I keep seeing data showing that a huge share of people around 30 can’t afford their own home anymore, not just in the US, but in parts of the EU as well. It seems like homeownership at that age used to be normal, or at least achievable, but now it feels almost out of reach for an entire generation.
What’s strange is that, for decades, we were told that communism was terrifying because you would supposedly “own nothing,” yet it increasingly feels like the people who can’t afford anything today are those living under capitalism. And at the same time, mainstream messaging keeps telling us we’ll “own nothing and be happy,” as if that outcome is now simply expected.
If people can’t afford a home, how are they supposed to start a family? And without stable conditions for forming households, what does that mean for birth rates, future labor force size, and the long-term sustainability of pensions, healthcare systems, and public infrastructure? Are countries going to end up relying almost entirely on immigration just to maintain population and tax bases?
Curious to know what people think. How do you feel about all this, and what are the long-term consequences if these trends continue?
We are in a bubble. Several bubbles, actually. One popping will likely trigger the others to pop. One of the reasons we are in a real estate bubble is due to housing being used as an investment by large corporations. There are many empty houses sitting around like a stock earning value for shareholders. We are also in an AI bubble. NVIDEA is NOT worth over a trillion dollars, but that’s what the shares are priced at due to the bubble. People make the most money in a bubble riding it to the peak.
Let’s pretend the AI bubble pops. Something happens, investors get spooked and start selling AI stocks off en-mass. The stock market corrects, and we enter a recession. This is normal and good, and to be expected. However, as company’s stocks lose value, they divest themselves of assests to keep paying shareholders, and sell houses while they still have value. This causes the Real Estate bubble to pop. As prices go down more and more corporations try to quick sell before the houses value drops below what they were bought at. Boomers die, and their kids place old homes they can’t afford to maintain on the market causing it to further collapse. Prices plummet to rock bottom. People who own multiple homes may also sell off the extras due to mortgages being owed for several times what the property is now worth. This has happened before and will happen again.
This takes years, but houses will become affordable again. Lots of people will watch the falling prices and try to time the bottom. They’ll rent for another year or two and see the market get flooded with houses for sale. Some will buy too early and the prices will keep dropping. Eventually though things will get cheap enough that people will, en-mass start buying again and the prices will stabalize.
Very good hypothetical and reasoning.
Fortress capitalism and increased militarization and surveillance.
The new serfdom.
The company will provide you with food and shelter and you do what you’re told to do.
The ‘talented tenth,’ people who are clever enough to be useful, will be raised above their cohorts, but in most cases no one who isn’t already part of the ruling classes will be able to ascend.
The West will try their hardest to kill the rest of us for profit and seize whatever they can because they know the decline is on its way and they wanna squeeze the lemon as much as possible. Internally, because of the lack of an actual ideology besides “white people rule because we make big bombs and planes and you better be our slave or we’ll kill ya” on top of the decline in material acquisition (which, for a group of people that really like their toys even in their mid 30s and all sorts of hedonistic pursuits, is pretty grave), there can only be strife. I honestly don’t care about them, from Latin America to Asia to the Middle East, the West is ramping up their murderous efforts… people are dying, maybe Americans won’t be able to afford some things here and there but hey, your cousin in the army is killing my cousins so how can you expect me to care? 🤷
The “optimist” in me wants to believe that the idiots who have all the power and money will never be satisfied and thus will keep crushing us to the point where the conditions for forcibly removing them from power will be met: enough of us will feel there is nothing else to do and nothing to lose.
As for what comes after that… Lots of instability and misery for a while, with the hope that whatever emerges is better and fairer than what we have now.
Don’t start a family. Go to war fighting for humanity instead of nations.
1st world marketed lifestyles are actual evil.
There’s a sci-fi book called “rats bats and vats” that has an interesting dystopia. There are “shareholders” that own everything and multiple races of slave cast people (vats). I thought it was a fun book but it also went into the dynamics of one class literally owning all assets except dept, which was owned by the lower slave classes.
The ending is pretty good ;)
