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Millennials, compared to older generations, have to pay more of their income towards housing, have higher student loan debt to manage, are getting married later
by davidf18 8y ago
Millennials, compared to older generations, have to pay more of their income towards housing, have higher student loan debt to manage, are getting married later and are starting families later as they feel they don't have the financial resources.
Moreover, thanks to automation and globalization, good paying jobs in many disciplines can be harder to come by -- perhaps greatest in the working class.
They feel they have to work harder than older generations to keep up and that is because they do.
The reasons for the higher cost of housing and of education has to do with the older generations using politics to take created wealth for themselves and not to help younger generations has been done in the past.
For example, in NYC, DC, Boston, Seattle, SF, LA, London, there are zoning laws that restrict zoning density creating an artificial scarcity in housing while benefiting primarily wealthy landlords.
States are paying smaller and smaller proportions of public university budgets with the remainder having to be made up of student loans.
Special interests stopped a bill in committee in the Senate of California that would have allowed construction of 5 stories buildings near mass transit stops.
Japan realizes the harm of zoning density restrictions and thus has federal laws overriding any local laws. The result: in 2014, there were 140,000 housing units were built in Tokyo vs. less than 90,000 for all of California.
Ultimately, Millennials need to focus and prioritize these issues in order to have a future -- becoming politically involved to help lower housing costs and university education.
Specifically, both Democrats and Republicans are focused on so many issues instead of focusing on what is important: Fixing local zoning laws so that there is affordable housing for Millennials and taxpayer money contributing proportions of public university education that had been spent in the past.