Anachostic

What Millennials Can Learn From Gen X’s Money Mistakes

You can consider me a sucker for any article on generational warfare, especially one that involves mine.  So when an article immediately says I’m making mistakes with my money, I’m doubly interested.

I feel I’ve made this clear in other posts, but I really do feel sorry for generations after mine.  While the generation preceding me couldn’t care much about anything other than itself, I am embarrassed at what has been left for the younger ones to clean up, fix, or just try to survive through.  My whole generation is too small to have made any political impression or enact any meaningful change, but I’ve been waiting for the next major cohort to flex its muscle, and I expect we see things the same way.

Anyway…

This article says its a collection of advice from financial experts who want Gen Y to do things differently from Gen X – "Break the chains of financial norms that were enshrined as gospel in the last century."  Here’s the truth that overshadows the entire article: The financial norms are not norms anymore because the entire economy and financial markets got fucked.  But that’s not a problem.  Don’t focus on that problem.  Don’t bother trying to solve the problem (as if you could anyway).

The term "gaslight" is used way too frequently and usually inappropriately.  I’m not going to use it here, but it feels some would.  This article is more of the more traditional, "blowing smoke up your ass" flavor.

Point 1: Gen Y should focus on Roth accounts instead of traditional retirement accounts.  I’m not going to argue particulars, this advice can go either way.  I just want to point out that Roth IRA’s were created in 1997.  It’s not like there was a lot of information on the benefits of a Roth at the time.  And now, given time, experience, and income growth, I now contribute 100% to post-tax retirement accounts.  Because Gen X makes all the financial mistakes.

Point 2: Gen Y should give up on whatever used to be the idea of financial success.  Let me get that exact quote.

"…millennials need to reconsider the entire concept of wealth, success and financial freedom – particularly as it applies to standards that were set in a different time"

It shouldn’t take much cynicism to deduce that "a different time" means "a better time".  What example of change was provided?

"Are we sure we want a 30-year mortgage on the largest house we can possibly secure financing for to go along with our student loan debt and auto loan? … Maybe a used RV and a WiFi hotspot are more appealing than a 2,000-square-foot ranch."

And now I want to really punch someone.  I’ll give you this much.  Buying the biggest house you can get financing for is a financial mistake, worthy of the title of the article.  But to suggest that Gen Y should just literally give up on the concept of owning a house to live in a depreciating asset and have them consider that move financially savvy?  That is an even bigger financial mistake.  One that a future article will use comparing Gen Y and Gen Z.

And there’s a real trigger: "student loan debt".  Something my generation didn’t have to worry about, at least not to enslavement levels of debt like today.  Maybe a used RV is not so much "more appealing" as it is "the only option".  I’m not saying lower your expectations, I’m just saying to refine them.

Point 3: Accept that shit sucks.  Deal with it.  I would really have to copy the whole text of the two paragraphs to do justice to what is being bullshitted.  Remember, the problem the article is hiding is that the economy absolutely sucks.  Gen Y started a revolution by creating "the gig economy".  You know what the gig economy has done?  It has resulted in workers being exploited and cheapened, with no redeeming benefits.  And no benefits at all.  For every success story on a gig worker, you have a thousand who are working themselves to the bone just to get by. 

The Gen X life story? "Get a college degree. Land a job. Buy a house. Invest for retirement someday."  Their take on these universal desires?  "It’s a flawed model."  IT’S A FUCKING FLAWED MODEL.  I got my job with a Associates degree in an unrelated field.  Gen Y (and Z now) have to have Bachelors degrees to get entry level jobs.  They can’t get any job paying well enough to buy a house or to invest for retirement someday.  WHOSE MODEL IS FUCKING FLAWED HERE?

So the explanation for being flawed is that it doesn’t align with Gen Y’s priorities: "experiences over possessions, and prioritizing purpose, innovation, and flexibility".  And I’m going to say again, these priorities are due to the fact the world is garbage.  They are compensation for having nothing else.  When your world is so dead that you simply want to experience as much happiness as possible as soon as possible because you don’t expect things to be getting better in your lifetime, that’s a problem.  When you demand flexibility because you know you can’t trust any institution for stability, that’s a problem.  As far as purpose and innovation, Gen X had that as well, only it wasn’t something we had to demand, it was simply allowed.  That’s a problem.

This romanticizing of renting for life and RVing and being mobile and nomadic, that’s a symptom of the times.  It’s a necessity to survival.  You really don’t think that if circumstances were the same now as they were 20 years ago that a whole generation would behave so differently?  If anything the nomadic lifestyle would be taken up for pleasure.  If the promise of technology had not been stolen by a few obscenely rich, powerful people, we’d all be living a utopian life.

For the boomers who were flower children until the end and look around with sadness at what they were unable to sustain, I will be a nerd who will die lamenting how the Internet was supposed to bring enlightenment and knowledge and was reduced to conspiracies and trolls.  Gen Y, ponder well what legacy you wish to leave unfulfilled to the world.