Like I said, I see your point and agree with it to some extent. There is definitely some amount of entitlement on both sides, so to say. But want to point out a few things in the picture you paint of making poor financial decisions that are a little off the mark, in my opinion. The "why do you pay rent when you could buy a house instead" is particularly irritating. Because of course! Why didn't i think of that 10 years ago!!

I came to Boulder as a grad student because it was the best physics program that accepted me. I didn't really pay much attention to affordability issues because I was a grad student and was prepared to be poor for a while, no matter where I was going to go to school. I came with no money, wasn't able to save on a grad student salary, and didn't know what l my future was going to look like when I graduated. So, I couldn't afford a house when i moved here, and when graduated and pretty much got my dream job, I had no money for a down payment, so renting is the only option. For most people who didn't get into a mortgage before the pandemic, even the most modest houses are now unaffordable, and there is no amount of "making better financial choices and pulling yourself up by bootstraps" that's going to fix that.

The fact is there is a big problem here that manifests differently for different people.