No Middle-Class Family Can Live Like ‘The Simpsons’ Anymore, Census Shows
Over the past 36 seasons, The Simpsons has given us episodes about elaborate monorail scams, gun-toting babies and aliens from the planet Rigel 7, but in 2025, the most implausible aspect of the show just might be the family’s comfortable lifestyle.
Homer and Marge are able to raise three children on a single income, all while maintaining two cars and a house so massive that they’ve hardly set foot in one of the rooms in nearly four decades. Not to mention how the family is able to take spontaneous vacations to exotic locations and ultra-violent theme parks.
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But, according to Australia’s ABC News, the U.S. census data from 2025 illustrates that the show “no longer represents ordinary America.” For one thing, when the animated series first premiered back in 1989, “the ordinary American family household was comprised of 3.16 people — typically two parents and up to two young children.” But in the “decades since, those numbers have slowly been declining as American families have chosen to remain smaller.” Although, to be fair, the Simpsons didn’t exactly plan to have so many kids.
Dr. Rodney Taveira, the academic director and senior lecturer in American studies at the University of Sydney's United States Studies Centre, noted that the ages that people get married has shifted as well. “When Homer and Marge would’ve got married, the average age would’ve been something like 20 to 22 years old, and now it's going up to almost 30 years old,” he explained.
And the Simpson family’s financial situation is harder to swallow than a jagged metal Krusty O. “For a patriarchal father of a family to be able to provide for (his family) have a double-storey home, take the family on holiday, buy a new car every few years — that was normal for many white, middle-class Americans and that is no longer the case,” Taveira added.
This was already becoming a thing of the past when the show debuted. “It was decreasingly the case in 1989 and even less-so now,” Taveira suggested. “While the median income of families has risen, inequality means that fewer people have that amount of money.”
A big reason why the show’s depiction of the middle class became so dated so quickly is because the Simpsons were (hastily) created to reflect creator Matt Groening’s own family unit, as well as the shows he grew up with during the golden age of television.
Taveira did admit that The Simpsons is “kind of aware of the improbable position that Homer is in” and arguably “confronted this with the character of (Frank) Grimes."
Perhaps Springfieldians are reluctant to bring any of this up, seeing as how Grimey’s obsession with Homer’s circumstances led to his untimely demise.
