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Comment by rconti | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, it makes me very uncomfortable when people say "housing is unaffordable in ${region} for anyone making less than ${salary}.

On the one hand, I appreciate that they're trying to put numbers on a problem we all feel in our gut. You can't hand-wave it away by saying "well, things change".

But, at the same time, things DO change. At a time when many goods and services are at an all-time low in terms of costs, why WOULDN'T housing costs go up? On the one hand, costs will be affected by constrained or increased supply. On the other hand, there's the demand side. If I can afford to cheaply feed and transport and clothe myself, why would I not choose to allocate a greater share of my income towards housing closer to work, or with more space, or in a more desirable neighborhood? The choices we all freely make with how to allocate our income necessarily drives affordability for others.

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This seems like a reasonable hypothesis.

And easily tested.

Is it true that the other costs of living have gone down in real terms. If it is, then we also need to know if people are buying those cheaper products and services.

We also need to know which groups of people are affected by which price-changes-over-time, in real terms.

This seems like information the statistics bureaus are likely to collect, definitely recall seeing this sort of data published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, and I vaguely recall the costs of living have gone up but I’ve never attempted to dissect the data.

I think the most important idea from the parent comment here is whether it’s possible to live on rice, lentils, onions, and potatoes, plus heating and cooking energy, at a lower rate now than the recent past, and if so why are we choosing not to.

Cars are more expensive compared to many people's salaries, as evidenced by car loans getting extended to 7 years. However they are more fuel efficient, last longer, and have lower maintenance costs (oil change at 10,000 instead of 3000 miles, for example).

For food it really depends on what you get. Meat seems to be higher, but I'm always amazed at how cheap bananas and potatoes are (and rice). Paying per minute for phone calls is a thing of the past too.

However a modern lifestyle also comes with more "almost necessary" expenses, such as home internet, cable ($150 - $200 a month), plus cell phone ($160 per month for two lines, to get unlimited calls and data). But electric usage is lower due to higher efficiency appliances and lighting.

> However a modern lifestyle also comes with more "almost necessary" expenses, such as home internet, cable ($150 - $200 a month), plus cell phone ($160 per month for two lines, to get unlimited calls and data). But electric usage is lower due to higher efficiency appliances and lighting.

The "almost necessary" level of those bills is ~$60 for internet and netflix and ~$45/line with a company like straight talk.

Paying $150-$200 for TV and Internet is on the very luxurious side of TV/Internet, and $80/line is both a luxurious amount of data and a premium cellphone carrier.

The 7 year loans could just mean people are choosing to buy more expensive cars, or have less money left over after other costs. I believe average selling prices are tracking inflation, but mandated safety and efficiency drives costs up. (I'm not saying this is a bad thing -- it just IS).

I agree with you on the "almost necessary" expenses. While nobody "needs" a $1000 smartphone, of course, it's hardly reasonable to not expect someone to complain about the cost of living unless they're adjusting their rabbit ears and using a tin cup and string. In particular, for many lower-income people, their (say) $400 smartphone might be their primary computing device

In other words, it's complicated!

>The 7 year loans could just mean people are choosing to buy more expensive cars,

That's exactly what it is. Cars are lasting longer so more of the market is shifting to various types of used (e.g. CPO Avalon is bought by people who would have formerly bought a new Echo) and there's a bunch of secondary mechanisms and financial incentive shenanigans that further this.

I lol'd at the $200 month cable bill being "almost necessary". Do you work for the cable company? Too many people cutting the cord? Every day I must almost die because I've never paid for cable. My $30 cell phone plan almost killed me yesterday.

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