A lot of my dancer friends absolutely swim in money but can't get a lease on their own to save their lives. And I also know a lot of kids who have finished college but wound up in low-paying jobs due to other factors, like industry reliance on contract workers who don't get insurance benefits within their field of study.
I'd be in the same boat myself if I had to get a lease. No steady paycheck type income. And no prior leases to use as references.
That said, if your dancer friends make all this money they probably have nice bank accounts. Can't they use that as collateral for a lease?
I don't see how young people are doing it.
Me neither. It was hard enough when I started out. I remember I was taking home about $200 a week after taxes and car fare. My student loan payments were about $100 a month. Not even counting food or clothing, I had maybe $750 a month left. Rents for even a not so great apartment were about $600 a month. Needless to say, I just stayed with my parents, like lots of other people.
It's way harder now. Rents are at least twice as much in real terms.
I'm finding that many younger people are asking for unrealistic salaries these days. Somewhere they read that it's an employees market and are they just looking for jobs without any clear plan other than hopping around to move up. I've been a hiring manager since my mid 20s and it's worse now than ever, but never was easy to find really good staff. In large companies many of the contractors work for 3rd party companies that provide some benefits, but nothing like employees get. CWs working for themselves don't get any, but they get 100% of the pay. Mostly those are high-level consultants or maybe work for small companies since large companies don't want to deal with co-employment issues.
Well, consider happened to their parents. Their parents did everything they were told to do. Stayed loyal to their company for years, worked late in the hopes someone might notice and give them a promotion and nice raise. Came to work sick, or with injuries. What did decades of coming to a soul-draining office get them except tired broken bodies and spirits? At best they got garbage raises that kept pace with inflation, if that. After doing "extra" work without extra pay their bosses came to expect it of them. If there were any promotions, generally someone else got them, either a person who kissed the boss's behind, or slept with them. Merit didn't factor into any of this. And the biggest insult of all? When the company no longer needed them, they were unceremoniously let go despite spending half their life there. Often they were fired by email, told to clear out their desk by lunch, and let out by security.
So yeah, you expect today's younger people to start working for peanuts and to not hop around? They're being smart in my book. Ask for stratospheric salaries. You might get a company that actually falls for it. If not, accept the highest offer, but be ready to jump ship the minute something better comes along. And unless the company has a clear path of advancement, where if you meet certain defined goals you move up, just do the bare minimum to keep the job, and not a bit more.
There's also perks. If companies can't afford to pay top salaries, that's fine so long as they offer things like remote work. Not having to physically come to an office each day is worth earning somewhat less in my book.
I've overhead people complaining that they can't pay their workers $4 an hour. Their reasoning? It's what THEY made when they started out, so why should today's kids get more? They forget how much less things cost back then, especially housing. If your business depends upon virtual slave labor, then your business model isn't viable.
BTW, I saw the handwriting on the wall back when I was starting out. It's only gotten much worse since. At least lately the tide is shifting back to the workers.
Nobody in any major professional sport has won such an event 14 times. No baseball, basketball, hockey, golf, football, etc. It's almost superhunan especially considering the degenerative effects of 
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