My mom and I were discussing this the other day. When she and my dad first married they had a house payment, groceries, and, I think a electric bill but maybe that was included with their house. And they had home and car insurance. That was pretty much their monthly bills.

Would you like to compare my monthly bills now to their's then?

Now, one of our former students, age 16, is visiting -- I can only imagine what his future bills will be if he continues at the current rate. Right now he has TWO cell phones - he really wanted the new iPhone! He's been texting on both of them the entire weekend. His freshman in college sister just got a new car -- a Mercades (used, he explained, a 2005). She's going to school to become a teacher. No offense to those who work in the educational system but how the heck is she ever going to afford replacing that car with her own money?

It just seems that each generation's standard of living keeps climbing and at some point it has to stop. Here is an article that I ran across this morning. Middle Class Reality Check Essentials - MSN Money

I think kids get way to much and therefore when they get to be adults they expect to have all this "stuff" even if they can't afford it. My sons go to a private school and a lot of these kids have parents who are doctors, lawyers, and own their own businesses, so they have money. My son has gone to have play dates with his friends and then comes home all upset because they have tv's,computers, and PS2's in their bedrooms, and he wants to know why he can't have all that stuff, and I tell him it's because an 8 year old doesn't need all that stuff and shouldn't have it anyway. I know parents want their kids to have more then they did when they were a kid, but some parents go way overboard. JMO

I totally agree with this article. I don't necessarily think that people don't earn enough money; they simply are out of touch with what is essential and have confused wants and needs. I see it all the time - people spending to Keep up with the Joneses. They say they're not doing it, yet they have 2000+ square foot homes, cell phones, cable TV, gym memberships, and barely nothing in savings or else they're living paycheck to paycheck. They're not putting first things first. The line between luxury and necessity has really blurred with our generation.

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I think Kim explained my feelings as well. It is ok to have that stuff as long as you have your priorities in order, I think. As a college student there was no way I could have half the stuff they have now nor would I expect to.

I agree that so much that used to be 'free' for older generations is now something that we pay for - necessity or not.

A review of our regular expenses ...

Mortgage - a much higher percentage of income than my parent's generation. Some people who got mortgages in the height of the real estate boom were being approved for 50% of income. In my grandparent's day, a mortgage was nearly unheard of. If you couldn't afford to save up and pay cash for your house, then you couldn't afford it. In my parent's day, a 2-3% interest rate was usury!

Utilities - Ours could be electricity, gas, water, sewer and garbage. We're on a private well and septic system so at least we don't have water and sewer.

Homeowner's association fees - In our town almost all new subdivisions have HOA fees associated with them even though these may have no subdivision amenities (ie, no swimming pool or park) and all the houses are single family residences. We escaped that cost by buying in an older subdivision. When my parent's bought their brand new house in the 1950's, a HOA fee was completely unheard of.

Taxes - Yes, even my parents paid income taxes and property taxes. They even got used to paying sales tax. But look at everything else that has been added on: taxes on utility bills, gasoline taxes, bond taxes added to property tax bills, fees paid to government agencies for simple transactions, fees for accessing government parks, etc. Costs as basic as auto registration or hunting licenses have skyrocketed.

TV reception - Used to be you got three channels on your TV, if you were lucky (my husband grew up with two!). At least those channels were free - or paid for with advertising dollars. Now we have access to over 200 channels, still get subjected to commercials, and pay $50 a month (more or less) for the privilege.

Radio reception - Yes, I know most of us still listen to the radio for free. However, many of us also pay for Sirius or XM. Many more pay for 'downloads' to our computers or MP3 players - anything from audio broadcasts to full TV programs.

Movies - When my parents were young adults, going to the movies was one of the cheapest forms of entertainment available. Now many people pay for a monthly Netflix subscription because going to the movies is too expensive.

Telephone - Let's see, growing up in my parent's house we had one telephone. It was the phone that came with the house and it had a dial, not push buttons. If there was a problem with the phone, the telephone company came out and fixed the lines for free or replaced the phone for free. The phone didn't take electricity to run. The phone company provided the power it needed. My parents had ONE phone line and one phone number. The phone was in the kitchen. If you wanted to talk to someone, you had to put up with mom washing dishes right next to you or dad paying bills at the kitchen table while you talked. Now, we have two hardwire phones in our house. Those two lines have (or had because I got rid of most of them) extensions which I had to go to the store to purchase. I've probably purchased over ten different phones in the last 10 to 15 years. My parents eventually got an answering machine because we gave them an old one of ours. Purchasing an answering machine, much less having voicemail, was unheard of. Having more than one phone line was something businesses did, not homeowners.

Telephone II - Of course, we have cellphones, too. Hubby has a cellphone that his company provides. I have my own cellphone and we pay for that plan out of pocket. This means of the three people in our household, we have FOUR DIFFERENT PHONE NUMBERS - two landlines and two cellphones. Each comes with a separate bill. We have three phone bills. My parents had one.

Telephone III - In my parents day, calling something long distance was a rare, carefully planned event. It was expensive. It also was something that had few choices. You dialed the number and your phone company connected you. Now we have to sign up with and pay for a long distance telephone company. In some cases we pay that company a connection fee whether we make a long distance phone call or not. It would be easy to do without long distance service except the phone companies mismanaged the phone number system so now some people live in areas where just calling across town means dialing a different area code and you incur a toll charge. Now, many of us use our cellphones for long distance. We have one landline at home that can be used for international long distance.

Internet coverage - My parents never imagined paying for this service. Now many people pay minimally $25 a month for it because it is a necessity.

Autos - My parents considered themselves well off to afford ONE car. It was a big deal when my parents got two cars. In our household, with two licenced drivers, we have three cars. It doesn't make sense, I know. Again, in my parent's day, if you didn't pay cash for even a new car you couldn't afford it. Now a 5-year auto loan is almost standard and many autos qualify for loans that have much longer terms and much higher interest rates.

Credit cards - My parents rarely applied for loans and a credit card (much less a debit card) was unheard of. Now many families have a minimum of three credit cards. Many families have significantly more than three and many of those have on-going balances.

Financial institutions - My parents dealt with one bank for checking and savings. In our household we have main checking, three MMFs, a medical savings account, a few on-line accounts (ING, Sharebuilders, paypal), and a whole host of IRAs and 401ks. Pension? My dad retired with one. My husband and I will be lucky to see Social Security.

Insurance - My parents had medical insurance, auto insurance, life insurance and homeowner's insurance. We have all that plus an umbrella policy (extra liability), insurance riders (jewelry, critical electronics, etc), dental insurance, disability insurance and more than one life insurance policy. Many families are also adding expenses like credit card insurance, mortgage life insurance, identity theft insurance, pet insurance, auto repair insurance, earthquake insurance, flood insurance (mandatory in some areas), legal insurance, uninsured motorist insurance, long term care insurance, medigap, and travel insurance. When you rent a car your regular auto insurance isn't enough so you pay an outrageous amount for temporary auto insurance. Some utilities offer to charge you for service insurance in case something breaks and you have to pay to get it fixed. When we installed our wireless internet service we had to hire an electrician to do part of the wiring because the internet company wouldn't do it.

Whew! I'm tired. Life HAS gotten more complicated. It has also gotten much more expensive.

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I think many people don't even "think" about what is a luxury expense in some of these cases. When DH and I were barely able to eat it never occurred to us to cut out cable service. We wore shoes with holes, ate ramen, never went out, but still paid for cable. My parents, who are GREAT with saving $$$, never said, "Hey guys maybe you could cut out your cable," it never occurred to them either. And they are very frugal by most standards. It's kind of like many of us have lost true touch with reality of what we need and don't need. I hope I can help these things sink in better with my own kids, so they will realize more of their options than we did. It was a good article.

Thanks for posting that article, and I agree with it as well.

I think some of the overspending when it comes to entertainment items and our children stem from several reasons. People have the attitude "oh just charge it" if you don't have the cash for it. Who cares if I have to pay 18% interest? Plus their is a larger percentage of households with 2 working parents than in generations past. I think some parents are guilted into buying things for their children because they feel bad for not being able to be with them more. Plus toys are ALOT more expensive and elaborate than they were when I was growing up. I was fine with board games, books, and Barbies. Now kids have Leappads, Leapsters, computers, and PS 2, etc in their rooms.

I'm tired just reading YOUR post!! LOL

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"It's time to move from what we can do, to what we must do, to what we will do." ~Hillary Clinton

We've tried so hard to get rid of things we don't need. I cut the cable back, switched to Vonage, we have the cheapest cell plan, etc. I think one of the big budget hogs is insurance, medical, home, life, auto, etc. It eats our budget up.

You know Its interesting but yes I agree we have so many things now that are monthly payments to things that are really wants.

We are gadget Happy. Everyone has to have there big TV, little phones, computers, fancy cars, cable and high speed internet. Things that should be luxeries are getting written off as standard. And it keeps starting at a younger and younger age. I know too many Toddlers and Pre Schoolers who have there own TV and Computer. Elementary school students with cell phones and ATMs in High schools. Ouch so part of it is we are starting them young with over inflated ideas of what they must have.

I have the 1950s House We bought it 4 years ago from the original owner. You really start seeing how the previous generation lived differently from us. 1050 sq feet was fine for raising 4 kids
One car Garage worked as they only had one Car
Gardening old rugs make great weed gaurd and Tires great containers (we have 7 to remove from our yard and a laundry basket and some boots that were used as planters)
There was no need to make big changes. Kitchen was fine with no dish washer, Lighting was adequet If it wasn't broke it didn't get fixed.
They probably used the clothes line in the back yard

So it was more then just things costing less it was more that standards were different. No one ate out once or twice a week it was a special treat, you didn't have so much electricity needs because you didn't have the electronics.

We do faily well at keeping costs down but its tough and prices are much higher and we like many others want to fulfill our wants

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Kimberly Proud Mommy to Bethany Rose April 2006