Why is household income such a common statistic to use - it seems like it doesn't tell us much unless you at least normalize it by the number of earners in the house and the cost of rent?
For example - I'm pretty sure large numbers of people living together and sharing rent is way more common nowadays than it used to be. From 18 - 25 (I'm 27 now) I was always living in a house with at least 3 other people (usually 4-5), because that was literally the only way I could afford to pay rent if I wanted to eat as well and I'm still splitting rent 50/50 with one other person now.
Most of us were working (low paid) full time jobs, so our total household income would have been pretty big - but this situation is obviously not at all an improvement over what we had a few decades ago when one minimum wage full time income could afford their own house and a full belly.