.

The home ownership rate has been 64%, plus or minus about 1%, for the last 45 years.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RSAHORUSQ156S

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#172

I broadly agree with the article. I'm also wondering if the rising political polarization is at least in part caused by the "antisocial" phenomenon. If you're not exposed to a spectrum of political worldviews through being involved with all these people you randomly met back in the day, it becomes easier to dehumanize the people you disagree with. You also never have to listen to their talking points, because you can…

The talking points themselves have got much worse. So many things are now mainstream, especially in racism, that would have been kept out of "polite company" previously. It's not that social media has made people less aware of other's political views, it's made them more aware, which is why they hate each other. Entire accounts exist (libsoftiktok) for the purpose of exposing people to views which they will hate, so they can get angry and ramp up their rhetoric.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#173
post #28

This article isn’t wrong, but it neglects to mention real estate, transportation, and lodging. A party needs a venue, and it needs guests. And the guests need a way to get to and from the venue. If they stay a long time, they need a place to sleep. People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes. It’s kind of hard to throw a big party witho…

I'm not convinced. I live in Berlin and everyone is living in a flat, yet I've had my fair share of home parties, even in small two room apartments where half the party spilled out to the stairwell.

I'm pretty sure Berlin has public transportation. I have it here in Trondheim, Norway - but only one town that I've lived in the states had busses. They didn't run all night, on Sunday, nor did they visit all areas of the somewhat small town. (I'm from the US, lived more places there than I have in Norway)

Other places had taxis (that you couldn't order ahead of time to get to work on time) and some had none until they uber/lyft. (Don't know the current situation).

I'm going to guess the other thing Berlin has is safe areas to walk. I can go to a party and walk home, safely on walking paths complete with shortcuts, without even being harassed by the police and risk getting arrested and in jail for the night (for public intoxication). None of these were luxuries I had in the states.

And I'll say that yes, I've been in some small apartments - but only some folks with small apartments can host. You probably have no clue how many would host if they only had enough space, but a small apartment with 2 adults that have hobbies limits things.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#174
post #6

The parental part bears special mention. My spouse and I find that we are overwhelmingly the ones calling to organize playdates rather than vice versa. I'd like to think it's not that my kids are poorly socialized or misbehave - they've always received glowing reports at school. I give my kids business cards with my phone number to pass out to their friends to give to their parents, and there is also a class list whe…

[dead]

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#175
post #28

This article isn’t wrong, but it neglects to mention real estate, transportation, and lodging. A party needs a venue, and it needs guests. And the guests need a way to get to and from the venue. If they stay a long time, they need a place to sleep. People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes. It’s kind of hard to throw a big party witho…

> People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes.

If you look at a graph of home ownership in the US by cohort at various points in time (see, e.g., https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2018/08/homeownership...), while the rates are somewhat lower, between the highest point and the lowest point the difference is at worst 10 percentage points.

This sentiment strikes me a lot more as people in their 20's complaining that they're poor because they don't have the financial resources of someone in their 40's, despite having more resources than the latter did at their age.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#177
post #28

This article isn’t wrong, but it neglects to mention real estate, transportation, and lodging. A party needs a venue, and it needs guests. And the guests need a way to get to and from the venue. If they stay a long time, they need a place to sleep. People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes. It’s kind of hard to throw a big party witho…

>People these days don’t own real estate. The home ownership rate has been 64%, plus or minus about 1%, for the last 45 years. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RSAHORUSQ156S

The number of first-time home owners has plummeted though

https://www.nar.realtor/research-and-statistics/research-rep...

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#178
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>With COVID partying meant that someone could kill you with an illness. Given the mortality rate for people typically in the partying age group (and especially those under 30), you were more likely to die in a traffic accident on your way to or back from the party, or from alcohol poisoning, than from a case of COVID acquired there. Let's not exaggerate. From the NIH: The median IFR for COVID based on age groups: 0.0…

To be pedantic, it's still possible for people to modify their behavior based on mistaken beliefs (in this case, that COVID is really dangerous, when it isn't for healthy young people). Though I don't think this explains the actual trend in this case.

Healthy young people still do not want to spread it to grandma or whoever. That is something frequent forgotten by these arguments - not everyone is sociopath and young people sometimes think about other people.

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#179
post #28

This article isn’t wrong, but it neglects to mention real estate, transportation, and lodging. A party needs a venue, and it needs guests. And the guests need a way to get to and from the venue. If they stay a long time, they need a place to sleep. People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes. It’s kind of hard to throw a big party witho…

>People these days don’t own real estate. The home ownership rate has been 64%, plus or minus about 1%, for the last 45 years. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RSAHORUSQ156S

Perhaps, but what about the median age of buyers? That tells a more complete story here https://www.axios.com/2024/11/04/home-buyer-age-older

Re: The death of partying in the USA

#180
post #28

This article isn’t wrong, but it neglects to mention real estate, transportation, and lodging. A party needs a venue, and it needs guests. And the guests need a way to get to and from the venue. If they stay a long time, they need a place to sleep. People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes. It’s kind of hard to throw a big party witho…

> People these days don’t own real estate. Wealthy people own it all. Normal people are renting apartments or portions of homes. If you look at a graph of home ownership in the US by cohort at various points in time (see, e.g., https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2018/08/homeownership... ), while the rates are somewhat lower, between the highest point and the lowest point the difference is at worst 10 percentage p…

It is really strange to read complaints that the vast vast majority of 20 somethings have no chance of competing against older established households in the housing market.

I would hope so, otherwise that would mean the country/locale is so bad that older households are packing their bags and fleeing.

So the most desirable properties, such as large SFHs, townhouses, penthouses, etc… within a short driving distance of an attractive city will likely be owned by the latter, by definition.

Post reply on HN