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Notes -
I appreciate talking specifics here!
For the first part: $70k is well within the target range. The numbers I picked up said it was actually a little high. However - point being - while the average 1bed costs somewhere in the $1,600-$1,700 range, that means that half of them are BELOW that in cost, matching the roughly 50% of workers occupying that income range. So, in fact, you can get below the average and still meet the concrete requirements that he sets. Here's a link out to some cities with REALLY cheap rent. When you're talking $1k/mo or less, you could practically get away with minimum wage. Not saying you necessarily want to live there, but considering that the cities he has top of mind are NYC and SF rather than Des Moines and Madison, you should expect the number to be skewed.
And that's my point! He gives an estimate that is highly specific to the kind of coastal city he's used to (the guy's from Portland, OR), and the only reason to index that estimate highly is if you're trying to live in a similar city. (He's actually pretty far off even for Portland - median rent there is $1,380, which puts target income at around $50,000 - median income is just shy of that at $47,000, making it within reason for a single guy and well within budget if it helps you land a girl to help pay rent.) So the number is not what matters. He even caveats the number as "probably." I'd certainly caveat it as "probably," given that it's the wrong number, but I'm not here to beat up on the guy over the math he did or did not do before his fingers hit the upper row of his keyboard. I'm here to say that the meat of that paragraph is this sentence, edited down to exclude all bait:
Now we hit the real point of contention. Can the average American afford their own apartment, own a car, and pay for an adult lifestyle? When you consider that the costs of these things scale based on place and class, the answer seems to be a pretty confident yes, most men have the potential to do it, even assuming a relatively luxurious (but not frivolous) American adult lifestyle. If we're looking at the type of person who he is trying to advise, the kind of person who has even heard of Substack or who is willing to hire a dating counselor, I'd estimate that the number approaches 100%.
Let's go back to what you said in the beginning.
I've highlighted the two assertions that seem totally unsupportable to me after reading the guy's actual post. He doesn't insist on $70k, he spitball estimates it, and he's wrong. Oops. As for the second, here's what he actually says:
This is why I'm accusing you of reading what you want out of the piece rather than what's actually there. If you told this guy "hey, I read a Substack post the other day that said you need to make more than the national average income to have a chance at scoring a woman," and then revealed to him it was his post, I bet he'd be shocked at the twist reveal. Call him innumerate, sure, but actually talk about what he wants to talk about. Are those fair standards for a job? Can nearly all men live up to them? I think so, on both counts. But, if we're being honest, assuming that there's a substantial contingent of men who CAN'T meet that bar is actually more about the job market and the housing market than the dating market.
So, for your big point, and here I'll do exactly what you're asking and respond to you personally:
I couldn't disagree more. It's necessary to deal with social decline.
Draw back. What is a society if not the totality and product of its constituents? What is the quality of a society if not the quality of its constituents? What could cause a society to decline if not a decline in the quality of its material?
When you talk about societal decline, you say:
We're not talking specifics here, so I don't know how much I agree with you on the details, but what you're describing here is coherent. So: how were these social norms continually enforced? Was it done by God, by the laws of nature, or by the individual members of American communities on the back of their own character? When we talk about competent social systems, aren't we talking about the competence of these old Americans? You say: "The system is broken and pretending that individual actions can fix it is, frankly, delusional." OK, then who's supposed to fix it? "Us" "communally?" Come on, we all know how value-props that start as "we should really..." wind up going. "We" means "nobody," unless there's someone in the room who hears "we" and thinks "me."
That kind of thinking is, very specifically, the poison in America right now. It's the thought that you, personally do not have responsibility to fix a given problem, that it doesn't rest on your shoulders, that it's communal guilt. Say what you like about Christ, but he was big on personal guilt, that it's not enough to say that everyone else is doing it, that you personally must repent and uphold standards. He was even willing to make that his own cross to bear. He took on our sins, and died for them. Our Lord took on our communal guilt - so we could no longer have the excuse.
At my current stage in life, the biggest thing on my mind is my family. In particular, it's the future of it. My parents were not especially good at keeping the fabric of the family together. I love them dearly, they have much to commend them, but that was not one of their strengths. I want to keep mine together. I want my children to have faith, to have me and my wife, to have their eventual spouses and children. I want them to have honor. I don't see any way for them to get this if I do not act faithfully and honorably. I don't see how they can be faithful and honorable to their friends or even to strangers if they can't be that way within their family. I don't see how their family can be that way if I am not that way. I don't expect these actions to magically change the entire world, but I do hope that they will change my family, and that we can be fruitful and multiply, that we can be a bedrock for our communities wherever they may be. And I believe that individuals making these decisions, over and over again individually, is what will create the new great American society.
Obviously I am still a poor sinner, no matter what I aspire to, you need no help picking that particular out. But I believe that the things I do matter for the people around me. My family is, right now, living in a better society than it was when I was a feckless adolescent because of the actions I have taken. It is a small society, but it is theirs, and I am proud of what I've done for them, no matter how small. That is what I believe in.
No - the question is "Can the 30th percentile 20something American man afford these things?" Half the population being too poor to date is a failure condition, telling young men to spend their 20s careermaxing and start dating in their 30s is incompatible with the cisHajnal marriage pattern, and the reversed gender pay gap for young childless people makes things worse.
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