More extreme weather, less water, more migration from countries where people have it worse than you, rise in political parties suggesting protectionism and anti-immigrant policies to combat the above, lower quality goods that don't last as long as people chase that margin down, less interesting and interest in art as people lack the spare time to come up with anything remotely non-mainstream, increasingly censored internet, rise in "tropical" diseases such as dengue fever & ebola in non-tropical countries due to climate change, more religion, more random civilian deaths at the hands of marginalised people and the police, people being prevented from travel/shop/work due to unchallengeable blacklisting by corporate CCTV networks with face/gait recognition resulting in homelessness.
Yep, there's a storm comin' alright.
The only solution I see to this is the richest 1% or so paying everyone else to have no children. It would sort out just about every problem in about 50 years. I don't see another solution.
Except for the whole "economic collapse" thing. See Japan.
That is part of the issue though. It wasn't that long ago that that was true of most people (90s is pushing it a bit, but before?).
These days a lot of people are DINK, and you're competing with those. So not only you have to index the salary for inflation, you have to consider that you're competing with people who don't have a bunch of kids, and whom's spouse also brings in a salary.
So (not a real calculation, but just to make a point) assume the spouse would make the same amount of money and the kids are taking half of it, the DINK equivalent of income available for housing is now inflation + 4x that.
If the norm back then was: 1 income, multiple kids.
Now you have - 1 income, 1 or more kids (essentially screwed) - 1 income, no kids - 2 incomes, 1 or more kids - 2 income, no kids (so far beyond the first case that the former can't come close to competing).
Its also why if you are in the later camp and something happens (you lose your job or get sick and get a divorce), you're completely fucked.
You can probably own a home if you want. You can travel the world if you want. You can meet a nice girl and cook food together in a cozy apartment. You can start brewing beer as a hobby with your friends. You can hike the Appalachian trail.
You can do a lot of things if you want.
The problem isn't that Chicago is going to become uninhabitable. The problem is that food supply for billions of people are going to be threatened, that will make the flood of refugees from Syria seem like a trickle.
It will also be a very gradual increase in temperature and we humans are very good at adapting and finding solutions.
Serious question: Have you ever lived in a country that was in the middle of a famine?
People 'find solutions' to that problem. They aren't pretty. Those solutions consist of 'rob', 'starve, or 'leave'.
If you live in the first world, your problem is going to be dealing with people who are taking option #3. We're barely capable of dealing with a flow of refugees from one or two countries.
Besides, I have to compete with people on welfare who have a lot more time to chase girls than I do as the person paying for their welfare.
Basically it's a mix between boomers not selling, and millennial's not wanting what they are selling (because what they are selling is shit). When we bought our home, we were looking at old (built in 1940's) starter homes in the 200k to 250k range and it was a nightmare. Anything that was great was out of our price range, and anything decent to 'ok' would be sold in the first 24 hours. Most of the stuff that wasn't selling was just straight garbage - stuff that would require a lot of work and money (50k minimum) to get moved into the 'decent' category.
There are plenty of new houses being built, but you have to go an hour or an hour and half outside the city. I have a family member and friend who went this route and they love it, but that obviously leads to long commutes and other downsides.
[1]: https://www.chicagotribune.com/real-estate/ct-re-millennial-...
"I can't afford to do the thing I want to do most."
"Then do something else."
If jobs in Toronto aren't paying enough to live there, move. Find a job making less money in a place where you can actually afford to live. I understand you may want the lifestyle afforded by being in a big city, but you're not owed that experience.
The answer is to flee these places, move on to greener pastures, these are barren.
Perhaps we should be thankful so many people are unaware of the cities between the coasts, more people might come here and wreck it!
With all due respect, this sounds like complete horseshit. How much are you paying for rent?
"Reported Average Starting Salary" for a mechanical engineer in 1995 was $35,744, or $55,189 adjusted to 2015 (https://www.naceweb.org/job-market/compensation/salary-trend...). Federal taxes on that are about $8,078 (https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040tt.pdf); let's double that to account for state and local taxes; $39,033 net after taxes, or $3,253/month.
Average rent in Seattle is $1,965 (https://www.rentcafe.com/average-rent-market-trends/us/wa/se...), but many neighborhoods are lower and more in tune with upstate New York (and "20 miles outside" is anywhere between Everett, Snoqualmie, or nearly to Tacoma); let's split the difference at $1,600. That leaves $1,653/month. Call it $53 for ramen and beer one night a month (that's a lot of ramen and beer) and there's $1,600 for everything else.
> I'm in the same spot I grew up with my grandparents in, barely making it with like an extra $40/mo for ramen & beer with a friend or two one night for entertainment. No debt. It's such a common story among my similarly aged friends too.
A $35,000 car loan, 60 mos, 5%, is about $660/mo (https://www.bankrate.com/loans/auto-loans/current-auto-loan-... average student loan debt is $38,390 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Student_debt), 120 mos (https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/how-long-does-it-ta...), 8% (https://www.valuepenguin.com/student-loans/student-loan-inte...) is about $466/mo. That totals to $1,126, leaving only $474 for vegetables and stuff.
A lot of what I’ll call “third tier” cities (Cleveland, Boise, Reno, etc.) are facing housing shortages precisely because a lot of people were priced out of larger cities. So housing shortages are popping up in those places as well, driving up home prices dramatically. I know at least one of those cities where the average price of a 2br house jumped from $300k to $600k in 5 years.
As usual, the problems are NIMBYs and restrictive zoning with a heavy preference for single-family homes. But moving to smaller, cheaper cities is only a short-term solution. The long-term solution is to build more, denser housing.
Reno's listing price $231/ft^2 up from $151/ft^2 five years ago, but keep in mind that Reno was rather badly hit by 2008: median sales prices for 2br homes peaked at about $284,000 in 2006, bottomed at about $75,000 in 2011, and are currently back up to $271,000 (https://www.trulia.com/real_estate/Reno-Nevada/market-trends...).
It’s a problem that will get worse before it gets better, and the cities that can figure out how to provide housing that someone working minimum wage can afford will be the winners.
What do we really have to look forward to?