Exactly. $400 for mine. $100 would fill a shopping cart with groceries back then. Health insurance: $80-125/mo. Internet: $15/mo. Garage sales almost everything was less than $10, most of it was less than $5. Goodwill was a deal. DIY/homemade was a deal, a way to save money.
It was a different time. There’s no equivalent to that time today, today is pretty awful.
And now it’s all going to be so much worse thanks to MAGA, oligarchs, and Heritage.
Yes, what is up with thrift stores charging almost the same as “first-hand” stores? Yet another example of how this generation is screwed (along with all of us old people).
I found a neat looking board game at the thrift store once. I looked it up on my phone to check reviews, and learned it would be cheaper to buy it new than what they were asking. Usually they have good deals but not that time.
Or they somehow want to price things off eBay prices. Bro, you are a thrift store. You aren't some place that should be trying to get the absolute most out of an item.
Price it vaguely on what people might pay for some used, unwashed, beat to hell thing. If someone thinks they can get more by selling it online, that's fine. That's on them. You don't have to compete with them. Turnover of items is more important than the most money on that old glass cup.
You used to be able to get grandpa's old used golf clubs for $5/7 at goodwill and I put together a whole set for cheap. Moved and had to leave it behind now they put all the clubs straight online, you can't even get them at the stores anymore. And the price is barely better than a newvset from Walmart. I wanna golf again :(
Video games are almost always ridiculous too. They’ll sell anything good online, and then charge like $10 for one of their 40 copies of Wii Fit.
The only good place to thrift nowadays is the small local places run by like churches. Goodwill sells shitty acrylic yarn for more than it costs new, wants $20+ for used kitchen appliances, sells current dollar tree shit for $5…
Goodwill fell off. It's worth noting how the stuff we buy is basically worthless for resale the moment we buy it, since cheap new stuff is outcompeting it. It's only value is use value.
I know it’s a little off topic but eBay is a fucking scam as well… So many used items go for prices very close to brand new.
I live in California, which charges VAT for ebay transactions. Add in shipping and I would be paying more than brand new for the vast majority of the inventory.
There are no good deals on ebay unless you spend a lot of time in bidding wars. You still risk getting a damaged item too…
Boutique thrift shops all try to act like they’re some amazing place to find funky retro fashion just waiting to be discovered on a Tiktok. It’s all overpriced. We’ve been to Goodwill and Habitat locally for stuff. Prices go from great to dirt cheap. They just want to move stuff, not hold on to someone’s idea of vintage cool.
The only way for a wage earner to bootstrap their way up is to have money when historic opportunities to invest present themselves, like March 2020 and April 2025. If you have a few thousand to invest now, chances are that will turn into a massive profit over time. And even better, hold those securities for longer than a year and you get a preferred, lower tax rate on any profits.
But most people can't do that. They're stuck taking out an (air quotes) "interest-free" loan from Klarna to make sure they don't starve this week. Our politicians are, thankfully, focused on the most important priorities, like drag queen story time. (And that's sarcasm, btw.)
Please don't invest right now. You are right that you can make a lot of money if you know what you're doing, but it's still a casino. With the people running the US right now, if they ever fully implement the tariffs, the market is going to eat shit. Then you can buy if there's some glimmer of hope like Republicans losing Congress in 2026. I'm not trying to do US defaultism here, I believe this advice holds worldwide.
I pulled all my money out when Trump got elected, and that was a good choice. If I'd gone all in on options I'd be straight up hood rich, but I can't gamble everything we have.
Yes... But if the US doesn't collapse then you make a lot of money buying the dip.
So either the US survives, and you make a lot of money if you invested, or the US crumbles and your cash or investments are both worth the same amount (zero).
I switched my retirement accounts to cash apprx feb 28, before the tariffs announcement and the market starting crashing. I just moved back into stocks this week. I'm convinced we've seen the worst of the tariffs... too many people are in trumps ear telling him he's a retard. It's only up from here.
Cluster B personality disorders don’t change their mind when called out, they double down. And interruption of the self constructed false reality makes them reactive.
I hope you're correct for your benefit and the benefit of people who have retirement funds in the market.
I disagree however. Even if that fucking toddler-brained jackass backs completely off the tariffs (which I don't think his ego will let him) he will do more heinous shit that will ruin the world economy in other ways. He's also got several accelerationists in his ear that would love to see another great depression.
In less than 90 days the tariffs are back on, and the insane China ones are currently rolling I believe. Adidas put out a statement today saying the shoes are going to get a lot more expensive. Also, as of today, the oligarch Jeff Bezos is under federal investigation over a rumor that Amazon was going to tell customers what portion of the price of an item was due to tariffs. Just over a rumor. A rumor about a legal action that would be a smart business decision.
I'm keeping my money in the bank, and some in cash hidden in my home. Hopefully FDIC insurance still works.
Strongly agree. We've seen nothing yet and I think we're going to see quarter after quarter of poor earnings and layoffs. Some empty shelves mid to late May. Housing crash at the end of this year or beginning of 2026. Hate to be somewhat doom and gloom but I'm also not going to miss this opportunity to jump back in with liquid. Good luck!
Yeah. We'll see i suppose. The markets holding back a lot of suppressed upward mobility that we saw when the fake "tariffs are off" tweet happened. One whiff of good news will have us going up again.
In any case, at least I mitigated some of the damage. Can't win 100% every time.
Just keep in mind the maxim- The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent. It's more of a vibes casino than it ever was before the GME stuff.
Even though I think you could be right, please don't bet the barn. I don't want to see you get hurt.
I was finally in a position to buy my first home just after the 2008 recession. Just a fluke of timing, and just enough to afford a hundred year old bungalow, but that luck gave me leverage. Sold the house 5 years later when I had a kid, paid off my college debt, and moved to a lower COL area. Never could have happened if I'd bought earlier or later.
(I have to assume wealth and intelligence have a decent correlation sometimes, but Heritage proves the relationship is certainly not 1:1)
They decidedly do not have a correlation. The majority of wealthy people inherited their wealth. Inheriting enough wealth to pay a competent finance professional has been the primary means of accruing wealth since at least the 80s. Those getting wealthy from startups and the like are outliers.
I bought my house in 2014, $224k at 4% APR, my monthly payment including taxes is $1400/mo.
It's only been 11 years, inflation is up ~35% in that time, so buying the same house now should be ~$1900/mo. Actual price if I were to buy it now? ~$3500/mo. And wages have barely budged. No wonder young people entering the workforce can't buy houses anymore.
We bought a house in Tampa Florida area in 2018, our monthly cost was $1400/month. Moved to Washington in 2022 and bought a house and the house is smaller and our monthly payment is $3k. Area matters of course, but comparably I'd imagine we're in similar situations.
Interestingly, though, that huge run-up in price is also half the reason why people think they need to own homes. We need to stop looking to homes to be the “engine of wealth creation” or we’re only asking for more of this.
The other half of the equation, of course, is wanting to have a stable home that you can control. And that’s still as valid as ever.
But homeownership isn’t necessarily the best choice for everyone. It reduces your mobility and optionality and it carries some risks and hidden costs.
But as long as everyone looks at it as the gateway to wealth, and feels like everyone is getting a piece of that action except them, it will contribute to the continuation of hyperinflation.
This is exactly right. I don’t believe in property ownership anyway, but even if you do, it is still irrational to chase this from a social and economic planning model. Life should be affordable for everyone. Period.
Please, I'm begging you, please call Habitat for Humanity. Don't make assumptions based on what you think you know about the program or have heard, just fucking call.
Worst case scenario: You spend an hour at the initial meeting and discover it won't work for you. The other scenario: You end up owning a brand new home (or one refurbished to brand new) at cost.
Because my es-wife picked up the phone, I now own my own home at $600/mo., 19-year mortgage. Took us right at a year to complete the program and have keys in hand.
Be glad to answer questions, but there are variations according to the local outfit's way of doing things.
She correct i worked making 6 bucks an hour in early 2001 and had my own apartment. Was 300 a month. Today fucking 1,000 for the same place. Bullshit not even close to what it should be.
I’ve thought about begging a similar outfit for that kind of help - I just got my first apartment on my own six or so months ago, and I’ve always been on the edge/dependent on others for help.
Do they ever help single people? I’d do anything just to have my name on a place. I’ve slept in a car before and I never want to be in that position again.
And you know the person that literally asked. And all the people that upvoted him. And if you look the comment saying he's never heard of it has more upvotes than the comment saying it's common. Brilliant analysis that it's only me lol.
Seriously. I'm sick of this let's-beg-for-an-itty-bitty-change nonsense. If rent near me is $2000/month, and that's supposed to be 1/3 of my pay, then I should be making $6000 per month ($72k per year!)
Assuming I worked a full 40 hours every week, with 4 full weeks in a month, that means I'd need to make $1,500 per week, which breaks down to $37.50 per hour (before taxes, as well as before payments for employee benefits, garnishments, etc.)
I don't live anywhere fancy. This place is an average apartment with too little parking and too many centipedes. Thankfully, I am not paying the entire rent by myself at this time, because I don't make anywhere near $37.50/hour.
If $13.75 was the wage of somebody who worked a full 40 hours/week, for 4 weeks, they'd only make $2,200. Total. That's it. For the entire month.
If your fight for a new minimum wage is starting with a number less than 30, you've already lost.
I see a lot of folks here saying "based on inflation since X, item Y SHOULD only cost Z." I want to point out those inflation numbers the government gives out every year are complete bullshit. Inflation has been WAY more than 30% over the last decade and a half or so (not you but someone above mentioned 30% as the inflation number since the aughts)
They change their basket of goods to artificially deflate inflation numbers, it is way way way higher than the 2% a year that they claim is the average. Add greed on top and you get the crazy insane prices we see today. For a 2% inflation to really work for everyone and not just the rich assholes then minimum wage needs to increase proportionately. Should force minimum wage up the stated inflation rate once a year. So every year min wage increases by 2% (or more depending on the actual inflation rate).
If you're born rich it doesn't matter what color you are. The difference is probably being born middle class and white, that's probably where you reap the most benefit from systemic racism. Being born poor, doesn't matter, the cards are forever stacked against you.
"Greedy landlords" is an easy cope out. Instead we should realize the system that's built to continously inflate the economy whereas our wages stagnate at best.
My first apartment (without roommates) was $600/month I think. I just check the present day at it rents for $1400! The mortgage cost on my first house (small/low cost of living area) was only $1000/month.
I just don't know how young people are affording housing these days.
I rent my parents' other house and just pay carrying costs. It's still $2800/month because of location. Trust me, it's a much better deal than it sounds...
There's a famous Agatha Christie quote where she mentions that when she was young, she never imagined she'd be rich enough to own an automobile or poor enough to not have servants in her house. At some point, the affordability of one shot way past the other.
In my lifetime, I've seen huge cost increases in housing, and huge cost decreases in most technological products. When I was a kid, the normal TV size was something like 20 inches, and cost more than a month's rent for a typical apartment. In 1990, the average rent was $447, according to this. I found a Sears catalog from 1989 with a 25 inch TV selling for $549, and a 20 inch TV for $318. It would be hard to convince someone from 1990 that one day the cheapest, shittiest apartments in the poorest neighborhoods would rent for more than a 60-inch TV per month. Or that the typical ambulance ride costs something like a month's salary of a factory worker.
That's the real problem with old people's sense of money. The human tendency is to assume that all products cost the same multiple of those products prices in their early adulthood, so the luxury products of their youth remain the luxury products of today. These old people are stuck in some kind of Agatha Christie style of cost comparison, without the self awareness, and thinking that someone who owns a cell phone should be able to afford to buy a single family detached house, or couldn't possibly be bankrupted by a single Emergency Room visit.
I totally agree with you that this is true, but I think it’s more a problem with reactionary thinking than anything else. The way I see it, the type of thinking that leads to reactionary comments is individualistic solutions to social and economic problems because you’re not allowed to question affordability.
People of all ages pull this shit. I can’t count how many times some millennial on reddit made unwanted suggestions for a poor person’s budgeting or grocery purchases. It is obviously difficult for older folks to understand things they’re not experiencing, but I don’t think that’s the primary issue.
Ask any traitor lunatic under 40 what to do about high prices, they’ll tell you exactly.
I definitely see this a lot. Any time someone complains about the unaffordability of life you get a swarm of people prying into their personal details desperately trying to figure out how that person's situation is their own fault.
I'm not "blaming" anyone. I'm pointing out the mechanism that causes a portion of old people to be out of touch on these things. They rely on their own experiences to draw inferences that don't actually apply to others.
"Blame" means to attribute for some negative result. There's no assigning fault here, just an observation, and an explanation behind that observation.
If I said "Bob is a fucking idiot," that's not blaming Bob for anything.
So yeah, I stand by my explanation behind the observation in OP's screenshot: that people tend to draw on past experiences even when those experiences are no longer as relevant, or are even actively misleading. And that the phenomenon I describe (that not all prices inflate at the same rate or preserve the same ratios to each other) exacerbates the problem.
The topic of the original posted screenshot is about inter-generational financial advice. I'm pointing out the need for intellectual humility when talking to a younger generation, by identifying a specific cognitive bias that tends to trip people up. And because this particular bias forms through experience, it tends to apply more to people with longer experience (that is, people who are older).
I thought my original comment wasn't judgmental, and didn't even purport to claim that all (or most) old people actually fall victim to the bias, to where they're acting upon that bias. I'm just pointing out that it's something to look out for, and to keep in mind, if you're ever in the position to be giving younger generations financial advice.
Coming in here and trying to defend old people against an imagined attack is, frankly, off topic and not particularly helpful.
It is absolutely OK to assign accurate blame and this basic misunderstanding absolutely afflicts people who aren't rich. The kind of person who bought their house when it's cheap and thinks the $2000 they pay in property taxes per year are murderous whilst ignoring the fact that folks around them are paying $2000 a month in rent.
But this flies in the face of the great American delusion that everyone can white knuckle their way through large crises arising from systemic failures or engineered on purpose by oligarchs.
We had to give up entirely on affording a house. There are ROOMS for rent at $1200 here. This used to be a low COL area until COVID. We had low infection rates so a ton of people moved here and we don't have the infrastructure to support them. We've been priced out of what living space we did have and since there's still the illusion it's cheap to live here, it's almost impossible to get a living wage.
My last apartment was 1500 a month and I made a huge jump to buy a house with a 2500 a month mortgage. Seems crazy at first, but in 5 years that same shitty "luxury" apartment is going to cost at least 2800 a month.
Having taken the point of this post as it was intended, we can also recognize that learning how to manage your money is in fact always a good thing. Will basic hygiene undo generations of economics? No, but we certainly shouldn’t NOT teach young people to manage their money.
I wish I felt confident in that. But you can almost hear it right in this tweet. The mere suggestion of financial literacy is borderline offensive.
It’s similar to how the notion of reducing your personal environmental impact is actively shit upon these days. Say anything about it and someone will shout you down about how corporations pollute more.
It’s very similar: there are larger forces polluting the environment that make your personal behaviors insufficient to solve the problem.
All true.
But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do what you can personally.
I think there's a suggestion we start teaching it. I'm 37, but there were idiots who didn't understand credit cards when I was 18, and there's just as many now, and there were just as many in 1995. I think this response thread here was meant to say yes, understanding the system is fucked, even if we come out on the other side with a functional economy, people still need to learn some personal responsibility when it comes to spending.
Honestly there are some beautiful and amazing places in Ohio and some places you don't even want to be on accident. I have a friend who is a civil engineer, his college was funded by Youngstown on the condition he worked there for five years after he graduated. A group of friends were going on a motorcycle trip to Maine and we met at his place for the first night. I was running out of gas as we got into Youngstown but the group wanted to go to a Shell for fuel so I coasted in on fumes. While we were filling our bikes seven people were screaming at each other and it broke out into a full-out brawl. I was worried about knives or guns coming out but we were done so we just burned the hell out of that place. I would bet you can still find a house in Youngstown for under $100k.
My own mother has been talking about leaving town and rather then selling her house, her plan is to rent the house out survive off the rent she collects.
on its own that wouldnt be outrageous, if it werent for the fact my mother is extremely irresponsible with money and her lifestyle and bad habits are essentially going to be paid for by someone else.
its opened my eyes on landlords.. a lot of them dont work, and they dont even do the minimum for their tenants. they just expect to get paid.
They now have services that are essentially landlord insurance where they will perform any service for you that needs to happen for a set price for low maintenance properties.
Hot take, but it's both. I make $40k in a major american city, and while it sucks I have a decent amount saved up, I live alone, and I've paid off all my debt (although I'll probably never be able to afford a home).
To be clear, I don't think anyone should have to cut the corners I do to live with financial security, and not everyone can (my partner is disabled, financial security is a pipe dream for them), but it isn't impossible for most people.
I do, I actually have very good insurance and a pretty-alright 401k. My partner doesn't, and it's... brutal. They've got several serious health conditions that they just hope aren't going to kill them in the next decade or so.
Look at what it would cost to rent a similar house in your area in terms of sq footage and location. Note a house not an apartment I shouldn't be surprised if its closer to $3500
So someone is renting it out. It's all supply and demand?? I don't think landlord just leave their apartment empty unless someone comes with 1600 bucks rents.
In Denver here, it's hard to find apartment and 2 bed 2 bath close to boulder is 2500 bucks minimum. But people still want to stay close to boulder rather than living on cheaper town.
If I'm not mistaken Liz Ryan is a former fortune 500, has been a consultant to several multibillion dollar companies like IBM, and at one point might have been appointed by the Biden Admin to run Youth Counseling services?
IDK, but I'm not convinced she's struggling with rent or groceries and she doesn't seem to pick the correct side in US Politics.
She doesn’t have to be struggling herself to see other people’s struggles and try to amplify their voice.
Even when people are millionaires, it’s a reality that they likely can’t just turn over their whole fortune at once to fix things. I’d generally guess people like this donate a lot to programs trying to fix these issues.
Whenever you see a message promoted and shared at large scale you have to try to analyze what it is they have to gain and what steps they've taken to achieve it.
They're not promoting the obvious solution. They make massive amounts of money just by maintaining this image as a megacorp consultant and an author. Smells like grift, that's all I'm saying.
Except she is identifying the problem and kinda the solution. You are just complaining because... you don't like her. Her analysis was fine, your "analysis" was "idk" and 'but but but she must be bad'. It's kinda weird. Something tells me I just should peace out of this conversation.
Dude. Your entire "analysis" was : this person might possibly have a bias so what they're saying must be wrong. Which is an idiotic conclusion. Bring skeptical is fine. But assuming everyone who could have a motive must therefore be lying is a good way to never gain any information at all because literally everyone who says something online has a motive to do so
Is it greedy landlords? Or is there a bigger issue at play, and landlords are the scapegoat? I imagine not all landlords are greedy, but if market price is $1,600, why wouldn’t the landlord charge $1,600?
I shouldn’t have phrased it as an either or. Landlords are definitely partly to blame. Especially the ones making millions and lobbying congressmen to keep things shitty for the less wealthy.
But it’s a much bigger issue than just blaming a group of faceless people.
No, not all landlords are greedy but the ones who's decisions have a large impact on the housing market are. The elderly widow who is renting out her basement to a young professional isn't being greedy. The CEO who said this quarter he'll return 25 million in stock buy backs instead of the regular 15 million are the greedy motherfuckers
You’re just saying “capitalism is greed”. Which is fine, and not wrong, but it Isn’t all that insightful and does nothing to solve any actual problems.
Fact is, supply and demand is driving these costs, not greedy landlords. If somebody wasn’t paying that rent, they wouldn’t be charging that much.
We need to prioritize building low income/affordable homes. Flood the market with supply and the price will go down.
In an abstract economy 101 sense that is true.
In a more concrete real world sense, the price is set by the landlord. Neither the supply nor the demand curve force the landlord to increase rent.
We need to prioritize building low income/affordable homes. Flood the market with supply and the price will go down.
That too is somewhat true. In a profit oriented market however the lower bound of the price of rent is dictated by the building costs, the time it takes to recuperate these costs and the expected profit margin.
Assuming building costs are more or less fixed in the short term, flooding the market and reducing the price you can charge will reduce potential profits. Thus private investors are incentivized to build only so much that it does not significantly lower prices.
So, the "we" that could lower prices by building more would have to be the state or some public entity that is less profit focused, not private landlords.
In an abstract economy 101 sense that is true.
In a more concrete real world sense, the price is set by the landlord. Neither the supply nor the demand curve force the landlord to increase rent.
The price is set by the landlord based on what people are willing to pay. What people are willing to pay is based on what is available in the market.
This is all just supply and demand. If a landlord has an empty home for rent, and there are no other homes for rent nearby, they can charge whatever anybody is willing to pay. If there are 3 empty homes right nearby, they will need to price it in line with the others.
So, the "we" that could lower prices by building more would have to be the state or some public entity that is less profit focused, not private landlords.
Or the local/state governments need to create zones for lower/middle income homes or apartments. Or in some way they need to encourage developers to build these homes.
Capitalism alone gives us the current situation. Having a government that can counterbalance this will make it work.
The price is set by the landlord based on what people are willing to pay.
What people are willing to pay sets the upper limit of what he can charge. He is not forced to set the price at this upper limit. No amount of demand forces him to increase the price beyond cost + enough profit to live off.
Or the local/state governments need to create zones for lower/middle income homes or apartments. Or in some way they need to encourage developers to build these homes.
I'm not sure how zoning in the US works. How exactly does this reduce construction costs or increase return on investment without high rents? What incentive does this give profit oriented investors to invest in affordable housing instead of other investment options?
He is not forced to set the price at this upper limit.
It’s no different than any other product you could buy in a store. Supply and demand ultimately determines the price. Charging what it is worth is no more greedy than any other aspect of capitalism. And as I said originally, maybe there are bigger issues than just “greedy landlords” that are causing the prices to go up so much, in this case unchecked capitalism.
Zoning is just one example. Part of the problem is that someone that just bought a million dollar home doesn’t want multi family homes built across the street. That will decrease the value of their house. Zoning plays into this. There’s plenty more state/local governments can do, but are not doing.
It’s interesting that when talking about the people building homes, you totally get the profit driven mentality. Why should we expect investors to build homes that would give them less profit? Exactly, and why would you expect landlords to charge less than what the home is worth? Why would Nike charge $50 for those shoes when they can charge $200 and still sell out immediately?
There’s lots to consider and saying “greedy landlords” is the problem just ignores the entire reality.
To be clear, I am making one statement in this discussion and that is that the price is being set higher than it needs to be.
By stating that int he discussion about Landlord greed, it can be inferred that I equate this with greed.
It’s no different than any other product you could buy in a store.
Saying that other businesses operate similarly does not refute my point. As you yourself pointed out, at best your argument is that all "capitalism is greed".
It’s interesting that when talking about the people building homes, you totally get the profit driven mentality.
I never pretended not to "get" it. I'm just claiming that it's greedy.
The way I see it there are two ways to counter my argument:
Either show that landlords have no choice and must demand the prices they do.
Or argue that wanting more than you need (usually to the detriment of others) is not greed. In that case I would be very interested where greed actually starts.
Rent isn't linked to inflation, it's linked to your income. The income you are able to gain in the area goes partially to the real estate in that area.
You can't compare it to easily imported goods from china. Who don't work for an amount that you get paid.
Ok and assuming this person was probably in the 80’s where minimum wage was about half what it is now… that means the $310 should be $620… which it isn’t.
Just compare median income with median rent over the span of time in various places of the world. Make a study like that, or find one that did this. That's useful information.
"In 2023, 1.1% of hourly paid workers in the USA earned the federal minimum wage or less."
Okay minimum wage+50¢, woopie. It’s someone’s first apartment. For rent. This is not median levels of income. This is first quartile at best. Median income shouldn’t even be renting.
The data is on household incomes which is less ideal than individual income but whatever.
Ignoring if it’s the same apartment from the 80s to now that’s 40 years older, and I doubt it’s been kept up to date, so it should not be worth anywhere near as much, but you know, whatever.
That approach should be the standard, not talking bout minimum wages when it's clearly just a symbolic euro. Your country doesn't have a real minimum wage so you cannot use it in calculations.
Aight, now you need to figure out why this is the case. Real estate went up in value. Why is that?
Your country has a lot of capital. Like 550k euros per adult. In a country of 230 million adults or such. It's all residing at top 1 to 10% because they live in USA for its legislature.
If you change the legislature then they'd flee to other parts of the world. Such as Ireland.
I'd say go and learn French and move to France. They have the highest taxes in the world. Bonjour Duolingo, comment çava?
Basically where you're from will make it easier to either travel or move. Belgian passports are pretty good. On top of that, being educated and having capital will make getting a residency quite easy.
The phone that you use every day, that is required to function in daily society, and is the NUMBER ONE priority when you're homeless, aside from maybe obtaining legal documentation?
OMG, would people get off the friggin cell phone thing already. People buy all kinds of things they can't afford. Money management would help with that. That was my only point. But if we HAVE to talk cell phones then fine. High end phones are over $1k. I just bought one for $200. To a person with little money, yeah cell phones too.
That argument is stupid, because usually people need a reason to save for. Now rent is so high that people can barely save, and houses are so expensive that even if they do and get a credit with their staggering student debt, they'll never be able to afford it.
So what do people do? they just enjoy the small things, because they know they'll never have the big ones.
It's not stupid, you've just stupidly misinterpreted it.
I believe you've mistakenly interpreted it to mean that I disagree with the premise that people have been priced out of the things we've come to believe are the standard of living now. That's not what I was objecting to.
My point is that money should ALWAYS be managed. If you have no money, then, well I guess it manages itself. But if you have very little money, you shouldn't be buying s $60k car you can't afford. You buy a $3k car you can. Saying, I can't afford a house so I'm going to go into massive amounts of debt to buy a car to make up for it, is the REASON you need to manage money.
you just avocado toast even harder. Now you not only over generalized people, and willfully ignore the cause of the problem.
You then turn items that are essential to life in society into irresponsible luxuries. If you can’t afford to rent there is no such thing as an affordable phone/car.
The point of the post is that it’s not merely impulsive spending and you went, “nah, it is just that”
A $60k car and a $1600 cell phone are NOT essential for life and I didn't just "nah, it is just that," the argument. You're just having reading comprehension problems.
Let's drop to your level. Are you stupid enough to believe that people don't buy things they can't afford? If you only have even $10 to your name and you need food, you go to the most economical grocery store you can get to and maximize your purchases. You don't walk into Starbucks and order a latte. The OP implied that because there is as larger economic problem at hand, money management isn't an issue. They are ALWAYS both an issue.
And yes I understand that the problem is that people have to manage $10 now instead of $1000. It was not my intention to minimalize that.
You invent a scenario, and applied that to all people who struggle then? Context be dammed? Damn, sounds like a bad take.
The OP context is “older generations say that things are easy, when they had it easy. But here is an example that shows that things are not equal by a long shot.
Then you show up with a ‘if people would just stop eating avocado toast, they would have it just as easy’ ignoring the message in the OP and the systemic issues that not only make owning both your stated items a necessary component of life, but makes everything much more expensive.
A stupid take. Do struggling people own $1300 phones or expensive cars? Maybe there are some but not a lot. You fucking just dammed everyone struggling over just the possibility, inventing a character flaw on an entire class of people.
The Ratio says it's actually pretty stupid. The percentage of people who can't afford a home purely because they bought a $60k car is going to be absolutely minuscule, but it's a great dog whistle for trying to lay the blame at the feet of personal responsibility.
There is no such thing as a $3k car, those days are gone. If it's going to be something that is expected to start and drive every day without major repairs that are overdue, you need to spend closer to $10k.
I know this because I recently bought my sons some used cars. Used 2006 Volvo was $6k in about as good of condition it could be for the age and miles. Still needed a bunch of little things that quickly added up. New tires ($800), PCV breather system ($120 did myself), new ignition coils ($200, did myself), brakes ($80, did myself), etc. If I wasn't doing my own work, it would have been 3x the cost.
I also bought a 2013, nearly identical car to the 06. It needs far less, put tires on it, still has an evaporative emissions leak causing a check engine light. Not going to fix that.
I buy $1k cars sometimes, but they usually don't run. A $3k car will be usable if you know how to turn wrenches, have space to work, and own multiple other cars for when it breaks down.
$10k barely buys a reliable car in most markets these days.
Used car markets are highly localized markets and depending on demand in the area can fluctuate wildly, just because you got a steal on a 14 year old car 3 years ago doesn't mean other people aren't struggling to find an affordable used car now.
That's truly terrible but I don't know what that has to do with money management, which is the only point I'm trying to make. I agree on the rest of all of this.
The highest priced iPhone, all max specs, is $1600.
If you get a new one every year, and trade in the previous year's, you'll probably get around $600 trade in value. So we're talking $1000/year for the highest priced phone.
On a monthly basis, we're talking $83/month. That's like a rounding error on rent, utilities, and food, much less transportation and health care.
And, more realistically, people are buying $800 phones once every 2 years, maybe seeing something like a $600 net expense spread over 24 months, for $25/month.
Phones are like the one thing that are cheaper in 2025 than in 1985.
Exactly. $400 for mine. $100 would fill a shopping cart with groceries back then. Health insurance: $80-125/mo. Internet: $15/mo. Garage sales almost everything was less than $10, most of it was less than $5. Goodwill was a deal. DIY/homemade was a deal, a way to save money.
It was a different time. There’s no equivalent to that time today, today is pretty awful.
And now it’s all going to be so much worse thanks to MAGA, oligarchs, and Heritage.
Yes, what is up with thrift stores charging almost the same as “first-hand” stores? Yet another example of how this generation is screwed (along with all of us old people).
I found a neat looking board game at the thrift store once. I looked it up on my phone to check reviews, and learned it would be cheaper to buy it new than what they were asking. Usually they have good deals but not that time.
Or they somehow want to price things off eBay prices. Bro, you are a thrift store. You aren't some place that should be trying to get the absolute most out of an item.
Price it vaguely on what people might pay for some used, unwashed, beat to hell thing. If someone thinks they can get more by selling it online, that's fine. That's on them. You don't have to compete with them. Turnover of items is more important than the most money on that old glass cup.
You used to be able to get grandpa's old used golf clubs for $5/7 at goodwill and I put together a whole set for cheap. Moved and had to leave it behind now they put all the clubs straight online, you can't even get them at the stores anymore. And the price is barely better than a newvset from Walmart. I wanna golf again :(
Video games are almost always ridiculous too. They’ll sell anything good online, and then charge like $10 for one of their 40 copies of Wii Fit.
The only good place to thrift nowadays is the small local places run by like churches. Goodwill sells shitty acrylic yarn for more than it costs new, wants $20+ for used kitchen appliances, sells current dollar tree shit for $5…
Goodwill fell off. It's worth noting how the stuff we buy is basically worthless for resale the moment we buy it, since cheap new stuff is outcompeting it. It's only value is use value.
Good news! Tariffs just made new stuff significantly more expensive so the resale value will be higher now. /s
Watching new vs used prices on things will be intresting
They do employ people who might not be able to get a job elsewhere, so not evil, just halfway shitty.
They pay disabled people 22 cents an hour.
What the fuck? Thanks for making my day even worse I guess. Seriously thank you for the information, they will no longer get my business.
I know it’s a little off topic but eBay is a fucking scam as well… So many used items go for prices very close to brand new. I live in California, which charges VAT for ebay transactions. Add in shipping and I would be paying more than brand new for the vast majority of the inventory.
There are no good deals on ebay unless you spend a lot of time in bidding wars. You still risk getting a damaged item too…
Hey, at least they employ people who might not be able to get a job elsewhere. Goodwill does anyway.
Boutique thrift shops all try to act like they’re some amazing place to find funky retro fashion just waiting to be discovered on a Tiktok. It’s all overpriced. We’ve been to Goodwill and Habitat locally for stuff. Prices go from great to dirt cheap. They just want to move stuff, not hold on to someone’s idea of vintage cool.
Walmart cut costs to the bone and squeezed down on what thrift stores used to charge.
Thrift stores are a deal compared to Macy's, JC Penny, and such.
I blame macklemore.
Now playing MACKLEMORE & RYAN LEWIS - Thrift Shop
Agreed.
The only way for a wage earner to bootstrap their way up is to have money when historic opportunities to invest present themselves, like March 2020 and April 2025. If you have a few thousand to invest now, chances are that will turn into a massive profit over time. And even better, hold those securities for longer than a year and you get a preferred, lower tax rate on any profits.
But most people can't do that. They're stuck taking out an (air quotes) "interest-free" loan from Klarna to make sure they don't starve this week. Our politicians are, thankfully, focused on the most important priorities, like drag queen story time. (And that's sarcasm, btw.)
Please don't invest right now. You are right that you can make a lot of money if you know what you're doing, but it's still a casino. With the people running the US right now, if they ever fully implement the tariffs, the market is going to eat shit. Then you can buy if there's some glimmer of hope like Republicans losing Congress in 2026. I'm not trying to do US defaultism here, I believe this advice holds worldwide.
I pulled all my money out when Trump got elected, and that was a good choice. If I'd gone all in on options I'd be straight up hood rich, but I can't gamble everything we have.
If the US collapses, the dollars you saved from pulling your investments is worthless...
That's true, but so would the investments themselves.
Yes... But if the US doesn't collapse then you make a lot of money buying the dip.
So either the US survives, and you make a lot of money if you invested, or the US crumbles and your cash or investments are both worth the same amount (zero).
I switched my retirement accounts to cash apprx feb 28, before the tariffs announcement and the market starting crashing. I just moved back into stocks this week. I'm convinced we've seen the worst of the tariffs... too many people are in trumps ear telling him he's a retard. It's only up from here.
Cluster B personality disorders don’t change their mind when called out, they double down. And interruption of the self constructed false reality makes them reactive.
I hope you're correct for your benefit and the benefit of people who have retirement funds in the market.
I disagree however. Even if that fucking toddler-brained jackass backs completely off the tariffs (which I don't think his ego will let him) he will do more heinous shit that will ruin the world economy in other ways. He's also got several accelerationists in his ear that would love to see another great depression.
In less than 90 days the tariffs are back on, and the insane China ones are currently rolling I believe. Adidas put out a statement today saying the shoes are going to get a lot more expensive. Also, as of today, the oligarch Jeff Bezos is under federal investigation over a rumor that Amazon was going to tell customers what portion of the price of an item was due to tariffs. Just over a rumor. A rumor about a legal action that would be a smart business decision.
I'm keeping my money in the bank, and some in cash hidden in my home. Hopefully FDIC insurance still works.
Strongly agree. We've seen nothing yet and I think we're going to see quarter after quarter of poor earnings and layoffs. Some empty shelves mid to late May. Housing crash at the end of this year or beginning of 2026. Hate to be somewhat doom and gloom but I'm also not going to miss this opportunity to jump back in with liquid. Good luck!
Yeah. We'll see i suppose. The markets holding back a lot of suppressed upward mobility that we saw when the fake "tariffs are off" tweet happened. One whiff of good news will have us going up again.
In any case, at least I mitigated some of the damage. Can't win 100% every time.
Just keep in mind the maxim- The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent. It's more of a vibes casino than it ever was before the GME stuff.
Even though I think you could be right, please don't bet the barn. I don't want to see you get hurt.
Ill be ok. Been 100% in a vtsax equivalent for 10 years... not retiring any time soon
I was finally in a position to buy my first home just after the 2008 recession. Just a fluke of timing, and just enough to afford a hundred year old bungalow, but that luck gave me leverage. Sold the house 5 years later when I had a kid, paid off my college debt, and moved to a lower COL area. Never could have happened if I'd bought earlier or later.
Pooooor Heritage Foo dation
Actually think their kids will be down to be obscenely rich in the future world where coral reef diving and backcountry skiing are only possible in VR
(I have to assume wealth and intelligence have a decent correlation sometimes, but Heritage proves the relationship is certainly not 1:1)
They decidedly do not have a correlation. The majority of wealthy people inherited their wealth. Inheriting enough wealth to pay a competent finance professional has been the primary means of accruing wealth since at least the 80s. Those getting wealthy from startups and the like are outliers.
I bought my house in 2014, $224k at 4% APR, my monthly payment including taxes is $1400/mo.
It's only been 11 years, inflation is up ~35% in that time, so buying the same house now should be ~$1900/mo. Actual price if I were to buy it now? ~$3500/mo. And wages have barely budged. No wonder young people entering the workforce can't buy houses anymore.
We bought a house in Tampa Florida area in 2018, our monthly cost was $1400/month. Moved to Washington in 2022 and bought a house and the house is smaller and our monthly payment is $3k. Area matters of course, but comparably I'd imagine we're in similar situations.
Interestingly, though, that huge run-up in price is also half the reason why people think they need to own homes. We need to stop looking to homes to be the “engine of wealth creation” or we’re only asking for more of this.
The other half of the equation, of course, is wanting to have a stable home that you can control. And that’s still as valid as ever.
But homeownership isn’t necessarily the best choice for everyone. It reduces your mobility and optionality and it carries some risks and hidden costs.
But as long as everyone looks at it as the gateway to wealth, and feels like everyone is getting a piece of that action except them, it will contribute to the continuation of hyperinflation.
This is exactly right. I don’t believe in property ownership anyway, but even if you do, it is still irrational to chase this from a social and economic planning model. Life should be affordable for everyone. Period.
Saving money on food to buy a guillotine is personal finance.
Trade and barter with your fellow proletariat and create the tools.
Have tools, need wood.
Have wood, need hands. Sounds like we have a start!
Now kiss. Get your hands on their wood.
Wood for sheep?
Maybe there is a financing plan in installments. Klarna or something...
We have scrapyards and bulk pickup. Reuse materials and save some dough
Is this the original unmodified drawing? What a dump truck on the lad.
Nope!
Right I remembered him fit, not deformed lol.
This is from the alternate reality where Rob Liefeld illustrated Watchmen
Nah, Doc has feet, couldn't be liefeld
Somebody actually took the time and effort to make that adjustment.
Dr. Manhatten got back.
Please, I'm begging you, please call Habitat for Humanity. Don't make assumptions based on what you think you know about the program or have heard, just fucking call.
Worst case scenario: You spend an hour at the initial meeting and discover it won't work for you. The other scenario: You end up owning a brand new home (or one refurbished to brand new) at cost.
Because my es-wife picked up the phone, I now own my own home at $600/mo., 19-year mortgage. Took us right at a year to complete the program and have keys in hand.
Be glad to answer questions, but there are variations according to the local outfit's way of doing things.
She correct i worked making 6 bucks an hour in early 2001 and had my own apartment. Was 300 a month. Today fucking 1,000 for the same place. Bullshit not even close to what it should be.
I’ve thought about begging a similar outfit for that kind of help - I just got my first apartment on my own six or so months ago, and I’ve always been on the edge/dependent on others for help.
Do they ever help single people? I’d do anything just to have my name on a place. I’ve slept in a car before and I never want to be in that position again.
Perhaps you and a friend could pretend to be a couple? Doesn't matter their gender or sexuality.
Oh uh hey, andros_rex, wanna go out? We can take a nice, romantic drive to a Habitat for Humanity's interview.
My parents, 35000 dollars for a two bedroom, 1 bath house 3 acres of land in the middle of BFE back in the 80's
Today, 3 bed, 1 bath house with less than .25 acres, 200k same BFE area.
With inflation something comparable to my parents house in BFE, because it's not changed all that much, should only be 100k.
And the recent minimum wage increase to 13.75 an hour passed by the people is in process of being revoked by Republicans.
And I do get tired of visiting home and taking to people that spout off the 'back in my day' bs.
BFE?
Acronym for being in the middle of nowhere.
“Bum Fuck Egypt” or some odd variant of that.
I’ve heard of “Butt Fuck Nowhere.” But never BFE or Egypt.
It’s been around a long time, at least since the ‘80s. You can now add it to your vocabulary.
Or not if noone knows what it means and it makes no sense.
I don’t care, you do you. Nobody’s making you do anything. Plenty of people do know, so not like your lack of knowledge limits anyone else’s usage.
Sounds like "I enjoy being indecipherable, not my problem!"
Everybody I know knows what BFE is. Ask around.
It does make sense. It's hyperbolically saying it's so far away it might as well be in Egypt.
A lot of us in the Midwest say BFI, with I being Iowa. Think it has more to do with none of us wanting to be in Iowa.
It means out in the middle of nowhere. Most people know what it means, looks like it is just you here who doesn't.
And you know the person that literally asked. And all the people that upvoted him. And if you look the comment saying he's never heard of it has more upvotes than the comment saying it's common. Brilliant analysis that it's only me lol.
Have higher standards
Seriously. I'm sick of this let's-beg-for-an-itty-bitty-change nonsense. If rent near me is $2000/month, and that's supposed to be 1/3 of my pay, then I should be making $6000 per month ($72k per year!)
Assuming I worked a full 40 hours every week, with 4 full weeks in a month, that means I'd need to make $1,500 per week, which breaks down to $37.50 per hour (before taxes, as well as before payments for employee benefits, garnishments, etc.)
I don't live anywhere fancy. This place is an average apartment with too little parking and too many centipedes. Thankfully, I am not paying the entire rent by myself at this time, because I don't make anywhere near $37.50/hour.
If $13.75 was the wage of somebody who worked a full 40 hours/week, for 4 weeks, they'd only make $2,200. Total. That's it. For the entire month.
If your fight for a new minimum wage is starting with a number less than 30, you've already lost.
I see a lot of folks here saying "based on inflation since X, item Y SHOULD only cost Z." I want to point out those inflation numbers the government gives out every year are complete bullshit. Inflation has been WAY more than 30% over the last decade and a half or so (not you but someone above mentioned 30% as the inflation number since the aughts)
They change their basket of goods to artificially deflate inflation numbers, it is way way way higher than the 2% a year that they claim is the average. Add greed on top and you get the crazy insane prices we see today. For a 2% inflation to really work for everyone and not just the rich assholes then minimum wage needs to increase proportionately. Should force minimum wage up the stated inflation rate once a year. So every year min wage increases by 2% (or more depending on the actual inflation rate).
"Have you tried simply having more money?"
Life's really easy when you're born rich and white.
If you're born rich it doesn't matter what color you are. The difference is probably being born middle class and white, that's probably where you reap the most benefit from systemic racism. Being born poor, doesn't matter, the cards are forever stacked against you.
"Greedy landlords" is an easy cope out. Instead we should realize the system that's built to continously inflate the economy whereas our wages stagnate at best.
My first apartment (without roommates) was $600/month I think. I just check the present day at it rents for $1400! The mortgage cost on my first house (small/low cost of living area) was only $1000/month.
I just don't know how young people are affording housing these days.
Well, most don't. Just let them enjoy abuse at home.
I rent my parents' other house and just pay carrying costs. It's still $2800/month because of location. Trust me, it's a much better deal than it sounds...
There's a famous Agatha Christie quote where she mentions that when she was young, she never imagined she'd be rich enough to own an automobile or poor enough to not have servants in her house. At some point, the affordability of one shot way past the other.
In my lifetime, I've seen huge cost increases in housing, and huge cost decreases in most technological products. When I was a kid, the normal TV size was something like 20 inches, and cost more than a month's rent for a typical apartment. In 1990, the average rent was $447, according to this. I found a Sears catalog from 1989 with a 25 inch TV selling for $549, and a 20 inch TV for $318. It would be hard to convince someone from 1990 that one day the cheapest, shittiest apartments in the poorest neighborhoods would rent for more than a 60-inch TV per month. Or that the typical ambulance ride costs something like a month's salary of a factory worker.
That's the real problem with old people's sense of money. The human tendency is to assume that all products cost the same multiple of those products prices in their early adulthood, so the luxury products of their youth remain the luxury products of today. These old people are stuck in some kind of Agatha Christie style of cost comparison, without the self awareness, and thinking that someone who owns a cell phone should be able to afford to buy a single family detached house, or couldn't possibly be bankrupted by a single Emergency Room visit.
I totally agree with you that this is true, but I think it’s more a problem with reactionary thinking than anything else. The way I see it, the type of thinking that leads to reactionary comments is individualistic solutions to social and economic problems because you’re not allowed to question affordability.
People of all ages pull this shit. I can’t count how many times some millennial on reddit made unwanted suggestions for a poor person’s budgeting or grocery purchases. It is obviously difficult for older folks to understand things they’re not experiencing, but I don’t think that’s the primary issue.
Ask any traitor lunatic under 40 what to do about high prices, they’ll tell you exactly.
I definitely see this a lot. Any time someone complains about the unaffordability of life you get a swarm of people prying into their personal details desperately trying to figure out how that person's situation is their own fault.
Exactly. I never want to hear from someone making >$300,000 that I should be eating lentils all week.
I'm not "blaming" anyone. I'm pointing out the mechanism that causes a portion of old people to be out of touch on these things. They rely on their own experiences to draw inferences that don't actually apply to others.
"Blame" means to attribute for some negative result. There's no assigning fault here, just an observation, and an explanation behind that observation.
If I said "Bob is a fucking idiot," that's not blaming Bob for anything.
So yeah, I stand by my explanation behind the observation in OP's screenshot: that people tend to draw on past experiences even when those experiences are no longer as relevant, or are even actively misleading. And that the phenomenon I describe (that not all prices inflate at the same rate or preserve the same ratios to each other) exacerbates the problem.
The topic of the original posted screenshot is about inter-generational financial advice. I'm pointing out the need for intellectual humility when talking to a younger generation, by identifying a specific cognitive bias that tends to trip people up. And because this particular bias forms through experience, it tends to apply more to people with longer experience (that is, people who are older).
I thought my original comment wasn't judgmental, and didn't even purport to claim that all (or most) old people actually fall victim to the bias, to where they're acting upon that bias. I'm just pointing out that it's something to look out for, and to keep in mind, if you're ever in the position to be giving younger generations financial advice.
Coming in here and trying to defend old people against an imagined attack is, frankly, off topic and not particularly helpful.
It is absolutely OK to assign accurate blame and this basic misunderstanding absolutely afflicts people who aren't rich. The kind of person who bought their house when it's cheap and thinks the $2000 they pay in property taxes per year are murderous whilst ignoring the fact that folks around them are paying $2000 a month in rent.
But this flies in the face of the great American delusion that everyone can white knuckle their way through large crises arising from systemic failures or engineered on purpose by oligarchs.
Exactly. We need more flying in that face. Like bricks
We had to give up entirely on affording a house. There are ROOMS for rent at $1200 here. This used to be a low COL area until COVID. We had low infection rates so a ton of people moved here and we don't have the infrastructure to support them. We've been priced out of what living space we did have and since there's still the illusion it's cheap to live here, it's almost impossible to get a living wage.
I started at $1,400 in 2011. That went up to $3,200 by 2023 for the cheapest place in a worse part of town.
I had to move to an entirely different city. Fuck San Diego. Shitty ass city.
My last apartment was 1500 a month and I made a huge jump to buy a house with a 2500 a month mortgage. Seems crazy at first, but in 5 years that same shitty "luxury" apartment is going to cost at least 2800 a month.
All CEOs are bastards or something
Having taken the point of this post as it was intended, we can also recognize that learning how to manage your money is in fact always a good thing. Will basic hygiene undo generations of economics? No, but we certainly shouldn’t NOT teach young people to manage their money.
Nobody on earth has suggested we stop teaching economic literacy. We should however stop pretending it is sufficient. We require systemic change.
I wish I felt confident in that. But you can almost hear it right in this tweet. The mere suggestion of financial literacy is borderline offensive.
It’s similar to how the notion of reducing your personal environmental impact is actively shit upon these days. Say anything about it and someone will shout you down about how corporations pollute more.
It’s very similar: there are larger forces polluting the environment that make your personal behaviors insufficient to solve the problem.
All true.
But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do what you can personally.
I think there's a suggestion we start teaching it. I'm 37, but there were idiots who didn't understand credit cards when I was 18, and there's just as many now, and there were just as many in 1995. I think this response thread here was meant to say yes, understanding the system is fucked, even if we come out on the other side with a functional economy, people still need to learn some personal responsibility when it comes to spending.
I used to pay $1100 for a 3 bedroom apartment 10 years ago, now a 2 bedroom is $2600+
Landlords are not greedy. They are inherently parasitic.
Adam Smith would agree with you.
I paid $750 for a 2br 30 years ago. I pay $850 for a 3br now. I used to live outside San Francisco, now I'm in Ohio.
Not living in Ohio is worth at least $1k a month, so that tracks.
Yeah places with really low rents, there's always a reason. But sometimes it's still an option.
Ha, I was just being snarky. I've never liked the few parts of Ohio I've been at, but I'm guessing there are some good places there.
Honestly there are some beautiful and amazing places in Ohio and some places you don't even want to be on accident. I have a friend who is a civil engineer, his college was funded by Youngstown on the condition he worked there for five years after he graduated. A group of friends were going on a motorcycle trip to Maine and we met at his place for the first night. I was running out of gas as we got into Youngstown but the group wanted to go to a Shell for fuel so I coasted in on fumes. While we were filling our bikes seven people were screaming at each other and it broke out into a full-out brawl. I was worried about knives or guns coming out but we were done so we just burned the hell out of that place. I would bet you can still find a house in Youngstown for under $100k.
My own mother has been talking about leaving town and rather then selling her house, her plan is to rent the house out survive off the rent she collects.
on its own that wouldnt be outrageous, if it werent for the fact my mother is extremely irresponsible with money and her lifestyle and bad habits are essentially going to be paid for by someone else.
its opened my eyes on landlords.. a lot of them dont work, and they dont even do the minimum for their tenants. they just expect to get paid.
They now have services that are essentially landlord insurance where they will perform any service for you that needs to happen for a set price for low maintenance properties.
Hot take, but it's both. I make $40k in a major american city, and while it sucks I have a decent amount saved up, I live alone, and I've paid off all my debt (although I'll probably never be able to afford a home).
To be clear, I don't think anyone should have to cut the corners I do to live with financial security, and not everyone can (my partner is disabled, financial security is a pipe dream for them), but it isn't impossible for most people.
I hope you have healthcare, because that sounds terrifying.
I do, I actually have very good insurance and a pretty-alright 401k. My partner doesn't, and it's... brutal. They've got several serious health conditions that they just hope aren't going to kill them in the next decade or so.
Nobody should be subjected to that.
My mortgage is close to 1600 a month. Plus HOA fees on top of that.
I dont think rent being at that price range is always greedy landlords.
I think you're right. The problem is that salaries are not keeping up. It's been a chronic problem.
What's your interest rate? That plays a huge factor in what your monthly payments are.
Im at 5%
Look at what it would cost to rent a similar house in your area in terms of sq footage and location. Note a house not an apartment I shouldn't be surprised if its closer to $3500
I have the same mortgage and a property manager I talked to said my house would rent for $2300. Major American city.
Actually there's an influx of similar properties around here that are just asking for 1600ish per month.
Ya what market, sq footage and bedrooms?
So someone is renting it out. It's all supply and demand?? I don't think landlord just leave their apartment empty unless someone comes with 1600 bucks rents.
In Denver here, it's hard to find apartment and 2 bed 2 bath close to boulder is 2500 bucks minimum. But people still want to stay close to boulder rather than living on cheaper town.
If I'm not mistaken Liz Ryan is a former fortune 500, has been a consultant to several multibillion dollar companies like IBM, and at one point might have been appointed by the Biden Admin to run Youth Counseling services?
IDK, but I'm not convinced she's struggling with rent or groceries and she doesn't seem to pick the correct side in US Politics.
She doesn’t have to be struggling herself to see other people’s struggles and try to amplify their voice.
Even when people are millionaires, it’s a reality that they likely can’t just turn over their whole fortune at once to fix things. I’d generally guess people like this donate a lot to programs trying to fix these issues.
So because she's not personally struggling, she can't analyze the situation?
Whenever you see a message promoted and shared at large scale you have to try to analyze what it is they have to gain and what steps they've taken to achieve it.
They're not promoting the obvious solution. They make massive amounts of money just by maintaining this image as a megacorp consultant and an author. Smells like grift, that's all I'm saying.
Except she is identifying the problem and kinda the solution. You are just complaining because... you don't like her. Her analysis was fine, your "analysis" was "idk" and 'but but but she must be bad'. It's kinda weird. Something tells me I just should peace out of this conversation.
You sound like a Maga right now.
Dude. Your entire "analysis" was : this person might possibly have a bias so what they're saying must be wrong. Which is an idiotic conclusion. Bring skeptical is fine. But assuming everyone who could have a motive must therefore be lying is a good way to never gain any information at all because literally everyone who says something online has a motive to do so
I never claimed they were wrong in any way, shape, or form. I said it smells like a grift and we should be aware of their position.
You just called someone maga because they said she was right regardless of what her personal situation was...
It's right there. You're not going to trick people in forgetting what was already said.
Said the person complaining that someone pointed out that its getting to expensive to live and that avocado toast isnt the issue
Are you implying that the CEO of a company that consults for IBM is struggling to get by?
She never said she struggled
Shes likely not renting as the CEO
She also says it in past tense
I dont know what her life was like before hand
Avocado toast is a big fat waste of money and I don't take anyone seriously who buys it then complains they need more.
Is it greedy landlords? Or is there a bigger issue at play, and landlords are the scapegoat? I imagine not all landlords are greedy, but if market price is $1,600, why wouldn’t the landlord charge $1,600?
Are you not in America? We have whole software systems illegally manipulating the rental market prices.
This is a great example of one of those “bigger issues” I was talking about.
Even if it is a bigger issue, the landlords still hold blame for the situation. Can’t escape that
I shouldn’t have phrased it as an either or. Landlords are definitely partly to blame. Especially the ones making millions and lobbying congressmen to keep things shitty for the less wealthy.
But it’s a much bigger issue than just blaming a group of faceless people.
It's definitely landlords. See: Rent seeking behavior.
Ok, but it’s not just landlords. It’s an entire infrastructure built on allowing this kind of thing to happen.
Why should we have a market for housing at all? Not everything needs to be a market
Also add in: education, health care, and prisons.
It's appalling the things people are able to make money off of and still sleep well at night.
Because they're not greedy. Since they all do, they're all greedy. No exceptions.
There’s a concept of supply and demand. There should be more supply.
No, not all landlords are greedy but the ones who's decisions have a large impact on the housing market are. The elderly widow who is renting out her basement to a young professional isn't being greedy. The CEO who said this quarter he'll return 25 million in stock buy backs instead of the regular 15 million are the greedy motherfuckers
You got 2 downvotes for saying it’s not all landlords. I think that was what I was getting at.
It’s easy to point your finger and blame an imaginary person for your problems. But it’s often much more complicated than that.
There’s an infrastructure built around benefiting people with wealth that, in turn, harms people without wealth.
whose
Because after construction costs have already been paid off everything that exceeds maintenance costs is pure profit for landlords.
Wanting to increase profis beyond the inflation rate to cover their own costs of living is greed.
You’re just saying “capitalism is greed”. Which is fine, and not wrong, but it Isn’t all that insightful and does nothing to solve any actual problems.
Fact is, supply and demand is driving these costs, not greedy landlords. If somebody wasn’t paying that rent, they wouldn’t be charging that much.
We need to prioritize building low income/affordable homes. Flood the market with supply and the price will go down.
In an abstract economy 101 sense that is true.
In a more concrete real world sense, the price is set by the landlord. Neither the supply nor the demand curve force the landlord to increase rent.
That too is somewhat true. In a profit oriented market however the lower bound of the price of rent is dictated by the building costs, the time it takes to recuperate these costs and the expected profit margin.
Assuming building costs are more or less fixed in the short term, flooding the market and reducing the price you can charge will reduce potential profits. Thus private investors are incentivized to build only so much that it does not significantly lower prices.
So, the "we" that could lower prices by building more would have to be the state or some public entity that is less profit focused, not private landlords.
The price is set by the landlord based on what people are willing to pay. What people are willing to pay is based on what is available in the market.
This is all just supply and demand. If a landlord has an empty home for rent, and there are no other homes for rent nearby, they can charge whatever anybody is willing to pay. If there are 3 empty homes right nearby, they will need to price it in line with the others.
Or the local/state governments need to create zones for lower/middle income homes or apartments. Or in some way they need to encourage developers to build these homes.
Capitalism alone gives us the current situation. Having a government that can counterbalance this will make it work.
What people are willing to pay sets the upper limit of what he can charge. He is not forced to set the price at this upper limit. No amount of demand forces him to increase the price beyond cost + enough profit to live off.
I'm not sure how zoning in the US works. How exactly does this reduce construction costs or increase return on investment without high rents? What incentive does this give profit oriented investors to invest in affordable housing instead of other investment options?
It’s no different than any other product you could buy in a store. Supply and demand ultimately determines the price. Charging what it is worth is no more greedy than any other aspect of capitalism. And as I said originally, maybe there are bigger issues than just “greedy landlords” that are causing the prices to go up so much, in this case unchecked capitalism.
Zoning is just one example. Part of the problem is that someone that just bought a million dollar home doesn’t want multi family homes built across the street. That will decrease the value of their house. Zoning plays into this. There’s plenty more state/local governments can do, but are not doing.
It’s interesting that when talking about the people building homes, you totally get the profit driven mentality. Why should we expect investors to build homes that would give them less profit? Exactly, and why would you expect landlords to charge less than what the home is worth? Why would Nike charge $50 for those shoes when they can charge $200 and still sell out immediately?
There’s lots to consider and saying “greedy landlords” is the problem just ignores the entire reality.
To be clear, I am making one statement in this discussion and that is that the price is being set higher than it needs to be.
By stating that int he discussion about Landlord greed, it can be inferred that I equate this with greed.
Saying that other businesses operate similarly does not refute my point. As you yourself pointed out, at best your argument is that all "capitalism is greed".
I never pretended not to "get" it. I'm just claiming that it's greedy.
The way I see it there are two ways to counter my argument:
Either show that landlords have no choice and must demand the prices they do.
Or argue that wanting more than you need (usually to the detriment of others) is not greed. In that case I would be very interested where greed actually starts.
Rent isn't linked to inflation, it's linked to your income. The income you are able to gain in the area goes partially to the real estate in that area.
You can't compare it to easily imported goods from china. Who don't work for an amount that you get paid.
Ok and assuming this person was probably in the 80’s where minimum wage was about half what it is now… that means the $310 should be $620… which it isn’t.
Just compare median income with median rent over the span of time in various places of the world. Make a study like that, or find one that did this. That's useful information.
"In 2023, 1.1% of hourly paid workers in the USA earned the federal minimum wage or less."
Okay minimum wage+50¢, woopie. It’s someone’s first apartment. For rent. This is not median levels of income. This is first quartile at best. Median income shouldn’t even be renting.
But sure, they have data on quintiles, so let’s use upper limit of the first from 1985 (~10k) and 2022 (30k) is 3x so even at that, it should be $930. https://taxpolicycenter.org/statistics/household-income-quintiles
The data is on household incomes which is less ideal than individual income but whatever.
Ignoring if it’s the same apartment from the 80s to now that’s 40 years older, and I doubt it’s been kept up to date, so it should not be worth anywhere near as much, but you know, whatever.
That approach should be the standard, not talking bout minimum wages when it's clearly just a symbolic euro. Your country doesn't have a real minimum wage so you cannot use it in calculations.
Aight, now you need to figure out why this is the case. Real estate went up in value. Why is that?
Your country has a lot of capital. Like 550k euros per adult. In a country of 230 million adults or such. It's all residing at top 1 to 10% because they live in USA for its legislature.
If you change the legislature then they'd flee to other parts of the world. Such as Ireland.
I'd say go and learn French and move to France. They have the highest taxes in the world. Bonjour Duolingo, comment çava?
Someone who doesn't know the difference between a passport and a visa 😒
Basically where you're from will make it easier to either travel or move. Belgian passports are pretty good. On top of that, being educated and having capital will make getting a residency quite easy.
Well then it's good we kept the minimum wage at $7.25 which is why inflation never happened.
And we're still getting ripped off.
Profit incentive seems to be important. I have no problem giving misinformation if you people can't figure things out.
There's a great answer that you folks could use to look at this subject.
You should ask yourselves why the situation is what it is. How it relates to other areas in the world.
Do some research.
I'd do it, but you'd have to pay me and you don't have any money 😬
Could I pay you to shut up instead? I think that's a better use of my money.
You can't get there buying cars and phones you can't afford either.
The phone that you use every day, that is required to function in daily society, and is the NUMBER ONE priority when you're homeless, aside from maybe obtaining legal documentation?
That cell phone?
OMG, would people get off the friggin cell phone thing already. People buy all kinds of things they can't afford. Money management would help with that. That was my only point. But if we HAVE to talk cell phones then fine. High end phones are over $1k. I just bought one for $200. To a person with little money, yeah cell phones too.
That argument is stupid, because usually people need a reason to save for. Now rent is so high that people can barely save, and houses are so expensive that even if they do and get a credit with their staggering student debt, they'll never be able to afford it.
So what do people do? they just enjoy the small things, because they know they'll never have the big ones.
It's not stupid, you've just stupidly misinterpreted it.
I believe you've mistakenly interpreted it to mean that I disagree with the premise that people have been priced out of the things we've come to believe are the standard of living now. That's not what I was objecting to.
My point is that money should ALWAYS be managed. If you have no money, then, well I guess it manages itself. But if you have very little money, you shouldn't be buying s $60k car you can't afford. You buy a $3k car you can. Saying, I can't afford a house so I'm going to go into massive amounts of debt to buy a car to make up for it, is the REASON you need to manage money.
No, your take is very stupid
you just avocado toast even harder. Now you not only over generalized people, and willfully ignore the cause of the problem.
You then turn items that are essential to life in society into irresponsible luxuries. If you can’t afford to rent there is no such thing as an affordable phone/car.
The point of the post is that it’s not merely impulsive spending and you went, “nah, it is just that”
A $60k car and a $1600 cell phone are NOT essential for life and I didn't just "nah, it is just that," the argument. You're just having reading comprehension problems.
Let's drop to your level. Are you stupid enough to believe that people don't buy things they can't afford? If you only have even $10 to your name and you need food, you go to the most economical grocery store you can get to and maximize your purchases. You don't walk into Starbucks and order a latte. The OP implied that because there is as larger economic problem at hand, money management isn't an issue. They are ALWAYS both an issue.
And yes I understand that the problem is that people have to manage $10 now instead of $1000. It was not my intention to minimalize that.
You invent a scenario, and applied that to all people who struggle then? Context be dammed? Damn, sounds like a bad take.
The OP context is “older generations say that things are easy, when they had it easy. But here is an example that shows that things are not equal by a long shot.
Then you show up with a ‘if people would just stop eating avocado toast, they would have it just as easy’ ignoring the message in the OP and the systemic issues that not only make owning both your stated items a necessary component of life, but makes everything much more expensive.
A stupid take. Do struggling people own $1300 phones or expensive cars? Maybe there are some but not a lot. You fucking just dammed everyone struggling over just the possibility, inventing a character flaw on an entire class of people.
A very, very stupid take.
The Ratio says it's actually pretty stupid. The percentage of people who can't afford a home purely because they bought a $60k car is going to be absolutely minuscule, but it's a great dog whistle for trying to lay the blame at the feet of personal responsibility.
It's a whole lot more than you think.
It's a whole lot less than you think.
No, it's not. It's not measured in the decimals of percentages, so it's significant.
Ok. Troll go ahead and keep believing what you want. You will always be right.
There is no such thing as a $3k car, those days are gone. If it's going to be something that is expected to start and drive every day without major repairs that are overdue, you need to spend closer to $10k.
I know this because I recently bought my sons some used cars. Used 2006 Volvo was $6k in about as good of condition it could be for the age and miles. Still needed a bunch of little things that quickly added up. New tires ($800), PCV breather system ($120 did myself), new ignition coils ($200, did myself), brakes ($80, did myself), etc. If I wasn't doing my own work, it would have been 3x the cost.
I also bought a 2013, nearly identical car to the 06. It needs far less, put tires on it, still has an evaporative emissions leak causing a check engine light. Not going to fix that.
I buy $1k cars sometimes, but they usually don't run. A $3k car will be usable if you know how to turn wrenches, have space to work, and own multiple other cars for when it breaks down.
$10k barely buys a reliable car in most markets these days.
Yes there is ....
My 2009 honda fit cost me 5k 3 years ago and has needed no repairs at all... You can go lower pretty easily...
Used car markets are highly localized markets and depending on demand in the area can fluctuate wildly, just because you got a steal on a 14 year old car 3 years ago doesn't mean other people aren't struggling to find an affordable used car now.
That's truly terrible but I don't know what that has to do with money management, which is the only point I'm trying to make. I agree on the rest of all of this.
Nice strawman you got there, goes well with all the avocado toast I buy instead of using it for a mortgage payment.
The highest priced iPhone, all max specs, is $1600.
If you get a new one every year, and trade in the previous year's, you'll probably get around $600 trade in value. So we're talking $1000/year for the highest priced phone.
On a monthly basis, we're talking $83/month. That's like a rounding error on rent, utilities, and food, much less transportation and health care.
And, more realistically, people are buying $800 phones once every 2 years, maybe seeing something like a $600 net expense spread over 24 months, for $25/month.
Phones are like the one thing that are cheaper in 2025 than in 1985.
Hell yeah, grind away for basic necessities. Bet you're a dream to talk to at parties.