I'm a mid-level engineer in the UK and I can afford a house on my salary.
By the way, when we say "afford", I mean be comfortable, that if you lose your job you will not lose your home because you cannot pay 2 payments, and therefore lose your deposit and everything you have payed in until that point. Buying home in UK is life under constant stress of "what if" and pandemic, Brexit and current economy have not done a good job of removing that fear...
I suppose it was a little disingenuous of me to say that "I" can afford to buy when I'm taking my wife's income to consideration too, but then I imagine most people who have reached the point in life where they're thinking about buying a home are thinking of doing it with a significant other.
> be comfortable, if you lose your job you will not lose your home because you cannot pay 2 payments
In what country is it not the case that you'll get evicted for failing to pay your mortgage on time? Also, won't you also get evicted for failing to pay rent?
Again, maybe thing is about being brave and just jump in without thinking about possible issues that may never happen...
Regarding eviction, I meant more, that you will be able to have some savings to bridge gap between two jobs or if it gets to unforeseen illness or event. Like what happens if you both lose jobs, or you need take care about your spouse ... (I hope that never happens). But, my only point was that system is adjusted so you are always on the edge (regardless where you are), so you always turning that economic wheel ...
I have few mates they have miscalculated amount they can borrow, forgot to include other expenses, service charges etc. now they really struggling as mortgage is eating most of their salary, they have very little room for any maneuver.
If lots of people want to live in a particular area because they think it will help them live better, that area will have more people jockeying/bidding to live there. Since everyone wants food with their meals, food will get bid up. If vacations to a beach are enjoyable people will vie for them (and suppliers emerge to cater to that).
The treadmill effect is caused because other people are running their own lives on their own treadmills, resulting in a system outcome.
That is part of what gives rise to the FIRE movement among people with some freedom to choose to live on less than their max (not everyone can, and certainly not to the same degree). If you adjust the hedonic consumption treadmill to run more slowly than you are running, you can literally get ahead. I’m not choosing it, instead choosing the expensive mortgage and longer worker career, but I can see why it appeals to some.
Our political and economic systems in the state of the things they are right now have not created on their own. All our systems are the human product - created through many iterations with a very similar theme and always done by similar actors - an elite that can influence those policies and the elite that have the right to invent and pass new policies, which is, to say the least, very corruption-prone process.
For instance, policies created after 1973 created a mismatch between productivity and salaries; basically, the working force become constant losers and elite winners. https://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/ https://files.epi.org/2013/ib388-figurea.jpg
At this point, who is to blame for those policies? And more importantly, when it becomes evident knowledge, who is to be blamed for keeping the state of things as it is?
Treadmill and the rules it runs on - are built by humans, and if we did built it, we could change it too.