80s & 90s sitcoms. Middle class families from those shows would today be priced out of their houses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, but I’m told I’m entitled for wanting a nice home with my good salary.

Fed and bank policies caused an unprecedented increase in home values in the last 25 or so years. (The primary beneficiaries were the boomers of course.) Once those home values go up in major metropolitan areas, they rarely go back down significantly. I don’t see it happening in DC anytime soon. Unfortunately, some generations got more screwed over than others.

The housing bubble started January 1, 2000, up till then homes were just a hedge against inflation. After 9/11 housing stalled shortly and was not till 2002 it took off. Then we had 2009-2011 correction.

I bought my first home Feb 2000, I paid $278k. Brand new in 1954 was $13,500. The first 45 years rose in value in average $5877 a year. Steady rise.

However, from 2000 to 2005 my home shot up to $540k. Around 52,000 a year. In 2000 the youngest boomer was born 1964 making him or her 36. First time buyers were mainly Gen x.

My old house rose in value from 2000 to 2005 the same $ amount it did from 1954 to 2000.

Yeah this is pretty consistent with what I’m saying. I’m Gen X and played it smart so was able to get a foothold. But boomers (as usual) made out like bandits, and generations younger than X got totally screwed.

I think most people don’t realize how much this country screwed the younger generations by allowing home values to get so insane. Many young people (who don’t have parents who will give them $$$ or homes) just won’t be able to become home owners anytime in the next few decades because we let the prices get way too high. (And the policy decisions to let prices get so crazy were made at the top by the ruling class. They knew what they were doing.)

Not even a home in flyover country?

I mean for sure everything is shades of gray. Less popular locations will generally be less expensive. But, as a gen Xer, I genuinely can’t believe how bad we’ve screwed our younger generations. It was a choice that policy makers made. Sure, some millenials and younger will get money from their parents. But what about the ones who don’t? They’re just gonna get screwed out of important lifetime opportunities because their parents weren’t rich?

And I think the answer is yes. Yes they are.

Amazing how instead of creating something new and original they have literally stolen everything from previous generations such as music, fashion etc...

But the 1 thing that they were unable to steal from previous generations was real estate.

Absolutely. But then they figured out how to steal real estate from future generations.

And they did it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Middle class TV families from the 80s/90s would be recategorized as UMC families in 2021. Families Ties, Who’s the Boss, Growing Pains, My So Called Life, Life Goes On, Wonder Years etc.

Roseanne & Married with Children are exceptions.

But they were not presented to us as UMC in the 1980s and 1990s.

Wasn’t the mom on who’s the boss running a company? And growing pains-was the dad a dr?
I think they were definitely UMC families. No idea about the other shows.

Yup, they were all UMC professionals or business owners. The Growing Pains dad was a psychiatrist. Family Ties mom was an architect. Mom on Who's the Boss was a corporate executive. My So Called Life mom owned a printing company. Etc.

Who's the Boss was never Middle-Class. The whole premise was that the mom hired a full-time live in housekeeper. She had room for him and his daughter. Never middle-class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Cosby show house

He ran his own OBGYN practice and I’m pretty sure she was a partner in her law firm. I don’t think it would be unrealistic for such a couple to buy that home.

Agreed. I also think we are underestimating the fact that they were meant to be living in Brooklyn Heights, not Manhattan. Out of curiosity, I found this article about Brooklyn Heights that suggested one could by a 4-story brownstone for under $30K in the mid-60s. If we assume the Cosby family bought in the 70s while young professionals, it still isn't out of reach for a doctor and lawyer.

[Anonymous]

OOPs, the article here: https://eportfolios.macaulay.cuny.edu/goldwyn17/files/2017/01/Super-gentrification-Lees.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Middle class TV families from the 80s/90s would be recategorized as UMC families in 2021. Families Ties, Who’s the Boss, Growing Pains, My So Called Life, Life Goes On, Wonder Years etc.

Roseanne & Married with Children are exceptions.

But they were not presented to us as UMC in the 1980s and 1990s.

Were your parents doctors, lawyers, architects, small business owners, etc?

I think when you were younger you did not catch the distinction. You just saw them as families like yours. But they weren't.

I was poor/LMC growing up, depending on exactly when we’re talking about. I definitely knew the families in those shows weren’t like mine. They all seemed rich.

+1 It was VERY clear to me that these are UMC families. No one working shifts? No discussion of whether the family could afford X this month? Vacations to Hawaii or Disney without any discussion of affordability? If you didn't see these as aspirational/rich families, it's probably because you were better off than you think you were.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Cosby show house

He ran his own OBGYN practice and I’m pretty sure she was a partner in her law firm. I don’t think it would be unrealistic for such a couple to buy that home.

Agreed. I also think we are underestimating the fact that they were meant to be living in Brooklyn Heights, not Manhattan. Out of curiosity, I found this article about Brooklyn Heights that suggested one could by a 4-story brownstone for under $30K in the mid-60s. If we assume the Cosby family bought in the 70s while young professionals, it still isn't out of reach for a doctor and lawyer.

I haven’t seen the show since it aired when I was a kid but as I recall it was made clear that they lived in Brooklyn, not Manhattan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Look at the December 2020 Atlantic article about The Simpsons if you want to see an even starker comparison:

The Life in The Simpsons Is No Longer Attainable

"The most famous dysfunctional family of 1990s television enjoyed, by today’s standards, an almost dreamily secure existence that now seems out of reach for all too many Americans. I refer, of course, to the Simpsons. Homer, a high-school graduate whose union job at the nuclear-power plant required little technical skill, supported a family of five. A home, a car, food, regular doctor’s appointments, and enough left over for plenty of beer at the local bar were all attainable on a single working-class salary. Bart might have had to find $1,000 for the family to go to England, but he didn’t have to worry that his parents would lose their home.

This lifestyle was not fantastical in the slightest—nothing, for example, like the ridiculously large Manhattan apartments in Friends. On the contrary, the Simpsons used to be quite ordinary—they were a lot like my Michigan working-class family in the 1990s.

The 1996 episode “Much Apu About Nothing” shows Homer’s paycheck. He grosses $479.60 per week, making his annual income about $25,000."

Moe Szyslak would be a multimillionaire today if he were to sell his tavern or patent/trademark his "Flaming Moe" drink. (He basically invented "Lean")

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Cosby show house

He ran his own OBGYN practice and I’m pretty sure she was a partner in her law firm. I don’t think it would be unrealistic for such a couple to buy that home.

Agreed. I also think we are underestimating the fact that they were meant to be living in Brooklyn Heights, not Manhattan. Out of curiosity, I found this article about Brooklyn Heights that suggested one could by a 4-story brownstone for under $30K in the mid-60s. If we assume the Cosby family bought in the 70s while young professionals, it still isn't out of reach for a doctor and lawyer.

I haven’t seen the show since it aired when I was a kid but as I recall it was made clear that they lived in Brooklyn, not Manhattan.

They lived in Brooklyn but the actual home used in show was in Manhattan that house sold for 10.2 million recently.

[Anonymous]

My so called life house.

$1 million+