We have on average gotten more wealthy, but the p50 and p20 brackets definitely are worse off than in past generations and worse off than in comparable post-industrial economies.
I agree there's a housing crisis, not sure how we arrived at one, "manufactured" or whatever.
Just one data point, personal.
As a young professional I bought a fairly new house in the Portland Oregon suburbs in the 1980s for about 2x my salary.
Today my daughter, a young professional, would have to pay closer to 8x her salary (if you believe Zillow) to buy that very same "starter" house, which is now 35 years older.
Rents have commensurately increased. To quote Jimmy McMillan: "the rent is too damn high".
It is far harder to build new housing in the US than it used to be, which drives up prices for existing homes, which benefits the local homeowners (voters!) at the expense of everyone else.
Portland is trying not to ruin what made it unique with density everywhere and they are not making new land so all of that equals higher prices.
Once interest rates go back to 7% and people start leaving you will see prices go down.
Salem or Gresham would be a cheaper city to move to.
When housing is 8x income and the bank won't lend you more than 5x income you need to start with a 40% equity to get anywhere
The wealthy folks are raking it in like never before.
The key issue is the cost of housing; which the USA is reluctant and resolve. Student loan debt also factors in to this situation.
Are those driving the USA's decline? Or simply symptoms of a systems dedicated more to Wall Street and less to Main Street?