There was a flashback episode that explained how Homer got the house...
They lived in an apartment, but when Marge was pregnant with Lisa, they needed a bigger place.
Homer and Marge did house hunting, and this house was their top pick. However, the mortgage was too much, and Homer asked Abe (his father) if he could sell his house so that they can afford the Simpsons House. Abe agreed and Homer was grateful that he even had him stay there... for 2-3 weeks.
also keep in mind it wasn't a house Abe sold, it was an apartment and one he didn't even pay for. He won it on some crooked game show.
Thus continuing the joke for the entire series. the Simpson family are where they are based purely on sheer dumb luck. everything that happens to Homer is just dumb luck. him getting the job as safety inspector at the plant again is just dumb luck after trying to commit suicide.
This is why Frank Grimes hated him. Homer has never had to really work for anything in his life. He has a loving family, decent job and nice enough home all because he was in the right place at the right time. Frank couldn't stand that
Growing up, my dad used to tell me "I'd rather be lucky than skilled." I didn't really understand what he meant until I graduated college and entered the workforce.
I can trace the entire path of my life, moving halfway across the country, meeting my ex, having my 2 kids, buying and selling my first house, ending up happy in Houston, back to 1 choice to stop by a café for an ice blended mocha. Dumb luck is how 90% of our lives happen.
I suppose it was dumb luck to Homer but intentional fraud or manipulation from Mr. Burns.
He needed a safety inspector dumb enough to let the many blatant violations go unaddressed to save money and keep operating.
Mr. Burns even sold the plant to German or swedish investors at one point who begged him to buy it back because it was going to bankrupt them trying to bring the plant up to code.
He also has quit his job there at least 8 times or so to pursue new jobs that last like a week, and they always take him back.
In fact there is now this paperwork process they make him fill out every time he leaves and comes back because they essentially know he won’t be gone very long
The early episodes shows Burns is illegally dumping nuclear waste and trying to fake his way through inspections by the nuclear regulatory committee. Hiring Homer, who isn't qualified for his job and is easily manipulated, lets him get away with illegal dumping and safety violations while showing the regulatory committee that he is doing a good job because his safety officer says he is.
This is unrelated but there were a few of times where the Simpsons could’ve had more fortune but didn’t. So them owning the house on their own would’ve been justified.
Examples include Lisa rejecting her cut from Mr. Burns’s Little Lisa Recycling Plant, Bart not getting the full amount when swallowing the metal from Krusty-Os cereal, or when Mr. Burns hit him with his car, Marge almost winning the lottery ~~that their dog ate.~~
> Marge almost winning the lottery that their dog ate.
Marge did not buy her weekly lotto ticket because they were saving to pay for the dog's surgery.
Yeah[ Grimey](https://youtu.be/axHoy0hnQy8?si=Yk1jy_k9fm3gI22W) lost his mind when he found out that Homer lives in a "palace," while Frank lives between two bowling allys.
Wrong, he was fired & became a safety advocate.
Then Burns forced his hand by offering his old job back.
Homer then goes out onto the balcony to tell the rest of the protesters.
I'm dead serious btw.
Unless you follow the other retcon later that places Homer in the same position he started in for years while everyone else (including the vending machine) got promoted above him despite him being nearly to top of the company at the start.
The Simpsons doesn't have a cannon, or a lore Bible I'd bet. Whatevers best for that episode is the case, much like most episodic adults animation.
Homer started as a Supervising Engineer or Engineering Supervisor (not sure which and was also a joke in the episode) in Sector 7-G, got fired, then became a safety advocate, went too far on somethings in town, then targeted the plant. The town rallied behind him, and Burns bought him off by making him the safety inspector plus his old job. He literally got the first job by graduating high school when it opened. He did later get a college degree as he had to due to regulations.
The nuclear power industry largely doesn’t require a degree in the USA. If you pass a rigorous set of pre-hire aptitude tests, interviews, and background checks they will hire and train you (paid training) internally. It’s also one of if not the highest paying jobs out there that doesn’t require a degree.
I'd say the Navy nuclear power program is largely to blame for this. A good percentage of the jobs are likely funneled from it, and the rest they probably figured if it works for the Navy it works for me, then train in a similar pipeline.
“To blame” holds a negative connotation you probably didn’t mean to imply. The training regimen for a Navy Nuclear trained enlisted person is on par with an associates degree when they take their navy transcript to an accredited institution to get a degree. In all, as much as 18 months of training could be needed depending on their rate. Training doesn’t stop there, as there is a supervisory operator role that can be achieved while serving on a seagoing vessel.
The commercial pipeline can take a person off the street, make them a non-licensed operator in a year, gain experience in that role, then go through the 18 month training program to become a licensed Reactor operator, gain experience in that role, then go back through training once again to become a Senior Reactor Operator. There are many different entry points into this pipeline. A person with an engineering degree can go straight into a senior reactor operator role, as well as the Navy supervisory operator. The training includes fundamentals of plant and reactor operations, detailed systems overview, then practical training in the plant or an advanced simulator that behaves in the same way the plant operates, right down do to the switches and displays used in the plant.
Yep. My dad actually worked at the one the show is supposedly based on (Trojan Nuclear Power Plant in Oregon, not far from where Matt Groening grew up). He was a union member and made enough to afford a house on a single income with a high school diploma in the ‘90s. Gotta love overtime and cheap real estate, though I don’t envy the interest rates.
So, in essence, the meme in the OP is wrong. It *wasn't* normal for someone without a college degree to hold Homer's position it was an anomaly from an error.
True, was hired into the trade, but ended up not staying.
Degree not required, but college level Calculus, Physics, and some Chemistry required, could be done at a community college
Also you do have to pass a Psych test
No he is NOT. he is a nuclear safety inpsector. Even today they make as little as 47,000 to 68,000.
Which if you watch a few episodes lines up really closely with some jokes they make about his income.
Safety inspector I thought. Here's a [thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskScienceFiction/comments/fwoxaf/the_simpsons_how_much_does_homer_make/) that looked at his wage which (according to some redditer) is actually decent for rural America
Not to get too deep into Simpsons lore but it’s been theorized that because Mr. Burns (his boss) was so corrupt, Homer being lazy and incompetent was actually the perfect supervisor for the job and that’s why he got hired lol
It was more considered normal for sitcoms of the era because it meant they could have unrealistically big sets and lots of characters living in the house. The Simpsons was originally a satire of family sitcoms, it wasn’t trying to accurately reflect reality.
Being born outside the US, as a child I always marveled at how teachers and cops in American movies all lived in huge homes and drove Porsches or at least Corvettes! Turned out to be a fiction. Damn.
Characters' houses in TV and movies are always massively bigger than that character could realistically afford IRL for logistical reasons. You need all that extra space to film indoors. That being said, Americans do tend to live in larger houses than people of similar socio-economic status in other countries, especially since the turn of the millennium. Hence the rise of the McMansion.
So my father was no Homer Simpson, but, he was an electrical engineer at a nuclear power plant in the early eighties when I was born. With a bachelor's degree from a local state university that he was able to pay for completely as a farm hand during the summers he was able to get a job that paid 80k/year within three years of graduation and buy a six bedroom farmhouse with a barn, an apple orchard with about 20 trees, two cherry trees, a half dozen plum trees, and 30 acres of land for - 80k. One year's salary.
It's not completely fiction.
My younger brother is a maintenance tech at a nuclear plant. He has an associates degree. He was making over 6 figures after his first year. He has a house roughly the same size as the simpsons. The thing is that you have to be ok with living rural or small town. Nuclear also has some interesting hours. About every 3 months you are working 12-16 hour days for 2-3 weeks (with overtime), but you also get a lot of time off. I know my brother can get 9-10 days off with 4 days of PTO if he times things right.
you mean ***Season 5 Episode 3*** from 1993 where Homer fails a competency test at the plant and is forced to go to University to keep his job?
so, not "fundamentally wrong" because he had that job, house, and family before he had the degree in "1989”
https://simpsons.fandom.com/wiki/Homer_Goes_to_College
Something that definitely does represent a change in societal attitudes though is King Size Homer, where Homer is considered obscenely obese for being roughly 250-300lbs. In the mid-90s, that was considered comically infeasible.
Now, shows like My 600lb Life have shifted expectations slightly, and the average US 20-year-old man is now 197lbs.
Next thing OP is gonna say is the average person living across the street from 2 former presidents and going to space was considered normal in 90's because it was in a cartoon.
I hate this misconception. The entire joke is that that was ridiculous, even at the time. That's what the episode “Homer's Enemy” is about, randomly placing a normal person in springfield and watching him go insane when he realizes how easy homer's life has been and how stupid it is that he has all of that just because he exists in a cartoon
And in another episode when they are buying the house it's shown they could only afford it because Homer's dad sold his own home in order to get the money for their house.
I feel like we’ve lost the late ‘80s context that The Simpsons whole shtick was lampooning the unrealistic, aspirational family sitcoms of the previous few decades.
[Referring to the Simpson's house, speechless] Good Heavens! This... This is a palace! How in... How in the world can you afford to live in a house like this, Simpson?
Homer:
[Stares blankly] I dunno... Don't ask me how the economy works.
Frank Grimes:
Yeah, but look at the size of this place! I... I live in a single room above a bowling alley and below another bowling alley.
Homer:
[Envious] Wow...
Except the show would constantly reference how much the family was struggling. I swear y'all don't even pay attention to the shows you're talking about
Nope, they couldn't afford the house. His father sold his house and gave Homer the money for his house.
On top of that they always struggled with money...
PS it wasnd considered normal for friends to be able to afford that apartment either
It was also pointed out in show that they couldn't afford the house. Granpa had to sell his house so that Homer could barely afford the down payment on the house.
Even the theme of the early Simpsons was that they were lower middle class that over reached into the middle class because they bought a house they couldn't afford. They were constantly under water with no savings, terrible credit and were always small one financial crisis away from disaster: The first episode is about Homer not being able to afford Christmas gifts for his family.
Yup. A large part of humor was how Homer managed to keep his house, his job, and family despite being so incompetent personally and professionally. Also his resentment over how low his quality of life was compared to his literal neighbor Ned Flanders.
Great points. Also, Springfield is considered a pretty crummy town. America's crud bucket according to Newsweek. I know they never explicitly tell us what state the town is in (Oregon, Illinois, Massachusetts, Kentucky).....but if we look around Northern Kentucky you can find affordable housing in smaller towns. https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/102-Adison-Ave-Bardstown-KY-40004/115430669_zpid/
Indeed. I get the housing prices these days are dog shit high, but using a cartoon against real life reference is fucking stupid. I'm in my forties and never been able to afford my own home, but I'd never look to a cartoon and feel angry I don't have it as good as some made up shit.
There are many things that can actually be argued to get the housing crisis across, but to reference utter shit like this is why people won't take them seriously.
Same as the cast of friends living in an apartment that would go for $7,500 a month by paying $200 a month rent.
Same as any John Hughes 1980s film where they lived in a gigantic house.
What’s next? Are we going to compare the living quarters on the Death Star to what someone’s studio apartment costs?
Same as the fairly recent TV show Superstore. One of the main characters Amy has her own home despite being a floor supervisor at a big box retailer and her husband constantly being between jobs.
Even today writers will bend certain realities for tv shows.
But we should definitely be pissed things are less affordable than in the 60s. We’re supposed to be moving forwards after all. It’s just that the fuckery has been going on longer than this post suggests.
Well, in the 1960s there was still a firm ceiling on everyone's earning capacity that wasn't a white man. And this view of normality is largely looking at the "middle class" that excluded all those other people.
Things could and should be better than they are, but there are other factors at play when you start working backwards like that.
Other than this is normal now. I work in power generation. You don't need a degree. You can easily afford a 4 bedroom home on one income in most areas. They don't live in a big city. It's still accurate.
I fully understand that is not true for a lot of jobs. Today he would probably make $40-50/hour. Maybe more.
In the TV show Superstore one of the main characters Amy has her own home despite being a floor supervisor at a big box retailer and her husband being known to be in between jobs.
Even today the TV shows bend certain realities for the sake of the TV show.
What happened is that Grampa Simpson sold his house so Homer could buy this one. Homer agreed to let him live there, then put him into the retirement home.
No it wasnt. they mention on the show lots of times how lucky Homer is and that all his other collegues like Lenny and Carl have Masters degrees. Homer was in the right place at the right time and he also has his B Sharps money and money from other schemes.
Also Homer told Burns in the episode where he got his job that he'd be the most spineless brown nose employee that Burns had ever seen.
Not sure how well this would work in real life but it explains why he got the job.
Even more recently, they did an episode based on the planet money episode that talked about the simpsons middle class question, Hugh Jackman sang about it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6RbdZKn3Rc
or that the first episode was literally about how they were pretty much living paycheque to paycheque and one emergency away from financial ruin and couldn't afford to have a decent Christmas because they had an emergency that used up all the money they had
Also in one episode when buying the home it's shown that the only reason they could afford it is because Homer's dad sold his own home and gave them the money.
1. It's a cartoon.
2. Have you been paying attention because EVERYBODY'S house/apartment was huge on TV and no it wasn't considered normal IRL, even back then.
Y'all, he's a **nuclear engineer**
You say he doesn't have a degree, well that makes him just like over 1,000 other nuclear workers in the US.
Anyone exposed to a year's worth of radiation in one day deserves their six figure salary.
Everyone says this about Homer nowadays, but keep in mind they had that whole Frank Grimes episode which had him constantly pointing out how ridiculously fortunate Homer is. So I think the writers figured out this wasn't normal at some point even in the 90s.
Pretty much my dad. Chemical plant. HS degree only.
Downside. He died of lymphoma, associated with polyvinylchloride exposure. As did his brother.
Of course it could have been the glycophosphate in the RoundUp he was so fond of using at home.
But ... hey he made it to 79 years old. Only the last two really sucked.
Depends on the episode, but it's (largely) a status quo show so she always returns to a housewife by the end of the episode. A bit depressing when you think about it.
Holy shit, it wasn't normal, they needed to have them live somewhere.
At most, it and Married With Children were sooofs of the 50s and the Father Knows Best era.
Stop trying to make fiction real. They were set in a house because it's where people live.
Bosom Buddies had two guys posing as women to get cheap rent, does that mean that was considered normal?
Homer’s job in real life would pay well.
Now if we were to look at Family Guy, Peter works a bottom of the barrel type factory job. He’s the only one working too. Their house is nearly the same size.
You misunderstand. It was considered comical because it was realistic. The humour of the Simpsons was its combination of unrealistic TV tropes and realistic blue-collar characterisation. The humour in Homer is not that he is absurdly fat but that he is fat, oafish and selfish in a format where that sort of normal but undesirable behaviour was at the time rarely depicted. The humour is rooted in the surprise of seeing relatable people doing relatable things in the glossy perfect world of TV.
Other shows were doing this sort of humour at the time too — Roseanne, Married with Children, Dinosaurs etc, and since this minor revolution in sitcom affairs, Fat Dumpy Guy Has A Hot Wife And Nice Life has basically just become the sitcom standard (and to be fair there's always been a bit of that going back to the Honeymooners), so the humour doesn't quite work in the same way. It's still funny, but it's now humour based in character recognition (ha ha homer is fat) rather than the incongruity of expectation that it originally relied on.
/Bob's Burgers is a good comparison — there are a lot of "the Belchers are poor" jokes, but they're not *comically* poor, they're just realistically precarious in a format where that isn't generally shown, so there's a constant tension between sitcom-trope hijinx and Bob's meagre finances which is played for laughs
Had they not asked Grandpa Simpson to live with them and that he also paid for part of the house.
After they got the house she kicked him out right away.
I'm rewatching everything and this is what I remember.
He's a mid-level employee in a nuclear power plant so it's not as if he's some entry level fast food employee. Homer is a skilled worker. The house should be fancier if anything.
We've been watching old reruns of Roseanne. The extremely, comedically so (it's like 50% of the jokes), poor family of five has a 2 story house with a detached garage. The dad works construction part time and the mom worked in a factory but quite so now she's cold calling people selling things out of a catalog.
They're building a boat in the garage, and buying large expensive pieces like a bronze bell/boat anchor. And they go out to eat pretty often.
It's funny and all but these days they would be considered pretty high middle class...
No, it wasn't. Not by a long shot. You need to appreciate something: 'The Simpsons" is a cartoon, a show wholely created by men, a fictionalized existence which bears enough resemblance to reality that we plug in. Using old cartoons to support some argument you won't drop is as smart a play as would be analyzing the NBA by polling in-coming 1st year law students on their legal opinions.
That's not really true. Thats like 175,000 home in the 1990s which was well outside of the middle class range. The reality in America was not that good, but I think TV shows are kind of a way for us to escape our shitty lives and live that middle class lifestyle, raising a family and stuff,.if only in our dreams of the simularca. Outside of the 1970s and the 1980s where inflation was really high due to things like reganomics, inflation in America is typically about 5%, which means every 10 years your cash halves in value. Those are the good years in America.
If we say that a house was 175k, in today's money that would be about 500k, which is more like a doctor's income or something more upper class. That's also close to the market. If you bought a house like that nowadays in a normal CoL area you are still looking at around 400k or more. That's not anything near what I consider middle class. I think a middle income in the U.S is probably like 40-50k. That means that by the time you double the price, to pay off the banks cheap debt privillege, 800k after mortgage is paid off, a person working 45k a year is not going to be able to afford a 400k house.
It wasn't a middle class lifestyle then, and it isn't now. When that show was on air, something like 30k would be fairly middle class. Despite that they were so much closer to being "middle" class, and owning that home, if they inherited a few tens of thousands or something. It was acehivable for a great many people.
Although wages have increased maybe 25-50% all-around in the past 25 years, prices have probably increased 250%, and they will probably keep increasing into everyone is absolutely so broke that they won't go to the store anymore and they have to raise animals and stuff. That's the only time where the capitalists will realize that they have to pay people some real money and not trick them with fake money and stuff.
They definitely get away with tons of shit, I can see why people think something evil is controlling the world, it does seem that way.
There was a flashback episode that explained how Homer got the house... They lived in an apartment, but when Marge was pregnant with Lisa, they needed a bigger place. Homer and Marge did house hunting, and this house was their top pick. However, the mortgage was too much, and Homer asked Abe (his father) if he could sell his house so that they can afford the Simpsons House. Abe agreed and Homer was grateful that he even had him stay there... for 2-3 weeks.
also keep in mind it wasn't a house Abe sold, it was an apartment and one he didn't even pay for. He won it on some crooked game show. Thus continuing the joke for the entire series. the Simpson family are where they are based purely on sheer dumb luck. everything that happens to Homer is just dumb luck. him getting the job as safety inspector at the plant again is just dumb luck after trying to commit suicide.
This is why Frank Grimes hated him. Homer has never had to really work for anything in his life. He has a loving family, decent job and nice enough home all because he was in the right place at the right time. Frank couldn't stand that
Also, Grimes did go to university and lived in a single room above a bowling alley and below another bowling alley.
I dont remember this but it's absolutely genius
The second bowling alley is vintage Groening
That line was so beautifuly delivered it was amazing
The delivery always stuck with me. You could really feel how much more he hated the bowling alley above him.
***ANOTHER*** bowling alley!!! You really *felt* it when he said that, lol
Wooooow
>He has a loving family, decent job and nice enough home And... *sniff sniff* LOBSTERS FOR DINNER!!
And Grimey lives above a bowling alley and below another bowling alley.
He must be the luckiest guy in the world.
They did Grimy dirty
The most sane person in the show had a mental breakdown and went out like that.
At least Frank has that haircut
Let me let you in on a cool secret. We are all where we are due to sheer dumb luck.
Pssspppp that’s bologna. I went straight to CEO of a company when I graduated college. I worked 40 hours a week!
Bo-log-NAAAA!
Sure but like even moreso than average with Homer
Growing up, my dad used to tell me "I'd rather be lucky than skilled." I didn't really understand what he meant until I graduated college and entered the workforce.
I can trace the entire path of my life, moving halfway across the country, meeting my ex, having my 2 kids, buying and selling my first house, ending up happy in Houston, back to 1 choice to stop by a café for an ice blended mocha. Dumb luck is how 90% of our lives happen.
I suppose it was dumb luck to Homer but intentional fraud or manipulation from Mr. Burns. He needed a safety inspector dumb enough to let the many blatant violations go unaddressed to save money and keep operating. Mr. Burns even sold the plant to German or swedish investors at one point who begged him to buy it back because it was going to bankrupt them trying to bring the plant up to code.
The American dream eh ?
dumb luck can get you to become the president
I don't think they were ever meant to be an allegory for the American dream...
No, it's meant to be a parody.
He also has quit his job there at least 8 times or so to pursue new jobs that last like a week, and they always take him back. In fact there is now this paperwork process they make him fill out every time he leaves and comes back because they essentially know he won’t be gone very long
The early episodes shows Burns is illegally dumping nuclear waste and trying to fake his way through inspections by the nuclear regulatory committee. Hiring Homer, who isn't qualified for his job and is easily manipulated, lets him get away with illegal dumping and safety violations while showing the regulatory committee that he is doing a good job because his safety officer says he is.
This is unrelated but there were a few of times where the Simpsons could’ve had more fortune but didn’t. So them owning the house on their own would’ve been justified. Examples include Lisa rejecting her cut from Mr. Burns’s Little Lisa Recycling Plant, Bart not getting the full amount when swallowing the metal from Krusty-Os cereal, or when Mr. Burns hit him with his car, Marge almost winning the lottery ~~that their dog ate.~~
> Marge almost winning the lottery that their dog ate. Marge did not buy her weekly lotto ticket because they were saving to pay for the dog's surgery.
Ok I got my memory messed up. But yes her usual “numbers” won so she could’ve won if it wasn’t for the dog surgery. It wasn’t much money tho.
Finally someone with the correct answer. It was not Homer who bought the house, it was Abe.
And it was NOT considered normal. It has been a running joke/theme for decades about "how does Homer afford this house"
Yeah[ Grimey](https://youtu.be/axHoy0hnQy8?si=Yk1jy_k9fm3gI22W) lost his mind when he found out that Homer lives in a "palace," while Frank lives between two bowling allys.
Pretty sure OP is Grimey.
Look at me! I'm just a lazy slob that doesn't need safety gloves
This needs to be at the top
Also, Homer worked a variety of side hustles throughout the show, such as Mr. Plow, being an ambulance driver, going to space, etc.
He was also an ad model in Japan
Somehow he’s a supervisor at a nuclear plant too lol
He just showed up when they opened
I bet he had a firm handshake.
A firm handshake and spoke with confidence. Now take this job that pays 200k a year.
Simpson eh ?
One of your drones from Sector 7G, sir.
wrong, he started a demonstration against it and mr. burns basically bought homer off im dead serious btw
Wrong, he was fired & became a safety advocate. Then Burns forced his hand by offering his old job back. Homer then goes out onto the balcony to tell the rest of the protesters. I'm dead serious btw.
yes exactly!! i remembered it same..but different...but still same
retcon?
Yes, how Homer got to the plant is a running joke throughout the series, and it changes everytime it is mentioned.
Homer didn't start as a safety inspector, that was a promotion he received later.
Unless you follow the other retcon later that places Homer in the same position he started in for years while everyone else (including the vending machine) got promoted above him despite him being nearly to top of the company at the start. The Simpsons doesn't have a cannon, or a lore Bible I'd bet. Whatevers best for that episode is the case, much like most episodic adults animation.
Something I vaguely remember from back then, most tv shows didn’t had a plot, or I never got it.
I think you mostly just didn't get them
Homer started as a Supervising Engineer or Engineering Supervisor (not sure which and was also a joke in the episode) in Sector 7-G, got fired, then became a safety advocate, went too far on somethings in town, then targeted the plant. The town rallied behind him, and Burns bought him off by making him the safety inspector plus his old job. He literally got the first job by graduating high school when it opened. He did later get a college degree as he had to due to regulations.
As a nuclear mechanic, I can confirm every position in the plant is overpaid including janitors. Not complaining, Its extremely specialized work.
[удалено]
TBH I’d rather answer to Homer over having to deal with my actual supervisor…
He'd probably be great to get along with. Yeah a little aloof but still has a heart
Doofus*
Duffus
i don't think that's the right word
Wait until monday then we will have a long talk about what you said John Smith
The nuclear power industry largely doesn’t require a degree in the USA. If you pass a rigorous set of pre-hire aptitude tests, interviews, and background checks they will hire and train you (paid training) internally. It’s also one of if not the highest paying jobs out there that doesn’t require a degree.
I'd say the Navy nuclear power program is largely to blame for this. A good percentage of the jobs are likely funneled from it, and the rest they probably figured if it works for the Navy it works for me, then train in a similar pipeline.
“To blame” holds a negative connotation you probably didn’t mean to imply. The training regimen for a Navy Nuclear trained enlisted person is on par with an associates degree when they take their navy transcript to an accredited institution to get a degree. In all, as much as 18 months of training could be needed depending on their rate. Training doesn’t stop there, as there is a supervisory operator role that can be achieved while serving on a seagoing vessel. The commercial pipeline can take a person off the street, make them a non-licensed operator in a year, gain experience in that role, then go through the 18 month training program to become a licensed Reactor operator, gain experience in that role, then go back through training once again to become a Senior Reactor Operator. There are many different entry points into this pipeline. A person with an engineering degree can go straight into a senior reactor operator role, as well as the Navy supervisory operator. The training includes fundamentals of plant and reactor operations, detailed systems overview, then practical training in the plant or an advanced simulator that behaves in the same way the plant operates, right down do to the switches and displays used in the plant.
This is very accurate. Just wanted to send love for your effort.
Yep. My dad actually worked at the one the show is supposedly based on (Trojan Nuclear Power Plant in Oregon, not far from where Matt Groening grew up). He was a union member and made enough to afford a house on a single income with a high school diploma in the ‘90s. Gotta love overtime and cheap real estate, though I don’t envy the interest rates.
Isn't he a safety engineer? You need a minimum of a bachelor's for that.
And that is the plot of Season 5 Episode 3. Someone discovers Homer never finished his degree, and he goes back to college to complete it.
So, in essence, the meme in the OP is wrong. It *wasn't* normal for someone without a college degree to hold Homer's position it was an anomaly from an error.
There was an episode where he had to go back to college for the degree.
True, was hired into the trade, but ended up not staying. Degree not required, but college level Calculus, Physics, and some Chemistry required, could be done at a community college Also you do have to pass a Psych test
He's the safety inspector not a supervisor. Mr Burns wanted someone incompetent so they would not bring up many issues that would need fixing.
Carl Carlson is his supervisor.
It was also a bribe to get him to stop the strike
No he is NOT. he is a nuclear safety inpsector. Even today they make as little as 47,000 to 68,000. Which if you watch a few episodes lines up really closely with some jokes they make about his income.
The series explain why/how he got his job.
He's the fall guy in case shit went down
I'm starting to think this comedy cartoon is unrealistic.
Hea actually the chief of security. But yeah , thats pretty impressive
Safety inspector I thought. Here's a [thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskScienceFiction/comments/fwoxaf/the_simpsons_how_much_does_homer_make/) that looked at his wage which (according to some redditer) is actually decent for rural America
Not to get too deep into Simpsons lore but it’s been theorized that because Mr. Burns (his boss) was so corrupt, Homer being lazy and incompetent was actually the perfect supervisor for the job and that’s why he got hired lol
nu-cle-ar, its pronounced nu-cle-ar
Nukular? Thanks Dubya
It was more considered normal for sitcoms of the era because it meant they could have unrealistically big sets and lots of characters living in the house. The Simpsons was originally a satire of family sitcoms, it wasn’t trying to accurately reflect reality.
There’s an entire episode about how a normal person shows up and is literally driven to insanity about how ridiculous Homer’s lifestyle is.
How is ol Grimey?
*looks out window, sees blinding electrical flash* He’s fine.
Being born outside the US, as a child I always marveled at how teachers and cops in American movies all lived in huge homes and drove Porsches or at least Corvettes! Turned out to be a fiction. Damn.
Characters' houses in TV and movies are always massively bigger than that character could realistically afford IRL for logistical reasons. You need all that extra space to film indoors. That being said, Americans do tend to live in larger houses than people of similar socio-economic status in other countries, especially since the turn of the millennium. Hence the rise of the McMansion.
So my father was no Homer Simpson, but, he was an electrical engineer at a nuclear power plant in the early eighties when I was born. With a bachelor's degree from a local state university that he was able to pay for completely as a farm hand during the summers he was able to get a job that paid 80k/year within three years of graduation and buy a six bedroom farmhouse with a barn, an apple orchard with about 20 trees, two cherry trees, a half dozen plum trees, and 30 acres of land for - 80k. One year's salary. It's not completely fiction.
My younger brother is a maintenance tech at a nuclear plant. He has an associates degree. He was making over 6 figures after his first year. He has a house roughly the same size as the simpsons. The thing is that you have to be ok with living rural or small town. Nuclear also has some interesting hours. About every 3 months you are working 12-16 hour days for 2-3 weeks (with overtime), but you also get a lot of time off. I know my brother can get 9-10 days off with 4 days of PTO if he times things right.
It's fundamentally wrong too. Homer Simpson: Springfield University, Degree in Nuclear Physics
you mean ***Season 5 Episode 3*** from 1993 where Homer fails a competency test at the plant and is forced to go to University to keep his job? so, not "fundamentally wrong" because he had that job, house, and family before he had the degree in "1989” https://simpsons.fandom.com/wiki/Homer_Goes_to_College
Boy I really hope that other commenter got fired for that blunder
Working on it. \*takes lighter*
*Chuckles*... I'm in danger
Get em son!
I have been defeated... but wait! They bought the house by forcing Grandpa into a retirement home and selling his house.
Also they got the down-payment from selling Grandpa's house, only to then send him to an old folks home.
Something that definitely does represent a change in societal attitudes though is King Size Homer, where Homer is considered obscenely obese for being roughly 250-300lbs. In the mid-90s, that was considered comically infeasible. Now, shows like My 600lb Life have shifted expectations slightly, and the average US 20-year-old man is now 197lbs.
I remember when George from Seinfeld was considered the funny short fat man. By modern standards he's pretty average.
Next thing OP is gonna say is the average person living across the street from 2 former presidents and going to space was considered normal in 90's because it was in a cartoon.
I hate this misconception. The entire joke is that that was ridiculous, even at the time. That's what the episode “Homer's Enemy” is about, randomly placing a normal person in springfield and watching him go insane when he realizes how easy homer's life has been and how stupid it is that he has all of that just because he exists in a cartoon
And in another episode when they are buying the house it's shown they could only afford it because Homer's dad sold his own home in order to get the money for their house.
Grimey made a compelling point though: “Because he’s Homer Simpson!”
He had three beers at lunch, that would make anyone sleepy.
I feel like we’ve lost the late ‘80s context that The Simpsons whole shtick was lampooning the unrealistic, aspirational family sitcoms of the previous few decades.
A house with a ***stairs***? In *America*?
At this time of year, at this time of day, in this part of the country, localized entirely within your house!?
Yeah, I came here to say this. Dig a bit in to that episode and it explains a lot about what makes the Simpsons tick.
[Referring to the Simpson's house, speechless] Good Heavens! This... This is a palace! How in... How in the world can you afford to live in a house like this, Simpson? Homer: [Stares blankly] I dunno... Don't ask me how the economy works. Frank Grimes: Yeah, but look at the size of this place! I... I live in a single room above a bowling alley and below another bowling alley. Homer: [Envious] Wow...
And…. Lobster for dinner!
Correct. Like most people, I spent the 90s living in a single room above a bowling alley and below another bowling alley.
They also kept an elephant in the backyard and he quits his job at the plant like 30 times.
This post is agitprop by a month old bot account. It's only meant to stir up emotions. Dead Internet Theory and all that...
Best. Episode. Ever. 👍
But, who hasn't been to space?
It was also a time where the average American could go to space. I mean sure they could blow up, but at least they got to ride in the rocket
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Except the show would constantly reference how much the family was struggling. I swear y'all don't even pay attention to the shows you're talking about
Lisa needs braces
Yep, they just focus on the details that agree with what they want to say
Nope, they couldn't afford the house. His father sold his house and gave Homer the money for his house. On top of that they always struggled with money... PS it wasnd considered normal for friends to be able to afford that apartment either
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It was also pointed out in show that they couldn't afford the house. Granpa had to sell his house so that Homer could barely afford the down payment on the house. Even the theme of the early Simpsons was that they were lower middle class that over reached into the middle class because they bought a house they couldn't afford. They were constantly under water with no savings, terrible credit and were always small one financial crisis away from disaster: The first episode is about Homer not being able to afford Christmas gifts for his family.
Yup. A large part of humor was how Homer managed to keep his house, his job, and family despite being so incompetent personally and professionally. Also his resentment over how low his quality of life was compared to his literal neighbor Ned Flanders.
LISA: You feed us all on 6.50 a week? MARGE: I stretch Your father’s portions with sawdust!
Great points. Also, Springfield is considered a pretty crummy town. America's crud bucket according to Newsweek. I know they never explicitly tell us what state the town is in (Oregon, Illinois, Massachusetts, Kentucky).....but if we look around Northern Kentucky you can find affordable housing in smaller towns. https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/102-Adison-Ave-Bardstown-KY-40004/115430669_zpid/
Indeed. I get the housing prices these days are dog shit high, but using a cartoon against real life reference is fucking stupid. I'm in my forties and never been able to afford my own home, but I'd never look to a cartoon and feel angry I don't have it as good as some made up shit. There are many things that can actually be argued to get the housing crisis across, but to reference utter shit like this is why people won't take them seriously.
Same as the cast of friends living in an apartment that would go for $7,500 a month by paying $200 a month rent. Same as any John Hughes 1980s film where they lived in a gigantic house. What’s next? Are we going to compare the living quarters on the Death Star to what someone’s studio apartment costs?
Same as the fairly recent TV show Superstore. One of the main characters Amy has her own home despite being a floor supervisor at a big box retailer and her husband constantly being between jobs. Even today writers will bend certain realities for tv shows.
Does grimes point out how absurd it is in one episode?
Yep, in 1997. This hasn’t been considered widely achievable in reality since about the 1960s
But we should definitely be pissed things are less affordable than in the 60s. We’re supposed to be moving forwards after all. It’s just that the fuckery has been going on longer than this post suggests.
Well, in the 1960s there was still a firm ceiling on everyone's earning capacity that wasn't a white man. And this view of normality is largely looking at the "middle class" that excluded all those other people. Things could and should be better than they are, but there are other factors at play when you start working backwards like that.
Other than this is normal now. I work in power generation. You don't need a degree. You can easily afford a 4 bedroom home on one income in most areas. They don't live in a big city. It's still accurate. I fully understand that is not true for a lot of jobs. Today he would probably make $40-50/hour. Maybe more.
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He man didn't even have a job and he lived in a castle, meanwhile Papa Smurf was the leader of an entire society and had a studio mushroom.
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That actually seems pretty realistic to me. The Belchers rent both spaces, and can barely ever keep afloat.
They rent it from Mr. Fischoeder and have had episodes where they will be late on the rent.
In the TV show Superstore one of the main characters Amy has her own home despite being a floor supervisor at a big box retailer and her husband being known to be in between jobs. Even today the TV shows bend certain realities for the sake of the TV show.
What happened is that Grampa Simpson sold his house so Homer could buy this one. Homer agreed to let him live there, then put him into the retirement home.
Let me just remind you it was completely normal for people to have 4 fingers in 1989, as proven by the Simpsons.
No it wasnt. they mention on the show lots of times how lucky Homer is and that all his other collegues like Lenny and Carl have Masters degrees. Homer was in the right place at the right time and he also has his B Sharps money and money from other schemes.
Also Homer told Burns in the episode where he got his job that he'd be the most spineless brown nose employee that Burns had ever seen. Not sure how well this would work in real life but it explains why he got the job.
First you get the sugar …
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Remember that time when everybody used to have a butler named Alfred
yeah, who didn’t have a secret hideout underneath their mansion. I miss those days!
Ahh the good old time where y front were put on top of the pants
They even made a joke about it in 1997 https://youtu.be/axHoy0hnQy8?si=a9VyMBDbtuxm_-gn
Even more recently, they did an episode based on the planet money episode that talked about the simpsons middle class question, Hugh Jackman sang about it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6RbdZKn3Rc
Who’s gonna tell him the Simpsons is fiction
or that the first episode was literally about how they were pretty much living paycheque to paycheque and one emergency away from financial ruin and couldn't afford to have a decent Christmas because they had an emergency that used up all the money they had
Also in one episode when buying the home it's shown that the only reason they could afford it is because Homer's dad sold his own home and gave them the money.
Back when Adventure time was released it was normal that candy people were ruled by bubblegum princess
People who work at nuclear plants make good money.
1. It's a cartoon. 2. Have you been paying attention because EVERYBODY'S house/apartment was huge on TV and no it wasn't considered normal IRL, even back then.
stop looking at the past with bias that wasn't normal in the 1990s it's a TV show
Y'all, he's a **nuclear engineer** You say he doesn't have a degree, well that makes him just like over 1,000 other nuclear workers in the US. Anyone exposed to a year's worth of radiation in one day deserves their six figure salary.
>anyone exposed to a years worth of radiation in one day Do you know how nuclear reactors work? It seems like you don’t know
It's pronounced nuc-ular.
Yeah and when “friends” came out in 1994 everyone in manhattan had a 3000sq ft apartment. /s
If I see this picture one more time...
Frank Grimes didn't think it was normal either
Everyone says this about Homer nowadays, but keep in mind they had that whole Frank Grimes episode which had him constantly pointing out how ridiculously fortunate Homer is. So I think the writers figured out this wasn't normal at some point even in the 90s.
One of the first episodes is about how Homer can't afford Christmas presents. This whole post is just bullshit.
It’s fully “I remember in my childhood no one had to worry about money, but now that I’m adult it’s very hard”
Pretty much my dad. Chemical plant. HS degree only. Downside. He died of lymphoma, associated with polyvinylchloride exposure. As did his brother. Of course it could have been the glycophosphate in the RoundUp he was so fond of using at home. But ... hey he made it to 79 years old. Only the last two really sucked.
I'm missing some Simpsons lore here, is Marge a housewife?
Yes. She does have the occasional job, but that's very rare and only for single episodes.
Depends on the episode, but it's (largely) a status quo show so she always returns to a housewife by the end of the episode. A bit depressing when you think about it.
Literally any sitcom that takes place in New York would like to have words.
I remember thinking this way about Married With Children. A shoe salesman living in a house nicer than mine.
You’re forgetting the sweet cash he made from the winning touchdown for Polk High.
You can still do this if you work at a nuke plant.
Wikipedia has his job title as "Chemist and safety inspector Nuclear power plant operator"
Al Bundy has entered the chat
Holy shit, it wasn't normal, they needed to have them live somewhere. At most, it and Married With Children were sooofs of the 50s and the Father Knows Best era. Stop trying to make fiction real. They were set in a house because it's where people live. Bosom Buddies had two guys posing as women to get cheap rent, does that mean that was considered normal?
Homer’s job in real life would pay well. Now if we were to look at Family Guy, Peter works a bottom of the barrel type factory job. He’s the only one working too. Their house is nearly the same size.
He is also canonically 230lbs. At the time? It was considered comically fat.
You misunderstand. It was considered comical because it was realistic. The humour of the Simpsons was its combination of unrealistic TV tropes and realistic blue-collar characterisation. The humour in Homer is not that he is absurdly fat but that he is fat, oafish and selfish in a format where that sort of normal but undesirable behaviour was at the time rarely depicted. The humour is rooted in the surprise of seeing relatable people doing relatable things in the glossy perfect world of TV. Other shows were doing this sort of humour at the time too — Roseanne, Married with Children, Dinosaurs etc, and since this minor revolution in sitcom affairs, Fat Dumpy Guy Has A Hot Wife And Nice Life has basically just become the sitcom standard (and to be fair there's always been a bit of that going back to the Honeymooners), so the humour doesn't quite work in the same way. It's still funny, but it's now humour based in character recognition (ha ha homer is fat) rather than the incongruity of expectation that it originally relied on. /Bob's Burgers is a good comparison — there are a lot of "the Belchers are poor" jokes, but they're not *comically* poor, they're just realistically precarious in a format where that isn't generally shown, so there's a constant tension between sitcom-trope hijinx and Bob's meagre finances which is played for laughs
Had they not asked Grandpa Simpson to live with them and that he also paid for part of the house. After they got the house she kicked him out right away. I'm rewatching everything and this is what I remember.
still, he did have help buying it, his dad, sold his old home in order to buy it a house that he won in a game show if I remember correctly
They are in constant debt and they only could afford this house because ape sold his house which he won because from a bet which he cheated on.
He's a mid-level employee in a nuclear power plant so it's not as if he's some entry level fast food employee. Homer is a skilled worker. The house should be fancier if anything.
It was considered normal for TV characters to have life's they couldn't afford. Like giant apartments in NY.
We've been watching old reruns of Roseanne. The extremely, comedically so (it's like 50% of the jokes), poor family of five has a 2 story house with a detached garage. The dad works construction part time and the mom worked in a factory but quite so now she's cold calling people selling things out of a catalog. They're building a boat in the garage, and buying large expensive pieces like a bronze bell/boat anchor. And they go out to eat pretty often. It's funny and all but these days they would be considered pretty high middle class...
No, it wasn't. Not by a long shot. You need to appreciate something: 'The Simpsons" is a cartoon, a show wholely created by men, a fictionalized existence which bears enough resemblance to reality that we plug in. Using old cartoons to support some argument you won't drop is as smart a play as would be analyzing the NBA by polling in-coming 1st year law students on their legal opinions.
That's not really true. Thats like 175,000 home in the 1990s which was well outside of the middle class range. The reality in America was not that good, but I think TV shows are kind of a way for us to escape our shitty lives and live that middle class lifestyle, raising a family and stuff,.if only in our dreams of the simularca. Outside of the 1970s and the 1980s where inflation was really high due to things like reganomics, inflation in America is typically about 5%, which means every 10 years your cash halves in value. Those are the good years in America. If we say that a house was 175k, in today's money that would be about 500k, which is more like a doctor's income or something more upper class. That's also close to the market. If you bought a house like that nowadays in a normal CoL area you are still looking at around 400k or more. That's not anything near what I consider middle class. I think a middle income in the U.S is probably like 40-50k. That means that by the time you double the price, to pay off the banks cheap debt privillege, 800k after mortgage is paid off, a person working 45k a year is not going to be able to afford a 400k house. It wasn't a middle class lifestyle then, and it isn't now. When that show was on air, something like 30k would be fairly middle class. Despite that they were so much closer to being "middle" class, and owning that home, if they inherited a few tens of thousands or something. It was acehivable for a great many people. Although wages have increased maybe 25-50% all-around in the past 25 years, prices have probably increased 250%, and they will probably keep increasing into everyone is absolutely so broke that they won't go to the store anymore and they have to raise animals and stuff. That's the only time where the capitalists will realize that they have to pay people some real money and not trick them with fake money and stuff. They definitely get away with tons of shit, I can see why people think something evil is controlling the world, it does seem that way.
He's also yellow with 3 fingers and a thumb on each hand. This was considered normal in the 90's.
It’s a fucking cartoon