Change My Mind: A Society Cannot "Work" Itself to Equality

[lowlife]

Reality is probably somewhere in between you guys.

Obviously the cheapest homes in poor areas aren't $400k. That's the median for the entire country, so there are lots of homes much cheaper, and a friend making $80k and having to live in a van suggests truly horrific spending choices.

The problem is that what living frugally entails and the payoff for doing it is unreasonable imo. It would be one thing if living frugally meant stop buying luxury cars and taking expensive vacations and eating in restaurants every night, or stop wasting money on expensive entertainment, but if you have to not have a family, fast for days at a time, live in a crappy studio in a high scrime neighborhood and wear a coat at home so you don't freeze, and maybe you can buy a crappy place in the same high crime neighborhood a few years later, that's more than just being frugal.

The economy is pretty unstable if the house price to income ratio isn't even close to the recommended amount. Recommended amount is a house valued at 2.6x your income, and we're now almost at 6 for median house to median, so "affordability" now means median income matches you with a shit tier house for the next 30 years.

Not to mention that even if you got in when it was more reasonable just a few years ago and already bought a house, your property taxes keep climbing for something you allegedly alredy own.

well said. "The meaninglessness of suffering, not suffering itself, was the curse that lay over mankind so far." It's not that people are unwilling to sacrifice, it's that the payoff for said sacrifice is increasingly meager. This seems even more egregious when you see the upper 1% have increased their wealth by large degrees in the last couple years, while the rest of us are forced to accept less and less for the same amount of work put in.

 

[panamaican]

Yes this speaks to quality of life and what we as a society deem acceptable, generally speaking. Are we ok with an ever declining quality of life, so long as a certain number of us can still achieve a level of "success?" The "fuck you I got mine" or "I did it so there's absolutely no reason you can't" mentality is counterproductive to a healthy, happy society imo. It's a very narrow, selfish, unempathetic way to go through life; refusing to accept or acknowledge that your experience and/or situation doesn't necessarily reflect everyone else's. And it shouldn't! We are all different and we all face our own set of circumstances and challenges, what works for me might not necessarily work for the next man, and that's ok. I would expect things for the average hard working American to get better, easier with each passing generation, unfortunately it doesn't seem we're headed in that direction.

There's definitely a strain of the population that doesn't understand how bad it is for many people in the country.

I'm a big believer in frugality myself. But I've got clients who are trying to pay for $750/month apartments while making less than $35k/annually. It's really easy to say "Well just don't spend any money until you have that down payment." But that often means giving up on living a life. I don't mean vacations and fancy coffees, it means going out with friends, dating, having a family, etc.

How long can someone put that stuff off before the non-monetary costs to your well-being exceed the economic benefit of the reward?

 

[panamaican]

Reality is probably somewhere in between you guys.

Obviously the cheapest homes in poor areas aren't $400k. That's the median for the entire country, so there are lots of homes much cheaper, and a friend making $80k and having to live in a van suggests truly horrific spending choices.

The problem is that what living frugally entails and the payoff for doing it is unreasonable imo. It would be one thing if living frugally meant stop buying luxury cars and taking expensive vacations and eating in restaurants every night, or stop wasting money on expensive entertainment, but if you have to not have a family, fast for days at a time, live in a crappy studio in a high scrime neighborhood and wear a coat at home so you don't freeze, and maybe you can buy a crappy place in the same high crime neighborhood a few years later, that's more than just being frugal.

The economy is pretty unstable if the house price to income ratio isn't even close to the recommended amount. Recommended amount is a house valued at 2.6x your income, and we're now almost at 6 for median house to median, so "affordability" now means median income matches you with a shit tier house for the next 30 years.

Not to mention that even if you got in when it was more reasonable just a few years ago and already bought a house, your property taxes keep climbing for something you allegedly alredy own.

Exactly. Of course it can done but it's crazy to just call it "frugality" and not "hardship".

 

[lowlife]

There's definitely a strain of the population that doesn't understand how bad it is for many people in the country.

I'm a big believer in frugality myself. But I've got clients who are trying to pay for $750/month apartments while making less than $35k/annually. It's really easy to say "Well just don't spend any money until you have that down payment." But that often means giving up on living a life. I don't mean vacations and fancy coffees, it means going out with friends, dating, having a family, etc.

How long can someone put that stuff off before the non-monetary costs to your well-being exceed the economic benefit of the reward?

Agreed. It's the difference between merely surviving, and flourishing. I don't understand why we don't want to have a society where so long as you work hard, you will flourish. This uplifts everyone, society as a whole.

 

[panamaican]

Agreed. It's the difference between merely surviving, and flourishing. I don't understand why we don't want to have a society where so long as you work hard, you will flourish. This uplifts everyone, society as a whole.

There's a concrete answer for that but it requires an entirely new thread.

 

[Jack V Savage]

That sounds logical enough, and I wasn’t able to easily find statistics on unemployed health insurance costs before and after the ACA.

Per capita healthcare spending grew 6.4% per year in the '90s, 5.9% per year in the aughts, and then 3.6% in the '10s. Haven't seen more-recent data, but the ACA was designed to bring cost growth down and any serious analysis will show that it was very successful at that.

 

[terrapin]

Reality is probably somewhere in between you guys.

Obviously the cheapest homes in poor areas aren't $400k. That's the median for the entire country, so there are lots of homes much cheaper, and a friend making $80k and having to live in a van suggests truly horrific spending choices.

The problem is that what living frugally entails and the payoff for doing it is unreasonable imo. It would be one thing if living frugally meant stop buying luxury cars and taking expensive vacations and eating in restaurants every night, or stop wasting money on expensive entertainment, but if you have to not have a family, fast for days at a time, live in a crappy studio in a high scrime neighborhood and wear a coat at home so you don't freeze, and maybe you can buy a crappy place in the same high crime neighborhood a few years later, that's more than just being frugal.

The economy is pretty unstable if the house price to income ratio isn't even close to the recommended amount. Recommended amount is a house valued at 2.6x your income, and we're now almost at 6 for median house to median, so "affordability" now means median income matches you with a shit tier house for the next 30 years.

Not to mention that even if you got in when it was more reasonable just a few years ago and already bought a house, your property taxes keep climbing for something you allegedly alredy own.

The cheapest you can get a home for in my entire city is $400,000 that's in the poor s***** neighborhood. The reality is not in between. I'm just stating facts and median income here is 40 grand. Maybe a tiny bit more, not 45.

It's a myth that anyone who works full time can get into a home which is what I said.... It's just not even remotely the case.

 

[panamaican]

The cheapest you can get a home for in my entire city is $400,000 that's in the poor s***** neighborhood. The reality is not in between. I'm just stating facts and median income here is 40 grand. Maybe a tiny bit more, not 45.

It's a myth that anyone who works full time can get into a home which is what I said.... It's just not even remotely the case.

Unless of course you move far enough away so that the housing costs are much lower. But that usually means leaving your job and hoping that you find a similar one in a lower cost of living area.

It's all doable...but at what cost and we don't mean monetarily, lol.

 

[kahiljabroni]

I understood your point. What I'm disagreeing with, and maybe others are too, is that it's just a matter of frugality and that frugality is never a hardship.

For example, when I asked you for what you were paying in housing, I also asked what percentage of your income it represented. See frugality works when someone is spending 60% of their income on living expenses and they're asked to cut back to 40% but can still meet their needs. It doesn't work when someone is spending 75+% on living expenses and there's nowhere to reasonably cut without sacrificing basic needs.

Sometimes it is a hardship.

I mean you're talking about $1800 apartments when I'm thinking about people in $800/month apartments taking the bus to work. Could they cut out things to accelerate their savings? Sure. But it would basically rob them of having any kind of a life. And at that point, it's not "frugality" anymore.

So you're talking about living in poverty. That's an income problem, not a housing market problem. That said unemployment is near record lows and 20 per hour is now an entry level wage for anyone with a modicum of work ethic.


Most people complaining about the housing market actually make a reasonable amount of money. They have a middle class income and are pissed that doesn't get them a middle class home where they live.

 

[kahiljabroni]

The cheapest you can get a home for in my entire city is $400,000 that's in the poor s***** neighborhood. The reality is not in between. I'm just stating facts and median income here is 40 grand. Maybe a tiny bit more, not 45.

It's a myth that anyone who works full time can get into a home which is what I said.... It's just not even remotely the case.

Where do you live?
400k for a shitty house in a shitty part of town is a very expensive area.

 

[sickc0d3r]

Per capita healthcare spending grew 6.4% per year in the '90s, 5.9% per year in the aughts, and then 3.6% in the '10s. Haven't seen more-recent data, but the ACA was designed to bring cost growth down and any serious analysis will show that it was very successful at that.

Ok, that’s good. I don’t want to get into an ACA argument. My insurance costs have barely changed since 2002. Although it’s easy to see the massive increase in costs that I don’t actually pay.

I’m more interested greasing the wheels of entrepreneurship, and how necessities like health care play a part in social mobility.

 

[terrapin]

Unless of course you move far enough away so that the housing costs are much lower. But that usually means leaving your job and hoping that you find a similar one in a lower cost of living area.

It's all doable...but at what cost and we don't mean monetarily, lol.

Well that's the thing. It's just absurd that people say anyone can still get into a house. It really just betrays a religious belief in the marketplace as the just ruler of all things.

Moving away from your entire extended family just so you can buy a home. Probably isn't the American dream where all thinking of.

 

[kahiljabroni]

Unless of course you move far enough away so that the housing costs are much lower. But that usually means leaving your job and hoping that you find a similar one in a lower cost of living area.

It's all doable...but at what cost and we don't mean monetarily, lol.

If you were born in an expensive area and refuse to move then you're probably not going to get a home.

I would get the cheapest living arrangement I can get in said expensive city, that is reasonably safe and stack as much cash as possible. All the while researching where I want to move and looking for job opportunities in that location.

I wouldn't call moving a hardship. Half my cousins left the area after school and never came back...by choice, not necessity. I prefer to live near my immediate family but if I had to move I would.

 

[terrapin]

Where do you live?
400k for a shitty house in a shitty part of town is a very expensive area.

Just do a google search and find areas like that. There's no way I'm getting myself doxed.

The main thing is you have to stop apologizing for the market and pretending everything's good the way it is and just admit that it's absurdly difficult for most ordinary people to get into a home now.


I have two people living in vans in my backyard saving for homes. They both make 80,000 a year and they can't get into a home on that money. That's freaking ridiculous man....

 

[terrapin]

If you were born in an expensive area and refuse to move then you're probably not going to get a home.

I would get the cheapest living arrangement I can get in said expensive city, that is reasonably safe and stack as much cash as possible. All the while researching where I want to move and looking for job opportunities in that location.

I wouldn't call moving a hardship. Half my cousins left the area after school and never came back...by choice, not necessity. I prefer to live near my immediate family but if I had to move I would.

The area I live in that you are calling expensive has absurdly high home prices and yet when my wife bought her first home 25 years ago she only spent $20,000 when we bought our second home together an 1800 ft² home in a nice area. It was only 160,000 then when we bought our third home the same square footage but in a nicer area it was 460,000 on a half acre in a nice area of town. My property is now worth probably almost a million dollars.

Don't try to rewrite history and pretend everything's okay because it isn't.

 

[Scerpi]

Just do a google search and find areas like that. There's no way I'm getting myself doxed.

The main thing is you have to stop apologizing for the market and pretending everything's good the way it is and just admit that it's absurdly difficult for most ordinary people to get into a home now.


I have two people living in vans in my backyard saving for homes. They both make 80,000 a year and they can't get into a home on that money. That's freaking ridiculous man....

Are roommates not a thing anymore? Better than living in a van.... lol

I had roommates all through my 20's....

 

[kahiljabroni]

Just do a google search and find areas like that. There's no way I'm getting myself doxed.

The main thing is you have to stop apologizing for the market and pretending everything's good the way it is and just admit that it's absurdly difficult for most ordinary people to get into a home now.


I have two people living in vans in my backyard saving for homes. They both make 80,000 a year and they can't get into a home on that money. That's freaking ridiculous man....

Just start saying "people can't afford homes in my city" and we'll have no argument.

 

[terrapin]

Just start saying "people can't afford homes in my city" and we'll have no argument.

My city is not very unique and you're the one that said anyone who works full-time can buy a home which is a stupid, ignorant and ridiculous statement and you know it.

 

[terrapin]

Are roommates not a thing anymore? Better than living in a van.... lol

I had roommates all through my 20's....

All these guys could do that of course, but roommates are terrible and I would rather live in a van personally... They're plugged into my house so they have power and they have water and they have access to a restroom in my office which is also on the property. I also have a big field with lots of beautiful trees so they can barbecue and stuff so it's not so bad.

But also you can't get a room for less than 5 or 600 bucks here so they're only paying me $200 just to cover what they use for utilities. That way they can save much more money more quickly.

 

[Patrick Jane]

Inequality, for lack of a better word, is good.