The cost of living is going up, and the chance of living is going down.

In a compact bit of social satire, the line contrasts two trajectories: the rising “cost of living” (inflation, everyday expenses) and the declining “chance of living” (security, health, stability, or even optimism about the future). The humor comes from treating “living” as both an economic category and an existential one—suggesting that as life gets more expensive, it also feels less livable. Read as a comedian’s one-liner, it captures a perennial public anxiety about economic pressure eroding quality of life, and it works because it sounds like a commonsense observation while smuggling in a bleak, ironic punch.