[somenameforme]

It depends on what you're look at. This [1] is a graph of real median wages, for full time workers, since 1979 (date the Fed data begins). They've only increased by about 10%, and that's misleadingly high since 1979 was a local low of the era. The figures they give are in ~1983 constant dollars, so it works out to about $54k real median earnings in 1979 and $58.5k real median earnings today.

And since 1979 people have far more basic 'necessities' like internet and electronic devices. And other necessities like housing, education, and healthcare have all increased in cost far beyond nominal inflation figures. So a person in this situation is most certainly going to have a substantially lower quality of life in modern times. You have to keep in mind that in the past most families were single bread-winner, so wages and life were organized around the vision of one working individual being able to support at least 3 others, in a nuclear household. It was a very different economic vision than what has emerged in more modern times.

---

The one thing I'd say these numbers miss out on is opportunity. I think in modern times there is dramatically more opportunity, but if you're just going to live a normal, as expected, life without really aggressively going after the opportunities we all have available - then you'd almost certainly be better off living on the median in the 70s than today. And since most people should be expected to live these sort of perfectly average lives, as that's precisely what the average is, that's a real problem.

[1] - https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881600Q