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Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

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Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#101

Post by jakeogh »

dgabriel wrote: post #76
9HZZRfNlpR wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People's homes were much less luxurious, as their lifestyle. A lot of the things we take for granted the people at the time they only dreamed about.

In the last 6 years, my rent has gone up by about 800/mo. It's the same apartment.

Why rent? You are paying that money anyway. Get a FHA loan. You could be on the other side of that equation.

Sure it seems bad for you, but in actual fact, the place you are living has gone up in value. That's unambiguously a good thing.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#102

Post by bartcobain »

tathougies wrote: post #55

Millenial here, and I just don't understand why my generation is so pessimistic. Things are simply better than when we were children. Perhaps it's having immigrants for parents, but my life just seems great compared to my parents and my aunts and uncles.

LOL. Even this comment reflects part of the generation. Probably you are writing this from a first world country. The selfish gene makes people blind.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#104

Post by ta1234567890 »

ranie93 wrote: post #70
xyzzyz wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A single mother working as a waitress at Denny's in the 1980's had more spending power than a college educated cubicle drone in 2019 Do you have any source to support this? Because real median personal[1] income went up almost 50% since then[2]. [1] — don't confuse it with real median household income, which didn't grow nearly as much, because of a significant rise in single-person households which pushes the median…

I'm not the OP, and they may be overstating statistics (happy to be shown otherwise). At the same time, wage stagnation is no myth: "From 1973 to 2013, hourly compensation of a typical (production/nonsupervisory) worker rose just 9 percent while productivity increased 74 percent. This breakdown of pay growth has been especially evident in the last decade, affecting both college- and non-college-educated workers as we…

Thank you for putting all of that info together in a very easy way to read and to follow the sources.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#105

Post by save_ferris »

dmschulman wrote: post #54
rubicon33 wrote: post #38

My wife and I are not having kids. If you could sum it up into one short explanation as to why: My wife and I don't believe that the future is going to be a better place. Chief among the reasons are wealth inequality and buying power. If I can barely afford to buy a house now with a great job, I shudder to think what my kids would be faced with.

Is it that you can't afford to buy a house or that you can't afford to buy a house in the Bay Area?

Real estate prices are getting out of control in many of the US cities with healthy job markets, it's not just the Bay Area.

Home prices in my old neighborhood in Louisville, KY have skyrocketed in the last several years as "shotgun" style homes have become trendy in the area. Last time I visited, I saw a one such home on the market for about $350K, which would've gone for roughly a 3rd of that about 15 years ago.

The housing affordability is being felt in a lot of places, not just the west coast.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#106

Post by el_benhameen »

yeahitslikethat wrote: post #75
austincheney wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s really hard to take that seriously. If social media is causing you heartburn then back away from it or delete your accounts. I deleted my Facebook account nearly a decade ago and deleted my Reddit account last year. Nobody is forcing you to be a drug addict slave of online media. Some of your list looks like entitled anxiety desperately in search of sympathy. For example you mention rising sea levels. Do you own…

That's like saying if heroin is causing you pain then just back away from it. Rising sea levels will kill and or displace millions of people. That's heartbreaking for those who care .

And it's terrifying (or should be) to even those who are only self interested. Displacement of millions means mass migration and destabilization of larger parts of the world. The climate change and warming that cause it mean crop failures, novel diseases, and weather changes that will have the potential of affecting everyone.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#107

Post by emddudley »

xyzzyz wrote: post #26
syn0byte wrote: post #15

A single mother working as a waitress at Denny's in the 1980's had more spending power than a college educated cubicle drone in 2019; Let's talk about how is social media's fault! Twice in the last 20 years - more than any other time in US history combined - The Presidential election went to the candidate that LOST the popular vote; These generations just lack a proper understanding of civics! The beatings will conti…

A single mother working as a waitress at Denny's in the 1980's had more spending power than a college educated cubicle drone in 2019 Do you have any source to support this? Because real median personal[1] income went up almost 50% since then[2]. [1] — don't confuse it with real median household income, which didn't grow nearly as much, because of a significant rise in single-person households which pushes the median…

Best I could find... apologies for any mistakes below.

Purchasing power in the U.S. has stayed roughly the same since 1964. [0]

The median annual income for single women with children in the U.S. in 1985 was $16,431 [1]. Couldn't find information on just waiters/waitresses. I believe these are 1985 dollars? If so, that income is nearly $40,000 in 2018 dollars.

The median annual income for waiters/waitresses in the U.S. in 2018 was $21,780. [2]

[0] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/08/07/for-most-us...

[1] https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/income-p...

[2] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/food-preparation-and-serving/waiters...

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#108

Post by jerf »

oldjokes wrote: post #20
luckydata wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maybe we're also the first generation in a while that's seeing things considered normal by our parents systematically out of reach? Maybe we're a little pissed off that the implicit promise society made us if we "worked hard and played by the rules" like politicians like to say is being systematically broken? It's pretty clear it's not just the way we fell about things, we're objectively worse off than the previous c…

I hear this complaint a lot, but never really any details. What specifically are you mad about being out of reach and which metrics do you think you're worse off on compared to previous generations? Honest question. Is it just materials and money per person? Something more?

Part of the problem is that the economic changes have been very uneven, and I don't mean in the "social inequality" sense, I mean, the price increases are very uneven: https://www.financialsamurai.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/...

If you want to buy a big TV and a phone, now is the best time in history. If you want a college degree, some childcare, and some medical care, it's going to cost you a lot more than it did your parents.

The other problem is that even putting sarcasm about TVs vs. health care aside, things that increase in price by 125% loom a lot larger in your budget than things that decreased by 80%, just by the sheer numerical weight. Saving $9500 on a TV (not to mention you wouldn't have even bought such a large one if they weren't so cheap to begin with) doesn't make up for the house you want costing $100,000 more.

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#109

Post by tathougies »

bartcobain wrote: post #102
tathougies wrote: post #55

Millenial here, and I just don't understand why my generation is so pessimistic. Things are simply better than when we were children. Perhaps it's having immigrants for parents, but my life just seems great compared to my parents and my aunts and uncles.

LOL. Even this comment reflects part of the generation. Probably you are writing this from a first world country. The selfish gene makes people blind.

I am writing from a first world country but the news source cited(Bloomberg) is from a 1st world country too, so...

Re: Millennials and Gen Z Increasingly Pessimistic About Their Lives, Survey Finds

#110

Post by sjg007 »

SamuelAdams wrote: post #39

> Less than three in ten Millennials expect to stay at their current job for the next five years. Well yeah. I can stick around my current company for 5 years and get a 2-4% increase each year, or job hop every 2-3 years and get a 20% raise each time. With a market like this, why wouldn't you job hop? Loyalty to a company only inhibits you.

Lots of reasons: risk in the new job, different benefits, different job tasks and promotion opportunities.
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