Reply to Boomers' Billion-Dollar Bonanza: The Unseen Hoarding Behind Millennial Struggles

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[quote=Anonymous]I'd just like to note that I am perfectly happy with my life as an elder millennial. I am not rolling in dough and live in a condo instead of a house. I am also still paying of school debt in my 40s, which isn't great. But I don't run around feeling like crap about my life. My condo is nice and in a good neighborhood. I'm married and have a kid, who is happy. Our local schools are not great but not terrible, and we've found that with a little determination you can get your kid what they need even in a mediocre school -- it's about parental support more than anything else.

You know who thinks my life is a travesty? My boomer parents. They are embarrassed that I'm not more professionally successful (I mommy tracked when I had a kid because I wanted to be present in my child's life), that my spouse doesn't make more money (I married a good person for love and didn't go hunting for a wallet). They are ashamed I live in a condo. They think we're too frugal and should spend more of our money on vacations (to visit them of course) and consumer goods that they could brag to their friends about.

I think my life is good but my boomer parents think it can't possibly be because I don't have a 4 bedroom house in the best school district and 2 brand new cars and vacations to Disneyland and Mexico every year and nicer furniture and clothes and my kid in expensive activities and sports. When we explain that our frugality is so that we can pay down debt faster and be debt free by the time we hit our 50s and before our kid goes to college, they scoff at this like it's a silly plan.

So sometimes I wonder, when I read stuff like this thread, how much of how Millenials feels frustrated about their lot in life is about externally imposed expectations of what their lives *should* look like at this point. I remember my dad looking down on me for living with roommates in my 20s, or buying a used car when technically I could have afford something nicer. My parents and their siblings are very invested in external markers of financial success, and not so concerned about personal fulfillment or happiness, the hard work of being a present parent, or focusing on the meaning in life instead of jumping from one milestone to the next.

Maybe the problem with millennials is that they have internalized their parents' backwards value systems. And if you are a boomer who doesn't think millennials should complain about stuff like the cost of housing or childcare, I hope you also tell your own millennial kids that it's totally fine to rent longterm or buy a condo or townhouse you can afford, that their value as people cannot be represented by their paychecks or the stuff they own. Might be worth looking inward a bit on this.

(Cue some boomer coming along to tell me that all her children are much more wildly successful than me, personal fulfilled and also stinking rich, blah blah blah)[/quote]

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