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Comment by bendigedig | Hacker News Reader

> It means you can’t say something like “the numbers are only higher because more adults are living together”, as that is already being adjusted for. In theory.

I think it muddies the waters because it's possible that the numbers are higher because people are choosing to have fewer children (which may be driven by affordability), or more people are living in HMOs. It makes it much harder to argue about cause and effect. Are these equivalised incomes rising because people are having fewer children, because there are more people living in HMOs - or are more people doing these things because of a crisis of affordability?

> but the constant refrain of “living standards are collapsing” and “no one can afford a house” just doesn’t match the data IMO.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/housing/...

The price of housing in England has doubled relative to the median income since 2000.

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I don’t quite follow. Without equivalisation, adults cramming into HMOs would cause the household incomes to rise dramatically. The number of children, I suppose, could theoretically mask an impoverishment, but there’s not really any clear link between income levels and birth rates (maybe it’s even an inverse relationship).

House price ratio has doubled since 2000 but over the last twenty years in the UK it’s flat. The doomsaying is not justified.

> House price ratio has doubled since 2000 but over the last twenty years in the UK it’s flat. The doomsaying is not justified.

Now come on, data is data, if you want your arguments to live on the cite-able data, then you must accept that your arguments can also die on the cite-able data.

Take a look at a longer term view of the data and tell me you wouldn't be angry: https://www.schroders.com/en-gb/uk/individual/insights/what-...

And remember that this says nothing about the quality of housing, or its suitability for the needs of the household.

The housing crisis is not primarily one of homelessness (although many are forced to live in poor quality temporary accommodation waiting decades on lists for affordable housing), but of people living in the wrong accommodation for their needs; some of them forced to live in dangerous accommodation but unable to move, a greater number forced to rent, some people being forced to live with their parents; these are the things that happen when affordability decreases.

Do me a favour and do some real research on the topic before you dismiss other people's problems as nonsense. I think you owe them that.

It’s lower today than in 2005 https://www.nationwidehousepriceindex.co.uk/resources/5bwel-...

It is of course a lot higher than the 1950 - 2000 period, but I think two things explain this.

1. Women started having careers eventually doubled the borrowing power of the typical household

2. The housing is much higher quality (50s lodgings may not even have had indoor toilets; central heating wasn’t common until the 70s/80s)

So I think we’re essentially at a natural plateau of the house/earnings ratio, subject to volatility from outside factors. You could argue that housing has been unaffordable since the early 2000s, but the (false) narrative that’s usually pushed is of ever worsening conditions.

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