Comment by karlshea 2 days ago
I'm gonna have to hold your hand when I tell you this: when you tell the younger generation to "save" or "invest" they are going to walk away from that conversation knowing they were just speaking with one of the most mind-numbingly naive Olds they're going to encounter in probably the next several months.
Please, if you ever want any respect from anyone younger than you ever again in your entire life, do not say those words again.
I appreciate the point you're trying to make, and I agree taking responsibility for one's own life circumstances is the only way to improve them, but surely you understand that 'save and invest' is wholly unsuitable advice for someone with no disposable income or no income at all.
Who else is responsible for you?
You have two options. Continue to point fingers and complain and be broke, or start putting $100/mo in VOO and save what little money you have for your future?
I know it sucks. I know income inequality is huge. I know the only way out of this is to put in sweat equity. I know the only way to put food on the table is to have a second job at a gas station. I’ve been there. However, as much as you DON’T want to hear it - the only way out of your mess is by you working your way out of your mess.
As I said, I agree with taking personal responsibility - I'm not sure why you're still trying to fight me on that.
> You have two options. Continue to point fingers and complain and be broke, or start putting $100/mo in VOO and save what little money you have for your future?
The imaginary person you're trying to give this advice to graduated from university eighteen months ago and has been living in their parents' house ever since, applying for jobs non-stop. Their income is $0 per month. They are entirely unable to apply your advice; applying your advice is something they aspire to.
save and invest only makes sense if you can afford to not pull all savings every 3-5 years due to some unfortunate life event I feel like.
I'm pretty well off but my friends are in that siutation
$100/month in VOO isn’t going to do anything (except help people like me who already own a lot).
> the only way out of your mess is by you working your way out of your mess.
Third option is revolution. Could be violent, could be passive like not starting families, complaining on the internet, scrolling tiktok as long as the benefits and body allow, and suicide if necessary.
It is possible for too much of the benefits of working having too high of a likelihood of being captured by rent seekers to not make the work worth it. In old times, the lack of birth control made people have to work more due to needing to support kids, but if I didn’t have kids, I could get by with a much lower standard of living.
This is so clique it's painful.
Just grow up. Bootstraps! I did it, why can't you?
Well first off, you didn't do it, you got fucked up the ass and asked for more. Your parents and their parents lived in an America where one person could own a home, multiple cars, and care for a large family. They lived in an America where layoffs did not exist, where shareholders were at the bottom of the totem pole, and where companies like GE prided themselves in how much money they gave to their employees.
We now live in an America where GE has been run into the ground, dragged through hell, revived, and then damned again, only for the demon that did it to be praised as a Capitalist God - a template, an alchemist of money, who could seemingly create value out of thin air.
Of course, nobody has stepped back and asked what "value" we're measuring. Not that it matters, because whatever you measure, GE don't got it.
You could have been better off, but you weren't. You're complacent enough, but baby this train goes downtown. There's no reversing course. However hard it was for you, it will only get harder.
Of course, this is big picture stuff. Small picture, can you do things to help your situation? Of course you can. But those things become harder, they become rarer, they become more elusive.
Just get a job and you'll be good! Oh wait no, that doesn't work anymore. Just go to college and you'll be good! No wait, that doesn't work either. Well, just own a home, that's the path to financial freedom! Um, well, actually no not that either. Well just invest in the stock market!
Yes, great idea! I wonder how long that will last! I wouldn't hold your breath.
The only thing they can control is themselves and their habits though.
I’m not avoiding the fact that the economy is fucked. I’m fully aware. It’s up to you how much you’re willing to continue to pay or what you’re willing to sacrifice. It sucks, but the only thing you can control is yourself.
It’s just generic advice that doesn’t even really apply to the fresh grads, their issue is not having any entry point to a career anymore.
I graduated 10 years ago and it’s a day and night difference. Whatever worked for me in 2015 will not work for a fresh grad today, the game is completely different.
This is so condescending and infantilizing of young people. Of course many of them have it hard. They’re not the first, and they won’t be the last, but they’ll figure it out.
I graduated right before the collapse in 2008, and I’ve spent the last 17 years hustling, scraping, and clawing to make, save, and invest every dollar I could. It wasn’t easy, and after a divorce and a recent layoff, it’s still not. Particularly in one of the most expensive cities in the world, with kids and child support.
I worry a lot about my kids and their future economic prospects. I don’t want them to suffer, but the reality is that suffering comes for all of us, and saving and investing has been good advice for millennia. Blaming others and refusing to take responsibility for your own life and predicament has never been good advice. I hope my kids have the strength of character to resist the learned helplessness you’re offering here.
What's condescending is telling a whole generation of people who are working two jobs and barely able to make rent to "save".
I'm older than you and now doing fine AND able to save/invest but after multiple once-in-a-lifetime events that reset all of my progress each time, the last thing I need to hear from some out-of-touch old person is bullshit avocado toast pull yourself up by your bootstraps comments.
Wait, so the entire generation is working two jobs, or they're unable to find work? I constantly hear both...which is it?
And no one here said anything about avocado toast or pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. Sounds like you're just making assumptions and ranting against a strawman.
Serious question: if your kids were in the situation you're talking about, struggling to pay rent, and you couldn't help them financially, what advice would you give them? What would you hope they'd do? I'm genuinely curious.
So you have two options. One, you can change your habits and save your money. Two, you can get a higher paying job and save your money.
Both options require effort and discipline. If someone working two jobs can’t make rent, then who is to blame for it not working out? Society? The government? Your landlord? Who? Who do you be angry towards if not yourself?
It’s out of touch because they are out of touch. I was out of touch. We all go through this and realize this is it. This is all there is. This is life. Welcome to being fully grown.
As I’ve said before - I’m here for the revolution if that’s what it takes. I’ll be on the front. I’m not rich. I’m not a home owner. I just know there’s only one path carved and they’re at the bottom of the slide hoarding it, taxing us more for each body down.
Capitalism is a disease but it’s been that way for multiple millennia. Humans vs humans. Survival of the fittest. Stuff they don’t teach in private school. Only the school of hard knocks. So, again, who do we blame, if not ourselves? Why do we buy the boomer products? Why do we subscribe to the boomer media? Why do we put up with it?
At some point you are going to have to grow up and take matters into your own hands instead of blaming everyone for your situation.
I’m not old. Just wise.