13 ms·

I guess this is the real motive behind the article: But here’s the thing. Regardless of intent, these Millennials are telling an older generation of elite Amer

by qntty 9y ago

I guess this is the real motive behind the article: But here’s the thing. Regardless of intent, these Millennials are telling an older generation of elite Americans — the very people whose policies and financial decisions kneecapped the economy — what they want to hear: that everything is more or less okay, and young people just need to be more thoughtful about their money. And that’s a shitty idea to perpetuate. Because whatever happens in the years ahead, penny-pinching will likely remain a lifestyle enhancement for bourgeois Millennials who possess enough money to enjoy the dividends of being thrifty. For most of us, there are no dividends: just thrift. It's not about the advice itself -- the advice all seems pretty reasonable -- it's about the place that advice has in the story we tell ourselves about young people. I myself practice many of these thrifty tips, but I cringe to think that the blog posts that people write about them will be used to justify continuing to build a world where they are more and more necessary.

malvosenior 9y ago
I think there’s real value in spreading the message of thrift. The 20th century saw a massive build up of the consumerist lifestyle. It’s going to take a lot of work to back that out, so we might as well start now. I’ve personally seen people with high five figure student debt go on regular international trips. These people more or less live paycheck to paycheck and save specifically for travel (or use credit cards — if they can get them). Educating people as to why that might be a bad idea and creating a supportive culture of anti-consumerism seems like a good idea. Sure there are policy decisions at play too, but being “frugal” can hardly hurt.
- qntty 9y ago
  No doubt. Again: the tips are great and many people would do well to listen to them. However, the larger question of the place that these tips have in the story that we tell ourselves about society is still an open question. There are multiple ways to place these tips in a larger context while still following them and regarding them as worthwhile. It's important to understand that there is a choice to be made here about the story we tell ourselves.
  - malvosenior 9y ago
    I don’t think there’s a way to place them in the larger context that makes them less useful though. It’s tough out there, try to be frugal, seems like great advice. I like that it’s not political as well. Once you move the discussion to policy, people get territorial. The “American dream” of the 20th century was never sustainable. We’re just now realizing that en masse. Being frugal is just a natural realignment of culture and reality.
    - qntty 9y ago
      I agree on the first point, but I think part of the point of this article is that there no such thing as "not political" since everything you say in public has a place in the public consciousness which is the engine of democracy. Regarding the American dream, maybe it's sustainable or maybe it's not, but it's clear that it would be a lot more sustainable if people where willing to create a world with fewer obstacles to attaining it e.g. by implementing universal health care. If we tell ourselves that people who can't afford health care probably deserve to struggle with money because they're not being frugal, then that's a problem.
      - malvosenior 9y ago
        This is my point. We agree that being frugal is good. Great! As for universal healthcare, good luck getting everyone to agree on that... I disagree that every word spoken in public is political. “Don’t touch the hot stove” is great advice. Let’s be free to have those kinds of conversations without dragging them into the political mud.
        qntty 9y ago
        I guess I should say that everything said in public has the potential to be political. Something that's political, in my mind, is anything that has significance for running the government or the larger social machine. "Don't touch the hot stove" could be political in a world where malfunctioning stoves are burning people. I think that "don't spend too much money" is political in a world that couldn't continue to function without the existence of people who will never have enough money no matter how frugal they are.
- bsder 9y ago
  Why not? They're screwed by the economy, so might as well go all in. We need to get to the idea that there are not enough good jobs for everybody. Once we get to that point, we can start to figure out what to do about it.
throwaway84742 9y ago
Most young people do need to be more thoughtful about their money, though. And the economy as a whole is, by multiple different metrics, the best it’s ever been. It’s just that this greatness needs to be spread a bit wider. In the capitalist system with a labor market as tight as we’ve ever seen it this is addressed by getting another job for more money. Now is a good time to do it. You are responsible for your own success.
- bsder 9y ago
  > In the capitalist system with a labor market as tight as we’ve ever seen it this is addressed by getting another job for more money. Is it tight? I see very few occupations with rising wages. That's the REAL test for a tight labor market. Let me be anecdotal for a moment ... I was at a conference recently where the companies had a panel session complaining about getting more people into the business. Unlike most software disciplines, they really do have an infeed problem. In addition, they are also getting poached and losing their junior guys from the shop floor. Okay, think I, I was a hiring manager in the DotCom Boom(tm), I understand getting poached in a narrow field. So, do you know who their primary opponents are? Amazon and Foxconn. Two of the worst employers on the planet. You are losing employees from your manufacturing line to Amazon warehousing and Foxconn manufacturing. Um, please go bankrupt and may your industry die in a fire if you treat people so badly as to lose them to Amazon and Foxconn.
  - throwaway84742 9y ago
    Wages are rising at the highest rate since 2009: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/02/02/582641530/u-s-economy-added-200-000-jobs-in-january https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/02/02/582641530.... And black unemployment is at historic lows a well.
    - AstralStorm 9y ago
      Rates do not matter unless they are over big time scales. You have conveniently picked a year just past the banking crisis... Does the absolute inflation and purchasing power adjusted value even match 90s?
vorpalhex 9y ago
> continuing to build a world where they are more and more necessary My grandmother can still, to this day, recount living in an apartment with no furniture except a mattress, with my grandfather who was employed as an engineer in New York. It took, by her estimate, about two years to have enough furniture before she was willing to invite over any sorts of company. Today you can furnish an apartment reasonably with about a months worth of wages. I know this because I helped take a friend who makes a bit over minimum wage to IKEA to get all their furniture for an apartment they moved into. The myth of decline is that - a myth. The economy is better then it has been in decades, violence is at an all time low, and jobs are widely available in many areas of the country. I have friends who complain about the economy "being destroyed", who max out credit cards to buy brand new cars and buy expensive home theaters. I have one friend who despite making six figures a year, took a predatory payday loan because she had spent her wages on expensive unused tools. That's not to blame "millennials" anymore than to blame any other generation. Bad financial choices have existed since the dawn of human history, but in many cases today they are choices, not pre-supposed economic outcomes. We can help correct that by teaching good finance skills (budgeting, doing things yourself instead of hiring people, focusing on cheaper hobbies, etc).
- falcolas 9y ago
  So, your proof that decline is a myth is that you can buy cheap, moderate quality, mass-manufactured furniture that didn't exist in your grandparents age? Something seems awry there.
  - m_mueller 9y ago
    I think GP does have a point while missing the bigger picture. Yes, low to average income people can today afford more stuff to make their life a bit better. But they also can‘t afford an apartment close to work (loosing anywhere from 2 to 5 hours of their day they cannot spend e.g. with their kids) and they cannot afford college tuition. That‘s what‘s creating perpetual poverty, i.e. low social mobility, which is IMO one of the most important aspects of a fully developed nation.
  - vorpalhex 9y ago
JKCalhoun 9y ago
> Regardless of intent, these Millennials are telling an older generation of elite Americans — the very people whose policies and financial decisions kneecapped the economy — what they want to hear: that everything is more or less okay, and young people just need to be more thoughtful about their money. Perhaps the article got that wrong though. It could be just as likely that the Millennials are saying that they are shunning the crass consumerism that the 'older generation of elite Americans' are steeped* in. * Boomers, "You're soaking in it." ;)
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
proofbygazing 9y ago
It's kind of hard for me to believe that some people's analysis of their own behavior is this tragically dependent on what other people think.

by qntty 9y ago

malvosenior 9y ago

I think there’s real value in spreading the message of thrift. The 20th century saw a massive build up of the consumerist lifestyle. It’s going to take a lot of work to back that out, so we might as well start now. I’ve personally seen people with high five figure student debt go on regular international trips. These people more or less live paycheck to paycheck and save specifically for travel (or use credit cards — if they can get them). Educating people as to why that might be a bad idea and creating a supportive culture of anti-consumerism seems like a good idea. Sure there are policy decisions at play too, but being “frugal” can hardly hurt.

qntty 9y ago
No doubt. Again: the tips are great and many people would do well to listen to them. However, the larger question of the place that these tips have in the story that we tell ourselves about society is still an open question. There are multiple ways to place these tips in a larger context while still following them and regarding them as worthwhile. It's important to understand that there is a choice to be made here about the story we tell ourselves.
- malvosenior 9y ago
  I don’t think there’s a way to place them in the larger context that makes them less useful though. It’s tough out there, try to be frugal, seems like great advice. I like that it’s not political as well. Once you move the discussion to policy, people get territorial. The “American dream” of the 20th century was never sustainable. We’re just now realizing that en masse. Being frugal is just a natural realignment of culture and reality.
  - qntty 9y ago
    I agree on the first point, but I think part of the point of this article is that there no such thing as "not political" since everything you say in public has a place in the public consciousness which is the engine of democracy. Regarding the American dream, maybe it's sustainable or maybe it's not, but it's clear that it would be a lot more sustainable if people where willing to create a world with fewer obstacles to attaining it e.g. by implementing universal health care. If we tell ourselves that people who can't afford health care probably deserve to struggle with money because they're not being frugal, then that's a problem.
    - malvosenior 9y ago
      This is my point. We agree that being frugal is good. Great! As for universal healthcare, good luck getting everyone to agree on that... I disagree that every word spoken in public is political. “Don’t touch the hot stove” is great advice. Let’s be free to have those kinds of conversations without dragging them into the political mud.
      - qntty 9y ago
        I guess I should say that everything said in public has the potential to be political. Something that's political, in my mind, is anything that has significance for running the government or the larger social machine. "Don't touch the hot stove" could be political in a world where malfunctioning stoves are burning people. I think that "don't spend too much money" is political in a world that couldn't continue to function without the existence of people who will never have enough money no matter how frugal they are.
bsder 9y ago
Why not? They're screwed by the economy, so might as well go all in. We need to get to the idea that there are not enough good jobs for everybody. Once we get to that point, we can start to figure out what to do about it.

throwaway84742 9y ago

Most young people do need to be more thoughtful about their money, though. And the economy as a whole is, by multiple different metrics, the best it’s ever been. It’s just that this greatness needs to be spread a bit wider. In the capitalist system with a labor market as tight as we’ve ever seen it this is addressed by getting another job for more money. Now is a good time to do it. You are responsible for your own success.

bsder 9y ago
> In the capitalist system with a labor market as tight as we’ve ever seen it this is addressed by getting another job for more money. Is it tight? I see very few occupations with rising wages. That's the REAL test for a tight labor market. Let me be anecdotal for a moment ... I was at a conference recently where the companies had a panel session complaining about getting more people into the business. Unlike most software disciplines, they really do have an infeed problem. In addition, they are also getting poached and losing their junior guys from the shop floor. Okay, think I, I was a hiring manager in the DotCom Boom(tm), I understand getting poached in a narrow field. So, do you know who their primary opponents are? Amazon and Foxconn. Two of the worst employers on the planet. You are losing employees from your manufacturing line to Amazon warehousing and Foxconn manufacturing. Um, please go bankrupt and may your industry die in a fire if you treat people so badly as to lose them to Amazon and Foxconn.
- throwaway84742 9y ago
  Wages are rising at the highest rate since 2009: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/02/02/582641530/u-s-economy-added-200-000-jobs-in-january https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/02/02/582641530.... And black unemployment is at historic lows a well.
  - AstralStorm 9y ago
    Rates do not matter unless they are over big time scales. You have conveniently picked a year just past the banking crisis... Does the absolute inflation and purchasing power adjusted value even match 90s?

vorpalhex 9y ago

> continuing to build a world where they are more and more necessary My grandmother can still, to this day, recount living in an apartment with no furniture except a mattress, with my grandfather who was employed as an engineer in New York. It took, by her estimate, about two years to have enough furniture before she was willing to invite over any sorts of company. Today you can furnish an apartment reasonably with about a months worth of wages. I know this because I helped take a friend who makes a bit over minimum wage to IKEA to get all their furniture for an apartment they moved into. The myth of decline is that - a myth. The economy is better then it has been in decades, violence is at an all time low, and jobs are widely available in many areas of the country. I have friends who complain about the economy "being destroyed", who max out credit cards to buy brand new cars and buy expensive home theaters. I have one friend who despite making six figures a year, took a predatory payday loan because she had spent her wages on expensive unused tools. That's not to blame "millennials" anymore than to blame any other generation. Bad financial choices have existed since the dawn of human history, but in many cases today they are choices, not pre-supposed economic outcomes. We can help correct that by teaching good finance skills (budgeting, doing things yourself instead of hiring people, focusing on cheaper hobbies, etc).

falcolas 9y ago
So, your proof that decline is a myth is that you can buy cheap, moderate quality, mass-manufactured furniture that didn't exist in your grandparents age? Something seems awry there.
- m_mueller 9y ago
  I think GP does have a point while missing the bigger picture. Yes, low to average income people can today afford more stuff to make their life a bit better. But they also can‘t afford an apartment close to work (loosing anywhere from 2 to 5 hours of their day they cannot spend e.g. with their kids) and they cannot afford college tuition. That‘s what‘s creating perpetual poverty, i.e. low social mobility, which is IMO one of the most important aspects of a fully developed nation.
- vorpalhex 9y ago

JKCalhoun 9y ago

> Regardless of intent, these Millennials are telling an older generation of elite Americans — the very people whose policies and financial decisions kneecapped the economy — what they want to hear: that everything is more or less okay, and young people just need to be more thoughtful about their money. Perhaps the article got that wrong though. It could be just as likely that the Millennials are saying that they are shunning the crass consumerism that the 'older generation of elite Americans' are steeped* in. * Boomers, "You're soaking in it." ;)

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

proofbygazing 9y ago

It's kind of hard for me to believe that some people's analysis of their own behavior is this tragically dependent on what other people think.