4 ms·

As someone born in 1989, you are out of touch. The average person my age has nothing and is living on dog food.

ryandrake 5y ago
Born in the mid 70s. My (single) parent was able to provide a roof over our heads, health care, and significantly helped pay for my education, heck, eventually accumulating a few [typical boomer] toys like a second home and a boat... all on a single school teacher's salary. He retired stably and comfortably with a predictable pension. I (roughly 20 years younger) just recently managed to gain some financial stability, and by some miracle, now own a home. High deductible health plan means I avoid going to the doctor unless limbs are falling off. When my kid is of college age, it will be $200K per semester and she'll have to go into debt slavery to afford it. The idea of owning things like a second home seems ridiculous. If I ever retire, my lifestyle will depend to a large degree on whether or not my crappy 401(k) goes up or down. The next generation, 20 years younger than me, is utterly fucked, in basically all ways. I thank my lucky stars that I wasn't born in the late 90s. I think we'd all be willing to give up our smartphones if it meant going back to the "easy mode" of decades past.
- jrochkind1 5y ago
  heck, I'd consider giving up smartphones a plus!
- nickpp 5y ago
  Logical result of population growth plus highly regulating the home&health care markets. The next generation's only chances for success are in newly created, (yet) unregulated markets, like IT was for us. There is no surprise teacher salaries haven’t increase much even though parents are so eager to spend to ensure their kids success: heavy government involvement in education market.
- vineyardmike 5y ago
  > Born in the mid 70s. My (single) parent was able to provide a roof over our heads, health care, and significantly helped pay for my education, heck, eventually accumulating a few [typical boomer] toys like a second home and a boat... all on a single school teacher's salary. He retired stably and comfortably with a predictable pension. This sort of story is not uncommon, or crazy to believe. That said, the market conditions of that period of the 1900s were crazy, (inflations etc), so its wild to think about just how crazy it was that this was happening.
- jjav 5y ago
  > The next generation, 20 years younger than me, is utterly fucked, in basically all ways. I thank my lucky stars that I wasn't born in the late 90s. There's good and there's bad, it's not that clear cut. Entry level salaries today are through the roof like nothing I've ever experienced before. I started working in the early 90s with a masters degree from a top school (CMU) for $32K and that was a good job, most of my peers started in the high $20Ks. According to https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/ https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/ $30K then is just under $60K today. As HN knows, starting salaries these days are way more than $60K. I've personally hired new grads for over $150K, possibly closer to $200K if the RSUs do well. That's over $100K in early-90s dollars. Even our SVP wasn't making that kind of money back then. So the early career income potential is so high today that it actually becomes possible to implement things like FIRE and retire in your 30s.

Born in the mid 70s. My (single) parent was able to provide a roof over our heads, health care, and significantly helped pay for my education, heck, eventually accumulating a few [typical boomer] toys like a second home and a boat... all on a single school teacher's salary. He retired stably and comfortably with a predictable pension. I (roughly 20 years younger) just recently managed to gain some financial stability, and by some miracle, now own a home. High deductible health plan means I avoid going to the doctor unless limbs are falling off. When my kid is of college age, it will be $200K per semester and she'll have to go into debt slavery to afford it. The idea of owning things like a second home seems ridiculous. If I ever retire, my lifestyle will depend to a large degree on whether or not my crappy 401(k) goes up or down. The next generation, 20 years younger than me, is utterly fucked, in basically all ways. I thank my lucky stars that I wasn't born in the late 90s. I think we'd all be willing to give up our smartphones if it meant going back to the "easy mode" of decades past.

jrochkind1 5y ago
heck, I'd consider giving up smartphones a plus!
nickpp 5y ago
Logical result of population growth plus highly regulating the home&health care markets. The next generation's only chances for success are in newly created, (yet) unregulated markets, like IT was for us. There is no surprise teacher salaries haven’t increase much even though parents are so eager to spend to ensure their kids success: heavy government involvement in education market.
vineyardmike 5y ago
> Born in the mid 70s. My (single) parent was able to provide a roof over our heads, health care, and significantly helped pay for my education, heck, eventually accumulating a few [typical boomer] toys like a second home and a boat... all on a single school teacher's salary. He retired stably and comfortably with a predictable pension. This sort of story is not uncommon, or crazy to believe. That said, the market conditions of that period of the 1900s were crazy, (inflations etc), so its wild to think about just how crazy it was that this was happening.
jjav 5y ago
> The next generation, 20 years younger than me, is utterly fucked, in basically all ways. I thank my lucky stars that I wasn't born in the late 90s. There's good and there's bad, it's not that clear cut. Entry level salaries today are through the roof like nothing I've ever experienced before. I started working in the early 90s with a masters degree from a top school (CMU) for $32K and that was a good job, most of my peers started in the high $20Ks. According to https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/ https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/ $30K then is just under $60K today. As HN knows, starting salaries these days are way more than $60K. I've personally hired new grads for over $150K, possibly closer to $200K if the RSUs do well. That's over $100K in early-90s dollars. Even our SVP wasn't making that kind of money back then. So the early career income potential is so high today that it actually becomes possible to implement things like FIRE and retire in your 30s.