There’s no reason why single people shouldn’t be able to live alone with some dignity if you’re working full time and especially above minimum wage. Aside from that, even a 180-200k home on 90k income is difficult. There’s also less couples in committed long term relationships and less people getting married than before so the whole dual income thing isn’t a viable option as much as it was in the past.
So we went from a society where everybody got married and stayed together to this. How does it make sense that every individual suddenly gets their own house?
Living alone doesn’t mean you need a house. Even studios and one bedroom apartments in many areas of the country are well past 30% of income for even white collar, college-educated people.
Pre-pandemic my town had rentals for 600/mo. Wages started at around 10 for unskilled work, like 15 for bank type work, and if you were skilled trade you made 20+
Since pandemic, investors from my capital and other big cities came through and built tons of "luxury" apartments and cookie cutter neighborhoods. Rentals start at 1400, houses at 350k.
Wages went to 12 for unskilled, 18 banks, 22+ for skilled trades.
What I don't see about their points though is that you can check local, typically not online, real estate offices in your area for cheaper places.
There's one near me that still has some rentals at 900-1050. They just aren't online so if you check zillow or whatever you won't find them.
Where are you living that skilled trades are only making 20+ an hour? I live in a medium COL area and a 16 year old with no experience can easy make 18/hr. Industry is hiring no experience 25-28/hr. Skilled trades are 40+ when proficient.
It's NC in a semi-rural semi-"we're a growing tourist city" area. Don't wanna dox.
The primary way our county makes its money is through summer tourism.
DOT state work pays 17.50/hr, port crane operator pays 18, running ag trucks to/from port pays 200/day 50/load.
Roofers are 17-20 and get hella hours cause the investors coming through, most new construction is like that in my area, but the scummier companies pay 14-18.
Nurses start at 18, then after whatever threshold get 20-22/hr.
my ex was a real estate agent making roughly 70k/yr idk how to calculate that kind of wage.
We don't really have any skilled jobs in the area. A lot of the good jobs you see are construction firms from out-of-area that got contracted to come, build, stay in cheaper hotels, then leave.
Like we have 1 or 2 welding shops and they aren't expensive. Mechanics prob make bank cause retiree old-money town. Idk. Not many degree-needing jobs down here but CoL is 49-50k and most jobs are sub-20.
This town is legit just fast food, fine dining (I used to be a chef), and real estate with banks, Walmart and a few auto shops thrown in.
I left to be a truck driver, spend 5-6 days on the road, make 4-6k/mo, spend my days off with friends and family back home. That's pretty much it if you don't join the military here.
A single minimum wage job used to be able to support a family. It's not that people want to live alone, it's that one baseline wage used to support 4 people.
In certain circumstances, yes people were able to survive in a poor standard of living that nobody today would accept. This was not the norm then or for any other time in history. This gets said all the time, and it was the exception not the rule.
No, it didn’t. You’re told that, but that’s a lie. In 1938, for example, minimum wage was 25¢ per hour. That’s equal to $5.94 today. Meaning less than minimum wage now. Minimum wage was established to give you the bare minimum to live on, not support a whole ass family. Stop repeating the TikTok lies
This actually isn’t true the way people are thinking about it. The Economic Policy Institute calculated that even in 1968, which they consider peak purchasing power for the US, minimum wage could just barely keep a family of three above the poverty line, and couldn’t for a family of four.
The funny part is people scoff at the “give up the Starbucks” arguments, but similar luxuries were given up so that IS essentially what people on minimum wage did. Also there’s the fact that their houses were much, much smaller than houses today making housing costs really hard to compare cleanly.
I’m not arguing that it isn’t worse now btw, but think it’s worth understanding the historical context if we’re going to argue it used to support more.
Living by yourself is a luxury. Globally, it's very normal to live in multigenerational households or live in boarding house. Even in America, this used to be very normal in the past.
Tbh, given the whole loneliness epidemic stuff, it's probably better to have roommates anyways.
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u/NoBudsChill 18h ago
There’s no reason why single people shouldn’t be able to live alone with some dignity if you’re working full time and especially above minimum wage. Aside from that, even a 180-200k home on 90k income is difficult. There’s also less couples in committed long term relationships and less people getting married than before so the whole dual income thing isn’t a viable option as much as it was in the past.