Why do people think Boomers had it so good?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The oldest boomers were getting their first job and getting married in early to mid 60s. The 1970s were hard for working families. I am old enough to remember thinking the lines at gas stations and grocery stores were normal. I remember living in a house, but didn't think it was odd that the rooms weren't furnished for years, and "shopping" at garage sales to find a bed. My dad build my desk out of found materials. We wore clothes re-made out of material scavenged from Goodwill clothing. We made our curtains, grew and canned food, kids were sent on "adventures" into the woods to forage for berries, crab apples, and mushrooms. And we were privileged. We knew we were not poor, as my parents had good white collar jobs, and we lived in a nice middle class neighborhood, but all the money went into that home ownership, food, and gas so my parents could carpool to work. We were mostly latch key feral kids in our neighborhood (my mom was a non-contract teacher (so not pension eligible) so everyone ended up at our house after school); no one had nannies or after care or camps or club sports. No one went to restaurants. Vacation was camping (using Dad's old GI gear). No one had or needed multiple cars or electronics or giant metal mugs or fancy tennis shoes or cable TV or the myriad other things we think of today as "necessities." There was no extra money to be saving from age 22 on, and no, these boomers didn't have pensions either.

Is that how your white collar life is right now? Would you be willing to live that way to get the house of your dreams? Because that's what a lot of Boomers did.

I think the people who complain about Boomers must come from truly wealthy and privileged families. Further to a PP's pension story, my uncles retired with healthy pensions too, until the companies let the pension funds go bankrupt and left them with literally nothing to live on (pre-1974 PBGC). They and their wives did not go golfing, they went job hunting in their late 60s-early 70s. Not everyone had it as easy as your family. And not a lot of jobs had pensions in the first place.

I’m older GenX and this is my experience too. I think many of the complaints about Boomers really are from people with privileged backgrounds. I grew up solidly middle class and most neighbors were blue collar. The white collar jobs were squarely middle level. When people went on vacation it was literally once a year to visit their grandparents. Maybe one Disney level trip their entire childhood. As adults, they bought smaller, non updated homes and lived without updating them for years, if at all.

The younger people I see now buying their first homes are buying things our parents would have bought closer to retirement. Then they renovate immediately and have parental help either with their home purchase or private school or both. They also take grand vacations every year, as evidenced by many posts on this board.

Times are different and it’s really not an apples to apples comparison.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a hard insight issue and the tricky part is that it's impossible to know if the comparison is fair because not enough time has passed.

Yes Boomers dealt with Vietnam, stagflation, and much more restrictive banking policies that made home ownership more challenging. However that turned around and Boomers then enjoyed perhaps the single most prosperous two decades in the US during their prime earning years. The homes the bought in the early 80s with 12% interest rates and that they had to scrimp and save for to qualify at all, doubled, then ,tripled, then quadrupled in value. Their salaries also increased by multiples. The stock market exploded and they wound up on the ground floor of that rocket.

So yes, in 1982, boomers as a generation were struggling. But in 2024 they are not. They have immense wealth, plus social security is still solvent and medicare is actually functioning better than ever thanks to work on prescription drug prices and supplemental plans. They made it.

Millennials have different challenges. Yes mortgage rates are lower and the rules around mortgages are looser (though not quite as loose as they used to be and that's a good thing). Millennials have more debt starting out thanks to education costs, and unlike boomers they have zero faith their own children will be able to self-fund college. The economy is stronger but the job market is more competitive thanks to globalization and American workers must compete with more highly qualified workers.

Maybe it will all work out like it did for boomers. I hope so! One challenge millennials face is that they continue to lack political power as the political landscape remains dominated by Boomers with a continued focus on Boomer concerns. Key millennial issues (cost of college and cost of housing) still lack consensus and addressing them has been an uphill battle.

To top it off, when millennials advocate for policies that would relieve these key pressures, they are called entitled and whiny and told "hey boomers had high mortgage rates and it was hard to even qualify." But this ignores the fact that *those circumstances changed because they were bad.* Policies shifted to make it easier to buy a home and boomers profited wildly from it. The reason mortgage rules were relaxed and rates brought down over time was not dome gift to millennials. These were policies intended to help boomers. And they did.

This only applies to the privileged class. My boomer mom lives in the house we were born in and has a life you can't complain about, she does get social security and medicare, but none of the bolded benefitted her, a teacher in a middle class neighborhood where the housing has not doubled in value relative to inflation. The housing crisis, where so many people lost their homes -- a huge portion of them were boomers. Boomer home ownership fell by more than 10 percentage points and did not recover. And only half of home owning boomers owned their houses outright when the mortgage crisis hit; many have fallen behind on payments and are still at risk of losing their homes, leaving many without the housing wealth they were counting on for retirement. Some Millennials may not be able to afford to buy them, but some Boomers cannot afford to keep them either. And they can't make up for the losses over time with years to work and increase earnings. Don't forget that many of those who did see housing increases also had to live off of that equity because they had no pensions or savings, didn't work for companies with 401K plans, don't own stock, didn't have protected healthcare for most of their lives, etc. (see, e.g., the new thing for boomers called reverse mortgages). Some Boomers benefitted from the boom, but not everyone. Not by a long shot. Much of your post is only about the wealthier Boomers.

Wealthy, white boomers. PP’s description doesn’t apply to my AA’s family of origin.

No, PPP's description is not of wealthy Boomers, it's of middle class Boomers. A house comprising the vast majority of your wealth is not the hallmark of the wealthy. The existence of a pension is the real dividing line between Boomers who had it easy and those who didn't - in my (LMC, white) family of origin those who went into teaching or working for the City/State are doing well in retirement (homeowners, financially stable) and those who didn't are not (renting or living with kids, broke), regardless of whether they went to college. In DH's (MC, black) family of origin *every one* of his aunts and uncles worked for the government in some capacity or another and they're all solidly middle class or UMC, long-time homeowners, and helping their kids out.

[Anonymous]

I'm GenX, who I grew up in Soviet Union in the 80s. Seems to me like the Boomer life was like life in SU during 80s in good parts of SU. Everyone had a good job, place to live, cheap/free schooling, retirement guaranteed, free/cheap healthcare.
The difference was that nobody could build wealth really; there was also no need- the good times were going to last forever.
Boomers have live for a long time. Just a little bit of investing, like $30-50 a month over time, would have been their source of wealth rather than a house or alongside. Few people did it as it was hard back then with fees, minimums, and lousy investment choices.
It has never been easier to invest than now with computer in the pocket. Why concentrate on the housing.
It has never been easier to get a job or two. Seems like nobody wants the jobs available. I'm being called in daily to work, so I know the jobs are out there.
People seem to be concentrating on someone else's pensions, cheap college and that housing- all long gone. Investing is for millennials, but so is moving for a job, working from home, and changing jobs fast, working for oneself. The whole world can see your work online and they pay for it. That was not available before.
The list of good things available to all of us nowadays is probably longer. I ended up investing and retired in my mid 40s.
It's very hard to qualify for mortgage, but takes only $100 to start investing and learn from it. House is a liability, but what you learn while investing, is an asset.

[Anonymous]

You guys are describing my childhood as a white, middle class kid (boomer parents). Both worked as teachers, I was a latch key kid (whoever thinks teachers work bell-to-bell doesn't know any teachers), our summer vacations were one week camping and one week driving to the grandparents (no summer camps), and mostly hanging out at the town pool (not a private pool like what is so prevalent here).

I remember gas lines of the late 70s, high interest rates for housing, and other expensive items we didn't have. We played kick the can and hide and seek with the neighborhood kids, no one played on expensive sport/travel teams, and all headed home when the streetlights went on.

My parents have pensions, so fortunately we don't need to worry about care for them (yet), but they are starting to lose it cognitively, and I don't think their pensions + social security will cover AL or memory care in the DMV.

The complaints about boomers definitely don't cover all of them. As my late aunt said, "every generation complains about those who went before, and those who come after."

[Anonymous]

^
Agreed. A lot of it jealousy. Teenage years in the 90’s and my parents definitely managed a much simpler life for us.

Something is broken in our culture and we all know it, but can’t put our finger on it. Millennials blame boomers, but they deserve it imo. Mostly for not seeing (or refusing to see) the connection between their lifestyle demands and free trade agreements/shifting production jobs overseas/oil wars. This was the generation that was protesting Vietnam, but then largely led the charge for selling our blue collar jobs to the lowest bidder and sending us to die in Iraq so they can keep living fat with cheap oil.

[Anonymous]

Here are the many ways Boomers had it better than the rest of us.

https://milliondollarsense.com/reasons-why-baby-boomers-had-it-easier#:~:text=19%20Reasons%20Why%20Baby%20Boomers%20Had%20It%20Easier,...%208%20%238%20Generous%20Pensions%20...%20More%20items

[Anonymous]

Cheap housing.

[Anonymous]

I’m a just turned 40 millennial and my siblings and I are much better off than my parents were at the same age. Nicer homes, cars, travel etc. My father became extremely successful once he hit his late 40s and it’s hard to imagine that we will do the same given the nature of our jobs but I can’t complain.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm Gen X, not a Boomer so I have no dog in the Millenials vs Boomer fight, but I find it fascinating how history is totally lost with what Boomers had to deal with when they were young.

Inflation in the past few years is nothing like it was in the late 70's/early 80's when there was double digit inflation year after year. Same with Mortgages. In 1981 it was 18%. It also used to be much harder to qualify for a mortgage, There were no creative repayment terms or 3% down. It was straight up 30 year mortgage with 20% down. They also had to deal with severe gas shortages and a draft. How is it Millenials don't realize this?

You must be early GenX, likely 56?

Sure they paid 18% but prices were so low they could buy a home on 3x the income of a SINGLE EARNER. 20% down on a small number is about the same as 3% on crazy expensive houses now, plus while paying for daycare and college funds that they didn’t worry about.

[Anonymous]

Everyone here has been posting about housing markets, college costs, and pensions, but I think a big part of it is also the family relationships changed.
My grandparents were greatest generation and parents were among the earliest baby boomers (born in '46 and '48.) My siblings and I were born in the mid-late 70s.
When I was growing up we spent a lot of time with my grandparents. My mom was a SAHM so my grandparents didn't babysit full time or anything, but my mom definitely got a lot of help with long weekends, appointments, or other childcare. And yes--my grandparents were still working at that time, not retired.

When I had my kids my parents were very vocal that they would not be doing that kind of thing for their kids on the same level.
In their 50's and 60's my grandparents were working full time and helping family.
In my parents 50's and 60's they were retired- going on constant vacations and watching tv.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I purchased my first home in 1986 with a mortgage rate of 11%.

For a price that reflected that mortgage rate. You were then able to refinance multiple times; that's how a lot of people created wealth. Meanwhile prices today have not fallen as mortgage rates rose

Exactly buying at a high rate and low price and refinancing was a bonanza.

[Anonymous]

Boomers have had 40 years to build their wealth, millennials maybe 15. Forget housing costs, mortgages etc., it’s really education debt where the boomers have had an advantage. Education inflation has outpaced just about everything else.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Everyone here has been posting about housing markets, college costs, and pensions, but I think a big part of it is also the family relationships changed.
My grandparents were greatest generation and parents were among the earliest baby boomers (born in '46 and '48.) My siblings and I were born in the mid-late 70s.
When I was growing up we spent a lot of time with my grandparents. My mom was a SAHM so my grandparents didn't babysit full time or anything, but my mom definitely got a lot of help with long weekends, appointments, or other childcare. And yes--my grandparents were still working at that time, not retired.

When I had my kids my parents were very vocal that they would not be doing that kind of thing for their kids on the same level.
In their 50's and 60's my grandparents were working full time and helping family.
In my parents 50's and 60's they were retired- going on constant vacations and watching tv.

You sound like me. Growing up we didn't live near grandparents, but I would spend weeks at a time with them over the summer. My parents are local and useless

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The oldest boomers were getting their first job and getting married in early to mid 60s. The 1970s were hard for working families. I am old enough to remember thinking the lines at gas stations and grocery stores were normal. I remember living in a house, but didn't think it was odd that the rooms weren't furnished for years, and "shopping" at garage sales to find a bed. My dad build my desk out of found materials. We wore clothes re-made out of material scavenged from Goodwill clothing. We made our curtains, grew and canned food, kids were sent on "adventures" into the woods to forage for berries, crab apples, and mushrooms. And we were privileged. We knew we were not poor, as my parents had good white collar jobs, and we lived in a nice middle class neighborhood, but all the money went into that home ownership, food, and gas so my parents could carpool to work. We were mostly latch key feral kids in our neighborhood (my mom was a non-contract teacher (so not pension eligible) so everyone ended up at our house after school); no one had nannies or after care or camps or club sports. No one went to restaurants. Vacation was camping (using Dad's old GI gear). No one had or needed multiple cars or electronics or giant metal mugs or fancy tennis shoes or cable TV or the myriad other things we think of today as "necessities." There was no extra money to be saving from age 22 on, and no, these boomers didn't have pensions either.

Is that how your white collar life is right now? Would you be willing to live that way to get the house of your dreams? Because that's what a lot of Boomers did.

I think the people who complain about Boomers must come from truly wealthy and privileged families. Further to a PP's pension story, my uncles retired with healthy pensions too, until the companies let the pension funds go bankrupt and left them with literally nothing to live on (pre-1974 PBGC). They and their wives did not go golfing, they went job hunting in their late 60s-early 70s. Not everyone had it as easy as your family. And not a lot of jobs had pensions in the first place.

I’m older GenX and this is my experience too. I think many of the complaints about Boomers really are from people with privileged backgrounds. I grew up solidly middle class and most neighbors were blue collar. The white collar jobs were squarely middle level. When people went on vacation it was literally once a year to visit their grandparents. Maybe one Disney level trip their entire childhood. As adults, they bought smaller, non updated homes and lived without updating them for years, if at all.

The younger people I see now buying their first homes are buying things our parents would have bought closer to retirement. Then they renovate immediately and have parental help either with their home purchase or private school or both. They also take grand vacations every year, as evidenced by many posts on this board.

Times are different and it’s really not an apples to apples comparison.

Agree with this. I am Gen X but have 5 much older Boomer siblings (I was oops baby in the 70s). 2 are doing very well financially and retired; 2 are doing not well at all and I'm actually super concerned that they will not have enough money to carry them through retirement. (The last one is doing okay, but not that great except married a Gen Xer who is doing well.) Only 2 of the 5 has a defined benefit pension; 3 are still working in their 60s. Two of them had significant losses in the 2008 Great Recession -- one lost their business and one lost their home and filed for bankruptcy. All of them had educational debt with interest rates of like 12-15% on those loans that they were paying off through the 1980s and I think into the early 1990s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's a hard insight issue and the tricky part is that it's impossible to know if the comparison is fair because not enough time has passed.

Yes Boomers dealt with Vietnam, stagflation, and much more restrictive banking policies that made home ownership more challenging. However that turned around and Boomers then enjoyed perhaps the single most prosperous two decades in the US during their prime earning years. The homes the bought in the early 80s with 12% interest rates and that they had to scrimp and save for to qualify at all, doubled, then ,tripled, then quadrupled in value. Their salaries also increased by multiples. The stock market exploded and they wound up on the ground floor of that rocket.

So yes, in 1982, boomers as a generation were struggling. But in 2024 they are not. They have immense wealth, plus social security is still solvent and medicare is actually functioning better than ever thanks to work on prescription drug prices and supplemental plans. They made it.

Millennials have different challenges. Yes mortgage rates are lower and the rules around mortgages are looser (though not quite as loose as they used to be and that's a good thing). Millennials have more debt starting out thanks to education costs, and unlike boomers they have zero faith their own children will be able to self-fund college. The economy is stronger but the job market is more competitive thanks to globalization and American workers must compete with more highly qualified workers.

Maybe it will all work out like it did for boomers. I hope so! One challenge millennials face is that they continue to lack political power as the political landscape remains dominated by Boomers with a continued focus on Boomer concerns. Key millennial issues (cost of college and cost of housing) still lack consensus and addressing them has been an uphill battle.

To top it off, when millennials advocate for policies that would relieve these key pressures, they are called entitled and whiny and told "hey boomers had high mortgage rates and it was hard to even qualify." But this ignores the fact that *those circumstances changed because they were bad.* Policies shifted to make it easier to buy a home and boomers profited wildly from it. The reason mortgage rules were relaxed and rates brought down over time was not dome gift to millennials. These were policies intended to help boomers. And they did.

This made me chuckle. Sure, they dealt with the ravages of war but it's NBD. Such a millennial post.

My dad is a Boomer. Served during the Vietnam era. I don't think he'd shrug it off so lightly. My grandfather was greatest generation and served in WW2. He came back deaf and a changed man. I don't think younger generations quite understand the long-lasting effects that these wars had on these generations - particularly those that served, which constituted a huge portion of the population.

Millennials only focus on how much money they believe Boomers have now - in their retirement. And no, they're not looking at struggling boomers in middle-America but their own white, wealthy parents. My darling millennials - your worldview is skewed. Of course white, wealthy boomers have money now after 50 years of savings. You, too, will have more money after investing for 50 years. This is basic math.

But lucky you that you will likely never have to serve in war as every generation before you, and you have significantly more physical, food, and political security than any prior time in history. I know that they don't believe that but just open a history book to any random year in the 19th/20th century and do a side-by-side. Plus, most of what I hear complaints about are not buying a 3500 sq ft house. Ok. Check avg housing size in 1950 and then get back to me.