

Americans today are 60% richer than their parents - yummyfajitas
http://www.pewtrusts.org/our_work_report_detail.aspx?id=58965

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thyrsus
Several points

The study looks at income, not wealth ("riches").

To maintain a middle class lifestyle, one must today make a proportionally far
larger expenditure for housing, education and transportation.

In constant dollars, cost per square foot of housing has increased
dramatically (even with the recent declines).

It is now necessary to pay for daycare (due to two-income households) and for
college (high school used to be sufficient).

Most households now have two cars rather than one (due to two-income
households).

Further, because two income households make commitments based on two incomes,
they are not prepared for the loss of income from either spouse, whereas
formerly, there was reserve income potential in the stay-at-home child rearing
spouse.

The above is mostly summarised from a presentation by Elizabeth Warren here:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akVL7QY0S8A>

~~~
yummyfajitas
If you want to quibble over the definition of "rich", be my guest.

 _To maintain a middle class lifestyle, one must today make a proportionally
far larger expenditure for housing, education and transportation._

Only if you take a definition of middle class which has inflated faster than
economic growth. I.e., if you are 60% richer (in terms of income) than your
parents, but you define "middle class" to be 80% richer, indeed it is more
difficult to be middle class. This does not change the fact that most people
have higher income than their parents.

Also, you are misrepresenting Warren's data (admittedly, she presents it in a
very confusing way). The primary necessity which reduces discretionary income
is taxes, not housing, child care or automotive expenses.

In Warren's hypothetical, income increased 75%, mortgage expenses by 70% (for
a 66% bigger house [1]), two cars in 2010 cost 55% more than 1 car in 1970,
and health insurance increased 60%. The biggest increase in expenses was tax,
which increased 140%. In dollar terms, the tax increase was larger than the
cost increases in housing, automotive and health insurance expenses combined.

<http://www.volokh.com/posts/1185883980.shtml>

[http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2008_04_27-2008_05_03.sht...](http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2008_04_27-2008_05_03.shtml#1209323112)

By the way, did you notice that Warren claims household wealth increased?
I.e., the family has 66% more house and 100% more cars? (Not to mention better
health care, an XBox, etc.)

[1]
[http://www.realtor.org/RMODaily.nsf/pages/News2007032701?Ope...](http://www.realtor.org/RMODaily.nsf/pages/News2007032701?OpenDocument)

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hfinney
I'm not sure where the headline came from, but the income figures in the
report are adjusted for family size (and inflation). Since families are
getting smaller, this causes an increase in their income measure. The actual
median increase was 65% (page 8, line 2).

~~~
yummyfajitas
I took the headline from table 1, and only gave 1 significant figure.

I went with this headline because I found the comparison of people to their
parents far more interesting than the results on marriage, and figured others
would as well.

