# Do people generally expect to spend more money these days? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 31, 2019, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-people-generally-expect-to-spend-more-money-these-days/828726 "2019-01-31T14:43:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 20
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctor_jackson/32/32_2.png) [@Doctor\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2019, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-people-generally-expect-to-spend-more-money-these-days/828726/20 "2019-01-31T18:47:48Z")
> [@Icarus](#): > > At any rate - we do know that US wages have been stagnant for decades. Workers haven’t reaped the financial reward of all this “increased productivity”. Billionaires are richer, so YAY! I guess. Not according to the Federal Reserve, please look at the links I posted, particularly [this one](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N). Median real income has been steadily rising since at least 1985. That is part of what is fueling the lower savings rate - people have more and are confident that they will have even more in the future, so the perceived need to save is diminished. Generally speaking, a kid who gets a candy bar every day, guaranteed, will eat it more quickly than a kid who gets one candy bar per month, maybe. > [@Dinsdale](#): > > I think my perception may also have been colored by a shifting of peoples’ individual timelines. More folk used to get married and had kids earlier, which pushed back their discretionary spending until they were older. Yep, there are a smorgasbord of social and economic drivers behind the trend. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-people-generally-expect-to-spend-more-money-these-days/828726)._