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The cheap entry level car of today just isn't a VW, it is a Hyundai or a Chevy Cobalt or some such. With a lot more features than a typical car had then. Also, the amount you give was quite high for that time, not at all a typical entry level wage. The average worker has seen a dramatic expansion is lifestyle in the last 30 years - I've seen it with my own eyes, as well as knowing it from all the statistics. It is simply not possible to maintain the absurd thesis that Americans are getting poorer, when they are enjoying the greatest prosperity in human history. It is just utter nonsense.

Well, you got to consider that a new car you mention is the standard of a 2006 world, naturally a 1950's era car or even 1970's era car might not match. Even so, they even had cars in the 1950's like a 1959 Chrysler and DeSoto that had cruise control, automatic climate control system, scanning radio and even memory seats and a mechanical computer that tracked average speed and gas mileage IIRC.

It's like a TRS-80 computer may be quaint and underpowered today but in the late 1970's, it was state of the art and did the jobs admirably that we set it to. You can't really judge 1950's or 1970's standards with a 2000 outlook or vice versa. It is like judging the Founding Fathers as slave owners even though they were 18 and 19th Century men with a 20th and 21st Century outlook. There are some flaws in that logic.

Still though, we can't avoid the fact that in the 1960's and 1970's, you can buy a new car with only a few months pay whereas you cannot today.

You can't really judge 1950's or 1970's standards with a 2000 outlook or vice versa.

The reason you buy a car - to move people from point (a) to point (b) quickly, in comfort and safety - was well met by those cars. That may be 80% of the value of a car. It would be interesting to see what the market price of a new '68 Buick would be today, if they sold for 50% of the price of a '06 Buick do you think there would be buyers? 75%?

What would it cost GM to make a '68 Buick today?

"did the jobs admirably that we set it to"

No, it really didn't. I actually programmed TRS-80s in the 1970s, and trying to do anything useful in 4k of RAM was really rather pointless.

And I'd take a 2006 Cobalt for 12 months pay over a 60s Bug for 6 months pay, any day.