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Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

bbc.com

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Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#181

Post by dragonwriter »

ghaff wrote: post #97
BuckRogers wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a lot of us are. My parents are Boomers and we were born between 78 and 82. Technically being born in 78 makes you GenX. Yet if you have a brother born only 4 years later, it's another generation? We had the exact same experience, Atari 2600 on a TV that is now weird to even think existed. No TV remotes, walk up and change the channel. Rotary phones, city directories and phone books. Need the time and temp? Y…

From a technology standpoint, there was a real break around 1995 or so. It's not so much the consumer tech itself. Oh, it's incrementally advanced in a lot of ways but a 2016 laptop, for example, would be clearly recognizable as such to someone in 1995. A smartphone less so but it would have existing analogs in devices like the Palm Pilot. What would be vastly sea-change-levels different is the pervasiveness of conne…

> Oh, it's incrementally advanced in a lot of ways but a 2016 laptop, for example, would be clearly recognizable as such to someone in 1995. A smartphone less so but it would have existing analogs in devices like the Palm Pilot.

That's kind of backwards for 1995. Palm Pilots weren't around until 1996, but the first PDA+Phone combo -- a smartphone, except the name wasn't applied to that combination until much later -- was the IBM Simon in 1994 (though the first really popular PDA+Phone was the Nokia 9000 in 1996.) (Obviously, non-Palm PDAs were available and popular before 1995; the Psion Organizer had been around since 1984, and the Psion Series 3 in 1991 was a turning point for the category.)

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#182

Post by antisthenes »

snowwrestler wrote: post #176
_9vpl wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A home is no different from a car in that it also depreciates, things break, needs to be maintained, repaired, etc. The only real difference is that in major populated areas, the land it sits on tends to be rare and valuable, which allows its value to keep up with or even exceed the rate of inflation.

The biggest advantage of home ownership is the tax break. You can leverage capital 4:1 (with a 20% down payment) and your capital gains will be tax-free up to $250,000 per person. The second biggest advantage is that you can fix your housing costs. Good luck finding a rental that will have the same monthly payment for 30 years, but it's not hard to get a 30-year fixed rate mortgage.

You would be hard pressed to find rentals that have the same monthly payment even for 2 years, let alone 30.

I remember distinctly in 2008-2009, even as the housing prices were crashing, our rent went up by $90/month (outpacing inflation by 7%), and that's when we made the decision to buy a house (the $8000 first time homeowner credit/subsidy helped also)

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#183

Post by antisthenes »

gerbilly wrote: post #161

My feeling is that we've been giving our wealth away for trinkets. True wealth sustains life: strong social ties, housing, food and the means of production. We've been convinced to trade true wealth away for non-essentials. Fancy vacations in far away places and 2-3 cruises a year-people used to do that maybe once in their lives, 50inch flat panels in every second room in the house, huge houses with fewer kids in the…

> My feeling is that we've been giving our wealth away for trinkets.

If you want a great example of this, look at post-USSR Russia and what happens when you trade wealth for trinkets.

Massive regional concentrations of wealth, hopeless money-losing industries that are technologically behind by 25-30 years, massive brain drain, absolutely stagnated sciences, rising nationalism and censorship of the press.

But hey, at least gas is semi-cheap and everybody has cars and iphones.

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#184

Post by trentmb »

joshontheweb wrote: post #167
trentmb wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems hard enough to establish credibility for an in-office job these days. I can't even imagine trying to get a remote gig. Perhaps that says more about me though? Granted, I've deliberately eschewed larger cities, and as a consequence I've had a harder time convincing people that just because my degree was in math I can still be a competent developer.

I've found that my past employers actually didn't care at all about my degree. I actually never finished university but it never comes up. They want to see what I've built and hat is the determining factor. The first job is the hardest since you have to build a portfolio on your own. After that it has seemed pretty easy. Not trying to refute your point but rather to suggest that there are other ways to get n the door…

> Not trying to refute your point but rather to suggest that there are other ways to get n the door aside from leaning on your degree.

I guess I didn't articulate myself well- I think we're in accord here.

The degree seemed to hamper me-at best not help-in getting a CRUD gig in smaller cities.

I'm 'coming around'- started looking into work in Kansas City or St. Louis. Those are probably as large a city as I can handle.

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#185

Post by antisthenes »

WalterBright wrote: post #32
jolux wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not an argument. You're just asserting that it's not possible.

The rise in government's share of the economy correlates with the rise in the economic ills. What is the basis for thinking there is an inflection point where the correlation reverses?

> The rise in government's share of the economy correlates with the rise in the economic ills.

That's pure BS that's never been supported by any evidence.

Every developed country with strong property rights has seen an increase in quality of life and prosperity as the share of government's spending as % of GDP increased.

You won't see it on recent graphs though. If you want to see evidence that this is true, you have to look as far back as the 19th century.

There is plenty of information to suggest that %30-%40 is the optimal level of government's share in spending and the fact that most of the developed world has converged on those numbers over time should dissuade all but the most delusional libertarians that the notion of "minuscule government" is nothing more than a wet dream.

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#186

Post by antisthenes »

zone411 wrote: post #121
michaelchisari wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but is that metric useful? Wouldn't hours worked, vacation taken, etc. be more useful? And even then, you'd have to adjust for under-employment and precarity, don't you think? I just don't see a self-perception survey like this as very useful in determining the actual working habits of generations.

Sure, that would be nice to know, but I haven't seen such data. Edit: I looked it up and found this "gen X and especially the millennials were much more likely to say they wanted a job with more vacation – that was more flexible." ( http://www.apa.org/research/action/speaking-of-psychology/un... )

With the mandatory leave in the US being 0, I would expect every single employee in the private sector to want a job with more vacation.

If people aren't thinking with their best interest in mind, there isn't much you can do.

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#187

Post by antisthenes »

internaut wrote: post #157

The Stagnation Hypothesis basically explains all of this. I would like to remind you that earnings, prices in general are phenomenon which relate back to the real world in some way. That is to say they must be side affects of something else. The cartoon series The Venture Bros symbolizes the Stagnation Hypothesis. If you don't want to watch the entire series to understand the point, just take a look at the episode: S…

> That utterly fails to explain why new innovations aren't reaching the common person.

Because you can't innovate more land out of nothing. People need someplace to live and until they don't, land will continue to be the most constrained and contested "wealth" unit.

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#188

Post by seanmcdirmid »

michaelchisari wrote: post #142
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tea party was energized by 2008, they had to wait until the next election to take power.

At this point, I'm not sure the point you're trying to make.

2008 created the split, 2010 was when the hammer dropped. Simple easy.

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#189

Post by ktRolster »

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #163
ktRolster wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of the past administrations faced such partisan Congresses, This is unthinking lack of research. You only need to go back to Clinton to find a congress that vociferously was against him, to the point they impeached him. Clinton handled it because he was very good at handling compromise and the politics game.

The current Congress is the mentally unhinged bastard stepchild of that one.

If you look at the Newt, he was more insane by an order of magnitude than Ryan.

Re: Millennials 'set to earn less than Generation X'

#190

Post by aioprisan »

ktRolster wrote: post #189
MisterBastahrd wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The current Congress is the mentally unhinged bastard stepchild of that one.

If you look at the Newt, he was more insane by an order of magnitude than Ryan.

I highly doubt that. And there was no tea party back then.
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