Just looked at a Lariat on my local dealer's website. Still $79K, still $1300/month.

Who can afford that? Like, my wife and I make what I consider an absurd amount of money - over $300K gross combined this year, and there's no way I'd consider a payment that high.

Between our mortgage, internet, cell service, TV subscriptions, health insurance, saving for college for two kids, home repairs (because houses built in the early 2000s are due for just about every major issue now!), and taking one decent vacation per year (we usually budget $8k for our family of four), I just don't see how people are supposed to afford something like this. We're what I'd consider rich at this point, having grown up very much NOT rich, and I just don't get how people afford new cars.

Maybe it's because we got a late start to these types of wages? We didn't break $150K combined until four years ago, and we're in our 40s now. But still: we're very much on the upper end of earners in the US, so how the hell do the auto manufacturers sell anything?