> You probably don't even realise how far you are from average Americans
I think this is more you than me. The middle class in America is still strong. Is it weakening and eroding? That is also true.
> Shelling out three grand for a two-week vacation is simply unattainable for the vast majority of the population.
Would you quote me where I said it was the majority, let alone vast?
Well, actually, depending on the data and who you ask, 40-60% of Americans spend $3000 a year on travel. Is 60% the majority? I'm not good at math.
https://www.ngpf.org/blog/question-of-the-day/question-of-th...
https://www.nerdwallet.com/travel/studies/summer-travel-repo...
So really, you may be the one who's disconnected from reality. Not to say that things aren't getting better, I think they're getting worse. Just that you've got a bit of a doomer mindset.
No, 40-60% plan to travel, and the average amount of that travel is 3000. That is not at all the same thing as “40-60% of americans spend $3000 a year on travel”!
The data provided simply isn't sufficient to support the claim.
I went down a whole rabbit hole trying to find the numbers for this. If you Google there are lots of different numbers reported.
According to [1], the average American household spend $682 on airfares in 2024, plus an additional $199 on "Intercity bus, train, and ship fare"
There is spending data on "out of town" trips in [2] but it is extremely hard to work with.
If the average household spends $881 on these cost then it's probably at least reasonable to double that in total travel spend, so in round numbers at least $2000 is an estimate I'd believe.
It also makes $3000/year within reasonable bounds of possibility. But in terms of measuring how households are doing I'd note this is down from the 2023 numbers.
The normal issues with measuring average vs median apply etc.
[1] https://data.bts.gov/stories/s/Transportation-Economic-Trend...
[2] https://www.bls.gov/cex/tables/top-line-means.htm
> The data provided simply isn't sufficient to support the claim.
I posted more than one article.
A $3000 trip is within reach of more Americans than you expected. I don't know why you're unhappy to find that out.
Neither article provided anything like the sort of figures needed to determine if the median is way out of line with the mean; just a whole pile of uncorrelated percentages. You have not provided anything that supports the claim. And I don't have a dog in this fight, just pushing back against bad statistics.