[dhume]

Nor does he seem aware of inflation (see his "grandparents" paragraph at the end). The site below suggets $7k in 1950 would be about the same as $65k today, and I would hope people aren't amazed at the notion of being able to live on $65k per year.

http://www.dollartimes.com/calculators/inflation.htm

[cjy]

Nowhere in that paragraph does he say or imply that grandparents where living on 7K dollars in nominal terms. He simply notes that they lived simpler lives. That is supported by the data. Our grandparents had median incomes about 40% of what we have today (in real terms) see: http://www.stanford.edu/class/polisci120a/immigration/Median...

[erejacob]

I am aware of inflation. I did not intentionally imply anything about CPI. I was referring to the old generations attitude of "make it do or do without" compared to the current attitude of "just charge it on the card".

[potatolicious]

Both are straw men that represent the extremity of a population.

There's a bit of rose-tinted glasses going on here, isn't there? I don't particular buy into this notion that the previous generation was oh so virtuous, while this one is just daft as a brick.

[learc83]

Well they existed before the concept of easy credit, so it's not really a matter of them being more self disciplined--just sort of the way things were. For most people, you saved up and paid cash for everything b/c that was the only option.