Wealth Gap Increasing Among Millenials, Possibly Most Unequal Generation in History

[MeWithInfinityGauntlet]

If it got to the point where a significant portion of the workforce was no longer needed they would just have to start universal basic income.

As an employer with a mostly millennial staff I can tell you we see a massive disparity in that group even in similar age ranges.

Millennials have arguably the fastest path to the Management ranks of any prior work group. Employers know and are being told constantly that Millennials need more coddling and re-enforcement and when you get a good one you must not wait and you must show them a clear and quick path to growth and Management or they will leave to another employer. Unlike prior generations where you were told to keep your head down and shut up for at least the first 5-10 years this group is very vocal about needing to understand and know where their career is going? Are they valued?, etc.

So when you have a good working Millennial you try to keep them and you advance them and they make good money much quicker and they can save lots. But the vast majority of Millennials (again in our experience) have an IDGAF attitude about almost everything. They don't want to think long term. They don't want to commit or work hard. It is just a job and a temporary one at that. They quit and jump job to job because they are not looking to save to buy a house and may not even have a car expense. So they don't need to stick it out and make it work. But they also save nothing. Money is all spent on fancy latte's and Avocado toast.

So yes I can definitely see why there would be a huge a disparity in the savings of Millennials as a group as opposed to groups prior. Groups prior all had more of a agreed to blue print. You started your career and you worked hard with our head down and saved towards a home. You had that pretty clear goal, that many Millennials do not.

As someone who works in and has a degree in Finance, if workers are less loyal these days it's because companies aren't loyal to workers anymore.

Decades ago companies used to have some loyalty towards their employees, now for the most part companies treat their workers as numbers on a balance sheet. So it's not surprising that workers have responded by showing little loyalty in return.

 

[HIMBOB]

I don’t care about millennials.

I’m not one and I have more than 100k in savings after losing most of what I had and getting set far back in the 2008 recession.

They will determine the direction of your latter years so best have some interest.

True, millennials are much more likely than other generations to go out to eat regularly than other generations - even taking into account the eating habits of baby boomers, gen xers when they were younger. There are other factors that play into this of course - millennials are more inclined to prefer urban living to suburbs and countryside - so it isn't happening in a vaccum. Still, those $25+ meals add up when it's an almost everyday occurrence.

The jobs are largely in urban areas.

In Sydney it was recently calculated that the median worker needs to save 135% of their salary to get a housing deposit. With such unrealistic requirements it's logical to assume funds will not be used in the same methods when they have become unavailable for the majority.

 

[MikeMcMann]

Some well off youn people obviously spend a good deal but the reality is large numbers of them are simply very hard up with wages having failed to keep inline with rising cost of living expenses.

A big issue really is that Clinton's introduction of easy morgages just plastered over the cracks of falling home ownership rates under Reagan and post recession were seeing the reality of the situation...
...

I think the highlighted is the problem.

the rising cost of living expenses is key imo.

Many millenials want

- food that is organic or vegan (super high cost as opposed to other generations)
- Cars that are new and as nice as their parents (compared to junkers prior generations drove)
- homes that are as a big and nice as their parents when they finally commit to buying (as opposed to the true starter homes prior generations bought).


Because Millennials spend so much more on subsistence but on things that are not truly necessary to subsistence (iPhone, Vegan, Netflix, etc) they are generally much further back on the curve when it comes to savings and then they do debt themselves up huge when they do commit wanting a nice car and fancy home. Those small non-sacrifices at the start end up costing them massively over time.

Just as saving only a few hundred per month from your 20's to retirement can make an impact of millions on your savings so too can spending a few hundred extra per month ensure you struggle to build any savings. you can easily over spend to the tune of a $1000/mth with indulgences like Lattes and Avocado Toast and organic or vegan foods.

 

[MeWithInfinityGauntlet]

It's not just intelligence, but a particular kind of intelligence, specifically visual-spatial, i.e. the type that is useful in STEM fields. It requires not only a high level of intelligence, but a very specific kind that is even less common. It leaves the vast majority of the population out in the cold. Universal basic income may become a necessity when the average job becomes automated.

Quantitative is huge as well.

I agree, we are definitely moving into an age of numbers and stem. People that are good with spatial and quantitative intelligence and get the necessary education will do well. Because most of the jobs of the future will be tech focused or interpreting large amounts of data.

A lot of jobs won't be safe, there may even be effective algorithm fund managers in 30 years or less.

 

[HIMBOB]

I blame the boomers who raised the millennials to spends like them, despite most not making the cheddar they did, or building the equity that cheaper housing insured.

To be fair boomers racked up more debt than millennials, it's just government debt instead of personal.

 

[Scerpi]

Millenials... lol

Doing their best to keep my job skills in demand.

 

[MaureenCretis]

Thank goodness Millenials are such whining useless bell-ends, then.

 

[MeWithInfinityGauntlet]

If it got to the point where a significant portion of the workforce was no longer needed they would just have to start universal basic income.

Not sure if that would work. I doubt that 25% of the population would want to be working and supporting everyone else doing nothing. They'd have to tax those people so much that it would probably make more fiscal sense to get on universal basic income and work under the table.

Moreover rich people are extremely mobile with their wealth, if you increase taxes by enough in one country, they'll just leave the country and live in some tax haven in the Barbados or some shit.

 

[cmw43]

Not sure if that would work. I doubt that 25% of the population would want to be working and supporting everyone else doing nothing. They'd have to tax those people so much that it would probably make more fiscal sense to get on universal basic income and work under the table.

Moreover rich people are extremely mobile with their wealth, if you increase taxes by enough in one country, they'll just leave the country and live in some tax haven in the Barbados or some shit.

Universal basic income would go to everyone, working or not, you wouldn't need to work under the table.

The idea is that people have just enough to get by, but if you have a job you're just doing better.

 

[MeWithInfinityGauntlet]

Lmao you can't be this stupid

I'm a lot smarter than you. It's simple genetics: the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

Low iq people who are irresponsible, who have an inability to effectively plan for the future and who lack the capacity to delay gratification are being paid by the government to reproduce with each other like rabbits. You think these people are going to be producing hordes of productive genius's?

 

[PG29 red0 Jr]

Yup.

I would bet the poorer Millennials in many instances spend more on stuff than the better off millennials. But the big difference is WHERE they spend that money. The poorer Millennials are spending it on goods that provide no future value such as designer clothes, Lattes, Avocado Toast and foregoing cars and homes. The smaller group of wealthier millennials are spending on stuff that helps build savings.

I know many of the poorer millennials have Netflix, the newest iPhone and all sorts of other 'Pay' services that would in no way constitute a necessity for a young person trying to save some money and everything they eat has to be vegan or organic which is a massive extra expense.

Very well said.

 

[MikeMcMann]

As someone who works in and has a degree in Finance, if workers are less loyal these days it's because companies aren't loyal to workers anymore.

Decades ago companies used to have some loyalty towards their employees, now for the most part companies treat their workers as numbers on a balance sheet. So it's not surprising that workers have responded by showing little loyalty in return.

Loyalty of old is definitely gone but it is a chicken and egg thing to say who bailed on it first, the employer or the employee.

That said it has made 'key' employees that much more valuable. When we identify a millennial or other who is a performer who we want to keep, we jump to invest in that person (education, training) and to promote that person (supervisor, manager) in a fraction of the time that it would have taken in the past. And that is because, as you say employers are not so loyal to the older employees and they are not just getting the raise or promotion simply because they have been around so long and got loyalty. Now it is much easier for a younger person to leap frog a long time tenured but not great employee whereas that was harder in the past.

 

[TeTe]

Sometimes you have to spend money to get ahead.

I got my car on finance, for £120 a month spread over five years. I don't like credit, but I wouldn't have gotten a better job without it.

Same goes for University fees, and mortgages.

What you are describing are necessities.... but what I'm saying is, if you can't afford a BMW but buy one anyway or instead of buying a modest house, you buy more than house than you can afford... this is the problem.

LIke @Jackie Blue said, consumerism is big downfall of the US; the whole bigger is better attitude. Hey, if you can afford that $80,000 car or big ass house, great. But people think because a bank approves them for a $500,000 house, they have to spend that much. Or like others said, maybe if you're struggling financially, you should be eating at fancy places all the time and taking fancy vacations all the time.

Nothing wrong with buying the things you have, but like you said, if it helps you get ahead.. not put you in unnecessary debt.

 

[PG29 red0 Jr]

Universal basic income would go to everyone, working or not, you wouldn't need to work under the table.

The idea is that people have just enough to get by, but if you have a job you're just doing better.

You must be the "post -modern neo marxist" I have heard Jordan Peterson talk about.

What do you think about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez?

 

[cmw43]

You must be the "post -modern neo marxist" I have heard Jordan Peterson talk about.

What do you think about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez?

I'm not saying it's the answer, I just don't know what will be a good alternative in 20-30 years when a lot of the lower skilled manual and driving jobs (taxi, pilot, trucker, bus etc) have been replaced by automation.

I'm from the UK and not familiar with her. Just read her wiki and some quotes. She's got a lot of policies that sound positive like free tuition for all and medicare for all but I don't know if those could realistically work in the budget.

 

[moreorless87]

I think the highlighted is the problem.

the rising cost of living expenses is key imo.

Many millenials want

- food that is organic or vegan (super high cost as opposed to other generations)
- Cars that are new and as nice as their parents (compared to junkers prior generations drove)
- homes that are as a big and nice as their parents when they finally commit to buying (as opposed to the true starter homes prior generations bought).

Because Millennials spend so much more on subsistence but on things that are not truly necessary to subsistence (iPhone, Vegan, Netflix, etc) they are generally much further back on the curve when it comes to savings and then they do debt themselves up huge when they do commit wanting a nice car and fancy home. Those small non-sacrifices at the start end up costing them massively over time.

Just as saving only a few hundred per month from your 20's to retirement can make an impact of millions on your savings so too can spending a few hundred extra per month ensure you struggle to build any savings. you can easily over spend to the tune of a $1000/mth with indulgences like Lattes and Avocado Toast and organic or vegan foods.

Again though your putting this down to younger people having expensive tastes and perhaps some more well off ones do but that's really not the case for most of those at the bottom of the tree, maybe they have 1-2 things like large TV's or mobole phones that have come down in price a lot but people working part time in Walmart aren't hard up because their buying new cars or vegan food but due to basic post of living expenses.

 

[MikeMcMann]

Again though your putting this down to younger people having expensive tastes and perhaps some more well off ones do but that's really not the case for most of those at the bottom of the tree, maybe they have 1-2 things like large TV's or mobole phones that have come down in price a lot but people working part time in Walmart aren't hard up because their buying new cars or vegan food but due to basic post of living expenses.

based on what we see even the poorer ones do have expensive tastes.

they seem to not be able to make the connection that 5-6, $8 Latte's a week add up compared to the pennies cheaper coffee can cost. And that spending $15 on avocado toast and a dollar or two more on organic or vegan food versus non organic also adds up. They seem to not be able to connect that those seemingly small amounts here and there make all the difference over time. I make far more them all of them and yet am far more careful with my discretionary spending with an eye on my priorities. They want their Latte and are going to have it. It is only $8 after all.

 

[Possum Jenkins]

I love how every mouth breather shits on humanities, women's studies and ethnic studies as one of the major causes of all this. The Cultural Marxisms are causing potential neuroscientists to become Starbucks baristas!

Except the number of humanities degrees are at their lowest point in decades, while natural sciences are at their highest ever, by far.

https://www.insidehighered.com/news...-decline-humanities-bachelors-degrees-2-years

So, whine about the decline in STEM careers => fail to apply the most basic step in science (fact-gathering) to substantiate the opinion.

 

[cincymma79]

and yet the ones screamin

I love how every mouth breather shits on humanities, women's studies and ethnic studies as one of the major causes of all this. The Cultural Marxisms are causing potential neuroscientists to become Starbucks baristas!

Except the number of humanities degrees are at their lowest point in decades, while natural sciences are at their highest ever, by far.

https://www.insidehighered.com/news...-decline-humanities-bachelors-degrees-2-years

So, whine about the decline in STEM careers => fail to apply the most basic step in science (fact-gathering) to substantiate the opinion.

and yet the screaming ones on tv have social studies degrees and shit (occupy wallstreet had one with a standford degree in ss)

 

[MeWithInfinityGauntlet]

Loyalty of old is definitely gone but it is a chicken and egg thing to say who bailed on it first, the employer or the employee.

That said it has made 'key' employees that much more valuable. When we identify a millennial or other who is a performer who we want to keep, we jump to invest in that person (education, training) and to promote that person (supervisor, manager) in a fraction of the time that it would have taken in the past. And that is because, as you say employers are not so loyal to the older employees and they are not just getting the raise or promotion simply because they have been around so long and got loyalty. Now it is much easier for a younger person to leap frog a long time tenured but not great employee whereas that was harder in the past.

I agree with most of this.

Though I wouldn't say it's a chicken or egg case regarding who became disloyal to who first, ie the worker or employer.

The millenials grew up watching their parents or other older people get canned or screwed over by companies, despite their loyalty. Back when people could be employed by one company their whole life, provided they did a good job, they had more loyalty to companies. Now that everyone knows that most companies don't care about their employees, most people have become mercenaries.

I read an article about a worker, who worked at IBM. Worked there for 30 years. Died of a heart attack in his 50's and was a few months away from being eligible for a full pension. He left behind a family and naturally they did not receive the full pension, they only received a vastly reduced pension that he had qualified for up to that point. A corporation really only has loyalty to it's shareholders and millenials are aware of this to an extent that other generations were not, so they don't feel they owe anything to a company.

I agree that good, skilled workers can move up fast now though.