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And with inflation-adjusted household incomes steadily increasing over time, I think the simple answer is that people are spending more of their money on short-term wants.

Do you have a source to back that up? My impression is that wealth and income are becoming more and more unequal, I find it hard to believe that the issue is actually that people are “buying too much avocado toast”.

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sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago
My impression is that wealth and income are becoming more and more unequal

Both are true, people are making more and the gap between the rich and the poor is widening. So everyone is getting richer, with the rich are getting richer faster.

Ithink it’s keeping up with the Joneses. The sources I have listed above show the following:

income is increasing

personal savings is going down

Assuming inflation statistics are accurate, that means people are spending on different things than they did in the past.

Here’s an interesting source, and a table from that page:

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Basically, people are reducing savings instead of switching to cheaper products, reducing consumption, or delaying purchases. It’s not a huge change, but it’s a steady trend.

So I’m guessing people are seeing less value in savings than they did previously.

The studies I’ve looked at aren’t super granular, and the changes in housing and medical care don’t seem to tell the whole story.

Since renting is more expensive than buying a home in the long run

That’s true if you just look at dollar amounts, but if you include the opportunity cost of the down payment, if that money is invested in stocks, the rent vs buy math works out to be more of a wash. This obviously varies by area with some being very renter friendly and others being very homeowner friendly, but on average it’s pretty close.
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