Those That Were Considered To Be “Dirt Poor” In 1987 Would Be Considered To Be Very Wealthy In 2026
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Americans are facing the longest and most painful affordability crisis in our entire history, and young people are being hit the hardest. For many Americans under the age of 40, homeownership is just a dream that will probably never come true.
At this point, only workers that make at least six figures can afford to buy a decent home. If you can believe it, the home that Homer Simpson lived in would cost approximately 450,000 dollars today, and the home that was featured on Married With Children would cost approximately 700,000 dollars today. Those families were considered to be poor by the standards of the 1980s, but in 2026 they would be considered to be very wealthy. Of course just about everything else has become less affordable as well. Purchasing a new vehicle is totally out of reach for most of us, health insurance rates have become utterly absurd, and many of the items that I commonly purchase at the grocery store have doubled or tripled in price since the beginning of this decade. The cost of living has become the number one political issue in the United States, and it didn’t happen by accident.
Some time around the beginning of the decade, something in our system suddenly snapped.
Home prices started going through the roof, and now they are sitting at absolutely ridiculous levels
Married With Children was a very popular television show that first aired in 1987. The star of the show was a shoe salesman named Al Bundy that made very little money, and he was constantly complaining about how poor he was.
But in 2026 the home that Al Bundy and his family lived in is valued at approximately 700,000 dollars…
I was quite stunned when I came across that post by Sean Davis.
It just shows how far our economy has fallen.
Another user on X pointed out that even the house that Homer Simpson and his family lived in would now be valued at approximately 450,000 dollars…
The median price of existing homes in June was $440,660, up 1.8% from $432,700 a year ago, according to new data from the National Association of Realtors (NAR). Home prices have risen for 36 straight months.
“Housing affordability remains low under slowing wage growth and stronger home price growth,” Ershang Liang, an economist with PNC Economics Research, said in a report.
In order to be able to afford such a home, you need to be earning nearly $110,000 a year…
Americans still need to earn nearly $110,000 a year to comfortably afford the typical home for sale in the United States, even as housing affordability has shown modest signs of improvement over the past year.
A new Redfin report found that a household would need an annual income of $109,796 to purchase the median-priced U.S. home in June 2026 while spending no more than 30% of said income on housing costs.
If you don’t earn six figures, or if you don’t already own your own home, you are just out of luck in this economy.
Homelessness has been exploding all around us, millions of Americans are now living in their vehicles, and people are creating elaborate homes out of cardboard boxes on the side of the road…