Education but my bachelors degrees are microbiology and chemistry although I work in IT. You have to have a job to be making that and that is more difficult outside of HCOL areas. 95K in a city with a metro is barely enough to afford a place but likely not a stand alone home. Truly HCOL like new yor or san fran its have a few roomates. Aslo these jobs often do not have pensions and the people in it have serial unemployment over the course of their careers. They were not making something like that for 30 years. My father did way more than have a nice home. I mean it was kinda ramshackled but most folks would be ga ga to have it today. It was very much like the family at the start of caddy shack. That size house, single salary, with that many kids. Pension to boot. Thats a pipe dream for anyone who did not start workin in the eighties and even then unlikely. Xers are just about to start retiring and oh man is it going to be a trump show with social security barely covering medicare costs now. Combine that with no pension and savings only if someone is very successful like myself. So super successful today is < typical pleb of yesteryear.