You're not focusing on the other side of his statement, where costs for housing, healthcare and education have also skyrocketed, along with the development of the two income trap.

What he said isn't controversial for most academics studying this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Two-Income_Trap

https://medium.com/@6pranavk/insight-of-the-day-cost-disease...

The average home size in the 1970s was 1,500 square feet. It’s around 2,700 square feet today. And the percentage with air-conditioning, two car garages, pools, dish washers, etc have increased significantly as well.

Go price out a 1500 sqft house built in the 1930s-1970s today and you'll see that it's still significantly more expensive than it's inflation adjusted price back then, especially in the larger cities where there are jobs. And that 1970s house today is less valuable than it was back in the 1970s too, but that is harder to evaluate in aggregate. Jobs also used to be more distributed, so the need to move was less back then.

AC & Dishwashers are also only a few thousand dollars of value, mostly on the AC side. The rest are relatively luxury items.

If 1,500 SF homes cost more now than they did in the 70s, how is the average person affording 2,700 SF homes today?

And low end AC & Dishwashers can be had for only a few thousand dollars NOW. Back in the 70s the cheapest ones were still expensive enough to require an upper middle class income.

> how is the average person affording 2,700 SF homes today?

They're not. Home ownership is currently at about the same level it was in the 90's, declining from a boom in the 2000's driven by sub-prime lending, but if you look at generational differences, everyone younger than baby boomers is basically owning homes at much lower rates.

https://journal.firsttuesday.us/bad-news-for-tomorrows-homeo...

2014 was six years ago after a sharp recession. Current home ownership is near all time highs.

https://www.census.gov/housing/hvs/files/currenthvspress.pdf

So why is the average home size nearly double the size in the 70s?

And neither of you are focusing on the "extra" stuff you don't "need" - high speed phones, large TVs, cars with air bags, etc.

Want to compare to 1970? Then live with those restrictions and you'll probably have enough money to pay for insurance, college, etc.

This is complete nonsense.

Large TVs in 2020 cost just as much as small TVs did in the 70s (if not less), adding air bags to a car costs mere hundreds of dollars, and is ammortized over 20 years, and cancelling your phone plan is not going to let you support a family of four on a single blue-collar income. Shit, cancelling your phone plan won't even compensate for the annual growth in your health insurance premiums - which is something that compounds every year.

"Air bags is amortized over 20 years" Cars don't last 20 years, generally... 5-10. And airbags are one of hundreds of "improvements".

TVs are an example of the plethora of technology that most homes have. From microwaves to air conditioners to cell phones...

"Canceling one thing isn't going to support your family" Which is why I didn't mention one thing... I mentioned a handful of things. A host of "modern conveniences" that add up.

Education, health insurance and other things cost more? Those are also things that the government has stepped in to make more affordable as well... which is a massive topic in of itself.

My main point stands... quality of life and cost of life has risen with hundreds of costs that add up (a mere 100 for an air bag... a mere couple bucks a month for data on your phone... a mere 5 for text messages... a mere 100 for a microwave... etc.etc.etc.etc).

Remove all the "extra" stuff that's standard today compared to 50 years ago and even with outliers (IE Health Insurance), you'll still be much closer to being able to afford the same quality of life as "way back then".

The numbers don't add up. This is essentially the math which blames avocado toast for why millennials aren't buying homes. If the price of university has doubled relative to median wages in the past 50 years, you're going to have to buy an awful lot of smartphones every year to account for that difference.

The numbers add up when you add in healthcare, which has captured an increasing portion of workers compensation.

This is simply not true. Education, healthcare, and housing costs have far outpaced inflation.

People didn't buy nearly as much of those three things in 1970.

What do you mean? The home ownership is on the decline, especially among younger people, and "one unit of education" (i.e. a bachelors') hasn't changed. Yes more people are going to university on average, but the price of higher ed is not regulated by scarcity.

Compare the output of an inflation calculator vs the price of health insurance, collage, or the average new home in 1960’s USA vs now. Different prices don’t move in lockstep with inflation.

So, inflation as calculated on a basket of goods divorced from living expenses gives inaccurate comparisons. Yes wholesale food prices for example got really cheap, but overall food is still a significant fraction of people’s budgets.

There is more to quality of life than income. Despite rising incomes, younger peopple lagging far behind in terms of wealth accumulation[1]

This may have something to do with the fact that the cost of housing has risen drastically as compared to median income over the past few decades[2]

While the cost of education has also more than doubled for men, and increased by 20% for women relative to median income (despite a 73% increase in median income for women) since the 70's[3]

Yes income is increasing, but the costs for the markers of a middle-class existence are increasing much faster.

[1]https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-depressing-chart-show...

[2]https://www.longtermtrends.net/home-price-median-annual-inco...

[3]https://college-education.procon.org/median-incomes-v-averag...