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No matter how you slice it this is a tough time for low to middle income workers in America. Still, looking for scapegoats and excuses is inane and useless. It is true that you could practically fall off the turnip truck and do well at certain points in the past 30-40 years. But, that does not mean that anyone was screwed by "the baby boomers" (or "seniors" as the OP implies).
As far as homeownership goes, maybe millennials will have to wait until they are 35 to buy that first home, rather than at age 25? But, lets not forget that the cost of new homes today is not the same as it was in 1960 for many reasons besides inflation. Apples and oranges really. Homes are twice the size today as they were 50 years ago, with much nicer features. My Dad, a WW2 vet, bought his first home in 1961, way out in the burbs. He was 39 years old. He and my mother raised 7 kids in a 1700 sq ft cape cod with no A/C or dishwasher or even storm windows (northern Illinois). We certainly did not have cable TV, cell phones or internet or vacations. Today you could hardly call that "living the dream".
Let's not forget that the vast majority of baby boomers were not even out of HS when Medicare was created, let alone Social Security! Blaming them is akin to blaming the millennials for the housing bubble!
Maybe when we are all done pointing fingers and lamenting our lots in life, we can (as a country) work on some solutions?
Great post by you and Larry! Some of us are far from being "seniors" at 50. People like Scoop should be thrilled we still have another 10-15 years to contribute to the coffers before we can take out some of what we are putting in.
There is only so much we as average Americans can control as our corporations abandon us and move overseas. they have not been loyal to us so we should not be loyal to them.
If people lived today like families in the 50-70s they'd get ahead too. One car per family, one TV, home phone(you could sub a single cell phone) at dinner at home every night, bought a 1200 sqft house that was 3/1 etc
Ahh yes we will all go back to the dark ages. Maybe while we're at it we can listen to our music on 8-track tapes too. Sorry, but one car, one TV, and one phone isn't cutting it today. I agree with you on dinner at home, but with most people working 10-12 hour days, there isn't time to cook. I do NOT think this is a good thing, but that's the way it is.
While I don't think people should retire at 30, I agree wealth takes time to accumulate, but there more and more seniors falling into poverty too.
Ahh yes we will all go back to the dark ages. Maybe while we're at it we can listen to our music on 8-track tapes too. Sorry, but one car, one TV, and one phone isn't cutting it today. I agree with you on dinner at home, but with most people working 10-12 hour days, there isn't time to cook. I do NOT think this is a good thing, but that's the way it is.
While I don't think people should retire at 30, I agree wealth takes time to accumulate, but there more and more seniors falling into poverty too.
Lol, the dark ages. I am 31 and my wife is 29, we have 2 TVs (both over 5 years old), 1 cell phone (and my work cell phone) and eat dinner at home every evening. We do have 2 cars, but could get by with one if we needed to. I wouldn't exactly call us living in the dark ages, just simpler than most people today. We also both work full time 8-11 hour days.
Less than 5% make the bare minimum. This is an utter crock. Because these numbers don't reflect tipped employees making $2.13 per hour,and they don't reflect all the people who make $7.16 to $10.00 per hour -- otherwise known as "the misery zone." Five percent of our workforce makes EXACTLY $7.25 per hour. Many tipped workers make even less. They're not counted in your statistics.
Actually they do reflect those. The "five percent" is all those making minimum wage OR LESS. Please read the links I provide before shooting off at the mouth. I've provided this information in a link before but I'll do it again.
From that link (from the Bureau of Labor Statistics):
Quote:
Together, these 3.3 million workers with wages at or below the federal minimum made up 4.3 percent of all hourly paid workers.
Actually - I just realized something - it's LESS THAN 4.3 PERCENT OF ALL WORKERS because hourly workers only make up 59 percent of American workers, meaning that 41 percent are paid via other pay structures. So... yeah, LESS than 5 percent of American workers make minimum wage or below - way less.
YOUR unsubstantiated comments are what are an utter crock, sir, not mine. But that's no surprise.
I'm saying take your three-and-change bucks an hour and plug those numbers into 2015 prices. If you were making minimum wage as a single parent in 1986, how would you like to try it in 2015 making $7.25/hour?
Run. The. Numbers.
Every moron who says that millennials aren't making it in life entirely because "they're lazy, spoiled and have an overly developed sense of entitlement" fails to look at what they were making when they themselves were starting out, and comparing that to what things cost today.
Minimum wage in 1986 was $3.35 per hour. Take a good, long, hard look at what things cost today and ask yourself how you would do making today's minimum wage of $7.25 per hour.
Who struggled more? The single mom making $3.35 per hour in 1986? Or the same single mom making $7.25 per hour in 2015?
No.
Minimum wage wouldn't have gone as far where I was living than had I been living in say...Indiana. Today, MW here in my state is about 10 bucks an hour so you're wrong again.
As for my situation, since you seem to think I had it soooooo much easier than today's young people
I was thrown out of the house the day my father died by a mother who blamed ME for being molested by her perverted, sick, boyfriend. That's the the tip of the iceberg for all the crap she dealt me over the years.
Incidentally, I was 14 when it happened, but he treated me inappropriately from the time I entered puberty to the day my mother threw me out. He was 17 freaking years older than I was
I was 18 the day my dad died and got tossed to the curb, and I became pregnant that same week with my daughter...accidental of course, but I was in a relationship at the time with a person I thought I loved.
We scraped by. Lived is the dumpiest motel room imaginable that required we share a public bathroom with a bunch of degenerates, slept two to the twin bed, had no cooking facilities, and a refrigerator that barely worked. It took close to a year before we managed to find a run-down apt. Oh, and I didn't own a car of course....rode my bike everywhere or rode on the back of his motorcycle until the thing got stolen lol
He couldn't work due to a severe heart condition. I was the sole support of our family, and we had next to nothing. No health insurance, no car insurance, no savings, barely enough to make rent each month, etc. The only thing that helped me greatly when my daughter was little is the fact that since children required immunizations (something I'm a proponent of), we were able to take her to the clinic and get her immunized. We also had WIC for a time. THAT'S IT. He and I didn't stay together for very long.
All that same crap is available to young people now., BTW.
Now, Compare my situation with my millennial SKs:
My 18 yo SD is working as a dog groomer, living with a roommate, and has a father (my husband) with a good enough income to help her out. Same for my 21 yo SS who is also married and in college. Both are doing quite well, and their situations are very similar to the situations of most of their friends. Both are driving reliable cars that were passed down from us...
None of that was available to me so I suggest you learn to stop making such asinine assumptions when people in this post provide their own experiences.
There are MORE resources available today to young, single parents than there ever were in the 80s and before. Not only that, but parents are pressured to feel guilty as hell if they don't willingly enable their children to live at home until well past the time the kid should be out. I've always had interest in these sorts of situations, so I tend to read a lot.
I know I would have left my mom's house on my own well before I ever entered my 20s. I didn't want to live with her once I was legal to live on my own, and I likely would have been out well before my 19th birthday. Thing is, I'm mostly angry at WHY my mother threw me out and WHEN she chose to do so. What kind of POS parent throws their kid out the day the kid watches her father's body taken away in a body bag???
It wasn't until years later, in my mid-20s, that I began to take the steps to seriously turn my life around by going to college. The only way I was able to go was to get all the financial aid I could, because I was a single parent so my costs for living were higher, of which also meant a willingness to ACCEPT the consequences by taking out loans as well as grants. Nobody helped me navigate my way thorough all of it, and I didn't expect anyone to. I also know though that if I wanted to make it happen, it was up to ME and nobody else....so I did it. I found ways to live more cheaply though....such as student family housing, but I had to wait over a year before we got a place. Moreover, despite the fact my class load was hard as hell as a premed, I worked all through college as well, whether it was work study or waiting tables.
You really have no idea who you're talking to, and the same goes for the way you've responded to the other posters in here....but one thing I notice in others of older generations is a greater tendency to just buckle down and deal with the challenges life brings. Most of us were not home with our parents well into our 20s....EVEN IF the fact we were on our own meant we were barely surviving.
Millennials in general are the whiniest generation ever. Sorry.
NOTE: I do not imply they are all the same, however. Millennials have their good eggs, too.
Last edited by rhiannon67; 01-28-2015 at 11:09 AM..
No matter how you slice it this is a tough time for low to middle income workers in America. Still, looking for scapegoats and excuses is inane and useless. It is true that you could practically fall off the turnip truck and do well at certain points in the past 30-40 years. But, that does not mean that anyone was screwed by "the baby boomers" (or "seniors" as the OP implies).
As far as homeownership goes, maybe millennials will have to wait until they are 35 to buy that first home, rather than at age 25? But, lets not forget that the cost of new homes today is not the same as it was in 1960 for many reasons besides inflation. Apples and oranges really. Homes are twice the size today as they were 50 years ago, with much nicer features. My Dad, a WW2 vet, bought his first home in 1961, way out in the burbs. He was 39 years old. He and my mother raised 7 kids in a 1700 sq ft cape cod with no A/C or dishwasher or even storm windows (northern Illinois). We certainly did not have cable TV, cell phones or internet or vacations. Today you could hardly call that "living the dream".
Let's not forget that the vast majority of baby boomers were not even out of HS when Medicare was created, let alone Social Security! Blaming them is akin to blaming the millennials for the housing bubble!
Maybe when we are all done pointing fingers and lamenting our lots in life, we can (as a country) work on some solutions?
Excellent point on homes...
My 600 square foot 1910 cottage was on the market for a year before I bought it....
Ahh yes we will all go back to the dark ages. Maybe while we're at it we can listen to our music on 8-track tapes too. Sorry, but one car, one TV, and one phone isn't cutting it today. I agree with you on dinner at home, but with most people working 10-12 hour days, there isn't time to cook. I do NOT think this is a good thing, but that's the way it is.
While I don't think people should retire at 30, I agree wealth takes time to accumulate, but there more and more seniors falling into poverty too.
In there is the crux of the issue... people today, especially the young have much greater expectations...
My parents were happy just having a roof over their head and enough for a small vegetible garden with 1 or 2 fruit trees...
I drove the $800 car I bought in High School for 20 years... don't own a cell phone, never lived in a home with cable... no Ipads, Tablets here, no Flat Screen or cordless phones... don't drink coffee, etc...
Still remember when cable was going into the neighborhood where I grew up... the cable guy was trying to sign us up for $7.95 a month... Dad said he was not going to spend a $100 a year on the idiot box...
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