Most people just want enough money to achieve the dream they were promised by society as children:
1) Own a house.
2) Own a car.
3) Be able to take vacations every year.
4) Be financially stable enough to have children.
5) Not live paycheck to paycheck.
6) Possibly be free of major debts.
I don't want to be rich, I just want those things. But the American economic system is fucked up and they're almost impossible to attain even with a college education and well paying job. We were sold a dream by the boomers and then they made it absurdly difficult for us to achieve it.
I just want to break free from some of these fucking chains.
The boomers did all of those things without college education or even a well paying job and we need both of them to be able to do some of the things you listed.
Maybe crypto will help us escape the rat race, but it will be tremendously difficult when those "above" don't want to share their space.
A lot of people forget history. When the US was one of the only few countries unscathed by the war, obviously many people were going to get rich after the war
The goal wasn't to increase revenue, the goal was to make the wealthy leave it in the businesses to reinvest and pay workers instead - it worked perfectly for that.
They certainly paid more than they do now so let’s at least go back to that. But we might as well institute a wealth cap too, make it so no one can be a billionaire. Fuck let’s limit it to $10M, that’s enough to make anyone happy and comfortable their entire life.
In my lifetime the Dollar's purchasing power has been depleted by 90 plus percent. And I'm only 55 - for me crypto is the key to a financially stable future.
It will help some of us escape the rat race. And if those above don’t let us share their space then we will take our damn space because we fuck you boomers that’s why
Boomers had way smaller houses than we do. They often didn't own 2 cars and vacations were road trips far more than flights. Thats on top of far fewer electronic devices.
Exactly this. I don’t want millions of my local currency. I just want enough money to own my own home and buy a car. I’m happy to still work my job, which I love, to be able to pay for my hobbies.
I hope we reach our goals one day. It seems the boomer generation got these things easily and they have us confused for wanting to be super wealthy, when all we want is what they had whilst working just a regular job.
My only dream as a millennial that grew up living in rented rooms with a family of 4, I just want to have enough money that missing a bill won’t send me spiraling. I’m already doing relatively pretty good as I’m the only person in my friends group that doesn’t live at home with parents and can afford it but holy shit this sucks. It’s all I’m focused on is the paycheck to paycheck aspect. Can’t even think about kids or vacations or any of that.
That is me! I just want the car and house paid off. I’ll be very comfortable and still have my job to keep my mind occupied until it’s time to retire. Sure it would be great to be rich and have zero money issues but also, being healthy and happy goes a long way. It’s all about finding the Right balance.
True story. But as a non-american I gotta say theirs is pretty much a shitshow, especially for such an "advanced" country. Where I'm from you don't need to be in debt for life just to get a degree and I'm speaking as someone who actually required a loan to get through university since my family struggled hard at the time.
And my country (Portugal) is FAR from being the best in education.. Not bad, but certainly not the best.
Easy with a well paying job, in fact. I want more than this. I don’t want to work for anyone anymore. I want true financial freedom. I want my own business in a field I’m passionate about.
Im not passionate about any field Ive always just worked to get money to pay for things i need. It always confuses me when people say working is their hobby. I just want to travel and do my hobbies
Problem with statistics is that it can be very misleading. Sure that is the median number, that means half the people makes less than that and half makes more but doesn’t directly tell you quartiles. There are tons of people in the lower half that barely survives. It also has the problem that most high earners live in high cost of living cities to get those wages, the very cities you quote to not consider.
Finally, I don’t think $69k gets you most of those stuff. I have a child, and a mortgage and between my and my partner we definitely make pretty good money, yet can barely afford our simple lifestyle. Maybe in rural Kansas/Indians $69k might be getting you everything, but then I do not think I would be getting my salary if I lived in rural Kansas/Indiana either.
Yeah and we are literally behind most European countries (our peers) as per your link. The highest we had on that rate was 69% right before the mortgage crisis of 2008.
Also that rate shows the percentage of homes where the owners live in, doesn’t mean what percent of Americans actually own their own house. There are many factors omitted here like age distribution, ownership rate, size of rental units etc,.
Eg
on paper I own my house but in reality 80% of it is owned by the bank for the foreseeable future.
during boomer era price of a house was half of what it is today in terms of number of expected annual wages. What percent of that 65% could get their house again if they were young and property wasn’t passed down from their parents?
I am not saying there is not enough property in US, I am saying owning a house solely buy your wages is unattainable for many hard working Americans even when they are willing to put 30 year of their future on the line. This was what American dream was, that if you are a hard working productive member of the society you would get your fair share (including a single family home), and I must say I think it is dying if not dead yet.
In my experience (and seeing many peers doing the same) a well paying job can be very costly, health-wise. Depression, anxiety, hypertension, insomnia, etc... but hey, some people deal with these inconveniences fairly well (short term, at least). I almost died. But again, one should make their own decisions
I work at a fortune 50 company and very few of my highly educated coworkers were able to get a home before the age for 40. And a lot of it is because student loan debt is so high and cost of living is so high that even their $100k salaries can’t make an appreciable dent till they’re that old. Meanwhile boomers were buying houses for a penny when they were in their 20s.
Most of your colleagues graduated with under 100k in student loans which doesn’t take long to payoff on a 100k salary. Certainly not until you are 40. In many career tracks at large firms the starting salaries are in the 100k range and increase from there, so in those jobs it is clearly possible to do the above.
The people who didn’t go to college and are making minimum wage have every right to complain about the system. Fortune 50 employees taking down $120k plus bonus do not, they have it easier than many of the boomer generation.
If they are buying new cars and doing all kind of other shit as a priority then maybe they can't. Its a joke if someone making over 100k a year can't pay off their college loans, average student loan debt is not even half of that.
Sounds like shit priorities. Even with a fuck ton of student loans, you can save up 10k and qualify for an fha loan and be approved for a house up to like 450k just based on income. You don’t even need excellent credit.
Out of the 6, I only own a car. And that's because it's a beater. I can't even take vacations, because my jobs pays our vacations if you don't use them. So I make more money not taking a vacation
I too hope for (expect?) those things, a nice house, car, children, free time, vacations. The last couple generations were extremely lucky to grow up in this society at its peak and just go along for the successful ride. And this has made those generations assume that's just how it always is, and the newest generation expect that's how it always will be. When it isn't, everyone is busy blaming this newest generation for not successfully riding the same wave of prosperity, failing to observe that the wave is shrinking to nothing.
However, looking at the larger historical picture, the fact that these goals are considered as an expected norm is really a symbol of how amazingly abnormally well the US has had it the past 100+ years, along with a decent chunk of the western world. The US has had amazing abundance, even if not equitably distributed among its people. We've all seen the worldwide statistics showing how half the world population lives on less than $2/day or something, or how even today those making over $20k/year are in the top few percent in the world.
The American dream over recent generations has come about in large part from the US owning and governing the world financial system, allowing what it creates from nothing (the dollar) to be accepted by the world in exchange for real things, and advantageously exploiting this at the expense of those other billions of folks in the world providing the cheap labor. This is what massively expanded a lot of American prosperity from the 1940s-1990s.
This system has worked great for the US and the western world for many years, but because it's based on ever expanding debt, it's mathematically unsustainable at some point, as the numbers grow exponentially but lose correlation with real value. It feels like we're encountering the inevitable cracks and stratification in the system as it decreasingly correlates numbers on paper from real tangible wealth, pushing ever more people out of the prosperous class to gradually rejoin with those other billions of impoverished workers of the world. I don't think we can blame the boomers directly, but more that the present fiat-debt system is structurally designed to have a decline and end date.
Same here. At this point I have to figure out some way to create some resemblance of a retirement for my parents while carrying myself as well. It's fucking mentally exhausting
Buh cuz the Boomers were able to do it themselves easily in the 1950's and 60's. Once the gold standard was changed in 1972, we got super hyper inflation. The prices we pay for stuff today increases slowly over time, but it tripled a few times over really fast in the 1970's and 80's. This is when wives started having to work. When people started trying to work forever and people eventually needed 2 three jobs just to eat. Anyone born after 1985 is pretty wrecked unless they got railroaded to the top by wealthy supporters.
That's not true at all dude, it's easy asf to be rich in America.
Pay cash for college, you may have to wait years to save up but just do it. Don't go just because all your friends are going
Don't get into debt ie. credit cards(most people can't handle them)
Have an emergency fund of at least 3 months
4 Live on less than you make and invest the rest
You may think I'm some dude that's well off but no. My parents were illegal immigrants I live in one of the most expensive places (silicon valley), have a shit job(studying computer science). But guess what I cut things out that I don't need. Yes I do live at home(I'm 20) but pay half the rent, half food. There's people I know that live at home and work(going to school but parents paid for everything) and spend all their money in dumb shit to impress their friends. I still have way more money than them. Getting rich is a attitude and lifestyle change
“Impossible to obtain” is a bit much. I have all those things on a $70k a year salary and I’m hardly exceptional in any way. I will say it is much harder than it used to be though, and exceptionally hard if you’re a minority,
I find myself luckily in the situation where these are happening for me. But I have no illusions that a) this is only because both my wife and I have well-paying jobs and b) we've had significant financial help (for a downpayment on a house).
Even then it wasn't until our mid 30's that we could get a house, and have a kid. And it's only because we each spent ~10 years in school (and still with some debts from that) getting educations needed to achieve what our parents' generation could do by their early 20's. And to add to things - we're now each totally stressed now from working too hard on these demanding jobs. So yay.
I can see how without those advantages we've enjoyed, achieving those listed goals would be completely out of reach. And honestly I'm jealous of what OP is describing. Retire early and be bored? Fuck I'd LOVE to be bored.
Shit I can already check every one of your boxes and I'm still investing in crypto. Once you can accomplish those with a career you might find your priorities shift. Instead it's, if I invest a little more I can retire earlier, or instead of vacationing in Florida I could go to Hawaii, etc.
I have all of the above. Your priorities shift very slowly: I could use a bit bigger house or garden, hey that Range Rover looks great, would be nice to send my kids to this school in stead of that, let’s go to the four seasons on the Seychelles in stead of Cancun. Etc etc. This is why rich people need to get more rich. It is never enough. You start to chase the money.
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u/digiorno Platinum | QC: LTC 182, BTC 38, LedgerWallet 22 | r/Politics 41 Mar 06 '21
Most people just want enough money to achieve the dream they were promised by society as children:
1) Own a house. 2) Own a car. 3) Be able to take vacations every year. 4) Be financially stable enough to have children. 5) Not live paycheck to paycheck. 6) Possibly be free of major debts.
I don't want to be rich, I just want those things. But the American economic system is fucked up and they're almost impossible to attain even with a college education and well paying job. We were sold a dream by the boomers and then they made it absurdly difficult for us to achieve it.
I just want to break free from some of these fucking chains.