I know my standard of living has gone down the crapper from 2008/2009 to now. I’m barely getting by as well as my best friend has his wife. I know losing Mom in 2013 was a kick in the butt too but we were headed down before that. Right now, I’m applying for energy assistance with the gas bill, something I never had to do before plus I’m trying to help my buddy do the same since he has a sick wife now. B-( There were times I had to help him buy medicine for her.
What saved me was moving from Seattle to rural KY. I have a smaller house (on 32 acres) but it is, in a word, spectacular. And the property taxes are less per year than they were on the Seattle postage stamp lot PER MONTH.
If you were providing for your own family prior to 2008,
you were a target of the Obama administration.