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Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

nytimes.com

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Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#21

Post by randomdata »

noobermin wrote: post #15
aaron-lebo wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much disposable income do you need to be free? Cheap car, cheap rent, every form of media ever for about $50 a month. You can do that easily on 30k. If you can't make 30k a year, you've got a limited skillset, it's not anyone else's fault. What's amazing for US millenials in particular is just how much we've got and how little we appreciate it.

You are extremely ignorant of the cost of living in the US if you think 30K is enough to live on.

Why are costs so high in the US? As a Canadian, where things are said to be more expensive than in the US, $30K CAD (~$24K USD) is more than enough for a person without dependents to live quite comfortably.

The median income in the US is not far off $30K[1], so what do half the population do?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_...

Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#22

Post by yahna »

randomdata wrote: post #21
noobermin wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are extremely ignorant of the cost of living in the US if you think 30K is enough to live on.

Why are costs so high in the US? As a Canadian, where things are said to be more expensive than in the US, $30K CAD (~$24K USD) is more than enough for a person without dependents to live quite comfortably. The median income in the US is not far off $30K[1], so what do half the population do? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_...

No it's not.

Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#24

Post by manbearpigg »

The Founding Fathers of the United States said, everyone will be free to do whatever he pleases. It produced the greatest culture, the greatest technology, and the greatest generation in the history of this planet.

Leftists came along and said, I'd rather hold a gun to the head of people who produce wealth and make them give me some. That's why they don't like freedom.

Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#25

Post by ekanes »

danhak wrote: post #17
Brendinooo wrote: post #11

No one born in the mid-80s onward ever faced an outside existential threat like Hitler or the Soviets. It's not hard to imagine that people who only know relative freedom have a harder time appreciating that freedom. The grass is always greener elsewhere. Fear is a good answer here, though phrases like "helicopter parenting" and "victimhood culture" might bely some existing biases by the author. Perhaps the fear of t…

Very fascinating. You argue that millennials favor restrictions on hate speech because they have not experienced anything like Hitler. Yet Germany censors hate speech precisely because of that history.

Hate speech is always a problem. "let's kill all the $value" isn't the type of free speech that most people are trying to preserve.

Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#26

Post by randomdata »

yahna wrote: post #22
randomdata wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are costs so high in the US? As a Canadian, where things are said to be more expensive than in the US, $30K CAD (~$24K USD) is more than enough for a person without dependents to live quite comfortably. The median income in the US is not far off $30K[1], so what do half the population do? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_...

No it's not.

No it's not what?

For what it is worth, the median income in Canada is also ~$30K[1].

[1] http://www.statcan.gc.ca/tables-tableaux/sum-som/l01/cst01/f...

Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#27

Post by tempYeez »

aaron-lebo wrote: post #10
mbillie1 wrote: post #7

In the US at any rate you need a fairly significant amount of disposable income to meaningfully be free. Of course you are "free" to (attempt to) acquire this income, and most people reading HN will have already done so. But for a large swath of young people working low wage jobs, living at home because they can't afford rent, the notion of "freedom" might not seem that significant.

How much disposable income do you need to be free? Cheap car, cheap rent, every form of media ever for about $50 a month. You can do that easily on 30k. If you can't make 30k a year, you've got a limited skillset, it's not anyone else's fault. What's amazing for US millenials in particular is just how much we've got and how little we appreciate it.

Insurance, college loans, food, taxes. Yeh I can't image you live in the US if you think you can have that for 30k a year. It would take 30k in disposable income which would be around 75k+ and thats for a small town.

Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#28

Post by the_gastropod »

noobermin wrote: post #15
aaron-lebo wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much disposable income do you need to be free? Cheap car, cheap rent, every form of media ever for about $50 a month. You can do that easily on 30k. If you can't make 30k a year, you've got a limited skillset, it's not anyone else's fault. What's amazing for US millenials in particular is just how much we've got and how little we appreciate it.

You are extremely ignorant of the cost of living in the US if you think 30K is enough to live on.

I suggest that you may be a bit out of touch. Over 40% of Americans earn under $30k per year [1]. And many more choose to live on this much. Ralph Nader, for example, lives on $25,000 per year [2], and accomplishes far more than anyone I personally know.

[1] https://dqydj.com/income-percentile-calculator/

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Nader#Personality_and_ch...

Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#29

Post by yahna »

danhak wrote: post #17
Brendinooo wrote: post #11

No one born in the mid-80s onward ever faced an outside existential threat like Hitler or the Soviets. It's not hard to imagine that people who only know relative freedom have a harder time appreciating that freedom. The grass is always greener elsewhere. Fear is a good answer here, though phrases like "helicopter parenting" and "victimhood culture" might bely some existing biases by the author. Perhaps the fear of t…

Very fascinating. You argue that millennials favor restrictions on hate speech because they have not experienced anything like Hitler. Yet Germany censors hate speech precisely because of that history.

Maybe millenials think that this whole "if you don't let white supremacists march through the streets with guns then democracy will fail" is a rather silly notion.

Re: Why Are Millennials Wary of Freedom?

#30

Post by slezakattack »

aaron-lebo wrote: post #10
mbillie1 wrote: post #7

In the US at any rate you need a fairly significant amount of disposable income to meaningfully be free. Of course you are "free" to (attempt to) acquire this income, and most people reading HN will have already done so. But for a large swath of young people working low wage jobs, living at home because they can't afford rent, the notion of "freedom" might not seem that significant.

How much disposable income do you need to be free? Cheap car, cheap rent, every form of media ever for about $50 a month. You can do that easily on 30k. If you can't make 30k a year, you've got a limited skillset, it's not anyone else's fault. What's amazing for US millenials in particular is just how much we've got and how little we appreciate it.

You missed the student debt part. There's a lot of people I know (my brother included) who went to the more expensive schools for various reasons and walk out with some debt that's hard to pay back.
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