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Achieving the American Dream<\/a> doesn’t look the way it used to. <\/p>\n Over the years, societal and labor market changes, along with higher prices for everything from health care<\/a> to higher education<\/a>, have chipped away at the traditional makeup of the American family, which relied on a singular breadwinner to attain financial security<\/a>. <\/p>\n For starters, fewer couples are married<\/a> compared to a generation ago and among married couples, both spouses are more likely to work<\/a>, according to the Pew Research Center \u2014 by choice and necessity. <\/p>\n “We used to be in this golden age where you could own a home, a car, and get by on a single income \u2014 that is a bygone era,” Bankrate’s economic analyst Sarah Foster told CNBC<\/a>.<\/p>\n Read more CNBC personal finance coverage<\/p>\n Today, it often takes two working parents to afford a middle-class lifestyle, studies show. Even six-figure earners in the U.S. said one income feels “nearly impossible” to live on, according to a recent survey by The Harris Poll.<\/a><\/p>\n In about half of all married-couple families, both spouses were employed<\/a>, according to 2024 data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In families with children, two-thirds of all households had <\/a>both spouses working outside the home<\/a>.<\/p>\n “Where there was a time in the U.S. when a married couple, with children, could get by with a single-wage earner in the house, those days are mostly vestiges of the past,” according to Mark Hamrick, Bankrate’s senior economic analyst.<\/p>\n Household expenses have soared<\/p>\n Inflation<\/a>\u00a0and surging costs for expenses including child care, college, auto loans<\/a>, homes\u00a0and rent have created an “affordability challenge,” Hamrick said. <\/p>\n Across the country, health insurance premiums for family coverage have jumped more than 25% since 2020, outpacing inflation<\/a>. Both the cost of child care<\/a> and college tuition have increased more than 5% year after year<\/a> over the same period, also outpacing inflation and other household expenses, research shows. <\/p>\n At the same time, a housing shortfall<\/a> has helped push rents and mortgage<\/a> prices far beyond what a single earner may be able to afford. <\/p>\n “Because the costs have been rising so much for so many families, we know the cost of child care<\/a>, the cost of health care<\/a>, the need to be able to earn more money just to keep up, necessitated more hours per family,” said Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a nonprofit think tank.<\/p>\n Workplace dynamics have changed<\/p>\n Significant changes in the workplace have also made it more difficult to rely on one income. “There’s been a fracturing of both job security and a sense of belonging that workers have in the workplace,” Hamrick said. <\/p>\n More workers are now part of the gig economy<\/a>, which means they are less likely to have a sustained, predictable income or workplace benefits, he said, eroding long-term job stability: “If you are part of the gig economy, there’s a tremendous amount of insecurity.”<\/p>\n Fewer gig workers \u2014 and even full-time employees \u2014 have a traditional pension and are increasingly responsible for funding their own retirement plans<\/a>. <\/p>\n “For workers without predictable hours or benefits, even a full-time schedule isn’t enough to guarantee stable income or support a household on one paycheck,” said Scott Winship, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative public policy think tank.<\/p>\n Increasing opportunities for women<\/p>\n But there aren’t just economic pressures at play. <\/p>\n The shift to dual-earner households is also a reflection of the increasing opportunities for women and the elimination of some gender barriers, according to Winship.<\/p>\n Women have been making\u00a0significant strides<\/a>\u00a0in their education and careers\u00a0and are working as much, if not more, than their male counterparts, many studies also show. <\/p>\n In a growing share of opposite-sex marriages,\u00a0women have become breadwinners<\/a>,\u00a0or outearn their husbands, according to the Pew Research Center.<\/p>\n “Women have a lot more opportunities than they used to have, and so they’re working longer and they’re working for higher pay,” Winship said. That has changed the expectations of what a “middle-class lifestyle” entails today, he said.<\/p>\n \u2014 CNBC lead producer Charlotte Morabito contributed to this report.<\/p>\n