We've been trained well in our cultural brainwashing....Originally Posted by JaneV2.0
I'm with you on this one, Jane. It's absolutely not okay. Sometimes I have to really look deep to find anything of any real value remaining in our culture...or what passes for it as you suggested.
Rebecca
Saddle up my traveling shoes, I'm bound to walk away these blues.
I think greed works both ways. A student with massive student loan debt might be thought to be greedy, to borrow money for something with no clear way to pay it back. Same is true for someone who takes on a big mortgage, when financial condition is shaky.
My husband's step mother borrowed heavily on their house in Southern California when the market was ballooning. They lost the house, and were angry at being foreclosed on--but they borrowed a lot of money on that house and spent it on things other than housing, including a lot of travel.
Maybe there is greed on both sides. . .
Greed is certainly modeled for us at every level. Remember "Greed is good."
Needs to be emphasized. Two parents, both working outside the home, is what has increased the *household* income. Wages have been relatively stagnant. So on top of paying for child care that was previously done by the stay at home spouse, households are expected to fully fund their own retirement, their every-increasing health insurance and healthcare costs, plus buy a home in a good school district or else pay for private school.
None of that was the norm when I grew up in the 50's and 60's with a stay at home mom and a dad who supported all 8 of us. We had a tiny working class home and used cars but were financially getting by okay. He never made more than $11,000/year and retired to AZ with a pension and health care for himself and my mom.
My tuition and materials at a state college cost $500 a year (that I could pay for myself, working part time), good insurance was provided gratis by my employer (and considered a fair part of a compensation package), money saved earned actual interest, and my first house was perfectly affordable. Things have changed financially, and not in a good way.
I figured out how much it would cost me to get the same graduate degree I have today, at today's prices, and living the way I lived. It would cost $18,000 today. I don't know how much my degree cost in 1980's dollars, but I consider $18,000 for a graduate degree that propels me into the workforce to be eminently reasonable.
Why people have to borrow $35,000 - $50,000 for this type of degree, and they do, is utterly beyond me. But greed is one reason. They need to live in a 2BR apartment, drive a newish car, and have cell phones, gym memberships, restaurant meals out 3x weekly is all part of the new graduate student lifestyle and baby that cost $$$.
I lived in a dorm. I had no car. I sold plasma for beer and cigarette money. It was a simple life, and I enjoyed it.
Also, I find the excess campus amenities out there now, the huge sports complexes and gym complexes, to be ridiculous examples of excess. That is one reason why education costs have gone up. Certainly easy access to borrowed money is another.
Right, the colleges are certainly not spending it on faculty salaries. As an adjunct 34 years ago, I made 500 dollars more in actual dollars than I get now teaching same class as an adjunct. Not adjusted dollars, actual dollars. With over 60% of the classes taught by adjuncts who receive no benefits and make about 6-10 dollars an hour for their work, I think whole generations of students are being cheated, as is the workforce.
House prices are the same racket--they have gone up because of easy access to borrowed money. We lived very close to the bone when we bought a foreclosure several years ago--no central heat for 2 years until we paid off all debt and had more money coming in. Now, the younger generation seems to want "move in condition" and be willing to take on a lot of mortgage debt, with the misconception that it is "cheap money."
I think because we lived so lean, and did not do the fun things that we saw others doing with HELOC loans, we particularly resent the idea that "the rich bastards deserve to have their money taken away from them."
Lots of hard work and deprivation went into saving that money.
I read somewhere that my alma mater is charging $10K a year. Maybe that's out of state tuition. But it's far more than an adjustment for inflation would be.
And when you look at Abe's chart of household income it's only gone from 45k in 1970 to 45k today. I assume that 1970 had way less 2 income families. I'd be curious to see a chart of individual income during that time frame. I suspect it's gone down quite a bit during that time and the only dpreason households haven't completely imploded is because of more families with both adults working.
Wages, in constant dollars, have been pretty flat from 1965 through today.
Key there is "in constant dollars".
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