Comment by gruez
6 hours ago
>I do think quality of life is trending downward given the fact that housing, food, gas, medical care costs are all increasing while wages are stagnant or worse.
???
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEPAINUSA672N
Note this is already inflation adjusted, so "housing, food, gas, medical care costs are all increasing" is already accounted for.
That chart doesn't make the case you think it does. Real median household income rising can be explained by things like more dual earner households (more women working since the 70s), more hours worked, etc. The household income can rise while the wages can theoretically remain flat or even fall.
The more relevant statistic is that median real wages have only grown by about 29% across 40+ years (~0.6% per year)
Since 2000, medical care costs have risen by 121.3%, hospital services by 275%, college tuition and fees by 196%, compared to consumer goods by 86.1%. Things like TVs and electronics went way down in costs while the essentials have absolutely skyrocketed. The cheap stuff drags the average down.
You need a lot more than a single graph to argue against the quality of life going down for Americans.
>That chart doesn't make the case you think it does. Real median household income rising [...]
Where are you getting household income from? It clearly says "Personal Income"
You're right, I was mixing up the related charts. Still, this makes my case even stronger since personal controls for adding more earners to a household. If real median personal income only rose from ~$28k in 1974 to ~45$k today, that's a 60% increase. Median personal income rising by 0.9% every year over 50 years compared to healthcare rising by 3-4% every year since 2000 is not a gap you can ignore. Necessities grew at nearly 3 to 4x the income rate.
So the case that quality of life is trending downward is still completely valid and shows why you can't just point at a single graph and say "see? line go up therefore quality of life fine"
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