[somberi]

Experiences are expensive. Things are cheap(er).

A medium-quality dinner for two in an expensive city costs 100$. A beautiful kitchen knife costs about that much, but lasts 20 years.

A Broadway musical for a family of 4 costs about 800$. A good mattress costs about that much, but lasts for 20 years.

The given wisdom seems to be that we should value experiences more than things. Good things also cause small dose of repeated joyful experiences.

I am 50 years old, and live a reasonably opulent, upper-middle class, big city life. I am guessing here - all the items in my apartment put together, is probably worth 6 months of my work. A bargain, compared to the joy they give me.

[strken]

Taking a couple of tennis balls to the local park and throwing them with your kids costs about $5, depending on how many you lose. Going for a run along the beach costs a bus fare. You can camp on the weekend for an initial outlay of a few hundred dollars of secondhand gear plus perhaps $40 a trip. Having everyone bring a plate for a potluck dinner costs slightly more than you'd normally spend for a meal.

I think experiences can be as cheap or as expensive as you like. Essentials are the crux of the article, and without essentials most experiences are harder.

[stevage]

Those things aren't what are meant by "paying for an experience". They're paying for the ingredients and DIY the experience.

[MrJohz]

I'm not really sure I see the difference. The point is the experience and how much it costs, whether or not you pay that cost financially or through DIY. And as the previous poster points out, you can get great and life-changing experiences for very little money.

I think what's interesting here is that that's not so true for things. For example, I'm looking into custom ergo keyboards at the moment, and there's lots of off-the-shelf options, but there's also lots of DIY options where you print and solder lots of parts yourself. DIY keyboards tend to be cheaper, but not usually by very much, because fundamentally, the cost of the product is driven by the cost of its constituent parts.

Fundamentally, both things and experiences are driven by supply and demand. Rare experiences that have a low supply but high demand are naturally going to be expensive, just like rare or hard-to-manufacture things. Experiences that can be found everywhere - like throwing a ball around with friends or family - are cheap, just like many common things are.

That said, my intuition would be that the cheapest experiences are pretty much always cheaper than the cheapest things, and the most expensive things (e.g. one-of-a-kind art, rare objects, etc) are generally more expensive than the most expensive experiences.

[stevage]

Well, I think there is a clear difference that I'll try to make clearer. Most people, when they talk about buying an experience, essentially want to do something fairly passive, that is directed by someone else. Like going bungee jumping - pay lots of money, turn up, do as you're told. Or go to a concert - buy tickets, turn up, do as you're told.

As opposed to something like a hike, where you need to contribute a lot of your own decision making and energy into creating the experience. The dollars you spend on food and gear are a bit beside the point.

> Rare experiences that have a low supply but high demand are naturally going to be expensive, just like rare or hard-to-manufacture things.

I don't think the rarity of the experience is relevant. Watching the aurora australis in Australia is rare, but it doesn't cost anything. The cost of experiences is mostly about the labor. Very niche experiences might be expensive because there's a high staff-to-participant ratio, but I wouldn't call that a scarcity cost exactly.

International flights are common but expensive. So are 4 star hotels and fancy meals. And escorts for that matter.

> That said, my intuition would be that the cheapest experiences are pretty much always cheaper than the cheapest things, and the most expensive things (e.g. one-of-a-kind art, rare objects, etc) are generally more expensive than the most expensive experiences.

Probably. Though it gets a bit fuzzy how you define experience. Running for US president is extremely expensive and kind of an "experience". Probably the most expensive genuine experiences you can buy are space tourism trips, which cost in the millions. Although arguably high stakes poker is just an expensive experience for some people.

[mgaunard]

Renting a tennis court will cost you more than 5 dollars, even in a public park.

[Bjartr]

Rent... a tennis court? I've never even heard of such a practice before. You just wait until there's a free court, then use it. I can imagine places where it's exceptionally popular and the perfect weather where a rental system would be viable, but I'm curious if it's the norm in places.

[happyraul]

This is a very US-centric view, where public subsidies for tennis courts exist. In Germany for example, there's no such thing as a public tennis court, as far as I can tell.

[Bjartr]

Do parks in Germany have basketball courts, football pitches, or baseball diamonds? Is it that parks provide for sports that's US centric, or is it including tennis courts in that set of amenities that's US centric?

[poulsbohemian]

There was definitely a public basketball court and a football pitch within a few blocks of where I lived in suburban Münster. So can't speak for all of Germany, but there are some public spaces for the common sports in that country.

[gnicholas]

In Menlo Park, you have to pay something like $50/yr to get a key to the courts. The key price is higher if you live outside the city limits, in unincorporated Menlo Park (I assume because you're not paying city taxes). Fortunately there are unlocked courts in Palo Alto.

[ben_w]

You don't need a tennis court unless you're getting serious. I used to play cricket with apples[0]. As a kid I always had more fun from freeform play than from rules.

(Also strken wrote "throw" so I think they were thinking of a game of catch).

[0] Not sure which exactly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malus — unless they've been replaced since I was a kid, the ones on the right as you leave the cul-de-sac: https://maps.app.goo.gl/bsdmAm5cXtDyxwYy9?g_st=ic

[mgaunard]

You're being surprisingly overly specific with those tree links.

[supermatt]

The wikipedia link is for the apple tree genus. The word generic literally comes from the word genus, i.e. they couldn't be less specific when talking about apples.

[ben_w]

In fairness, my other link was to a Google street view image of (possibly) the actual trees from which the apples fell in c. 1993.

[kasey_junk]

There are dozens of public tennis courts within a 5 minute walk from my house that are all free all the time.

I’m sort of shocked to hear they aren’t free everywhere. Which park system charges for tennis?

[chii]

The one where there's too many people for two few courts.

[hef19898]

Oh, the horror of interacting with other people and not being priviledged enough to cut the waiting line!

[poulsbohemian]

I think this is just an unfortunately reality of almost any public resource... my community just built a new pickleball complex, but there is still an opportunity for a private pickleball club that has an indoor space. Government is constantly caught in the middle trying to provide resources while also controlling costs and not wanting any project to look like a boondoggle or overspend.

[johnnyanmac]

I could look harder, but I think my local parks only have basketball courts and a large field. The biggest park in my town has a baseball field. Never had a public access tennis court.

There are tennis courts in town, but they tend to be part of clubs or whatnot, similar to golf courses. Not public parks.

[calderknight]

Do you live in a densely populated area? There are free ones where I live too but I guess it might be different in the middle of a large city.

[kasey_junk]

I am in Chicago

[mgaunard]

Why is your local government paying for construction and maintenance of tennis courts if they're not being used?

[MrJohz]

I think they mean "free" here in the sense of "not costing any money".

[mgaunard]

"all free all the time" implies there is no one using them.

[lotsofpulp]

The government does not have to charge for tennis courts, it simply has to have too few of them.

[mcv]

> Renting a tennis court will cost you more than 5 dollars, even in a public park.

A great example of how even similar experiences can cost whatever you want to pay. You can throw some balls for free or rent a tennis court to do it. Some rich people rent an entire venue for themselves when they go out. You can camp in some nearby woods or go on safari in Africa. Experiences cost however much you want to pay for them. Exclusivity though, that's expensive.

[j4yav]

Why would you need to rent a tennis court to throw balls with your kids though?

[johnnyanmac]

I think baseballs or Footballs (both American and normal) would have been a better metaphor. tennis balls have this odd air resistance to them that make them less satifying to throw with your hands. Which makes sense, since they are designed to be whacked with a racket.

[j4yav]

Neither of those need you to rent anything to throw around either, though, as far as I know.

[dangus]

Respectfully, this doesn't have much relevance to the fact that basic necessities like rent and food are significantly more expensive than they were just two years ago.

Housing, transportation, and food account for over 60% of all spending.

Experienes and goods aren't my problem. My problem is that my dwelling costs $500 a month more than it did in 2021 and I live in the exact same place, and I haven't gotten a raise.

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/cesan.pdf

[hibikir]

Housing is an auction, and a bet on how well the area is going to do. If you live in a place that has very high demand, prices are going to go up if there's no building being done. But it's not all rising prices: My house's value hasn't outpaced inflation through the last 20 years, because it's in the wrong part of St Louis. People with blue collar occupations have no problem buying around me: You can buy a 4 bedroom house for under 300k, and their salaries have gone up far more than the price of the houses.

So house pricing problems? Just localized regulatory problems. We'd have a much smaller problem if more metro areas were attractive to people, instead of having such a big separation between of winners and losers.

[dangus]

There is a documented housing supply shortage on a national level.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/08/homes/housing-shortage/index....

Plus, mortgage rates are set at a national level. Your house price went up dramatically in the last two years even though the purchase price didn’t increase because someone new to the neighborhood has to pay a higher monthly payment to buy.

I would argue that the amount of homes that lost value enough to fully compensate the rapid increase in interest rates is going to be extremely low, even in towns and neighborhoods facing rapid decline.

It’s also the case that more metro areas grew than declined: https://www.businessinsider.com/2020-census-fastest-growing-...

In other words, pick any random person in the US and it’s more likely than not that they live somewhere that is growing.

[DeathArrow]

Who do you think are the winners, and who do you think are losers.

You can buy in the wrong part of a city but you will pay much less. Who wins, people who pay less or people who pay less? I think it depends on what they are after.

[yterdy]

>Housing is an auction

Between the recent (nationwide) realtor fee debacle and RealPage et al.'s (multi-state) price-fixing, it's probably more accurate to say that housing is a (national) grift.

[randomdata]

> basic necessities like [...] food are significantly more expensive than they were just two years ago.

Here on the farm, the price I'm getting when selling food is half of it was two years ago. If I, the farmer, am selling the food for less than two years ago, while you are paying more than two years ago, then it seems experiences are you problem – e.g. you are paying more for the experience of shopping in a grocery store.

[raincole]

... people didn't shop in a grocery store two years ago?

[randomdata]

People seemingly value the experience of shopping in a grocery store more now than two years ago.

[hattmall]

What is the reasonable and less expensive alternative to shopping in a grocery store though?

[randomdata]

If your time is worthless, the least expensive option will be to produce your own food.

If your time has value, the least expensive option will be to buy from a commercial kitchen.

What is reasonable is subjective and depends on the experience you want to have.

If you enjoy cooking as a hobby and are able to afford the high cost of operating your own kitchen, then that will be the only reasonable choice in your mind, and in that case the grocery store will provide a pretty nice experience in simulating wholesale distribution in quantities the hobbyist can manage.

A number of reports suggest that commercial kitchen use is on the decline, so, assuming people aren't eating less, it seems that cooking is gaining in interest as a hobby. Thus it stands to reason that the grocery store can charge that elevated interest more than in times past. That's just basic supply and demand.

[yterdy]

I'm upvoting you because your satire is biting. British, Vonnegut-level.

(To be clear, obviously that's not the case. Which leaves the alternative, that corporate food suppliers are screwing everyone.)

[mgaunard]

You're presumably in America, where they essentially have two kinds of produce: cheap and expensive. Not too much of a middle ground there.

If you produce the former, the shop will purchase large amounts and distribute them to a large audience. You couldn't possibly sell that quantity yourself. The value added is obvious, and their margin is relatively low anyway.

If you produce the latter, the shop will be taking higher margins, but they're much more involved in marketing your product, since they're taking a risk by associating it with their upper-class lifestyle brand. Again clear value added.

[mcv]

Best price for the farmer is always to sell it themselves, but you can only sell a limited amount that way. In Netherland, some smaller farms have a little stall outside where they sell their produce. It's very cheap and fresh for the customer, and the farmer gets a much better price. But the total amount they're selling that way is never going to be big. I suspect it's just a nice bonus to them.

My brother in law has cows, and he recently switched to producing organic milk. That gets him a much better price, and he also recently started making his own cheese and grow his own grain. I love the diversification and we buy directly from him, but his reach is more limited than when he just has Campina pick up all his milk (which still happens).

[randomdata]

> they essentially have two kinds of produce: cheap and expensive. Not too much of a middle ground there.

In fact, there is middle ground as the least expensive product goes for animal feed. The middle ground is the lesser quality, but still high enough quality, product that human consumers are still willing to purchase.

You, of course, set out to grow the highest quality product you can – it fetches the highest value, after all – but Mother Nature often has other plans.

[musicale]

Whose pockets is the money going into? Fuel companies? Shipping companies? Distributors? Retail grocers?

The last time I shopped at a farmer's market the quality was great, but the selection was limited and it was still expensive.

[randomdata]

The pockets of the entire economy. Ultimately, food is mostly sold on futures contracts, so realistically the end consumer is currently paying the price from one to two years ago when the farm gate price was double what it is now. Within the next year or so, retail food will no doubt crash hard as those old contracts start to clear and the much lower contracts of today start to come into force.

[musicale]

Great reply, thanks!

[DeathArrow]

Or it means that the farmer and buyer are both screwed up by third parties.

[randomdata]

The third parties provide an experience.

[DeathArrow]

I rather not have that experience. That experience is forced upon me. Like how paying taxes is forced upon me.

[randomdata]

Hardly. If you do not pay your taxes, other people will seek restitution. If you do not engage in the experience provided by the food middlemen, nobody is going to care.

One can always by directly from the farmer, or produce their own food, if they truly do not want the experiences provided by the third parties. But I expect most people will find out that the experiences are actually pretty great.

[thebigman433]

Not to put any blame on you or anything, because rents are crazy, but median wages have risen pretty significantly over the last few years. You definitely should be looking for a raise, or a new place of work.

[yterdy]

If the only way for people to keep apace of rising costs is to get a new job, that's got to be massively disruptive to businesses.

[DeathArrow]

If both prices and wages have risen than it means you have inflation.

[thebigman433]

Yes? Everyone knows there was more inflation than usual. It has literally dominated headlines for the last year and a half.

[lucaspm98]

On a personal level I feel the same strains, but all sources I’m finding have median wages rising more than median rent since 2020 and certainly since 2021.

However, that would not be true for buying a home especially when factoring in borrowing costs.

https://ipropertymanagement.com/research/average-rent-by-yea...

[yterdy]

That's because rents temporarily cratered when people couldn't move due to lockdowns. But that was monthly, during the latter half of 2020 and the early half of 2021. Moving season is early summer, so people were locked into leases until prices rose again. Then, those leases were hiked in a massive price-fixing scheme, I mean raised in observance of inflation.

[DeathArrow]

That's probably true for Bezos, too. Except that he got a raise.

[j7ake]

To be more precise : wages in big cities are high. Most “things” are made in low cost of living / low wage areas.

Therefore, paying a local to cook for you is expensive. Buying a kitchen knife made by someone in a low cost of living area is cheap.

This also means that buying a custom knife handmade by a local artisan in your city will be expensive.

[wongarsu]

Also the industrial revolution happened, which massively drove down the cost of things. Nothing comparable happened for experiences. A restaurant today needs a similar amount of labor to make your meal as a tavern did 400 years ago. Their ingredient costs went down, but waiters and cooks do about the same amount of work, and property values haven't gone down. Meanwhile the amount of work to make a knife has been drastically slashed through technological progress.

[j7ake]

There was some story once that a quality handmade tailored suit costs about the same amount of gold centuries ago compared to today.

Would love to see this fact checked.

[ajb]

Given the volatility of gold prices, you can just pick a date when that was true.

[j7ake]

You could, but then that would be bad analysis.

A more reasonable approach is a linear model.

[ajb]

True. If I had to, though, I'd bet that the article didn't do that.

[johnnyanmac]

>Nothing comparable happened for experiences.

it kind of did. Fast food sacrificed the experience for the core consumption. Then you have chain restaurants like Denny's that exist to give the bare minimum "experience" without throwing it all away like modern drive-thrus.

Did they cut down enough to eliminate fine dining? Doesn't look like it. But I haven't done a deep dive into the ecnonomics of that. Just general wisdom that food as a business has always operated on razor thin margins.

[nradov]

There was fast food 2000 years ago with no real "experience". Nothing has changed in that regard.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55454717

[lukas099]

> Fast food sacrificed the experience for the core consumption

Going to fast food restaurants is a social outing for a lot of people. McDonald's is one of the best hangout spots, really.

[antifa]

By 2032, that era will be over. https://www.restaurantdive.com/news/mcdonalds-will-remove-se...

[lukas099]

I'm not 100% sure that not being able to refill your own soda will kill it, but I suppose it might.

[pas]

environmental awareness, map of the whole world in your pocket, ebooks, 20Ah power banks, good thermal clothing, good cars

skiing/snowboarding, surfing, slacklining (highlining), biking, motorcycling

cinema, 4K/HDR, IMAX, streaming, youtube, single multi tabletop gaming, VR/AR/geocaching

music, festivals, amazing sound quality, headphones

psychedelics

sex (toys, porn, acceptance)

...

ordering basically any kind of AMAZING food for ridiculously cheap in most big cities.

[kridsdale3]

The equivalent to the industrial revolution's impact on material goods pricing, in the domain of labor, did happen. It was slavery. Clearly, that did not persist.

[DeathArrow]

What you say is that bigger cities have bigger inflation. If you live in a smaller city, earn half, but everything costs half, then, you don't have any incentive to move to a big city.

[j7ake]

True if you save zero or negative percent of your earnings.

If you always save 10 percent of your earnings, then clearly the multiplier works in your favour.

[psychoslave]

If inflation is higher than what you can earn from a saving account, then how is it rational to "save" anything? You’ll have a bit bigger number on the account, but in the end you can actually buy less.

You can of course go with more risky placements and hope to go higher than a saving account, but then you have to spend attention on the market circus with additional worrisome mental load that you can actually lose everything.

[alright2565]

> but then you have to spend attention on the market circus with additional worrisome mental load that you can actually lose everything.

Not true. You can just buy a slice of the whole economy.

Then the only situation in which you lose everything is that in which your dollars would be worthless anyway.

[johnnyanmac]

>If inflation is higher than what you can earn from a saving account, then how is it rational to "save" anything?

general security? You don't need to (nor should you) hoard 10% of your finances for all 40+ years of your career into a low interest savings account. But you do want to keep a decent amount in case of various downturns. a high CoL city where you pay not much more for "things" can help with that.

Can also help pay for an financial advisor who will happily play with the monopoly money for you. Delegation is a great "experience" to consider when comparing costs of living.

[satvikpendem]

No, just VTI and chill, it's the FIRE / Bogleheads model, and it works very well. No one who saves money for retirement should literally be doing so via a savings account. Sadly, not too many people know this then wonder why they're poor when others are rich come retirement age, not understanding the power of compounding in the market.

[psychoslave]

Where do you learn about these things? Having grown and living in France, I was never given a word about it, not even at university. We are supposed to have state managed retirement plans, but given the shady future of France, I’m starting to wonder what I should do to ensure I can either reach a retirement that also take into account being able to backup my two kids as they grow up.

[j7ake]

When you buy car, fly planes, or shop at Amazon, you do not get a discount for living in a low cost of living area.

So the bigger number matters because many products are the same price ecerywhere in the world.

[ZoomerCretin]

2x salary, 2x costs, 2x savings. The savings are far greater if they compound in investments, and if you're remitting income to someone who lives in the lower cost of living area, it can be worth it.

[peterlada]

100% this. Maxing out the 401k annually at the relatively low salary of 150k in NYC is easy. Doing that in St Louis at 50k livable wage is super hard. Car payments? Ditto.

[DeathArrow]

2x savings does not matter if you have 2x prices.

[citrin_ru]

I does matter if you plan to move to a cheaper area after a retirement. Or even if you are buying a car which costs about the same from California to Virginia - only local goods/services (and housing of course) are more expensive in high cost high salary places. Everything else if about the same within a given country.

[DeathArrow]

>I does matter if you plan to move to a cheaper area after a retirement.

Likewise, you can be employed in the big city and work from home living in the small city.

[Al-Khwarizmi]

Also explains why housing is a "thing", but not cheap at all.

[kbenson]

> A Broadway musical for a family of 4 costs about 800$. A good mattress costs about that much, but lasts for 20 years.

Am I the only one that read that and thought "Since when does a mattress last 20 years?" That certainly doesn't match my experience, even for mattresses much more expensive than that.

[michaelt]

I think this depends a lot on your build.

My friends who are 250 lbs linebackers have to regularly replace their sofas and suchlike because they're 'worn out' i.e. the springs and foam aren't springing and foaming back into place like they used to. On the other hand, I come from a family of 140 lbs marathon runners, and for us that simply does not happen.

[switch007]

Not sure about the US but that price and statement might have been true 15-20 years ago in the UK.

These days a high quality handmade king size mattress of natural materials starts closer to £2,500 and might have a guarantee of 10 years.

I’m lying on a small, high quality mattress purchase 6 years ago for £1,100 from a small boutique business and it started to dip in the middle a bit about 2 years ago but I think it’s got a 2 or 3 more years life left in it.

£630 ($800) will get you a very cheap mattress today and if it’s both comfortable and lasts 20 years that’ll be like winning the lottery

[pinkgolem]

To be fair there are 2 markets by now

One with in-store shopping & the above mentioned high prices(and 600 is rather on the low side there)

But quit a lot of the mattresses winning the usual testing reports here are around 200€(single 80x200) to 550€(200x220) for a bigger one

Only available online but with nice return terms

[rjmunro]

Here in the UK you can buy a mattress in IKEA for between £99 and £799. https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/cat/spring-mattresses-24828/

[switch007]

I think you’re referring to those modern foam mattresses which are made of horrid manmade materials, are cheaper for manufacturers, have better margins, don’t last as long and are too hot. Lord knows what you’re breathing in

I don’t understand why they’re so popular. Sex is far worse with them too.

Their marketing is so aggressive I think many people don’t even know pocket sprung mattresses exist.

But they’re selling in droves so maybe there’s I don’t get

But interestingly, out of the all the hotels I’ve stayed at in the past few years, I can only recall one that had a foam mattress (which was awful). Wonder why the hospitality industry favours pocket sprung too…

Foam topped I can understand. But all foam/latex… no thanks.

What’s telling is that all the very high end manufacturers use natural materials and pocket springs. They weight a tonne and are supremely comfortable (I stayed at a hotel with a €5,000 mattress. Was like sleeping on a cloud)

[pinkgolem]

>referring to those modern foam mattresses

I mean, I was referring to cheap mattresses winning prices, this year it's a pocket spring + foam mattress called myNap TFK for 300€(Stiftung Warentest Matratzentest 2023)

>foam mattresses which are made of horrid manmade materials >Lord knows what you’re breathing in

Any science supporting that? Anything beeing man made is not an argument

Apart from that, testing for harmful chemicals included in the test report, and did not find a whole lot

>are too hot.

It is a tradeoff, some people like it, some don't...

>Wonder why the hospitality industry favours pocket sprung too… >Was like sleeping on a cloud

To soft seams to be bad for you, to hard too.

I personally hate soft mattresses (and hotels for that reason) they are great for a night or two

But hotels are actually a good data point.

I would be interested to find some study's about it and would have thought manufacturers would plaster them all over there (expensive) products, but dead silence...

>very high end manufacturers use natural materials and pocket springs

I mean, they have to tell you something to justify the higher price. I would be more impressed if they could point to some data and say we have less from xx in the air and that's known bad for you.

[georgesimon]

Depends on which part of the UK. In Northern Ireland you can still get delivery and installation of a Respa bed and mattress-for-life, plus collection and recycling of old mattress all for easily under £1000. I think they're sold under the Silentnight brand in GB[0].

Why do you want all(?) natural materials, that doesn't sound hygienic for something you want to have for more than 10 years?

[0] Not all Silentnight would be Respa though, as far as I know.

[nly]

Definitely can last 10-15

[mejutoco]

Since we are on this topic. Yes, maybe 10 years. And since when does _one_ mattress work for a family of 4?

[paulddraper]

I certainly don't have the same mattress as I did in 2003.

[charlie0]

This is true in the US, but the opposite was true abroad. Which is I prefer to spend on experiences abroad.

Here in the US, experiences are very expensive. Going to a spa for a few hours, $300 to $500+. Buying the things they use at the spa, it's like $60.

[DeathArrow]

Eating at a restaurant, going on a cruise or going to spa are not experiences I care about.

Spending time with your loved ones, spending time with friends, going outside and walking, reading a book are experiences that I care more about, and they don't cost much, if anything.

Some people living in poor countries report that they are happier than people living in rich countries.

Why is that? Because they have better experiences.

[johnnyanmac]

>Spending time with your loved ones, spending time with friends, going outside and walking, reading a book are experiences that I care more about, and they don't cost much, if anything.

oh, it really depends on the loved one. Hanging out but BYOB? Well, that's $20 a case or so, and you probably bring a few varieties. Cooking or ordering out also incurs some cost on someone. house hangouts are "free" (I won't nitpick on rent), but there's not really any third places these days to really hang out otherwise. You got a park and maybe a dying mall. The natural terrain from there really shapes how much "experience" you can get without someone nickle-and-diming you.

And ofc books vary: my "reading" right now is on game animation and that was a book I paid $100 for or so a few years back. Worth every penny, but not really "cheap" by any metric.

>Why is that? Because they have better experiences

definitely true. experiences vary on your environment, and when there isn't much business to make (for obvious reaons in such a country) you will have more natural experiences. I do yearn somewhat for that, but it again stems down to the dwindling third place; there isn't a "town circle" in many places in the US, which I imagine is a more common aspect of such 3rd world countries.

[charlie0]

Yes, in poorer contries, there are lots of third places. This is exactly what I mean. Those third places are where artists often congregate, vendors sell tasty food at less than sit down restaurant, history tours are available as well as other random stuff/festivals. Many of these are outright free or low price.

The US is overly commercialized and overly regulated. Someone owns every square foot and they are trying to make as much money as possible. There aren't as many parks. Vendors certainly aren't allowed to sell anything in most parks. There aren't many creatives congregating in certain areas because they are priced out and must work to make a living way beyond just being able to buy food. So while you might see their once a year event, they certainly aren't out every month.

It is what it is. The US is for making money. With remote work being available, one can now optimize on location and have the best of many worlds.

[hef19898]

That and because people in those countries still value the little things a lot, things we in rich coubtries, unfortunately, take for granted.

[gizmondo]

> Some people living in poor countries report that they are happier than people living in rich countries. Why is that?

My guess would be the hedonic treadmill, some people just have a higher baseline level of happiness.

[argentinian]

Do you mean they become unable to enjoy good time with friends?

[Ekaros]

I wonder if it is poor countries. Or is it lower income countries.

If you have enough food, clothing, housing and entertainment. And you don't see too many people doing a lot better you can be pretty happy.

[tonyedgecombe]

>And you don't see too many people doing a lot better you can be pretty happy.

This is key, people compare themselves to their neighbours. If everybody around you appears to be wealthier then it's going to take a great deal of fortitude to not feel bad about that situation.

This is one of the reasons social media is so insidious. No mater how good you are at something you can always find someone online who appears much better. Watching some rich arsehole flaunt his Ferrari on YouTube might make you question the value of your ordinary and perfectly good car.

It's also one of the insecurities that advertisers pray on. Modern advertising is full of images of people who appear healthier and wealthier than the target audience with the suggestion that if you buy the product then you too will become slim, happy and wealthy.

Comparison is the thief of joy.

[DeathArrow]

>Experiences are expensive. Things are cheap(er).

Some experiences are expensive, some are free. Things are never free.

Why are things expensive? Because everyone will charge you the most they can get away with. Part because of supply and demand, part because they use your desires against you, part because they have to be profitable.

[hef19898]

Things are expensive, as are experiences, because companies and people earn there living creating them. Man, I hate the take of "everyone else is charging too much", because we all do that, don't we? We negotiate higher salaries, switch jobs and move to improve living standards. And each and every dime we make is ultimately paid for by someone else.

[ZoomerCretin]

Sure, but if prices rise high enough, that high demand induces more suppliers of those services. In cities, where rent is 3-5x that of rural areas, new suppliers cannot enter the market to provide more of that service unless it involves wages high enough to pay for rent. There is a finite amount of space in a city, especially those as extremely zoning-constrained as American cities.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baumol_effect

This "everyone will charge you the most they can get away with" doesn't always have to mean prices go parabolic forever; we can enact simple urban land use reforms that allows more housing units and commercial spaces to be built, which can reduce the price of rent for businesses and the rent of housing units that businesses pay indirectly via wages.

[frenchman99]

well, no, there are a lot of places where you can get used things (or sometimes even new) for free that still in good condition

[DeathArrow]

Not where I live.

[frenchman99]

Where's that? I live in France.

[DeathArrow]

I live in Romania.

[GuB-42]

The idea with "buy experiences, not things" is that things often come with upkeep costs, even if it is just a spot to store them. A knife needs cleaning and sharpening, a mattress takes a lot of space, needs clean sheets, etc...

And your examples are somewhat biased in that they are things you need anyways. You can't really live without a mattress and some kind of knife. The question is more about what to do with your disposable income. Do you buy a thing you don't really need or an experience you don't really need. The reason to favor experiences it that they don't come with upkeep costs.

[lelanthran]

> Do you buy a thing you don't really need or an experience you don't really need. The reason to favor experiences it that they don't come with upkeep costs

On the flip side, I regularly sell the things I don't need anymore. I can't sell my experiences, can I?

The other thing you appear to be missing is that there are few experiences you really need, while there are many things you really need, so any comparison of expenses to things is going to be comparing an unnecessary experience to a necessary thing.

[yterdy]

>I am 50 years old, and live a reasonably opulent, upper-middle class, big city life.

This indicates to me that you don't actually know the price of anything, particularly post-pandemic. E.g., a middle-of-the-road mattress costs $800. A good one sets you back 2 grand.

[api]

It’s the big three: real estate, tuition, and health care. Real estate is the biggest and most pervasive problem as it affects the most people.

Younger generations are wealthier in terms of almost everything but these three things whose cost growth has greatly exceeded inflation.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we simultaneously restrict supply and subsidize demand in those areas.

[cynicalsecurity]

> The given wisdom seems to be that we should value experiences more than things.

It's not. It's just it's easier and cheeper to produce things nowadays than experiences, thanks to the industrial revolution.

It hasn't been like this in the past. People valued things much more.

[Ekaros]

On other hand "experience things" are pretty cheap. Specially in second-hand market.

Second-hand books can be very cheap, same goes for music in form of CDs, or movies as DVDs. Or you can rent them pretty cheap. And even new ones are pretty cheap.

So if experience is mass produced as item it can be very cheap too.

[about3fitty]

In San Francisco, these numbers are wildly cheaper than the reality. Except a broadway musical.

[merek]

> all the items in my apartment put together, is probably worth 6 months of my work

Is that after tax? I'm refurbishing and trying to define a budget.

[PeterStuer]

Depends which 'things'. I cook every day and do the grocery shopping. Average food prices have gone up 2x - 3x over the last two years.

Probably not for the typical HN crowd, but for many people food is a substantial part of the monthly family budget.

[Dylan16807]

Average food prices most certainly have not done that.

[faeriechangling]

Things alone will leave most entertained and lonely.