Current times...

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Comparing generational struggles is difficult and arguably subjective to a large extent. We often hear life today is more stressful, there is too much technology... list goes on and on. I was born in 1976 so I can only really compare today, to how things were in the 80's. I feel my generation had the last taste of what life was like before technology really boomed. We certainly weren't coddled as much and while we did have Nintendo/Atari, we weren't hooked on iPads. We played outside a lot and "offended" wasn't a thing.

My parents grew up in the 50's and 60's. They had their share of challenges, but I often hear them claim life was easier in many ways. I'm sure it was to some extent. But at the same time, we have it so easy in so many ways.

My overall gut feeling is we've gotten a bit too soft. Sure, some things are challenging, but life today is pretty convenient.

With that said, I love the 80's and miss a lot of it.

Thoughts?
 
I don’t think we’ve necessarily gotten too soft. The world is so much more advanced and has made things disproportionately challenged for a lot of folks. Things aren’t like they used to be, and there isn’t an easy fix to it.

Back in the day a school teacher could comfortably support a stay at home mom and 3 kids and own a house and a car. Or a janitor.

You could also flip burgers on the weekend/summers and pay for an apartment and college.
 
Teenagers and young adults get on my nerves with the things that 'stress them out'. I hear them yammer, and they never really get to the point of what it is they're suffering with, and then my eyes roll back in my head and I just go deaf.

The nuts and bolts of daily life today are just a touch away. You can get anything, or get anything done with just with a few taps on a phone. A far cry from getting things, or getting things done in the 80s and 90s.

My generation has raised a society of entitled, lazy, over-indulged monsters, all in the name of giving their kids more than they had. They're not thankful for anything, but feel they deserve it. They don't want to work for anything, they want it handed to them. Things that I would have considered high-dollar or premium are just the standard to them, and they deserve more, but nothing less. And NOTHING is their fault, because everyone around them must be to blame. Children of Gen-Xers can claim the prize of making dash cams a daily necessity for us all, because they have no qualms about lying to a police officer's face about what transpired during the crash, and going full Karen, as NOTHING could possibly be their fault. I have a nephew that falls in this age group, and I've watched him lie directly to his parents' faces about damage done to his car while away at college. The car is beat to hell, but amazingly, he had nothing to do with any of it.

Technology, and rich, over-indulgent, disconnected parents have created what we're seeing on Youtube today. Fistfights at 30,000 feet, yelling obscenities into a cop's face, claiming no responsibility for the car wreck they caused while the whole thing was caught on tape.....the list is long. I find my self often saying "if I had behaved like that in public, my mother would already have me in the back seat of her car, whipping the tar out of me." Me, and a lot of people I consider friends, can tell tales of parental respect that doesn't exist today. The consensus among us is that a little bit of fear was a good thing, because it taught us respect, and how to act in public. This is why I have no younger friends, and can't stand other peoples' kids.

Oh, and.....get off my lawn.
 
Nobody wants to experience bad times or uncertainty in their lives but it is exactly these situations that test a person and a society in how they will react and respond.

The greatest generation went thru he🏒🏒 and then passed on how they coped to the next generation. Those of us who lived during the Malaise Era remembered and used frugal tips and other ideas to get by.

It’s going to get worse. Todays inflation news is just one part.
 
Young folks want everything NOW !!!!

If they don’t get what they want they start an Occupy Wall Street protest while yapping on their iPhone, sipping Starbucks coffee, wearing Ray Ban sunglasses and Nike sneakers.

:oops:

Life is very simple:
Shut up and stop complaining..... Stop expecting to be treated like an adult while acting like a brat..... Work hard and pay your dues. You are NOT special just because your parents accidentally had you.

Nobody owes you anything. Stop your Narcissistic and Toxic behavior. Shut up and realize you are nothing special.

Stop walking around like zombies on your cellphone, get a job and leave mommy’s basement.

Just because you have 732 Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TicTok and Twitter friends doesn’t make you important.

Again, some of the most successful people I’ve met in life did it the hard way. Young folks don’t want to put up with stress, anxiety or aggravation, they feel they are entitled to things older folks had to work their ass off for.



You want a difficult struggle ?
Try coming to the USA in the early 1950’s after Hitler and the Communists chased you out of Europe. No money, just a suitcase of old clothes, not speaking any English and no family or relatives in the USA to help you.

.
 
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“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”
Charles Dickens
 
My parents weren't always very attentive. We were to be NOT seen nor heard most of the time. "just go out and play!" was a common phrase in my household. I think that's a big difference. Today's version of "just go out and play" is "here's an iPad, leave me be."

Being offended has been around forever, btw. If you disagree, it's probably because you're a straight white male. :eek:

In all seriousness, I remember being offended all of the time when kids would pick on me in middle school. That usually ended with a punch to their face. I was raised kind of wild. I also felt offended for the queer kids who were beat on and picked on mercilessly. If you can't tell, we had a lot of ghetto kids in my schools, which is likely different than what you experienced, and definitely different than what my kids will experience.
 
I don't think it is even close. FWIW I was born in 1981

In the 70's/80's there were good jobs everywhere, school was cheap and you could buy a house for next to nothing. Now, none of that is really true. You can find a job right now but the question is how good is it, and you seem to need a degree in basket weaving to even be able to apply for anything. Then you're paying off student loans while making next to nothing. There is zero loyalty (from either side) anymore.

I was very lucky in that I was able to buy a home and get into the job market about 5-10 years before things went really sideways. I have no idea how someone in their 20's right now is supposed to make it in today's world without a serious amount of financial help. Learning a trade is almost certainly the way to go I would think.
 
I don't think it is even close. FWIW I was born in 1981

In the 70's/80's there were good jobs everywhere, school was cheap and you could buy a house for next to nothing. Now, none of that is really true. You can find a job right now but the question is how good is it, and you seem to need a degree in basket weaving to even be able to apply for anything. Then you're paying off student loans while making next to nothing. There is zero loyalty (from either side) anymore.

I was very lucky in that I was able to buy a home and get into the job market about 5-10 years before things went really sideways. I have no idea how someone in their 20's right now is supposed to make it in today's world without a serious amount of financial help. Learning a trade is almost certainly the way to go I would think.
Normal, average 20 year olds will be facing a steeper battle but the exceptional will make exceptional results. For example, Meet Kevin on youtube created his own ~50 million net worth in his 20s from real estate, youtube, and stocks.

Top 1% from a net worth perspective is over 10 million dollars of assets now, one in a hundred with 8 figures!
 
Comparing generational struggles is difficult and arguably subjective to a large extent. We often hear life today is more stressful, there is too much technology... list goes on and on. I was born in 1976 so I can only really compare today, to how things were in the 80's. I feel my generation had the last taste of what life was like before technology really boomed. We certainly weren't coddled as much and while we did have Nintendo/Atari, we weren't hooked on iPads. We played outside a lot and "offended" wasn't a thing.

My parents grew up in the 50's and 60's. They had their share of challenges, but I often hear them claim life was easier in many ways. I'm sure it was to some extent. But at the same time, we have it so easy in so many ways.

My overall gut feeling is we've gotten a bit too soft. Sure, some things are challenging, but life today is pretty convenient.

With that said, I love the 80's and miss a lot of it.

Thoughts?
'72 here.

50's and 60's were different. Capital wasn't very mobile so their parents weren't competing with labor on a global scale. It wasn't until the US GOV moved 100 percent off the gold standard in the early 1970s that credit creation at unimaginable levels ensued. It was also during the 1970s that women began in mass to move into professions which were dominated by men. Dual income households combined with benefits from access to credit (ex, credit cards, mortgages, USG spending) lent to rapid price appreciation and if one invested correctly great wealth.

Todays the labor pool is global (Europe, China, India). Over a decade of ultra-low interest rates has accelerated price appreciation and wages have not risen due to increases in health insurance (employer paid), advancements in automation and global competition. Life is harder for young adults. They're not going to benefit from the artificial reduction in domestic and worldwide competition via world wars (WW1,2) or an economic system which grew mostly from savings rather than debt.
 
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Normal, average 20 year olds will be facing a steeper battle but the exceptional will make exceptional results. For example, Meet Kevin on youtube created his own ~50 million net worth in his 20s from real estate, youtube, and stocks.

Top 1% from a net worth perspective is over 10 million dollars of assets now, one in a hundred with 8 figures!

So the 1% will continue being the 1%? Ok then
 
I don't think it is even close. FWIW I was born in 1981

In the 70's/80's there were good jobs everywhere


Okay, maybe you lived in a unique area? Jobs were scarce in the late 70’s. Unemployment was double digits.

I was looking for work in 1980. Back then unemployment consisted of six months of benefits plus a three month extension that was put in due to the lack of work available. As I drove around pretty much every business had signs that said, NO HIRING. NO APPLICATIONS TAKEN. They didn’t want people streaming into the office all day.


Here is a chart showing the unemployment rates over the years. This shows the national average. The UE rate where I lived was over 20%.


 
Oh, we have become soft for sure. Never is the history of mankind (this country) has life been more easy.
Problem is, people are spoiled.
1%? 5%? its laughable the majority of the population make them rich. Then cry about it.
Think about it. College loans, auto loans, pay TV, cell phones, nice clothes. They buy everything on credit then pay the people who lend them the money.
Like hello? Stop borrowing money to buy stuff you cant afford, drive a used car you can afford, use a cheap cell phone with a cheap plan, dont go to college on a loan and then decide FOUR years later what you want to do with you life, meanwhile you wasted 4 years on a general education and had lots of parties and vacations.
Stop blaming others and the 1, 2, 3, ..10% You live in the best ever of times, turn off the news, stop crying, stop borrowing money and get to work.
There will always be the 1 to 10% that work harder then you, dont waste money like the others, dont go to other people to borrow money for stuff they can buy on their own (that's the key) like a kid in middle school does to buy a snack.
Stop taking about 30 year mortgages and go for a 15 or if you do a 30 pay it off.
Its amazing the waste of money in our country. But the bottom line is, living off borrowed money gives the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 % their high end living.

Inflation? dont even get me started! I am THRILLED about inflation! What did the snowflakes think was going to happen when there is no cry to government to stop borrowing money. Its all a fairy tale, easy money everywhere!
Im telling you now, today is the best ever of times and its about to end for the next few decades, sooner or later, someone has to pay it back. http://www.usdebtclock.org (this mess is only the fault of the voters and nothing more, no passing the buck, we vote them into office)

No politics please, times are great and have been for decades... Glad I grew up when I did, 60s and 70s, yeah, those times where great.
We had to work for a living, wanted to buy something? Save your money, I got a paper route for my 12th birthday and worked all these decades to get what I managed to work for and proud of it, no one handed it to me. Gosh, It blows my mind someone who makes coffee in a Starbucks now makes $20 a hour *LOL*

🙃🙃🙃🙃🙃🙃
 
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I was born in 1970. I often say I am SO glad I was in my 20's through the 1990s. Cell phones really weren't a thing. The innerwebs were just beginning. Things were great then IMO.

I've always done what I thought was best for my kids (ranging from 10 to 20yrs old), but there's so many forces working against you.
 
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