Is The High Cost Of Living Our Main Problem Or The Cost Of High Living?

Costs of housing, child care, health
care and college are indeed rising.

We hear a lot of lament these days by those who say they are "living from paycheck to paycheck" in spite of having incomes that are far above the poverty level, and multiple times higher than billions of their fellow human beings around the world.

But is the problem only one of rising costs or is it also a result of our ever rising expectations for the kind of lifestyles to which we feel entitled?

Here are some examples:

1. Most of us assume the right to own at least one expensive, state-of-the-art vehicle, and often one for every licensed driver in the household. Fewer than one in five people around the world ever enjoy kind of convenience. 

2. In contrast to earlier generations, few households grow and preserve any significant amount of their own food. They eat out regularly (and recreationally), and rely on local supermarkets for overpackaged, overpriced and over processed food products that are convenient and tasty, but often unhealthy.

3. Most middle class Americans benefit from exceptional dental and medical care, but as a art of a healthcare system that is far more expensive than in most parts of the world.

4. According to Global Apparel Industrial Statistics,  the average American buys an article of clothing every five days, adding to their already overstocked wardrobes.

5. In my lifetime rentable storage units have popped up everywhere for our excess possessions, in spite of the average square footage of space per person in our homes having quadrupled over the past century. 

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