The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town

Actually, many of them did. Talk to some old people in the US suburbs about what life was like when they were young in the '50s and '60s. Most grew up in a dense city and then voluntarily left it for the suburbs. Most of them thought spending their life in a car was great -- certainly way better than having to take the bus or the train. It was a sign of success. When cars went mass-market as America suburbanized, densely built urban areas and the use of public transport were increasingly associated with poverty and being trapped in the archaic past.

If you lived in the suburbs and commuted by car, it was prestigious, it was modern; it meant you were doing well for yourself financially, and were forward-looking to a brighter future with new and better ways of doing things. It was the 1950s cultural equivalent of working at a startup and living in a gentrifying hipster neighborhood in San Francisco today.

No doubt someone will reply that these perceptions was all manufactured merely due to General Motors malfeasance and marketing campaigns. That may be true, but that's entirely beside the point. Those campaigns worked because many young people then actually did agree with their content, and were very happy to drive everywhere.

I can't help but feel that you're describing some mythical ideal that never really existed for most people. Yes, for a long time, a lot of manufacturing jobs were pretty stable and people worked for IBM for a long time. But, even in that case, even if the jobs were stable, people tended to move around the company a lot. The military, which has always been a large employer, is an even more extreme example of jobs being relatively stable but mobile.

By the way, according to this Economist article from a couple years back, US workforce mobility has actually gone down significantly to a degree not explained by demographics: http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2012/07/labour-m...

>Also with many family units having two workers, what happens when one doesn't have a job?

And what happened when there was more typically one worker and he (the common case) lost his job?

If you are living a commercial zoned space; realize that the government can come into your building(at anytime), slap a red tag on it, and the tenant is out. (My father had an illegial mother in-law unit in his garage(done well, even ADA accessible), wasn't even charging rent.

Well this building inspector found out about it. Knocked on my father's door. My father let him in. The guy told my father he needs to tear out the illegial unit. Well my father being the sensible Irishman, took the Inspector, threw him on the ground, frisked him, and called the Cops. My father had no idea these guys had so much authority. He thought he was being set up for a home invasion? No in reality, he just "lost it". He knew--he was in the Trades. He got mad--it happens to the best of us? Well, since this was years ago, and my father had his best friend(an Oakland cop) come to court; my father got off scott free. White privlege? (That day, my father realized too much government power is just wrong. I never heard, "They probally got what they deserved!"

While I'm at it; my rich neighbor, decided to build a three bedroom house on his property. Property his parents bought him 40 years ago. He has 20 acres? It was right after the 2008 crash. He needed rental income to live his lavish lifestyle. He thought he was a Titan, and "More people should get creative in down economies?"

He got all the permits. He spend $850,000 building the place. It was ready to rent! His first renter told him he would gladly move his family in, but there's rent control in detached homes. He could only rent to people at or below the federal poverty level, and rent was tied to this metric in some way? Instead of getting $5000/month---he could only rent it out for around $800. He was floored! Beyond angry. It's still just sitting there. (This is the only rent control we have in Marin County. I'm still a fan of some form of rent control though.) He told his mother she could live in the detached house for free. She said, 'I bought you your mansion, those fancy cars, antiques, and for all your stupid failed businesses(Businesses that kept him thinking he was completely self made? No one helped me out? A real Horato Alger's; I'll sleep in the mansion, and you sleep in the detached house!' Love that mom! Really, she set this dude up for life, why shouldn't she expect to sleep in the mansion? (I don't care if your parents made you wealthy, but admit it, and help needy family members? I've only know a few rich boys who weren't in denial--George Sorrows comes to mind. He frequently states, 'My wealth is completely due to my father's generosity, and connections! He's an interesting man. He's also an author. He believes his wealth prevents people from taking his writing seriously. He might be right?)

Cheers! (Make sure you are not overpaying rent. I know dudes who don't tell tenants about rent control. They wait until the tenant figures it out.)

That's the conventional wisdom, but I don't buy it. Raising a family was always tough - when I was young my parents scrimped and saved in a way that I've never seen among millennials. Everybody did, and it was considered just part of parenthood, especially in the beginning.

It's not that younger people can't raise a family as easily as their parents and grandparents, it's that either they don't realize how tough it was back then or they're just not interested in making the same sacrifices.

>On top of that, it's often no more expensive to rent a small apartment in the city vs. a large house in a suburb. And that large house with its tiring commute is just a burden to someone without kids.

Sure, but it's far cheaper to rent a small apartment in the suburbs and commute than it is to rent in the city.

Yes, commuting sucks. But it sucked in the 20th century as well. My dad spent more than an hour on the road each way. Every day. That't the kind of sacrifice I'm talking about. In addition to the commute my dad brown bagged his lunch every day, made his own coffee (Folgers), drank PBR non-ironically, did his own plumbing, painted what needed painting, mowed his own lawn, and fixed the family car himself when it broke down. If you live that kind of lifestyle today you can afford a family in the same way my parents did.

I'm not making a moral judgement on the other peoples' procreation choices. All I'm saying is family was a priority for previous generations in a way that it isn't today. It was part of being an adult.