“It’s Simply Impossible To Do So On Your Own”: Person Proves Why The Boomer Generation Had It Twice As Easy As Gen Z

Let's call it what it really is, greedy rich people hiking prices up because they want more money than they already have. It's intentional what these companies are doing. They don't have to raise prices and in fact could lower prices and raise wages and still maintain the extreme generational wealth they already have. It's a choice they are making to deliberately keep people at a disadvantage and struggling for basic needs. They lie and say it has to happen when it doesn't. There's enough resources that reproduce constantly for us all to exist. You're being convinced that it has to be like this when these people can literally still live a life of luxury with what money they already have for the next 400 years. I'm tired of the lies and b******t covering up what is really cruel and intentional suffering. That's what they are doing and it's inhumane and wrong.

If you factor in healthcare, the disparity is much worse

I'm in Scotland. Minimum wage is 9.50 an hour, so about 1650 before tax, if applicable, working 40hrs a week, approx £1400 after tax and NI. You can rent a one bedroom flat in Glasgow for about 650, where i am in ayrshire you could get that down to around 400, even 300 in the wee town in live in. Higher education is free, healthcare is provided through national insurance deducted from your wages. You wouldn't exactly be living in the lap of luxury after paying every other bill but it is possible to survive on minimum wage. This, however, isn't true for other areas in the uk - rent increases exponentially in a lot of places and cheaper areas may not be desirable but if that's what you can afford then that's what your choices are. The fear of being cut off from not paying one electricity bill doesn't exist, companies don't do that here. The fear of being completely ruined financially after an illness or injury is also a lot less - obviously income can still decrease but no huge bill

Let's not forget about buying a house. My grandparents were FAR from wealthy when my mother was growing up. My grandfather was the only household income, and they had 3 kids. The house they bought (granted it was small and in a bad location) cost about 5 grand. At the time my grandfather was probably making around 20 grand a year, so it took 1/4 of a year's wages to pay for their 2 bedroom 1 bathroom house. Compare that to houses now. In the area where I currently live, you can't find a decent house for less than 250K, and that's an old, small house in a not so nice neighborhood. I'm almost 28 and I currently make about 40K a year. It would take over 6 years of my entire salary just to pay for what little they had.

The cost of "higher education" has become ridiculous...and the return graduates get for their degree does not nearly match the cost. I went to one of the best state universities in the country in the late 60's and paid for it all myself, nothing from my parents, and no loans. I worked as a busboy at a hotel and lived in an old house with 8 friends. And that was enough then. I think "higher education" has its priorities all wrong, and it is failing to deliver a product of value.

Speculators, that is who I was told to blame for high house prices. I don't know who they are, I can't name a single company that does that, but my house is not worth $450,000 based on materials and labor and my lot isn't worth 120,000 dollars. For that same price 50 miles away I can get 50 acres of farmland and spend $50000 to get all the same services.

I'm a retired boomer and I struggle with costs just like anyone. I have no wealth to hoard, my first real job in 1968 paid 85 CENTS per hour my last job paid, counting performance bonus, an average of $28 an hour, I worked my way up same as you will. I understand the frustration ppl feel. But instead of blaming a group of ppl blame greed and bad politics. You can change that. Last week I was texting a friend, a much younger woman, that my generation will probably be the last Gen that had it all. I'm sorry about that. Big change is needed. My Gen and my parents build the world and saved our freedoms. It's now the younger Gen turn to make it what your version of ideal is. We protested a lot, we organized. We put pressure on politicians to get out of Vietnam. It worked. Women's movement, civil rights, no progress just happened. Your in charge now, let me know how I can help you. Your success makes me happy.

You should be going by the average you have listed, not minimum. Minimum wage is for high school kids not college age kids with bills etc. The average pay is more accurate to cost. Average cost of college etc. The fact is we are taxed to death... This is the real culprit. We don't get to keep what we make and every purchase is 80% tax. One shirt is taxed on the thread, the sewing, the textile, the print, the dye, the labor, the building, the transportation, the gasoline, the customs, the manufacturer, the wholesaler, the distributor, the branding, the franchising, the local store, the state tax, the sales tax. And guess who pays it all..... You. Theark up credit goes all to the government who spends, spends, spends. Cut the programs. Cut the spending. Vote no on increases. Government has enough money. They need to manage it better and stop taxing business. The people pay business taxes. And the business can't hire people to pay them more, because the business is taxed to death.

Technically, my parents are at the end of the Boomer generation, however, their parents helped them out tremendously when they went to buy a house, etc. Then there's me. An elder millennial, I always had good paying jobs, but my parents had to help me out with a number of bills. Thankfully, they completely understand the world today and what is happening. My family is far from rich, but we always do what we can to support each other. Back in October, I quit my job in Healthcare and moved home with my parents. No, it wasn't because of finances, but because my mom has early onset dementia. She's only 66, but she can't be on her own anymore. My dad also needs all the help he can get. So, here I am, taking care of them like they took care of me for so long. I do consider myself lucky that I've had such an amazing support system within my direct family. My dad is ready for a revolution, lol. I tell him all the time that the only way things will change is if the gov't completely collapses.

SOOOOO many naive commenters! Go out and get an MBA in finance like I did...oh, that's right, you could afford it. Or withhold judgment until you serve as a corporate VP for a number of years like I did...oh, that's right, you'd like to judge before facts prove you wrong. I'm pretty sure you'd be able to Google microeconomics and learn enough to disabuse you of all the naive conclusions you've come to...but your ego probably isn't up to it.

This is absolutely correct -it is tough now - however boomers didn't make housing prices go higher so aren't responsible for the problem. Prices are higher now because younger generations bid them up. Prices can't rise if no-one agrees to pay. I paid $300k for my home in 1990 with a $100k loan at 17% interest which took 100% of my $37k gross salary after essential expenses (food, electricity). It wasn't easy. But don't blame me for low salaries and high housing costs now. My 1990 purchase hasn't hurt you, has it? I didn't push prices up to $700k. Boomers aren't guilty. It's people who agree to pay $700k that have created the problem. It's young people competing with each other. You're not competing with boomers. You're doing it to yourself. But you have to, don't you? Okay it sucks but please don't blame me.

I recently ran the numbers for this using 1982 dollars; as people starting out in the workforce then are approaching retirement age now. Minimum wage was $2.75 ($5700/yr) and the median home was $47,200. That's 8.25 years salary. Now it's $7.25 ($15,200) and $428,000. That's over 28 years salary. Public college in 1982 was $1000 a year; and private was $4000. Now it's over $10,000 and $32,000. In 1982, you could get a summer job for minimum wage and make enough just during the summer to pay for public college without loans. Even private college was possible to work your way through school without loans. Now we have people that took $75,000 in loans and have paid $100,000 back; only to still owe $150,000.

I'm boomer age but I think I missed out. Despite having a degree I somehow never achieved one of these high-dollar jobs, I watched the pension disappear to be replaced by the 401(K), and my parents couldn't understand why it was so hard to get anywhere. My husband and I are retired and with the country sinking into fascism we are seriously looking at emigrating to somewhere that's cheaper to live in.

This must be "bash Boomers Day" on BP because this is the 2nd article on the front page doing so. It sucks just as much as bashing anyone, period. BP...when are you going to stop all this baiting and devisive c**p? There isn't enough room on here to tell you why these "articles" are flawed or incorrect or there is more to add. Boomers read your site, too...and it hurts to be mocked all the time. For being such a woke, fair, human place, even censoring words and listing that there are "triggers" in articles that aren't...you sure don't care about many dmeographics on here.

It wasn't supposed to be like this

Sadly, this analysis neglects income taxes meaning those hours-to-work numbers should be higher across the board.

Total nonsense. I was there. You needed a roommate or 2 to scrape by. If you had a car it was old and worn out with no insurance. Inflation was running over 10% per year every year, year in and year out. Not just a price spike like they're crying about now. There was no subsidized health ins. There was no such thing as unsecured credit. ( Thank God ) As Mark Twain once noted when asked about lies. "There's lies, damn lies and statistics."

I didn't know anyone making minimum wage back then who could afford to live on their own. We had our friends move in and split the costs. Then as we gained more education or experience that lead to higher wages, we went off on our own. Where did people get the idea that any entry level job should pay a "livable wage"?

I don't know the exact numbers, but the bottom line is that all the money is staying at the top, with the rich. In the 50s, the CEOs of companies made something like 42 times the average salary of the workers. Today that number is closer to 350, if not more. The rich own the corporations and the corporations own the politicians. And still we give tax breaks to the rich so it will trickle down? The only thing trickling down is brown and smells bad.

Boomer here. 1950. 100% agree with the above. I'd be enraged if I were in your position. Maybe I can make you feel a little better... Here are a few things we (female) boomers did NOT have. Birth control. Not available much until the mid 60s. Difficult to find a doctor to prescribe them for a while even after that. Illegal in many states to prescribe to married women. In many states where doctors could prescribe to married women, it was **with the husband's permission.**. In college admissions and in jobs... Our "place" was in teaching & nursing programs and in secretariat jobs. ("She'll just go and get herself pregnant.") Admitting woman to college or a higher level job was "wasting a job a man should have." ("She'll just go and get herself pregnant.") We couldn't get loans, credit or homes. ("She'll just go and get herself pregnant" .) I STILL see my generation as MUCH luckier. Financially. If married. But in other ways, female boomers had very very little control over their futures. 🤪

I'm absolutely praying inflation doesn't affect my college but I know it will. I'm not in college I have a few years to go and it's awful that as a teenager I know I might not be able to get an education without a loan or parental help

I am proud of you and people in similar situations. What a wonderful woman. You obviously raised your kids right. Kids need to know you don't get stuff for free if you want to get somewhere in life Some able bodies use the system and that's what the kids learn. You Really had struggles. Luckily you had some help even though that was hard.

Also, don't forget that society itself did everything it could to make boomers lives better. The suburbs were essentially built for baby boomers. Shopping malls, drive in theaters, entertainment on TV, new schools were built, even cars were designed with them in mind.

I totally agree that things are out of whack. And I'm a boomer whose children had to take out massive student loans at high interest rates and work to get through college.

Not sure why everyone is picking on boomers. It is, will always be, and has always been, the rich politicians and Corporate leaders who make the decisions as to how the average Joe lived his life. I'm a boomer, and certainly had no control over what I had to pay for rent or education. It was just the way it was, and I'm only too aware, having had children in the 80s who went to higher education in the late 90s and early 2000s, and now having grandchildren, what the difficulties are with the income disparities. Not sure whether Gen Z is just bitter and jealous of boomers. I don't know why. I had no say whatever in how easy or hard my life was. I was the daughter of parents who fought in WWII and lived in the depression before that. After the war, when we were born, they worked their a$$es off to give us a good life. Every generation has their issues, some better some worse, but there's no point in hating an entire demographic because of the era in which they lived.

Nonsense.

I'm middle-aged and once again live at home, but now with two kids of my own. Definitely, not where I thought I'd be 20 years ago when I was racking up all the hours I could making what would've been considered mega bucks for someone my age(at least where I live...$800++ on top of a minimum wage($5.25) paycheck/week). Boy, those days are long gone. If I work a service job now all I'll do is lose my insurance and not be able to afford groceries.