Average amount of living space per person in a new house has nearly doubled in just the last 50 years. Price per square foot is pretty much the same as decades before (adjusted for inflation).
Isn't it the abundance of housing?
>>When homes were abundant one income could support a household
Was it the case, though? Could one income support household with 3000sq ft house, big new truck and college for each kid back then?
No, but it also is much harder to buy smaller homes (especially townhouses, etc.), and you didn't actually need a vehicle nearly as much as you do now. The NIMBYs I mentioned made it much harder to have a decent ~1200 sqft home where your family needed one (or no) vehicle for their daily life.
College is actually another good example- sending more people to college mostly just meant everyone else _also_ needed to go to college in order to compete with their peers for jobs that didn't used to require a degree. We can see this across borders - jobs that require a bachelor's in the US often require a master's in Europe, because too many people in Europe have master's degrees compared to the number of jobs that should actually need one.
People often have master's degrees in Europe, because master's has been the primary university degree since the middle ages. Bachelor's degrees only started becoming popular in most European countries with the Bologna Process ~20 years ago. And the industry hesitated accepting them for a long time, often considering them little more than glorified dropouts.
It was mostly about the perception that people with a bachelor's degree had not learned anything useful yet.
There is a lot of variation between countries, but European countries often have a dual-track system in higher education. You can choose between the academic track (universities) and the vocational track, with more people ending up in the vocational track. Some fields are available in the academic track, some in the vocational track, and some in both. Professional fields such as healthcare, business, and engineering are often available in both, with the tracks preparing for different roles in the field (such as nurse vs. doctor).
Imagine being used to an educational system with two kinds of degrees. Some indicate practical studies preparing for a job, while others tell of longer theoretical studies and specialization. Suddenly the system changes and you start seeing a third kind of a degree: shorter theoretical studies without going particularly deep in anything. What use do you have for people like that?
I know plenty of people with “only” engineering bachelors degrees from my Alma Mater who would easily outperform people I’ve met with masters, so the same thing as the masters-holders I suppose?
It's not about being better or outperforming someone. A doctor is not supposed to be a better nurse. Similarly, engineers in the academic track are taught different things and prepared for different roles than engineers in the vocational track.
If you just need an engineer, someone from the vocational track will probably be more productive than an academic engineer due to more relevant education. Assuming a similar level of talent, of course. You only hire an academic engineer if you have an actual need for theoretical education. Or if you have a job where the specifics of the education don't really matter. Or if the academic engineer is from a higher-tier institution and likely more talented, despite the education.
You did not went into massive debt for life for that.
One bit difference is that European system did not had first three years of college as "life experience, basically generic study without specialization, basically another high school" thing.
You picked a field and studied that one. And that was structured as five years old study. If you are in the middle, you are eligible for the same positions as those who did not study at all - because you are not qualified yet.
In that system, demanding bachelor is the opportunity cost. Because basically there should be a trade school for that.
Like a nurse - before you would go to nursing high school and become qualified nurse there. The new demand to have bachelor made studies longer and did not brought higher quality nor was needed. Same with kindergarten teachers. Same with basic administration etc.
What actually happened was whole bunch of positions that did not required university suddenly formally requiring it. And half baked school programs to get you diploma. And 40-50 years old people going to diploma mills so that they can be formally better competitive apply to positions that required only high school before.
You also need to consider the distribution of housing sizes. The average being driven up by rural or suburban McMansions is not representative of the conditions of million of people living in large cities.
A mean is a type of average (i.e. a single figure that attempts to summarize the data). There can be a geometric mean average, an arithmetic mean a average, a median average, a mode average, etc.
It is often used ambiguously to intentionally create ambiguity as it allows for reaching muddied conclusions, which evoke more emotion.
I dream of a world where all data comes with at least quintile if not decile level distribution details. Especially in the digital age, I cannot think of a single good reason to not provide that detail.
Homelessness is not related to the housing prices. With any job one can afford to rent a room.
Homelessness is a complex issue, but a healthcare is the main cause. Lack of proper treatment of addictions and mental illness is the main cause of homelessness.
That is simply not true. Homelessness goes up and down with housing prices. You can see that in the data.
If housing is cheap, mentally sick person or even addict can get one in an easier way. And their relatives have easier time to help their mentally ill relative find a place.
Being homeless makes both addictions and mental illness worst, to the point of unsulvable.
But it also affects your safety net. If rent is 60% of your income, it's much easier to drown in it than if it's 30%. Especially considering once you start drowning, you'll need to pull 3 months' rent out of somewhere for the deposit of a new (cheaper) place.
It also makes it make more sense to live in a car. A car costs the same, mostly everywhere, so if you're in a stupidly expensive location, it might start to sound reasonable to live in a van.
Drugs, poor financial literacy and insanity are the main reasons, but expensive housing is also there.
Isn't it the abundance of housing?
>>When homes were abundant one income could support a household
Was it the case, though? Could one income support household with 3000sq ft house, big new truck and college for each kid back then?