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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]People want more things now. Bigger houses, eating out, house cleaners, more than one car, vacations, college for their kids, etc. I don’t know if things were actually cheaper but you are not comparing apples to apples. [/quote]
People want more now, but wages have not kept pace with the COL. Forty or fifty years ago, a man without a college degree could give his family the 1970’s or 80’s version of OP’s lifestyle on just his own salary. Now a college-educated, dual income family owes on their own college loan debt, is more likely to need childcare, (which is costly, even if it allows you to bring in more income), higher housing costs, higher healthcare costs, and astronomically higher costs to send their own kids to college one day.[/quote]

This was on page 2 so I'm not sure if it's been addressed; however, that guy in the 70s was not looking for a second car, beach week, or a big house.  He might've lived in a 2 or 3 bedroom, 1 bath in a working class suburb.  Their vacations were likely to grandma's house a state over. They were not the people buying phase 1 vcr's or walkman's or fancy stereo's.  He might've had a hifi 8 track player and his sahm wife made breakfast, lunch, and dinner EVERY.NIGHT.   Their fun was hanging with the neighbors in someone's driveway while the kids ran around catching lightning bugs or playing manhunt throughout the neighborhood.  Their kids only played (free) school sports or maybe parks-rec/little league sports. Couches and Christmas gifts were put on layaway and you started paying for them 6 months in advance, having to stop by the store on the way home from work to make a payment.

Don't fool yourself.  Your blue collar guy with a SAHM wife in the 70s and 80s was truly middle class. They were not strivers, they were survivors.  And they still felt they were giving their kids a great life because they were able to give their kid $5k for college when the time came. [/quote]

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