• yuri@sh.itjust.works
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    8 months ago

    And people can’t afford houses, college, healthcare, etc. because…? Like cool chart, but my generation will literally never be as financially stable as those who came before. I guess it’s fun to pretend we’re better off than we are though.

    Imagine paying for college with your income rather than loans.

    • iopq@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      People can afford more things now than the previous generation

      There are things that increased in price faster, like college. But that’s offset by other things that didn’t increase as fast, like fuel. There are other things that got cheaper, like computers and phones. You’re cherry picking the things that got more expensive, but those are not 100% of a person’s expenses

      • TopCoffee@programming.dev
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        8 months ago

        You’re missing the whole point. Think about it another way: You listed things that go down in value or get used up. They listed things that appreciate in value and build wealth.

        You’re comparing (barely) being able to afford the cheap iPhones and gas to an education and homeownership.

        • iopq@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          Those things still cost money and you still need them.

          If food prices didn’t go up as fast as housing, and you say “housing builds wealth and food gets used up” which is true, but you need to eat to live. Food not going up so fast is a good thing.

          Housing building wealth is a bad thing. Houses should go down in value, we should be building so many that old houses should be worth less than me ones, like they do in Japan

      • Croquette@sh.itjust.works
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        8 months ago

        It’s fun that tvs and computers got cheaper, but housing and food are through the roof.

        It’s cool that I can buy a laptop for 500$ dollars, but it’s a one time purchase that we can live without.

          • Croquette@sh.itjust.works
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            8 months ago

            Yeah and look 2 years back on your same graph and see the big 11% in one month.

            And let’s not forget that this is multiplicative. So these months/years with high inflation are still felt today even if the inflation is relatively normal.

            But you are disingenuous in your arguments, while accusing others of doing that same thing.

            So kindly fuck off

            • iopq@lemmy.world
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              8 months ago

              That’s in line with the inflation numbers. Food costs did not outpace inflation in any significant way

              • Croquette@sh.itjust.works
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                8 months ago

                If the food cost follows the inflation and the inflation is 20%, will you say that food prices are ok because they follow inflation?

                It would be fine if the wage followed the same inflation as food and housing, but the reality is that wage lag and stagnate behind inflation.

                So yeah, if your groceries cost you 20% and you haven’t received an equivalent wage increase, then your groceries cost significantly more in absolute term because you still have the same money as before, but your food cost more for the same grocery basket you bought before inflation.

                But again, you are disingenuous, so probably just a troll. I won’t respond anymore.

                • iopq@lemmy.world
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                  8 months ago

                  I would say you can’t use food as an argument for why 20% inflation is a wrong number

                  Remember, the inflation-adjusted earnings also have to go up 20% just to stay the same. You don’t have the same money as before, your paycheck must increase by 20% for your real earnings to stay the same.

                  If the graph says real earnings are up 1%, your paycheck went up 21%

                  If your paycheck didn’t increase, then you can just say that it didn’t track the inflation numbers, food prices or whatever doesn’t matter since it’s the real earnings that are too low