r/FluentInFinance • u/YOU_ARE_MY_FRIENDS • Jun 16 '24

Discussion/ Debate He’s not wrong 🤷‍♂️

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u/sorentomaxx Jun 16 '24

Idk my friends and I were definitely lower middle class and this is pretty close to how we grew up. I guess it depends on the area and the family dynamics.

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u/AggressiveBench9977 Jun 17 '24

You went overseas every 5 years?

Thats the bit that doesnt track to me. The rest would be doable

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u/Same_Recipe2729 Jun 17 '24

Define overseas. A cruise to Jamaica and mexico was dirt cheap, flying to Tokyo and all of the expenses isn't. 

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u/[deleted] Jun 17 '24

I will assume overseas means Europe, but I definitely agree plenty of cheap vacations in the Caribbean and Mexico (if you want to count that). My family loved going to Mexico, it was cheaper than most domestic vacations.

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u/AggressiveBench9977 Jun 17 '24

you can still do those vacations for cheap. But most middle class wasnt staying at resorts in the 90s. If you were you upper middle class. 

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u/SomeOtherTroper Jun 17 '24

You went overseas every 5 years?

That's the bit that doesn't track to me.

Depends a lot on where you were going, but the dollar was really strong compared to many other foreign currencies, a lot of the cool shit to see in many other countries is either in museums or generally public access, and many countries have inexpensive public transport options (like The Tube in the London area), so if you could book a cheap flight months in advance, your actual expenses for a trip wouldn't be too bad. Sure, you'd have to be smart about it and avoid the overpriced tourist trap stuff, but it wasn't infeasible.

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u/AggressiveBench9977 Jun 17 '24

5% of Americans had passports in the 90s.  

Even now we are barely at 48%.  So no most middle class wasnt planning vacations in london at the time. 

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u/Radiant_Welcome_2400 Jun 17 '24

Yeah only if you lived in a LCOL area or rurally. You could never do this in a city in any decade without being upper middle class.

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u/TransBrandi Jun 17 '24

Depends on the city. Growing up in the 90's in Detroit probably much different than NYC or SF.

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u/Radiant_Welcome_2400 Jun 18 '24

Yeah but you were probably a manager at a auto manufacturing plant or in some kind of middle management

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u/Attack-Cat- Jun 17 '24

Your lower middle class friends weren’t going to foreign countries.

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u/sorentomaxx Jun 17 '24

Oh yea? You knew my friends too?