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Some background on myself. I'm 25, make 40k, and live in NYC (Brooklyn) with the parents. I'm not a consumption type; I don't have a car nor a motorcycle although I would like one and technically can afford it. I don't have a smartphone with a $100 data plan nor do I go out to eat often (maybe once a month). Would I like to have those things? Sure. Can I technically afford it? Yes. I reality I can't (more on that later). I don't buy many discretionary items and I'd prob be known as an "extreme" save . I have no debt as well. . As "rent" I voluntarily cover the bills at my parents house which amount to about 1k/month.
As you can see I prob don't fit the mold of OP's Gen Y'er. Although he would classify me as a "whiner" as a result of my beliefs about the current system.
Maybe I'm crazy but making about 50k/year and having 3 kids doesn't sound all that great to me. Unless you have at least 40k in savings you're a layoff and an average unemployment span (now 10 months) away from hard times.
Maybe you live in an area where 50k provides you with a great standard of living... if you were single. Throw in the kids and I know it doesn't. No matter where you live. You're not starving but 50k and 5 mouths to feed ain't much.
To me, 33 and making 50k is kind of average to below average when you throw in 3 kids and a wife. Not to put you down because I don't make **** either. I'm just being realistic here.
The fact is that the job market is becoming increasingly elitist (aka "third" world) in a sense. You either have very well paying jobs or subsistence wage jobs. The middle is being eradicated. Inherently, the labor market is of a pyramidal nature. You'll have much more ****ty paying jobs than great paying jobs in a structure like this.
What do you get? You get employers asking employees to give 100% when the employer is only giving you 50%. In my world that's called being ****ed over.
Now, about the hard work. The truth is, provide the correct incentives and the vast majority of workers will response in kind. True story; for a 3 week stretch leading into the holiday season (I work for a midsize e-retailer) I worked 16 hour days (9am-1am) 6 days a week because for 8 of those hours I was being paid at an overtime rate (about 30/hour). I volunteered for those hours ( I work in the office but this was in the warehouse) because the incentive was there. I was the top producer for that 3 week stretch because I owed that to my employer since I was the highest paid employee on that 8 hour night shift amongst the warehouse workers. Since I was being paid the most, it was only fair that I produce the most and I did.
This is how the system should work. You have to have carrots and sticks. However, in todays private employer culture, you only have sticks. They pay folks 10/hour and expect them to produce at a 20/hour clip. Or they pay them 20/hour and expect them to produce at a 35/hour pace.
You don't see anything wrong with that?
This is where I respectfully ask that all public employees please shut the **** up because you have very little if any idea what it's like in the private sector.
I feel like Jim Cramer whenever ( YouTube - ‪MARKET MELTDOWN‬‏) I talk to public sector employees. It's two completely different worlds. They just have no ****ing clue what it's like in the private sector.
I have no health benefits. I have no pension plan. I have 2 sick days and a week's vacation a year. This is becoming/has become the norm for the vast majority of private sector employees. There are great corps with great work environments out there ( a few of my friends work for such firms) but I'd peg the ratio at about 1-1.5:10.
Add the above to the fact that there is virtually no job stability and what do you have? You have an exploitative and broken system.
This is what my generation has come to realize. The system is broken beyond repair. Problems such as we have now do not get fixed. They get managed until things fall apart. That's just a historical fact. The system has been breaking down since about the early 80's and there is more than ample data to substantiate this fact.
If you take away 1 thing from my post it should be this: History has shown things will not get better. At best we'll be stuck in a Japanese style zombie economy that meanders forward for a decade plus.
This is what my generation realizes. This is why I save like a madmen. I know that things can only get worse and there's little stability in our future as Americans. The standard of living for the vast majority of Americans will decrease. Do you still ask why we're "whining"?
btw, I would love to go in depth on the various points of the screwed up system and how it got there but it'd literally be book size. If anyone want to go point by point (question/asnwer format), that'd prob be the best way to go about it.
Well, if you'd just change your damn screen name I would stop assuming you are a whiner.
But you do make a good point... there is a big difference between the public and private sectors. Still, it begs the question...why not move to the public sector if it's so bad on the private side? Why not start a business?
Why not adapt, approach the problem from a new angle, go where the opportunity is? True, no one is going anywhere if they are just being bent over by their employer.. so pull up your trousers and go somewhere else!
I still maintain the doors aren't closed. There is still lots of opportunity for those who embrace it.
It's worth pointing out again that the student loan debt bubble in this country is over one trillion dollars.
That's a major obstacle to "youth advancement."
It also doesn't matter if you argue that they should have been smarter and not accumulated that debt. Because the debt already exists, and it has reached a size where it is exerting a serious negative drag on the US economy, especially when it comes to activities like business formation by younger people.
It's worth pointing out again that the student loan debt bubble in this country is over one trillion dollars.
That's a major obstacle to "youth advancement."
It also doesn't matter if you argue that they should have been smarter and not accumulated that debt. Because the debt already exists, and it has reached a size where it is exerting a serious negative drag on the US economy, especially when it comes to activities like business formation by younger people.
Hey, someone who gets it. I'm 25. I don't have close to six figures of student loan debt, but it's still a large enough burden on me.
Until I pay this off, there will be no purchasing a home for me (sorry housing market), no starting a business (sorry U.S. job market), no buying new cars (sorry U.S. auto companies), no lavish domestic vacations (sorry U.S. tourist industry), etc.
At the rate I'm going now, with the salary I'm currently making, I'm still probably 5-10 years off from paying these down. I wonder how many people are in my shoes. I wonder, with all the major increases in tuition rates each year (I think it was 23% here), how many people will be joining me.
Hey, someone who gets it. I'm 25. I don't have close to six figures of student loan debt, but it's still a large enough burden on me.
Until I pay this off, there will be no purchasing a home for me (sorry housing market), no starting a business (sorry U.S. job market), no buying new cars (sorry U.S. auto companies), no lavish domestic vacations (sorry U.S. tourist industry), etc.
At the rate I'm going now, with the salary I'm currently making, I'm still probably 5-10 years off from paying these down. I wonder how many people are in my shoes. I wonder, with all the major increases in tuition rates each year (I think it was 23% here), how many people will be joining me.
I'm 24 and in your club as well. I make a great (not stellar) salary but a good part of it goes to student loans. Guess I won't be buying property for the next ten years if I'm lucky, 20-30 years if I'm not.
THere are a few common misconceptions in your arguments:
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why not move to the public sector if it's so bad on the private side? Why not start a business?
Invariably everyone cannot move to the public sector. Furthermore, public sector employment should not be a driving force in our economy as government doesn't have the same incentives that drive productivity and an increasing standard of living for society as a whole. It perturbs me when people suggest to just go work for the government. How is that a solution?
I'm not saying we shouldn't have civil servants. We should and they should be paid well. However, government should run lean. Not the complete disaster and mountains of waste that occur now.
It's a huge red flag that government jobs are the saving grace in (supposedly) the greatest capitalist country of the last few centuries . That alone should signal that things are awry.
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Why not adapt, approach the problem from a new angle, go where the opportunity is? True, no one is going anywhere if they are just being bent over by their employer.. so pull up your trousers and go somewhere else!
This is a valid point but it's not so easy for many. Especially with high unemployment as it is. As they say, "one in the hand, is worth 2 in the bush".
Believe I've been looking but all the hits I've got so far have not been for better pay/ better environment. As they also say, "better the devil you know".
During good economic times, something like 3mm workers per month leave for greener pastures. That number has dipped to 1mm per month today. Worker mobility is at it's lowest point in decades.
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I still maintain the doors aren't closed. There is still lots of opportunity for those who embrace it.
Again, this is a valid point but should be made with a caveat.
Of course all doors aren't closed. Do you believe that all the folks in developing countries are poor? There are actually sizable populations of wealthy even in poor nations. The problem is that there are 10 or 15% or 20% wealthy and the rest relatively destitute.
The fact is that this isn't about individuals. Any single individual can succeed even in the gravest conditions. Usually through positive variance and determination. However, the more important thing is society at large.
We've all chosen to live under a certain social contract. That is why I can walk outside and not be afraid for my life in general. Nothing is stopping the millions of other people in my city from killing/ hurting/ robbing me whenever they wish to. They do not because everybody has decided that it's in their personal interest to play by the (relatively) same rules because that ensures the greatest chance of survival and quality of life for the each individual. What we have now are many people. in essence, breaking that contract and cheating.
Last edited by wawaweewa; 06-22-2011 at 08:10 PM..
Have you seen the LSAT or GMAT books lately? I was in barnes and noble tonight. One of the reasons why gen y is labeled "whiners"....they've got to do through *All* this paperwork, books, tests, test prep, etc. To end up with what....$50 or $100 k in student loans?
I was looking through this huge LSAT logic games book. Wheeewwww!!! A few hundred pages. It seems like gen y is being asked to jump over hurdles, only to find pebbles on the other end.
The two sides of the employment coin are completely out of whack....
Side A - Study, test prep, study...sleepless nights, cramming, etc.
Side B - A lot of debt. Murky and hazy economic reality.
I don't think everyone can be in the public sector, the private reality is looking more and more like japan, zombie economy. I think this generation got front loaded with tests, school, "aptitude tests", but they're going to end up with beans.
-The reality is the US has been running on fumes since the 70's. Why are government jobs the savings grace in a (supposedly) capitalistic society? We've been living on the US dollar standard, a lot of credit, and a hint of true "capitalism" since the 70's. There's been more bailouts than capitalism in the last 10-15 years. If not longer.
The fabric of american capitalism started getting ripped up in the 80's. When blue collar disappeared, manufacturing disappeared, white collar thinning out, or becoming more elite....and a whole bunch of credit $$$$ to paper over the problem. Look at the changes in the cpi or employment, just since the 80's?
We've had spurts of capitalism since then, like the dot com boom. But for every dot com ceo, there's 1,000 walmart workers. The internet may "flatten" certain parts of the economy for gen y. Like education. But technology can't flatten the wealth transfer that has already happened. It can't make those $100,000 law loans disappear, or the trillion dollar student debt.
But technology can't flatten the wealth transfer that has already happened.
You are probably right about that John, but ya just never know for sure. Anything CAN happen. There have been unforseen and unanticipted technological developments in the past that evened out the playing field and shifted some wealth back to the have less crowd. It could happen again. We'll have to wait and see how it all plays out.
Last edited by CosmicWizard; 06-23-2011 at 08:12 AM..
It's worth pointing out again that the student loan debt bubble in this country is over one trillion dollars.
That's a major obstacle to "youth advancement."
It also doesn't matter if you argue that they should have been smarter and not accumulated that debt. Because the debt already exists, and it has reached a size where it is exerting a serious negative drag on the US economy, especially when it comes to activities like business formation by younger people.
No, it's okay though, you see......people who can't find work are just taking student loans and getting a masters degree (with no emphasis or vision often times) and that's a "good" thing -- right? Right??
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