I'm 95th percentile of my country's income according to government data, but struggling in the same way. Most of my friends who have houses have gotten them by inheritance or massive help from their parents.
"Why aren't people having kids? Why is no one marrying and starting families anymore?" Like dude, if I can't afford to buy a small property for myself as a single occupant, I'm not going to dive straight in to having children and renting for the rest of my life. I need financial stability.
Exactly, stability is the most important. I don't even care about large paycheck (like you said, 95th p.) if I still need to take a bad loan for 20 years in a country that has recently seen doubling in mortgage payments.
I just want to know it's going to be ok, for me and my family. After that requirement is satisfied we can talk about having kids, creating innovative companies, having breakthrough research. We can't achieve great things without this sort of stability.
"Why aren't people having kids? Why is no one marrying and starting families anymore?" Like dude, if I can't afford to buy a small property for myself as a single occupant, I'm not going to dive straight in to having children and renting for the rest of my life. I need financial stability.