Nope. Oh, and cigarettes and alcohol were much cheaper.
And people drank and smoked much more than they do today which resulted in the average family spending more than twice what they do today on tobacco (it was 2% of family income in the '70s) and 20% more on alcohol.
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Well, if you don't buy it, then I guess it isn't true.
But there is really no comparison to life now vs the 70s. Standards of living have changed so much in so many ways.
No, it's not true because what you're saying is demonstrably false. Sure standards of living have changed which is why bringing up things like mobile phones, Netflix, etc. is silly in the face of the indisputable evidence that people in the past spent a higher proportion of their income on consumer goods than they do today.
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Sounds like everyone who wants to buy a home in Vancouver should give up, immediately lay down in the street and die.
Using a downtown home purchase in one of the most insane real estate markets in the world really doesn't do a whole lot in terms of being an argument. Try a less extreme outlier.
How do you mean? The inability to afford a 0-bedroom downtown(ish) condo in one of the poorest neighbourhoods in the country is considered an extreme outlier in an this market? I feel like that proves my point. That condo would have been easily <$200k 15 years ago.
Sounds like everyone who wants to buy a home in Vancouver should give up, immediately lay down in the street and die.
If you read CP real estate topics enough, you'll know that the bubble has been bursting since 2007 and only an idiot would buy real estate in Vancouver.
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Exactly, this is the problem. One can't "save" in order to afford to buy a small box of air in the sky, no matter how much lattes they stop buying. I would be fine with market here if people actually made money, but they don't. The wage:cost ratio is mind boggling. The only gig in town is... real estate. Realtor marketing now includes "borrow from the bank of mom and dad" lol.
Exactly, this is the problem. One can't "save" in order to afford to buy a small box of air in the sky, no matter how much lattes they stop buying. I would be fine with market here if people actually made money, but they don't. The wage:cost ratio is mind boggling. The only gig in town is... real estate. Realtor marketing now includes "borrow from the bank of mom and dad" lol.
Most people in Calgary who currently own homes couldn't buy in downtown Vancouver. If we want to have a discussion about how Vancouver real estate prices are broken, I'm totally for that, and agree. It just isn't a good example to use in a conversation in the overall ability of a subset of the population to buy a home.
Vancouver is the third least affordable city on the planet.
Idiots who say we should just buy in Abbotsford are completely missing the point and likely won the lottery of all lotteries when they bought their ####ty Vancouver special in 2005 for a few hundred thousand and now poo poo those who complain about the fact that it costs $1000 per square foot to buy a condo in the downtown east side, where corpses with needles in their arms litter the alleys. Half a million dollars for zero bedrooms - "buy fewer lattes" lol.
Have you tried working harder?
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Most people in Calgary who currently own homes couldn't buy in downtown Vancouver. If we want to have a discussion about how Vancouver real estate prices are broken, I'm totally for that, and agree. It just isn't a good example to use in a conversation in the overall ability of a subset of the population to buy a home.
I thought we were having a conversation about millennials and avo toast, my bad.
Calgary home owners could afford 0 bedroom condos in the DTES though, methinks. Not sure why they would to, however. Guy in my building is selling his condo and buying a house in Calgary though. Rather common.
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Originally Posted by CliffFletcher
Today, because housing is out of reach, many 28 year olds with decent jobs live at home rent-free and so have loads of discretionary spending that goes to food, drink, and travel.
Would they all own their own homes if they dialed back the $300 a week drinks and eating out lifestyle? Probably not. Doesn't change the fact they spend more on luxury items than Gen Xers or Boomers did at the same age.
When I head out to 17th ave or 4th street these days I'm always astonished at the number of 25 and 28 year olds I see casually splashing out for $16 cocktails and $17 appetizers at restaurants that are a few-times-a-year treat for my wife and I.
How many pricy restaurants and bars catered to 24 to 34 year olds back in the 80s and 90s? Precious few. I lived in this city then, and you had bars and restaurants that catered to 20-somethings, bars and restaurants that catered to people willing to splash out a lot of money, but they were not the same places. A high-end bistro catering to 20-somethings would have been an oxymoron in 1995.
Oh come now - your astonishment at these youngins spending so much money is really a little bit of jealousy mixed with a little bit of resentment (we all feel it).
Fact is, most young people don't buy $16 cocktails and never go to these types of places. In Calgary and Vancouver, there just happen to be a lot of young people who have made a fair chunk of money and/or whose parents have made a fair chunk of money. Most of the kids you see at these places on 17th have no problem buying a starter condo or home. Most do. Many will graduate to million dollar homes by the time they're in their mid thirties. That's just a fact of Calgary and Vancouver life (and any big city, especially one with an O and G boom or Vancouver's housing).
But that's a minority in Calgary of young people, and across the rest of Canada, it's a tiny minority. Yes, there are some young people faking it, but there are a lot of wealthy people in Calgary and in any big city, so a market develops for them to blow their money like they're in a hiphop video.
Elsewhere in Canada and the US - and even in Calgary - the stable middle class jobs have all but disappeared, leaving a chasm between the average 20/30 somethings who make less than or about $35,000 a year, have large student debts, little job security, and unrealistic prospects of owning their own homes.
I really feel like most discussions of "Millennials" deal with the ones who will likely make it out of the crap cycle eventually: parents with some savings, decent educations, connections. Yeah, they had to do a couple unpaid internships, but they'll likely make it back into the middle/upper middle-class. The majority of Millennials in most places in NA barely check one of those boxes, let alone all three: parents with no savings, a crap education, and no connections is a tough way to start out these days.
Sounds like everyone who wants to buy a home in Vancouver should give up, immediately lay down in the street and die.
Using a downtown home purchase in one of the most insane real estate markets in the world really doesn't do a whole lot in terms of being an argument. Try a less extreme outlier.
The same thing is going on in Toronto. Between those two cities that's like 1/3 of Canada's population. To a lesser extent the same thing is going on in cities like Victoria, Kelowna, and Montreal.
It's not going on that badly in Calgary, but Calgary is in the middle of a deep recession with oil prices tanking.
So basically, your choices in Canada are live somewhere expensive or live somewhere without jobs....
I would assume they do. And yet routinely hear the argument that since houses are so expensive, young people have to stay living with their parents until they're 32.
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Originally Posted by GirlySports
speaking of rent, what about people who say they can't afford rent but will die before they consider a roommate.
That's the other part of it. Rent is as much as a mortgage? Yeah, if one person is paying. Which is why people have roommates. Which is also good training for moving in with a partner at some point and dealing with different standards around dirty dishes.
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Originally Posted by opendoor
The fact is, in the 1970s people spent a far higher proportion of their income on consumer goods and services than they do now and that's indisputable. The largest increases in expenses since than have occurred in things like housing, health care, education, and financial services/insurance. Not a lot of discretionary spending in there so I don't really buy the idea that people are choosing to live more lavishly now compared to the 1970s.
Stuff was a lot more expensive back then. Clothes, appliances, children's toys, LPs/CDs, TVs. A microwave oven cost $900 in the early 80s ($2,750 in today's dollars). A 19" color TV ran you $590 ($1,800 in today's dollars). A standard drip coffee machine cost $35 ($110 in today's dollars). Pretty much anything you can buy at Wal-Mart is far cheaper than it was 30 or 40 years ago. But people back then spent far less on dining out, concerts, coffee, travel. Lower bowl Flames tickets were $30 in 1986 ($60 in today's money). When this city had half the population it has today it had about one-eighth as many restaurants. So while discretionary spending may be about the same, that spending has shifted from stuff to consumables. People today spend less on refrigerators, TVs, and clothes, and more on eating out, concerts/events, and trips to Mexico.
Also, even middle-class people were typically skint in their 20s and early 30s. Entry-level jobs + raising kids (often on a single income) = no money. Deferring child-rearing has create a large new class of young adults who spend lots on consumables.
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Last edited by CliffFletcher; 05-16-2017 at 07:11 PM.
I have junior colleagues who don't even have their professional designations yet who are spending over $1000 smackeroos on a single pair of high heels.
Don't think this is the case at all (unless you're only talking brick and mortar businesses).
Almost anyone can start an online business with very little cost, no brick and mortar costs, little inventory or employee costs, and greatly reduced marketing costs.
Competition may be greater, but accessibility to starting your own business has never been lower.
Should have clarified. Starting a successful business is much harder. Yes, anyone can start a crappy internet business. Starting a successful tradesman, professional, or any other kind of service related business is much harder.
People are having to resort to "virtual offices", not because it's good, but because it's cheap.
