Originally Posted by epitome

I was just telling someone that last night.

When I was a kid (20-25 years ago), we had a family of four with a single earner clearing about $550/wk. (he sometimes took on bigger out-of-state projects that netted him more). We had a nice townhouse, nice furnishings, ate out once or twice a week, two new cars, a modest boat, nice vacations, etc. All without any debt other than on the house (mortgage was like $400/mo.) and a note with a good interest rate on one of the vehicles. If they even had a credit card ... I never saw one ... it was used for emergencies only.