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Much bemoaning from young adults about high consumer prices and especially home ownership, that they say is out of reach, has led many of them into exploring socialism as a better way of life than capitalism. Quick answer: it's not. Socialism is the gateway drug into Marxist communism and has never, ever worked for the rank and file in any country in which it has been established. The only ones who benefit from it are the top tier of elitist aristocratic party members who rule over everyone else.
My question for the youthful ignorant wannabe socialists in our country is, if socialism is so wonderful, why do you suppose millions who lived under this totalitarian system have always desired to escape it to be free in America? Why do you suppose that the loudest anti-socialist voices come from people who have actually lived and suffered under that system? It is one thing to sit in a university classroom and listen to far-left Marxist professors espouse the fantastic benefits that Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels theorized in their perfect world, and quite another thing to experience the reality of having to live daily under it.
No one is happy when the price of living goes up. As frustrating as it is at the time, the fact is, that it is cyclical. Prices go up, prices come down. When the cost of a hamburger goes up, running head first into the arms of socialism isn't the answer. It's actually stupid. No one a year ago thought that the price of eggs was ever going to come down, but it has. In time gasoline prices will come down too.
But Big Government programs, set-asides, increased taxation and redistribution of wealth only does two things; it grows big government even bigger and is more intrusive to people's daily lives. It also acts as a deterrent to private ambition and individual accomplishment.
Yes, buying your own home is more expensive today than it was for your parents. But guess what? It's always been that way. Your parents undoubtedly had to spend more to buy a house than their parents did (if their parents could even afford to buy a house at all). It's a fact of life that generally property values go up, unless the area becomes undesirable due to neighborhood changes or the house itself has fallen into disrepair.
But all things being equal, a young couple making a decent salary can still buy their own home if they are willing to compromise and maybe have a bit of patience. When I was first married we wanted to own our own home. I was making what I considered a normal salary, not a lot by any measure, and certainly not enough to buy a house. What did I do?
In addition to my day job, I started working at night to increase our income. We saved everything we could toward a down payment on a condo. Believe me, neither of us wanted to live in a condominium complex, but we realized it was the only way we could get into the housing market. It wasn't in the location we wanted to live in, either. It wasn't our dream house, not by a long shot. But we figured in time we would eventually be able to step up to something more in line to what we wanted, a single family house. Meanwhile, we were willing to compromise and wait to do that.
Too many young couples are simply not willing to compromise, or maybe don't have the patience to save up for a down payment. Many want to live in a particular location and refuse to even consider going into another area. They want what they want and they want it NOW. Well, the world doesn't work that way, sorry to have to tell them. The world never worked that way.
My wife and I couldn't afford housing where we wanted to live, so we found housing that we could afford after saving up for the down payment. After a few years, we eventually found a nice little house in a better location, and we sold the condo and moved. About 10 years after that, we found a larger house in an even better neighborhood and again, we moved up. As the song goes, you can't always get what you want. But we learned if you're willing to have a little patience and work a bit harder, you can come damn close to getting that dream house.
The good news is, it appears that now there are some young people that have discovered that secret; that hard work, compromise, and patience can bring them closer to being homeowners. That's called capitalism. Flexibility and a bit of sacrifice is the key. Not socialism.
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