When I read something that changes my mind, I sit up and take notice. In two recent posts on Facebook, I said I learned, contrary to my earlier beliefs, that younger generations in America are doing OK compared to older generations, at least as measured by income and wealth. I used the two graphs above as evidence.
But readers were having none of this. None of them had their minds changed like I did. They replied, What about expenses? What about housing prices? I was planning to get to that. Those critics jumped the gun. What I learned about income and wealth came from an article by Noah Smith that was titled, "Housing is at the heart of America's economic problems." Huh? If income and wealth seem to be holding up for younger generations, then what's America's economic problem? That's when Noah Smith introduced a third graph, showing home ownership by generation. It doesn't negate the income and wealth graphs he showed first, but it does show a more complete picture of the younger generations' situation.
Smith says, "As you can see, Millennials eventually caught up with Gen X, but not until they were 42. And Gen X still hasn’t caught up with the Boomers, even by their late 50s! Gen Z is running very slightly behind the Millennials." And that's a problem, despite the good news on incomes and wealth. I'll stop there. Find his article on his Substack, Noahpinion. In it he gives a good summary of the various explanations for the source of the problem and approaches being taken (or least being advocated) for doing something about reducing the generational gaps in home ownership.
"Wealth blooms on paper,
but shelter's roots tell the truth.
Soil priced out of reach."
—h/t ChatGPT
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