I was first online 25 years ago and it cost me about 5-10% of my income from a minimum wage & part time job as a 16 year old. I paid for the dedicated phone line and the ISP bill. Maybe other first world countries were more costly but I would be surprised if anywhere in the US was that expensive in the post-Y2K era.
5-10% of your income while a kid living with your parents is very different than 5-10% when you're in college and using your part-time income to pay for tuition/housing/utilities which is different than using 2.5-5% of your income as an adult making minimum wage while working full time. Take a look at the introductory internet plans in the US and weigh it against minimum wage to see how much most folks are willing to pay for connectivity as a fraction of their income.
At minimum wage, any expense is brutal when viewed as a percentage of your income. It sucks to be poor. You have to pick and choose what you spend money on, and you still don't have enough.
My comment was more about how I think the parent comment over-inflated the cost when saying "10-20 years ago in "first world" countries was [20% of income]" because my experience in a first world country was much less expensive. To my knowledge, the US has fairly expensive internet compared to other first world countries so I'm not sure how that statement holds up globally but I'd assume it doesn't.
