The same reasons are said over and over but there are incentive problems as well, it's not just bad homes, public schools, socialism, etc.



Gen Z dollars today have 86% less purchasing power than those from when baby boomers were in their twenties.

Median home price in 1995 (in 2022 dollars): $206.4K

Median home price in 2022: $348.1K.

$22-$27 is shit pay for qualified help. It's the new starting wage to get people in and trained.

This is what I came to post.

Never forget the decades of ideological subversion by the Frankfurt School, KGB, and the Chinese. We may have fucked ourselves, but we had a damn lot of help, and no one took those crazy ideas seriously enough.

The USA had great economic times after WWII partly because the other economic powerhouses in the world were wrecked.  As time went on more and more countries got back on their feet and the US became less and less competitive.

People turned their backs on God and their hearts toward drugs.  The knee was bent to the devil in action, appeasement, and apathy.

Every congress and every President since FDR, had a hand in building up our National Debt.   The growth of debt is exponential, not linear, and No President who would cut spending, can get elected, or stay in power.

The fault lies within our very “Democracy”.   The vast majority of voters want Free Shit, and more Free Shit.      

Blaming the destruction of our dollar, and the fragmentation of our society, on Bush Jr., is beyond stupid.  
It’s Willful Ignorance.   Even someone like Bill Clinton or Bernie Sanders, wouldn’t try to make that argument, with a straight face.

This thread started out with promise, but then collapsed.

Qualified if they can pass a “hands on” test administered and proctored by our trainers (since local tech schools pass everyone.)  I don’t know the exact numbers, but something like $22, $27, $35 depending on skill level.

Unqualified can hire in with our overflow contractor at $12- $15. They change light bulbs in our offices and the occasional outlets.

The internet
Cell phones
Single moms
Fatherless kids
Public schools
Appeasement
Etc

Because there is a world to see, life to experience and foreign women to hold.

I'm guessing the pay is not as good as you think it is.

I live in an area that was hit terribly when our manufacturing was shipped to China and recently even one of the pricier fast food restaurants was offering over $20/hr to start.

Social media ruined it all...

Now everyone sits in front of their keyboard bawling to each other, about each other.  

Those great jobs in the 80s you had to wait 3 years to get a interview didn't keep up with inflation.


On the other aspect good times weak men thing rings true. You probably were in the weak men generation and its created tough times

Entitlement.  FSA > working man/woman.

Won’t argue with you, but if you get bored look at the trajectory of our national debt, it started with Bush Jr. are you related?

Yes, we’ve crossed the threshold where 50% of the population votes riches from the treasury (can’t remember the exact quote.)

NAFTA

It kinda sounds like there hasn’t been much of a raise in 36 years.    
Fwiw, the price of Gold was 1/4 of what it is today.  
OIL was $19 compared with $76 today.  

What was the price of an average 3/2 in a good neighborhood, then, compared to now?    

How about Farmland?    

If you’re being honest, and not cherry picking data, you’ll see that our Dollar is about 1/4 of its 1987 value.     (Unless you are buying Flat screen TV’s”.    

To get the same quality, You should be paying your workers 4 times more.    Not 30% more, or even 50% more.    

Did you / Do you, have a pension?

Probably not, but it is closer to the bottom than last year...

The paper mill smell ran them off maybe? Back in the 70's when I worked construction at an existing one I used to take my clothes off in the garage and head straight in to the shower to keep from stinking up the house.

USA had things too good. The entitlement mentality set in.

The military was constantly demonized on college campuses, and therefore less and less people wanted to enter service. While fighting wars, the military also teaches self reliance and independence to members. That leads to service personnel that are generally "squared away" and carry duties with responsibility. After leaving the military, former military continues to carry those values forward along with a trade and that has a halo effect on communities. People want to emulate those successful characteristics even if they weren't in the military.  It's not to say everyone one in the military is squared away, but overall, they have a sense of purpose, mission, patriotism and self pride. We no longer have that.

September 11th really got the debt ball rolling. Where debt was frowned upon earlier on, now the gate is wide open to all sorts of nonsense. Anything goes. Just hide it in complex legislation and make deals in the back room. Deals that are very self-destructive overall.

Washington budgeting went in the toilet when they went from 13 individual spending bills debated throughout the year, to one big omnibus bill that no one reads. They just cram everything in there and helicopter money falls from he sky. The world takes their cues from this and climbs aboard the USD as broken as it is.

The wide acceptance of single-motherhood to the point where its encouraged, with poor results in the offspring.

The consumer feedback mechanism is now broken since government funds so many things, even if they don't work. The answer from Washington is to throw more money at every problem. The "private market" sees that and responds with raising prices artificially to soak up all that free gubmint money. That starves other legitimate players in the market and deters excellence and competition. It shows everywhere. Schools lower standards and grade on a curve, if they even grade at all. Why bother?

We abandon allies overseas for convenience. They recognize that and realize the USA is only a partner until things get difficult. They take their cues and aren't fully in the partnership either.

Any common bonds in communities are broken as evil: prayer in school, moment of silence, pledge of allegiance, civic clubs and any forums where the free exchange of ideas can take place. That breaks people apart and it's difficult to put back together.

The cell phone further replaces individuals discussing issues and interacting together. They don't care about their fellow man - just keep those welfare checks and subsidies coming.

The tax system has become too progressive to where half the people pay nothing, but expect a lot from government. Half the country only has a stake in getting a check from Uncle Sham.

The 17th amendment pushes political parties to the forefront. Because of it, the state legislatures which are much more in-tune with the needs of their state no longer choose the best senator to represent their state on the federal stage. Instead, senators are now chosen by popular vote of their citizens and people aren't really choosing the best person, but the entire agenda (D or R) of a political party - winner takes all.

America has a lot of sacred cows.

Yeah, that too…

Back in my day an engineer could buy a Porsche 911. The parking lot had quite a few there. Today a person buying a 911 makes 200-400K a year. You can still buy a nice car on an engineers salary but it isn't going to be a 911. What's the point? Times change. You have to adapt to the way things are NOW and make yourself more valuable each year. Work hard, invest in your future, and live within your means...you'll get there.

George jr was a boomer.

Bill Clinton (another boomer) is probably most responsible for our current situation thanks to him giving manufacturing the greenlight to go overseas.

Lolz, I Wish I was a Bush.  

I always enjoy the socio-economics discussions, so I Did look it up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_of_the_United_States


Like I said, trying to pin it on Bush Jr., just makes you look willfully ignorant and woefully misinformed at best, or shilling propaganda at worse.

  I’m honestly just trying to help you here.    Even if you live in a big blue Bush hating area, it just sounds like one of those cringy Old Coot exclamations that everybody tries to ignore.  

I’m not even a fan of Either Bush.   Just a fan of History, and Accuracy.

Socio-economics, Macro-economics, are just not as simple as you seem to think.

World was on fire after WWII.  USA had no competition

USA did an overall okay job at keeping its competitive edge in the last 70 years but inevitably overseas advantages will occur.  Then some things are just confusing as to how anyone thought they’d be a good idea (NAFTA)

Now baby boomers pass judgment on young people as if young people have the boomer’s opportunities at their age.

Houses are 4x+ more expensive than in the 70s.  Have wages gone up 4x+ across the board?  Easy answer.  No.  There’s billions of Chinese and Indians who will do most jobs at a fraction of the cost.  That wasn’t a reality in the 70s.

There are a lot of soft factors like easy times, soft parents, death of the nuclear family, etc.  but the reality hits hardest in the numbers.  If OP was born in the 90s he’d have a much harder path.  Not impossible, but undeniably harder.

Could you ever buy a starter 3/2 for 150% of the starting salary of a 22 year old with a STEM or any degree?  I graduated from college in the late 80s and have only purchased houses in PA and the kind of homes that could be purchased for 150% of starting salaries were always dumps in bad areas.

Women fucking poor, bad boys and raising their bastards as single moms didn't help.

$12.00 in the 80's is $40-60 in today's money unless you live in an extremely low cost of living area.

People learned that factory work sucks. I'll build 'em, but I wont ever work in a factory setting again.

"The old man spoke up in a bar
Said I never been in prison
A lifetime serving one machine
Is ten times worse than prison"

In my line of work, an average 3/2 was less than one years salary for someone with my job.      Today, the exact same house is 2 years salary.  (And the House is now 30 years old, lol!).    

My profession has managed to double our income, through strenuous bargaining and because it’s a niche job which is not easily outsourced.

…so I’m not exactly complaining, but it’s a great illustration of how much we’ve lost in our buying power, with regards to houses.

Non-degreed workers are employed through a contractor or temp service?

This.  Fear not, hard times are coming because of these pathetic specimens.

Parents, that's what happened.

Take my girlfriend and her son as a perfect example. He was 3 when we met. The entire time she never made him do anything. I'd try to give him some responsibility by having him do some chores and help us. She wouldnt enforce it. I'd try to have him help me on the weekends, oh sonny boy is going to grandma's house.
Mother and grandma not doing their jobs.
This lead to many arguments between us.

Bad/weak parenting.

At least as a teenager hes smart enough to remember what I did and still do. Get up, go to work and take care of my responsibilities.
Luckily, he is doing the same. Fulltime job and a part time job.  
Mom and grandma hate when I take their credit, lol.

When moral accountability to God
was replaced by the immoral secular political religion of liberalism,
with its "holy sacraments" of dope, sexual perversion, and fetusnuffing.
America forfeit God's Providence and is now getting God's judgement.

You never got Married?    

Don’t get me wrong, I understand fully, and even congratulate you, but I hope you can recognize at least a little of the irony inherent in offering up this anecdote.  

People just don’t appreciate irony enough these days.

Contractor. We use the contractor as a recruiting firm. If their employee gets our attention, we will recruit them for production jobs.

Boomer who lived during a time where working a minimum wage job meant you could support a family of 4 and purchase a house opines about all of the lazy kids nowadays who can't afford to even rent a shared apartment and live alone on a minimum wage salary due to the absolute shit tier boomer generation bilking the country of every cent it could.

Psyops, psyops happened.

As awesome as my generation is, (GenX), we are the leading purveyors of this mess.

It our kids (not mine) who are the "Participation Trophy" generation. Our kids are the "Time Out" generation. It's mostly our kids who are the "Identify as Whatever you want" generation. The "Pronoun Kids".

So many GenX people thought they could "do it better" than previous generations, that they fucked it all up.

The problems go far deeper than money.

and there it is with the first post again

Just like me.
My kid wanted stuff.
I made him actually work for money to get stuff.
I shit you not I never gave the kid anything he didn't need.
All the other kids were handed x boxes and play stations and cell phones and fancy clothes and newer if not brand new cars.

Today my 27yo kid owns his own house and 2 vehicles free and clear. He's worked every day since he was 15 to get the shit he wanted and everything he has is important to him.

You including my generation?
The 70s and 80s? They grew up like normal kids, then some bastards blew up our buildings and killed thousands of people....

a bunch of my generation went to war and died for dumb reasons while the government overreached and the new generation was scared to play football in the front yard...

we now have alot of my generation broken mentally and physically supporting boomers and zoomers

FIFY

ETA: The internet in and of itself is a fantastic tool. You have the best encyclopedia of information from all over the world at the click of the enter button. Social media and MSM media by comparison are cesspools.

Work in a factory, it isn't great but it isn't bad. Pay is decent to good for the area depending on job. I realize it isn't for everybody but if someone lacks any job skills they can make a living here on a lower tier job essentially.

Been there 12 years, and the downfall in quality of the newer employees had been dramatic.

Most bitch about not having money but call off all the time, never work any OT, or never move up to a higher paying job.

Few I talk to that don't have anything have shit credit as well.

YES

The Boomers were spoiled and given an easy life by their parents, and that spoiling has just continued on down through the next generations, probably even accelerating. Yes, it's a very broad brush to paint with, and I know there are notable exceptions, but you get the picture.

We would need a Great Depression or WW2 to toughen people back up.

Meant most politely, paper is not a cutting edge industry these days.  I doubt it attracts the best and brightest.

A lot has changed in 33 years in the world, and paper is one of them.

These kids today