I hear this sentiment frequently but it doesn't pencil out. Renting an equivalent unit will typically, month-to-month, be cheaper than buying. Of course a significant portion of the monthly mortgage payment goes to principal which increases your net worth, but there are many cases where the money you save monthly by renting will actually exceed the principal you accumulate from your mortgage payment. In fact, there are plenty of helpful calculators to help you figure out what makes the most sense if you don't have a love affair with Excel [1].
You may argue that the the value of the house will appreciate well in a good market, but there is nothing stopping you from taking the money you saved by renting and putting it in an appreciating asset.
Where do I input the yearly growth of the property's value? Property prices where I live in Sydney have grown ~7% on average over the last ten years. That's higher than the average loan interest rate over the last ten years of ~4.5%. It's possible to find some other investment that earns more than ~7% profit, but in order to really be more profitable it would also need to cover the amount you spent in rent over that period.
This really isn't true. I am not deficit doomer, but you can't say its meaningless. The US paid $881 billion on interest on its debt last year. This is on par with the DoD. Yes, it's still only around a tenth of the US's total budget, but it is not hard to imagine the debt going up by 10 times. With the same interest rates, we then the US will pay as much in interest as the rest of the budget combined. If the US just needs to "print as much money as it needs", there is a certain point at which it will become hyperinflationary.
It's worth noting that it pays that interest back to itself. The risk of becoming hyperinflationary is real, but US can continue ignoring the problem pretty much indefinitely as long as other countries do their trading in US dollar.
I highly dispute this. Networks in college are absolutely a thing and absolutely advantageous. In my experience, the network didn't come from just sitting in class, but from extracurricular competition engineering/cs teams. Competition teams certainly helped many people get their first jobs through friends referring each other or elevated exposure to employers. In fact, recruiters would often have separate hiring events for the competition teams and then have the standard college hiring event. There's also an intangible effect from being surrounded by other highly motivated and mission driven students that you gain in these environments. I am sure there is a way to get involved in similar teams outside of college, but a well situated college significantly lowers the barrier to joining these teams and almost creates a funnel for it should you choose to spend your spare time in such as team.
>There's also an intangible effect from being surrounded by other highly motivated and mission driven students that you gain in these environments.
I think that is absolutely true. But other than one thing (which was part of a class and was really great even if we didn't do well), didn't really do competition teams in any formal way other than some class groups. Certainly nothing involving separate hiring events.
Why isn't SpaceX doing that then? Why isn't any airline doing that then? Oh look, it's cheaper to use refined natural gas from a well. That's why. In the absence of either properly priced externalities, the market will always choose the cheapest option—Sabatier-generated Methane is not remotely comparable in price to fossil nat gas.
Mentioning theoretical solutions doesn't help if they will never be used practically.
Aircraft use hydrocarbons which require similarly intensive chemical processes to create the fuels from the same constituent ingredients as the Sabatier reaction.
You may argue that the the value of the house will appreciate well in a good market, but there is nothing stopping you from taking the money you saved by renting and putting it in an appreciating asset.
[1] https://www.nerdwallet.com/calculator/rent-vs-buy-calculator