Why Chicken Wings Suddenly Became the Ultimate Luxury No One Can Justify Paying For
Remember when Grandma’s war stories included how a candy bar barely dented her pocket change, or Grandpa casually mentioned buying a house without needing a treasure map? Well, buckle up—because the world’s flipped that script hard. Prices have launched into orbit, but guess what? Our paychecks didn’t get the memo. Suddenly, those once-simple joys—your cozy summer lake house, fresh cod dinners, or even just a decent standard of living—are tagged “luxury” and priced like a VIP-only club. So, what’s changed in the last 50 years? And more importantly, how did owning a home, eating well, or just kicking back become an exclusive gig? Dive into the surprisingly candid Reddit confessions of things we used to afford without sweating it—now seemingly reserved for the high rollers. Ready to feel nostalgic and a tad bit stunned? Let’s unpack this rollercoaster of soaring costs and shrinking accessibility. LEARN MORE
Grandparents love to brag about how inexpensive a chocolate bar was “back in their day” or how little they paid for their first home. And in a perfect world, it wouldn’t really matter how much prices had increased because our salaries would inflate on the same scale. But as we all know, that’s just not the case today.
Costs of living are soaring all over the planet, and it seems like every year, things that were once basic necessities or little treats are turning into luxuries reserved only for the rich. Redditors have recently been discussing some of these things that have become unattainable for most of us, so we’ve gathered some of their thoughts below.
A summer house. I know many families that have an old house on a lake that they go to in the summers. It’s been passed down for a couple generations. Nobody in the current generation could afford one but some how a family with a single income bought it 50 years ago and the man’s wife and wife and kids would spend the whole summer there and he would go up on weekends.
Reasonable living standards.
Edit: apparently people aren’t able to put the original question and answer together. My point is that having reasonable living by today’s standards is something fewer people can afford compared to 50 years ago. The difference between living standards of wealthy and poor was far narrower than it is today. Sure, we didn’t have internet and fancy TVs and take away deliveries from our phones back then, but *nobody* had that, so that’s irrelevant. 50 years ago you didn’t have to be rich to own your home, to work reasonable hours, to have some leisure time. Now you simply cannot afford to even rent somewhere in some places unless you’re earning well above minimum wage.
Cod in Sweden. When I grew up, it was the staple fish, the base for most traditional fish dishes and you’d eat it several times a week. With a dwindling cod population in Swedish waters, it has now gotten so expensive that I can’t remember when I last had cod.
In 1980, according to Statistics Sweden, one kilogram of cod was 15 SEK (US$1.42 with today’s FX rate). In 2024 money, that would be $5.60.
But in the stores today, one kilogram of cod will cost you $29.70 (cheapest cod at Hemköp).
(Apparently Statistics Sweden stopped tracking the price of cod in 2012, which I guess is just proof of its loss of importance as a staple food in Sweden)
Organic or specialty foods that were once more affordable have become increasingly expensive compared to processed or unhealthy alternatives, making access to healthy food more difficult for lower-income individuals.
