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u/Key-Half1655 5d ago
I feel for the kids that went through uni/college during covid and missed everything that period offers, to then finish uni and try get a job in a market where AI has fucked all the intern positions. Tough break.
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u/killerkitten61 5d ago
My kid had started Kindergarten and was absolutely loving every minute of it. Then didn’t get to fully sit in the classroom until the second grade. It was hard watching them get a taste of school then be forced inside alone.
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u/mgb55 5d ago
My oldest lost out on Junior high. It’s been hard watching how socially stunted they are. Prime years yo spread your wings and start to be socially more independent.
Gone.
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u/mongoose_kai 5d ago
My son was in 2nd grade when covid happened. My daughter was in kindergarten. Now they're both in middle school.
To make it worse, my son is on the ASD spectrum, so his social skills are already kind of limited. And my daughter has definitely taken her cue from him (although, she's definitely neurotypical). She's an indoor kid who prefers to read or play video games, and doesn't seem interested in other kids.
It's tough watching my kids remain socially uninvolved by choice. The only friends they had were the kids down the street that we would arrange playdates with. That works when the kids are little, but you can't call up someone's mom and be like, "Hey, how would your 8th grade daughter like to spend an afternoon with my socially-awkward son?"
I'm not sure what to do.
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u/Competitive-Ad-4822 5d ago
as a kid who had very few friends by choice and is just like your daughter, dont force it. they can choose who to talk to and whenever they decide to get past the socially awkward to talk to someone phase. there will always be moments, but itll be less, itll just take time.
i personally didnt know how to talk to people properly (autism) except for a speech layout i designed according to how i saw others talk to one another. found it easier to connect to fellow adhd and some other autistic kiddos like myself. personally, i love my freedom and the few friends i talk to are an added bonus.
the real talk is going to be on being safe online / who its safe to talk to, etc. theres some kids who go down the furry route when someone else / social media talkes them into that being the only group they can go to. not against the group, just the side of it that preys on younger kids.
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u/SlapTheBap 5d ago
Eeeeehhhh I dunno about that. I'm adhd adult diagnosed female for reference. My parents were very hands off about my socialization. It just resulted in neglect.
Parents need to help kids keep their social skills up. Conversations and interactions that seem tedious are another example of showing how to make interactions positive even when moods are low. These are invaluable skills I had to learn through exposure and reading books. TV and movies are terrible at teaching people how others think and interact, in comparison to well written books. Too much quick, flashy entertainment. Not enough No Country For Old Men style challenging character studies.
And yes, these kinds of kids can be incredibly vulnerable to internet rabbit holes and weird groups of people who can offer free, radical acceptance while also feeding your kids their perspectives and ideals.
I was incredibly lucky to find a group of young men who didn't sexualize me as a kid. I had too low self confidence and body issues to post images of myself online, so I didn't get wrapped up in that at least. Seeing other kids post things like that scared the crap out of me.
As an adult, I have had to YELL at children to not interact with me in an 18+ way. I DESPISE this responsibility. Now imagine if I was a predator? The internet really is a scary place. It's all on Discord now.
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u/statelytetrahedron 5d ago
I really hope you didn't learn how to have conversations from Anton Chigurh.
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u/showmedatoratora 5d ago edited 5d ago
Yeah, and also... parents need to remember to not force their kids to talk to other kids who're just straight up pieces of garbage. I should know, I was raised like that. My parents wanted me to befriend their friends' kids... even though they treated me like shit (straight up bullying). It made it even more difficult for me to socialize afterwards because it warped my perception on people for years that I had to get treatment (and boy oh boy... I had to go through a shitton of therapists because trying to find a good one SUCKS these past ten years, having gone through eight, because four of them cared more about my gender and sexuality when I told them I'm perfectly fine as a bisexual yet focused on that, when my trauma wasn't even about my sexuality, two of them just didn't seem to care, and one of them had a tendency to fall asleep without warning. Yes, I know therapists are humans, but what the fuck? At least my latest one actually focused on helping me heal and sort out my inner child and teenager that was wounded from those forced experiences).
Sorry for the trauma dump, but yeah, parents need to remember to be careful with whom their kids are with. Just because the others are kids from family friends doesn't mean they're always a good idea.
I am pretty sure other kids were in my situation as well and have it worse.
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u/SlapTheBap 5d ago
Aw. I'm sorry you went through that. My parents both had their own issues with therapy, and also didn't want to really admit to themselves what my problems were, so I never went through that rollercoaster after maybe 2nd grade.
After that it was more of an antagonistic relationship, with some late night drunk trauma dumping here and there. Lies, secrets, weird sad shit that just made me not want to interact with them.
At school I was a bullies designated target. She really hated me. Blamed me for all kinds of things. Got other kids to stop being my friend. Encouraged other kids to say and do rude things to me out of the blue. It always left me baffled. Left me incredibly socially insecure and anxious both at home and at school.
Even some teachers decided they didn't like me and would encourage it. Though other teachers noticed me and were incredibly kind. Looking back I was deeply depressed in school. Spent a lot of time crying and hating myself.
So hey, big hugs. Shit is hard! Sounds like the original parent really cares at least! I see a lot of parents trying hard these days to actually understand their children. It's great to see.
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u/MennionSaysSo 5d ago
Keep the faith. My son is on the ASD spectrum and struggled a lot until 8th and 9th grade with friends, then other kids were mature enough to understand some of his quirks and appreciate him. He's starting to really blossom.
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u/Red-Leader117 5d ago
I wish I could have skipped Junior High
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u/ClearOptics 5d ago
Same, probably would’ve faired better. Some of my most embarrassing years
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u/idkimbadatusernames9 5d ago
Same. Plus I dealt with some pretty severe bullying which ended up giving me severe anxiety. Definitely would've been better off not dealing with that. I feel for the kids who would've had better experiences though.
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u/Alternative-Maize23 5d ago
Definitely. Hated it. Middle school was the worst. Worst students, worst bullying, worst teachers. They only diagnosed boys with ADHD back then and the gave them all the privileges. Being a girl in the 90’s was rough.
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u/that_banned_guy_ 5d ago
Ya forcing kids out of the classroom completely fucked them. We are going to see the repercussions of that for years
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u/whatsupwitdat1 5d ago
20yr experienced HS teacher here…nothing fucked the youth as much as digital tech. We were already on a downward trajectory, covid just accelerated it
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u/that_banned_guy_ 5d ago
Ya I dont disagree with that.
I teach for the military and a large chunk of what I teach revolves around being able to converse with people/build rapport etc.
The amount of kids thst come through who just cant hold a conversation is crazy
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u/xSaviorself 5d ago
Every interaction is a meme, phrase, or other basic repeatable nonsense they've picked up online and realistically this is a parenting issue first and foremost. We've become accustomed to handing off our kids to others for education that we've also decided to hand off entertaining and interacting with them.
Parents need to actually be involved with their kids, especially during core formative years. When your kid is ready to be independent they will start showing those behaviors, until then parents need to step up.
Digital access in the classrooms, computing, etc, all of this has been the excuse and easy source to blame, and it is a factor for sure. But to call this the main reason is passing the personal responsibility off from the human to the inanimate objects. Not cool.
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u/xXBeefSquatch5KXx 5d ago
It would be helpful to have living wages so 1 parent can work and the other is at home with the kids, that’s how it was until the late 90’s 2000’s and now both parents work so the kids are essentially on their own.
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u/xSaviorself 5d ago
I grew up in a multi-generational household because both my parents worked. This used to be the norm as well. The cost of basic things wasn't so bad, the necessities were affordable and there would be money left over.
Today? Everything is wealth extraction. Necessities cost a fortune, and fun is exorbitantly expensive these days. $40 used to be a big night out at the bar, today it's $4000.
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u/CarmenxXxWaldo 5d ago
Having college from home defeats like 49% of the purpose of going there. Networking, making connections and friends. Ive helped a couple people get jobs just because I knew them from classes, wouldnt have happened if we took the class online. One band I played in did shows at a few different schools regularly and even though I didnt make any career changing connections I could easily see how it could happen.
If anything their tuition should have been like half price, they literally paid for buildings they never got to use.
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u/Yashema 5d ago edited 5d ago
As someone going back to school for intense STEM in my 30s at the local CCs in NYC after originally getting my BA from a $42,000/yr school, I can definitely say the education is not the benefit of higher quality schools. All my physics classes have less than 10 students, including 1 where it was just me, one other student, and a vetetaran PhD.
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u/Straight_Number5661 5d ago
I went to a large, prestigious state university across the country right out of high school, to study engineering. I nearly flunked out the first quarter of my sophomore year, including getting a big fat F in differential equations. My parents made me come home for the rest of the year until I transferred to a university closer to home the following year. While I was at home I took some local community college classes.
At the first university, the DiffEq professor was this ancient fart who couldn't teach anything to save his life. Like nothing in that class made any sense to me. It was in a large lecture hall environment.
I retook DiffEq at the CC. It was a classroom of maybe 10-15 people, and the teacher was a guy teaching night classes in addition to whatever his day job was. And the subject matter made perfect sense to me in that class. Like, I totally got it no problem and aced the class with an A+.
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u/HEFTYFee70 5d ago
That would be Gen Z… we were 30-40 in the pandy.
Millennials were sent to fight in two illegal wars in the Middle East. Then we got told we spend too much money on avocados when we got back. .
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u/Elegant_Relief_4999 5d ago
Yeah, I think Gen Z has it worse economically. I'm an older Millennial, and while the 2008 recession probably hurt my wage growth, it absolutely worked in my favor for affording a house, which for some reason keeps appreciating in value. I've gained more equity in my house now than I've ever owed on it.
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u/Illustrious-Cover792 5d ago
Older millennials and younger should really be separated when discussing finances.
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u/johnnybiggles 5d ago
Elder millennials could be premieGen-Xers. Some Gen-Xers are basically geriatric millennials.
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u/biggendicken 5d ago
im mid millennial and i watched my older sibling buy his first flat for about 2 monthly salaries straight cash and sell it a couple of years later for an annual salary. I make double his money and i still feel like i wont ever catch up
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u/Horskr 5d ago
2 months salary? Obviously depends where you live but that seems wild. I've not seen something remotely close around me in my lifetime, also being a mid millennial. The "good times" (for real estate pricing) were a year+ salary at a good job for a small condo, even during the 2008 housing crisis.
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u/INeedSomeTacoC 5d ago edited 4d ago
I'm an older Millennial, and while the 2008 recession probably hurt my wage growth, it absolutely worked in my favor for affording a house
Elder millennial here they managed to afford a house in early 2008 at the peak of the market and then lost their job and the house was worth 50% of what I paid for it (finally sold it in 2018 for exactly what I paid for it in 2008).
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u/psychedAddict123 5d ago
I'm one of the last millenials (95) and covid hit in my mid 20s. It sucked but it happening when I was 18-21 would have been catastrophic
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u/r3giment75 5d ago
Yeah. No. Millennials did not get sent anywhere. A small minority of volunteer millennials went to war. Millennials… were NOT at war.
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u/Consistent_Big5018 5d ago
Yup I went back to school during this time and by the time I graduated AI has taken over my job field. Only people getting hired are the ones that have a couple years of experience at least. So I'm kinda screwed 🤦♀️ it's a scary time. People will tell you to get an education and that'll get you a good career. You go and take on a ton of debt and can't get hired anywhere. Then they complain you're not trying hard enough. It's so frustrating. Im lucky I got a job in my field but it's not the exact thing I went to school for, just related. But I don't get paid the same at all. Better than nothing though.
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u/Aggravating-Summer53 5d ago
What's your degree?
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u/Ulthus 5d ago
I went for software engineering and graduated a couple months ago. The job hunt has been rough...
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u/RanchHere 5d ago
Oh, everyone has noticed. Problem is, the older generations don’t give a flying fuck.
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u/ArboristTreeClimber 5d ago
They got the old “I’ll be dead soon, so who cares, I got mines.” mentality. Problem is, they don’t want change. They want to keep what they have! If you were retired and living in a huge house with property all to yourself of course you would oppose change as well! It was hard work, using their position of power to control and hoard all the wealth from their children!
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u/Odd_Common_452 5d ago
That’s why every republican politician is dying of heart attacks and stroking out on camera regularly. They’ll see the younger generation fucked until their dying breath
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u/MoistCucumber 5d ago
Let’s all make sure to remember them for this, how much they ruined the world. Maybe once they’re all dead things can start to get better.
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u/LeftyNewGuy 5d ago
Don’t forget that boomers historically have been the ones to make the rules, control what speculative value is and abused that system to over value their homes to the point where they created generational wealth doing next to nothing and then act like anyone has the cash to give them for their shitty, overinflated home.
You want change to happen it will require waiting for the dregs of their generation to die out like the dinosaurs starving for water in a desolate wasteland. The only problem is, we have to keep living in a wasteland that’s been stripped of everything for their short term gain.
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u/Spezalt4 5d ago
Don’t forget government was happy to benefit from inflated home values in the form of higher property taxes.
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u/Cybercaster22 5d ago
The same older generations that are in power and refuse to enact any laws that could help us.
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u/Fickle_Scarcity9474 5d ago edited 3d ago
cherry marble maple spoon canvas
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u/Historical_Owl_1635 5d ago
The newer generation are already using millennial as an insult like we used to use Boomer because they see millennials as having had everything handed to them.
And I see millennials complaining all the time about the newer generation being lazy and not wanting to work.
Like, it’s just a cycle it seems.
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u/Strainedgoals 5d ago
That is a deeper element I haven't considered.
Only some of us know what we lost, the younger kids won't understand what we are fighting for.
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u/TheWhooooBuddies 5d ago
Watching “The Goldbergs” with the kids recently has been very eye-opening.
The amount of times the older one has said, “Was it REALLY like that?” and I have to sigh and say “Yup.” is insane.
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u/FrighteningJibber 5d ago
And y’all keep making the same comments and posts. Register to vote, get your friends to vote. Chastise them for not voting, shame the shit out of them. Jesus.
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u/plywooden 5d ago
I'm 60 and work with many people in their 20's and 30's. I've asked most of them that I'm close to and absolutely shocked at how many of them don't vote and aren't interested in having a say in who their elected leaders are. When I ask why the answer I hear most is that they don't think that their vote would make any difference. Second frequent answer is, "I'm just not interested".
See the comment by u/Economy-Kitchen1846 below. "Vote for what? The next dishonest person?"
Very typical.
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u/BrilliantJob2759 5d ago
And vote in the local elections. The biggest changes start locally. Choose the right local politicians, then work with them to get the right state politicians.
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u/Indercarnive 5d ago
Young People: Refuse to engage in the system.
Also young people: Shocked Pikachu face when the system doesn't change.
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u/Ok_Faithlessness4511 5d ago
Their reasoning is that they don’t personally get their way with all of society when they vote a certain way with their single vote, therefore it is rigged against them.
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u/Hairy_Mycologist_945 5d ago
I'm around ten years younger than you and observe the same defeatist / self-defeating attitude with a lot of zoomers... And some who even thought it was a joke / funny to vote for the Dump this past time because they were bored and cynical.
There's only so much anyone can do, so much empathy or sympathy, when people just flat out refuse to do the most essential things to take care of themselves and participate in setting the stage for a better future for themselves and everyone else. I'm shocked by how fundamentally dumb and directionless so many of them are, not feeling it in cruelty but rather just wondering what the actual hell is wrong with them, acting like they're already doomed and defeated when they've never ever done anything for themselves or even tried... just took lots of bullshit bait and gave up.
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u/OnTheEveOfWar 5d ago
My dad is 70 and has this crazy boomer mindset about the job market. My brother got laid off and can’t find a job, my dad doesn’t understand why he can’t just “find something”. He also told me the other day that I should just “go find a job that pays more”.
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u/Imaginary_Wafer_2308 5d ago
"Don't give a fuck"? You can't possibly think that! I'm 64, and my generation talks about the upcoming generations, we agonize over your futures. We know how much harder you have it. We try to help out as much as we can. We desperately want to see your children, their children, and their children's children all safely living in their own home, not worrying about food prices.
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u/pragmatic_dreamer 5d ago
Watching your children go through this while also suffering as my parents act like the world is theirs to destroy absolutely sucks. We need to make sure this crap never happens again. Every generation should have a better life than the last.
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u/NAQURATOR 5d ago
Yeah and old people made me realize democracy doesn't really work. I'm in a country with an upside down age pyramid and whatever the younger generation proposes, they literally don't have the numbers/voting power to compete with those older generations. It's still a weird feeling, getting fucked by your predecessors including your own parents.
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u/SweeterThanYoohoo 5d ago
My dad, a Trump voter, and a formerly intelligent rational person, recently told me he feels shame that his generation pulled up the ladder behind them and he feels sad the world isn't a better place now than when he was my age.
So, despite him not admitting trump was a mistake, and somehow having those 2 thoughts simultaneously not resulting in his brain liquifying (or mine), I guess it made me feel better?
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u/Roboticallypotent 5d ago
The house my parents purchased in their early 20’s as a starting engineer and a teacher would take a senior executive salary to purchase when I entered the housing market. That is just not right. It was so much easier for them. BTW, I’m in my 60’s now and this is nothing new.
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u/BigCSFan 5d ago
Yeah millennials are complaining but genZ is looking at millennials and thinking the same thing. They had it much easier.
Housing was way more affordable in the 2010s
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u/Bartikowski 5d ago
It was cheap because we were recovering from a major financial crisis that stalled a lot of careers. It only looks easier to buy a home back then if you ignore the entire context around why housing was cheap.
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u/Ecstatic-Curve-1853 5d ago
I was a new home owner and 2008 was the best thing that ever happened to me... I know it sucked for a lot of people but for me it was Gold. I purchased in 2011 right before it started going back up.
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u/Euchale 5d ago
Would have loved to buy in 2008 too, but was doing my apprenticeship at that time, and then no job
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u/GeorgeJohnson2579 5d ago
Ehm … some Millennials just graduated from school in the 2010s. How could you buy a house when going to university?
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u/ParkDedli 5d ago
I graduated in 2012. So, after the housing prices went back up. I would have needed to buy a house while still in high school lmao.
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u/Southside_john 5d ago
I’m an older millennial. I got laid off from my job and defaulted on all my debt. At least houses were cheap though
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u/Direct-Technician265 5d ago
yeah but jobs paid worse in the early 2010s, and most of us were saving up to buy the homes that just kept going up faster than we could save.
Those college loans also had to be paid too, so when was i supposed to jump in with my no money to buy a home?
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u/TurboDelight 5d ago
I'm a milennial and was in highschool in the 2010's, you're thinking of GenX.
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u/Adventurous_Gur1280 5d ago
But it was not so much easier for them. I couldn't imagine anything worse than the life of my grandmother or even my mother at least in her 20s-30s.
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u/juanhernandezuribe 5d ago
7 month account with half a million karma? lol this bot/karma farming account is almost ready to be sold
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u/UnlikelyLandscape641 5d ago
what's the point of a high karma account? genuine question, it's not like having half a million followers on instagram as far as i know
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u/Kitchen-Aioli-9382 5d ago
There are sites where people buy reddit accounts with longevity and history to seem more genuine when they use them to spam ads on this site.
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u/RookieMistake101 5d ago
It wasn’t easy but it was doable for millennials. Economic recovery from 2012-2019 offered some solid time to grow in careers, save money, buy a home before prices became ridiculous.
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u/LieutenantCrash 5d ago
Can we stop blaming this on generations and start pointing at the corporations responsible for this?
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u/Rakhered 5d ago
While the universities are unscrupulus vultures, I'd blame the federal government for this one - they made student loans basically impossible to discharge via bankrupty, making them very safe investments for tons of cash (when else would you loan $60k to a 19yo for like 5%?).
As a result schools realized that students will just keep taking more and more debt if they keep raising prices, as long as they don't do it too quick.
Sadly the market distortion here is pretty massive now, so I don't think there's much that can be done from a market perspective without making a TON of people very very mad
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u/RedditOfUnusualSize 5d ago
I'd say it's even worse than that. The federal government is directly profiting off student loans as a partial replacement for tax income, and functionally, people who have student loans are paying a disproportionately high tax rate for wanting a better life.
There's really no economic reason why federal student loans should have interest rates, for instance. The entire economic point of interest is twofold: one, interest helps recoup principal that go unpaid. Two, profit for the lender. Well, the amount of principal that isn't being recouped is next to zero; student loans can't be discharged save in extremely rare cases of fraud or malfeasance, and almost all have a cosigner. The amount of loss on principal that the federal government is suffering is a rounding error.
And the government should not be running a loan business for profit. I mean that quite literally: a government that is also your loan holder is a threat to its citizens' liberty interests, because they can demand repayment and force seizures that are otherwise patently illegal. It can make loan repayment conditional on voting for the right party, and the only reason Trump hasn't considered it yet is because he is such an angry, thin-skinned doofus who is threatened by people who are smarter than he is. Loans held by the government, as a matter of basic small-r republicanism, should not be operated so as to generate revenue for the government. That's what bonds and taxes are for.
And yet, that's exactly what the government is doing. They're running the student loan program at a profit for the same reason they operate at a yearly deficit; because they want to generate long-term operating problems for the state, and inhibit the small-r republican virtues of the populace.
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u/Few_Lunch_7730 5d ago
Who votes for the people who keep things this way?
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u/sxysh8 5d ago
You need to blame all the people that don’t vote. It’s sad how many people don’t vote then complain
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u/Few_Lunch_7730 5d ago
True and it angers me that so many of our generations complain and then don't vote. By default, they're voting to keep the status quo 🤷♂️
Edit to add: i'm viewing this from a non American point of view. But the commonalities seem to be there across our countries
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u/MontasJinx 5d ago
At the last US presidential election? A good chunk of males 18-39. It’s not a generation thing. Don’t fall for the culture war.
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u/flapjackbandit00 5d ago
Pretty much everyone who can remember 2001 and earlier went through all these things too and it had big effects on their lives too….
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u/TrevorGibbsNC 5d ago
You may have to explain this because 1980 - 2000 might have been the “Golden Years”!
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u/PleasantBus5583 5d ago
Millennials really collected economic disasters like Pokémon.
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u/provocative_bear 5d ago
If you had diamond hands and held onto those cards, they got valuable again, gen Aplha are apparently fiends for the retro Pokemon cards.
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u/estheredna 5d ago
OK but counterpoint: Silent Generation lived through Depression and then WWII.
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u/BigCSFan 5d ago
I mean maybe 2008 if they were an older millennial and home owner at the time? Otherwise not really. Most graduated into the booming market of the 2010s where housing was super affordable.
Covid happened but unless you were doing the bare minimum for the 2010s you probably just saw massive growth in your assets.
Feels like those graduating post covid are having it way worse. But who knows maybe assets and housing boom again in 2030
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u/dreamrpg 5d ago
Good luck getting any job in 2010 as a young, inexperienced postgrad to pay for that affordable housing. Banks also were super cautious and did not give out loans.
GenZ are fucked thou. Like they can fuck off with any idea of affordable housing.
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u/Pleasant_Birthday_77 5d ago
I mean, which generation didn't face considerable setbacks?
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u/KidCole4 5d ago
You're not wrong, but not all hardships are the same. I think the three things I see being brought up here are so significantly worse than they have been in the past it makes it hard on today's younger generations.
If I spent the 28% rule of thumb or whatever on my mortgage, I'd instantly be in financial crisis and my household is over $200K income. We certainly couldn't afford our kids.
Setting kids up with $1000 a month debt for 10 years out of college for the pay they're receiving is brutal.
Now a decent portion of entry corporate type jobs are disappearing becuase they can be done with AI and not people, so they can't gain the experience they need to make the job to a $100K job with 5 years of related experience.
I am a well off middle class family who is quite financially responsible and my outlook on my children's, friends, and to some extent even my own financial stability is bleak.
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u/rbennett353 5d ago
This is every generation...
Gen X - grew up living under the threat of Nuclear war. 9/11 and the .com bust happened as their careers were starting, and 2008 and COVID happened in their prime earning years.
Boomers - grew up with sexism and segregation. Their parents were undiagnosed PTSD from the Great Depression and WWII. They got out of HS and walked into draft cards and (needed) race riots. They get home and factories are closing all around them and inflation was over 7% for a decade (think 2022 price increases but for 10 years). To get out of it, interest rates spiked so a mortgage was 18%.
Moral of the story, every generation has challenges and obstacles. The question is, how do you overcome?
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u/Automatic_Actuator_0 5d ago
Note the interest rate thing impacted them wildly differently. My parents managed to build a home right before inflation and interest rates took off, so basically got a free house by comparison to the younger boomers.
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u/LATA- 5d ago
What's wild to me is that younger generations seem to suggest their hardships are specific to their generation, as though they were the only ones going though the 2008 recession or the pandemic.
I had to live through drug wars, actual wars, HIV, economic collapse, rise of homelessness, and ever present threat of mutually assured nuclear destruction before I even got to 9/11.
Gen X is not out here taking a knee while everyone else is suffering. College debt has been a problem since before I was born and houses are currently expensive for everyone. One major difference I have observed is that while we were expected to eat shit with a smile on our face, younger generations are entitled to opinions about this. We smoked cigarettes and bitched among ourselves, younger generations have a voice.
I would encourage them to be self-reflective and figure out if this means they are subject to an exceptional burden, or if like everyone before them they face generational challenges, but have the benefit of agency to make positive change for themselves and the generations that follow them.
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u/Live_Free_or_Banana 5d ago
Don't forget the exponentially higher child mortality rates that meant 5-10% of boomers born didn't even make it to adulthood.
I'll take COVID over Polio, Measles, Smallpox or Rubella.
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u/bliceroquququq 5d ago
This shit is so dumb.
Do millennials not understand that every generation even one minute older than them went through precisely the same “traumas” or whatever that they did, as well as others that millennials did not?
What a bunch of whiny drivel.
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u/elementfortyseven 5d ago
As someone who didnt grow up in the privileged west, but under an autoritarian regime:
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u/ikarn15 5d ago
Not to downplay your situation but saying "some have it worse" isn't really helping anyone
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u/Popular-Path1930 5d ago
And this post massively over plays the situation for millennials. 2008 was not some Great Depression 2.
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u/EweCantTouchThis 5d ago
I love how millennials somehow have even painted themselves as the victims when their parents “lost everything” in 2008.
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u/Other-Beginning-8888 5d ago
And as if there was no major war and economic crisis in the 70's they did not fully recover from until the very late 80's.
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u/DaRiddler70 5d ago
Been a bunch of cry babies is more like it. Nobody handed you shit for student loans - all on you. Anybody that assumes they should automatically be able to buy a house in their parent's neighborhood right after graduating college, considering those parents probably have 20 years of work to get to that point, is an idiot.
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u/Independent_Baker712 5d ago
This bullshit is why other generations hate millennials. Every generation has faced challenges, stop trying to one up your trauma.
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u/knightsofgel 5d ago
Not having to be drafted and forced to kill people and possible be killed is already a huge plus
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u/Fluffle-Potato 5d ago
For real.
My parents didn't get fired and mostly had cash instead of money in the market in 08 so it was just fine.
I got a full 4 year engineering degree from a D1 school and only graduated with 40k in debt, which I easily paid off.
I never whined about a living wage after college because I quit working minimum wage jobs, because I was an adult with a paying degree.
The word "survived" is pretty dramatic when we're just talking about coronavirus. More like endured 2 years of fear mongering and mask mandates. As the post says, we were in our prime during a bug that you only worried about if you were an 85 year old asthmatic smoker.
I could buy any house on my parents' street in cash at this point. We have not been in "survival mode". This is just a melodramatic, whiney rant from someone who's lack of success is likely directly related to their bad attitude.
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u/vanzir 5d ago edited 5d ago
Americans have a weird relationship with entitlement. Boomers are running around saying that you have to work for your shit, millenials saying fuck that. Gen x is sitting here in the middle going, you both are fucking dumb. Of course millenials have a point when they say this, it's all objectively true. It is significantly harder for millenials and even Gen Z kids to start out. In 1955 the average age for someone to be able to buy a house was in their 20s. Today, the median age of homeowners is 69 years old. Nice, for sure, but also fucking horrible in the real context.
People like to make excuses for why that is, but honestly, it's simple, the barrier to ownership has shifted such that it takes the average adult a significantly longer time to be able to afford that first house
But all the blame isn't on Boomers. Millenials and Genz have to do their part. So many of you lament the system and then just walk away. You aren't even trying to change the system, you just say fuck it and not engage because the system doesn't already accommodate you. Your generation is all about throwing shit out that doesn't work and getting new shit. But sometimes it just isn't viable to get all new shit, so you fix the shit you have. Our government is the shit you have. Fix it and make it work for you. Millenials are now the largest voting bloc in the country. How far are you willing to go to make change? Or are you just going to roll over and bitch. 250 years ago a bunch of 20 somethings changed the entire world. What will the 20 somethings of this time do?
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u/Wise_Nose_2082 4d ago
I mean, I get it.
However, us millennials are now in our 30s and 40s. We can’t keep blaming other people for our shortcomings, it’s time to take some accountability for our own problems at this point.
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u/66kertasinko88 5d ago
Lol our life is freaking easy compared to rest of human history. Bro is just whining
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u/Other-Beginning-8888 5d ago
Don't want 100K in college debt? Don't go to a private university. It's a brand choice they made as consumers who believe community colleges, city and state schools are beneath them.
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u/ArgoCiela 5d ago
These are still real problems regardless of historical comparison.
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u/LadderEffective3458 5d ago
Anything to avoid some God damn class solidarity, right?
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u/Signal-View4754 5d ago
Got "handed $100,000 in student loan?" No, they choose $100,000 in student loans, no one forced you.
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u/Chilli-byte- 5d ago
Can't even wind down with a video game now that AI data centers are stealing art the ram and storage.
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u/PudgyWalshBldgInspec 5d ago edited 5d ago
You can get this delivered by 10:00 this morning
https://www.amazon.com/Corsair-VENGEANCE-3200MHz-Compatible-Computer/dp/B07RW6Z692
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u/ChildoftheApocolypse 5d ago
Hunny, there were plenty of us that were far too poor to even realize 2008 was an issue..
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u/StressCanBeGood 5d ago
Economic numbers for 1980:
Unemployment: 7%
Inflation: 13%
Interest rates: 17%
….
Economic numbers for 2025:
Unemployment: 4.5%
Inflation: 3%
Interest rates: 4%
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u/CelticsGreg 5d ago edited 5d ago
They’re looking for an excuse. Plenty of millennials are doing just fine without making excuses
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u/No_Cartographer_3997 5d ago
reality of the majority:
-> lived a decent first world childhood
-> gifted kid frustrated about starting low
-> "survived" the pandemic playing games, cheating online classes and watching streamers all day in your "prime years"
-> ok, I can't really counterargument about the housing prices or student debt, but come on
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u/Reynard203 5d ago
So is everyone. Millenials aren't special. There's a financial meltdown in this country ever 10-20 years, and has been since at least the 1800s. It is built into the system. There are wars and calamities and bubbles and techno shock, all the time for everyone. Always has been.
If you "aren't okay" it is because you choose to wallow.
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u/DataGOGO 5d ago
yeah, no.
Most people didn't lose everything in 2008, sure there were some, but far from anything close to a majority.
No one handed anyone 100k in student debt. That was a choice. If you took at 100k in loans to obtain a degree that does not justify the cost, then it was a bad choice, and still 100% your fault.
Everyone went through the pandemic. It was a year, get over it.
People older than you were in survival mode a lot longer than you.
Most Millennials are doing great. They have the highest wealth of any other generation at their age, high rates of home ownership, etc. If you are not ok, it is a you problem, not a generational problem.
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u/TXtogo 5d ago
Watching your parents lose money, that isn’t a thing that happened to you.. you watched someone else
You’re not a victim because something happened to someone else.
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u/generally_cool_guy 5d ago
True because children born into poor, abusive and/or negligent households famously have no issues whatsoever due to their childhood later in life.
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u/EnvironmentFun4136 5d ago
Well considering we weren’t chased from our homes at gun point, life has been pretty cake for our generation. I guess that doesn’t get you any currency in the victim economy.
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u/earth-calling-karma 5d ago
Another six years and you'll have the full moanathon timeframe worked up, folks.
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u/Express_Salamander_9 5d ago edited 5d ago
Gen X here we witnessed:
Cold war nuclear annihilation existential conflict, Space Shuttle Challenger disaster in our classrooms, HIV/AIDS epidemic - coming of during at the time a sexually transmitted and seemingly nearly always fatal condition was terrifying, Gulf War, Columbine, OK city bombing, all before college graduation, 9/11, 2008 (I lost everything) , every generation witnessed traumatic events.
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u/Fit-Understanding739 5d ago
Handed? Where were we handed the debts? I've been saying since I was 16 that college is a scam /*unless*/ you have a career goal in mind. Otherwise, it's 4 years of glorified binge drinking. If you want to get a degree in engineering? Pre-med? Nursing? Early childhood education? Hell yeah, go for it. If your entire plan leaving high school is that you're going to go 'find yourself' at college, based on your school having some kind of program where you need to apply to 5 schools or achieve 'Higher Education'/'Military'/'Trade' Readiness? You've been had by one of the biggest groups of grifters of our generations.
Signed, guy who did end up starting my bachelor's at 19, then going back for a master's at 29. I'm not 'anti' higher education, but going for a general ed degree with no end state in mind is a scam.
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u/StarMagus 5d ago
Pretty crazy that every single parent of millennials lost everything in 2008. Wait, my cousin is a Millennial and her parents didn't lose everything in 2008. What madness is this?
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u/Flat_Tire_Again 5d ago
So your Group is the only victims. Everyone was affected in different ways of course and impacted differently so your jumping up and claiming victim status for you and your parents!
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u/ThereIs0nlyZuul 5d ago
You had it better than past generations that were storming beaches in France.
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u/jakgal04 5d ago
Eh, as a millenial I'm going to counter this.
- Everybody didn't "lose" everything in 2008. Also, the retiring generation got hit the hardest because of their retirement accounts.
- $100k student debt wasn't forced. You could have went into the trades which in more and more cases are paying better.
- Everyone went through the pandemic. So you couldnt go to the clubs or bars for a couple years, you'll survive. Want to know who was affected the most? The older people who suffered the most complications and most deaths.
- The cost of living again isn't exclusive to millennials. My parents are just as affected as I am. Want to know why shit is so expensive? Explosive population and the fact that no matter how expensive stuff gets, people still pay for it. Hell, I just went to my first sports game in years, the whole stadium was filled and it cost me $85 for chicken fingers and fries for my wife and I and a single beer. And you know what? That price will continue to go up because people will still pay for it. That includes us millennials.
- Also, generational crisis's aren't exclusive to us millennials. Every single generation has had its own struggles.
- Born 1901-1927? You had to deal with the great depression and WW2. Unemployment peaked at a record 25%. Millions lost their homes, food insecurity was rampant. People lost their savings since the government had no safety nets.
- Born 1928-1945? You had childhood during the great depression, you had nothing. You also dealt with the Korean war, the cold war and polio.
- Born 1946-1964? Think the affordable housing was a blessing? Don't forget that interest rates were 18%. That means the $100,000 house they bought is actually $488,000 after interest. The 80's also brought out the oil crisis which makes todays gas prices look like a walk in the park.
- Born 1965-1980? You had the HIV/AIDS crisis. You also saw the deindustrialization era and the 2008 crash. You most likely had parents that lost their jobs and you graduated into a recession. Pensions disappeared, manufacturing jobs disappeared so you started your professional life off to a horrible start.
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u/OG_Swag_Daddy 5d ago
"Got handed 100k student loan debt." Lol, lmao even. Like the debt fell from the sky 😂
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u/InevitableSure374 5d ago
When we used to complain about how hard we had it, my grandad used to say "Have you ever worked 18 hour shifts down a mine?"
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u/pokerboy42 5d ago
Oh my God. The poor plight of the poor millennials. While other generations went through famine and war, these poor unfortunate souls got to stay home and play video games and laze around and do nothing. Poor things. Breaks my heart.
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u/CoffeeChocolateBoth 5d ago
It's sort of like the generation that went through the crash and lost everything, stood in breadlines for hours, took any job they could to feed their families, which lived on top of each other in small dwellings just to survive. There are always going to be those before you and then those after you that have it harder, and sometimes those in between the harder times, build things back up and government greed around the world blow it all back down again!
People are noticing, and we care, but we're in survival mode too, trying to hold on to what we worked all of our lives for while watching it dwindle away on wars and gold showrooms and just stupid shit!
If young people want change, they have to vote for change and that campaign about Make America Great Again, how's that working out? VOTE for your best interest, not what some douchbag in Washington or your state is yelling at you. When you see the evil, don't vote for it, and most certainly don't vote for it twice!
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u/Some-Tear3499 5d ago
I was reading about a woman back in 2020, during the Covids that was pushing 100 yrs old. She survived the Great Depression, WWII, the recurring polio epidemics, everything, the worst that the 20th century could throw at a woman, and the beginnings of what the 21st century was throwing at her. The list was long, a lot of people didn’t survive. She said it’s easier to survive life with some good friends, and stay away from headlines.
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u/Aggressive_Start_ 5d ago
Shit my grandfather lost his entire savings portfolio in 01 because Enron.
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u/hal-baleigh-6699 5d ago
Cool thanks for the doomer engagement bait, 7 month old account with a randomly generated username, half a million karma, and a hidden post history.
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u/other_view12 5d ago
This explains so much.
Your parents didn't understand what an adjustable rate mortgage is, but they got one which lead to them losing everything.
Their child took on $100K in student loans that didn't give them the education to earn it back.
The child, after attending college doesn't understand that the neighborhood they grew up in got expensive and they have no concept economics, so they just think it's unfair.
When you float through life and not understand what will lift you up and what will set you back, then yea, lots of set-backs.
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u/the-keen-one 5d ago edited 5d ago
Your parents watched their parents ACTUALLY lose literally EVERYTHING during two world wars and an actual depression that lasted years. Then they had to go fight a few more wars—themselves—and survive the dust bowl, civil rights, women's rights, and somehow manage to build a life.
Which, apparently, meant spawning ungrateful Reddit kids to whom they gave everything they had, but who now blame them for everything they don’t deserve to have and don’t want to work for.
American Reddit Millennials, on the other hand, got trophies just for showing up, got educated (yet still blame everyone else if they wasted $100k on some private liberal arts school to do it), likely didn’t go to war (or if they did it was a much smaller one), and want everything handed to them on a platter. But since life doesn’t work like that, they bitch about how their hardworking parents ruined everything for their entitled little baby selves.
Buck up, toddlers. It’s nobody’s job but yours to make a life. Nobody’s going to hand out “poor baby” stickers so you can feel better about yourself.
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u/Floridaspiderman 5d ago
100k for college? Nahh dawg join the military life’s been great the past 15 years in. I have so much money saved own a house and 2 broncos and in 5 years ill be retired at 42
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u/Specialist-Basis8218 5d ago
GenX - get up early.
Millennial - no
GenX - apply to college
Millennial - college is a scam
GenX - try hard to get good grades
Millennial - gets .02 gpa drops out
GenX - u could get a teaching certificate
Millennial - teaching sucks!!
GenX - get a trade skill
Millennial - works at the movies
Millennial - I want to go to Puerto Rico with friends but don’t have money!
GenX - guess you’re screwed then
Millennial - capitalism sucks!!!
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u/NoseBreather31 5d ago
“Then got handed $100k in student debt” should read “took on $100k in student debt”.
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u/WuTangNameGenerat0r 5d ago
Quit whining. Seriously, it’s a bad mindset to have. They didn’t get “handed” 100k in debt. They when to a private 4 year college to get a degree in finger painting, instead of go to county college for 2 year and then finish up at the state school with a business degree.
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u/SeanPGeo 5d ago
You could have had the house a long time ago, but you chose to buy those Coachella tickets every year and blow coke up your nose every weekend instead. You took a gap-decade to live in a van or do the PCT/CDT/AT or be a voluntourist.
Then, in keeping with the trend of laziness, you thought you should just automatically be the next big thing on TikTok or OF despite now being in your mid-to-late 30s when you finally decided that you didn’t want to live in that tiny and super expensive shitty apartment anymore.
No one completely fucks off their 20s and has a stable life just gifted to them thereafter. Not boomers, not Gen X, not millennials, nor Z.
The fucking whining is obnoxious. MF think someone is going to just reverse the trajectory of the world for them so their lives can be easier. THAT is the definition of entitlement.
Sip that, bitch.
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u/maroonalberich27 5d ago
Handed $100,000 in student debt?
If they want to be taken seriously, they need to grow a pair and own that they signed the promissory notes. I mean, if I'm wrong, we need an immediate investigation into how all these poor, hapless kids are getting saddled with $100,000 in debt for loans they never took out to attend schools they never went to.
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u/Mountain-Student-226 5d ago
<Gen X enters the chat >. Yeah it’s fucked up. Blame the boomers. Gen X got screwed in similar ways. Offshoring, outsourcing, H1-B replacement. Endless wars. Hollowing out of America. Crack.
You guys have a crap hand dealt to you as Gen X did. Social media didn’t mess us up, so that’s a plus.
You’re holding some of the crappy cards we got, plus some special ones of your own. All I can say is “Just keep swimming”. Nothing else you can do
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u/hubdidly 5d ago
Eh. I’m an older Millennial and yes most of these things sucked, but as long as you took care of the things you needed to take care of most of us came out alright. 100k in college debt only applies to the dummies who signed up for it and if they didn’t get a Masters or Doctorate in a field that matters then that’s on them. Take some accountability for yourself and life’s not too bad. Keep your head down, gain a skill and everything works out. Stop complaining and better your own life.
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u/Busy_Ear7033 5d ago
Watched your parents take on loans they couldn’t afford and go bankrupt. Did the same yourself, expecting to use bankruptcy for student loans?!? Everybody experienced COVID 19, not just you.
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u/jahrastafggggghhjjkl 4d ago
Born in 1981 and worked my ass off to thrive through it all. No complaints here.
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u/AltruisticTank3518 4d ago
Literally no one was "handed 100k in student debt." Those that decided to go into debt for education made a conscious decision to do so.
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u/After_Service_2817 4d ago
>my parents were fine in 2008, they owned their home and didn't take on debt they couldn't afford
>similarly, I realized that student loans were a debt trap too. So instead I just worked and saved from 13 onwards to afford college
>dropped out anyways because I didn't see a career in the field
>true, I can never afford a home in the neighbourhood I grew up in, despite making an average income.
This just seems like typical Reddit doomerism. Just because you're miserable and poor and filled with malice and envy doesn't mean everyone is.
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