No, it's really not debatable the world is richer than in the 80s. Much of that wealth has been accumulating outside the US, though, particularly in India and China.
With interest rates as low as they are you could definitely get into a 1500 sq ft. house by age 26 today. You just can't do it in the places many 26 year olds want to live.
https://www.discover.com/home-loans/blog/how-expensive-is-yo...
At current interest rates you can make payments on a $150k home if you make $15/hr.
http://michaelbluejay.com/house/howmuchhome.html
Where in the country can you not make $15/hr by age 26?
Any town where the only jobs are at Walmart and the feed-and-seed store. Walmart doesn't pay those kinds of wages in rural locations (or probably anywhere else, unless you're a manager).
But from a US perspective we seem to be poorer now.
> With interest rates as low as they are you could definitely get into a 1500 sq ft. house by age 26 today. You just can't do it in the places many 26 year olds want to live.
I bought that house in a place where 26-year-olds want to live (a West Coast city). Interest rate was 10%, but I was able to pay off the mortgage in 9 years. I don't think a lot of 26-year-olds are in that position these days. Too much student loan debt and houses much more expensive as compared to incomes.
This chart [1] seems to imply that 21% of people under 25 own a house, which is higher than the 14% of under 25's who owned a house in 1994.
http://thereformedbroker.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Scre...
...maybe someone can check this against another data source.
It's debatable. I was in my 20's in the 80's. I was able to buy a 3br/2ba, 1500sq ft. house when I was 26. I had my school loans paid off a couple of years after I graduated - that's not happening for 20-somethings now.
> I believe that the answers to this crucial question are obscure
I don't think they're so obscure. If we are wealthier now, then it's likely that the wealth is in much fewer hands than it was in the 80's and before. Income stagnation. Wealth accumulating in fewer and fewer hands. Back in the 1860's Marx told us this is what happens in Capitalist economies. While you may not agree with his prescription (and I certainly don't agree with most of it) his diagnosis was pretty much spot on.