Homeownership is usually reported with households in the denominator. Under shortage conditions, this leads to bias in the indicator. If a lack of housing units reduces household formation, then homeownership per capita deviates from homeownership per household.
A lot to unpack here, and thanks for taking the deep dive. I feel like the U.S. is in the midst of a gruesome social experiment: Younger generations delay household formation & ownership and just wait for boomers with large houses to die. While they're waiting, they don't have kids, don't move around the country, and don't have any ambitions except trying to outlast their parents. Given that wealth and political leadership is concentrated in the hands of the older generation, this experiment is being drawn out by lending/land use regulations and the magical medical apparatus that sustains the old people for longer than anyone expected.
Seriously, yes, there have been technological breakthroughs---like i-tablets, better medical procedures and drugs, and so on. Tires last longer, cars may be ugly and cramped but last longer.
Private enterprise continues to better products and services.
But housing is a daily disaster for most Americans, and wages have stagnated for 50 years, and even gone down in real terms for young males.
The racial-social-political tensions appear...well, insoluble, and exacerbated by de facto immigration and trade policies.
For whatever reason, academia and media is teaching people to hate the perceived oppressor class or race, including Jews.
The left-wing of America has been valorizing Muslim terror.
Yes, there was rotten and overt racism and homophobia 50 years ago in the US. And that has improved (but not if you listen to the permanently aggrieved).
A lot to unpack here, and thanks for taking the deep dive. I feel like the U.S. is in the midst of a gruesome social experiment: Younger generations delay household formation & ownership and just wait for boomers with large houses to die. While they're waiting, they don't have kids, don't move around the country, and don't have any ambitions except trying to outlast their parents. Given that wealth and political leadership is concentrated in the hands of the older generation, this experiment is being drawn out by lending/land use regulations and the magical medical apparatus that sustains the old people for longer than anyone expected.
Seriously, yes, there have been technological breakthroughs---like i-tablets, better medical procedures and drugs, and so on. Tires last longer, cars may be ugly and cramped but last longer.
Private enterprise continues to better products and services.
But housing is a daily disaster for most Americans, and wages have stagnated for 50 years, and even gone down in real terms for young males.
The racial-social-political tensions appear...well, insoluble, and exacerbated by de facto immigration and trade policies.
For whatever reason, academia and media is teaching people to hate the perceived oppressor class or race, including Jews.
The left-wing of America has been valorizing Muslim terror.
Yes, there was rotten and overt racism and homophobia 50 years ago in the US. And that has improved (but not if you listen to the permanently aggrieved).
Well, good luck to us all.
Americans should give up on the idea of homeownership, good wages and a civil society.
So...1950s.