To think, as a 'millennial', that we do have it quite good?

[kokosnuss]

Hate the term, but the common narrative amongst 'millennials' is that the baby boomers stole all the houses and good pensions, leaving none for us.

AIBU to think that yes, many baby boomers are in an enviable position (paid off mortgage, pension, savings), but only because:
(and I'm thinking only of my own working class grandparents and their friends here, others may have different experiences)

• They started working and saving early, often as soon as they finished school at 15, and had little opportunity to go onto higher education; many would have gone into jobs the millennial generation might consider 'unfulfilling' (e.g. my Grandma was a sewing machinist). They also led lives my generation might consider 'unfulfilling', e.g. simple (meat and 2 veg) food, no foreign holidays, few trips to restaurants, events, etc. Their lives were very much lived in the home i.e. very cheaply and expectations of life were very different.

Of course, many baby boomers now enjoy an expensive lifestyle, with lots of foreign trips and new experiences, but only because they're enjoying the fruits of years of careful saving. They haven't always lived that way, but there seems to be an assumption on the part of millennials that they have. So whereas my generation might only finish education at 21 or later, and then want to spend time travelling, or building up experience towards a 'fulfilling' career path, they also want to live what they consider to be a 'fulfilling' lifestyle, e.g. gadgets, subscriptions, foreign trips, going to events, restaurants, bars, the latest fashions, etc. And then are surprised when they have no savings or pension!

I'm nearly 30, renting, and only just in the position my grandparents would have been in at 18/19 - steady job, actively saving for a house, making regular pension contributions. But I don't blame anybody else for that, because I've had lots of opportunities and experiences in return that I know my grandparents (and female grandparents in particular) didn't have.

AIBU?

Well foreign travel and foods weren't around in the 70's so there wasn't the temptation.

Conceded, but I mean package holidays were not as popular or abundant in the 70's. You couldn't fly over to France for a fiver. We didn't eat anything with rice or pasta, meals were meat and veg. In the 80's a Chinese takeaway opened in the next village, next to the chippie that had been there for 20 odd years.

And yes, as others have said, it was common for people in the 60s and 70s to live essentially hand to mouth to afford the basics - I don't think many millennials would be keen on barely ever having the heating on or having the same plain food day in and day out. When someone drinking a latte that cost £3 tells me they can't afford things I have to laugh a bit - the idea of spending that much money on a drink would have made my mother (who was 30 in 1985) puke.

You have a point but also I think people of our age were hit by the recession just as we were of graduate age

The recession? You think that there has only been one? We had ours, too.

Well foreign travel and foods weren't around in the 70's so there wasn't the temptation'

Now that's just silly!! I assume you mean the 1970s not the 1870s. We lived in the Bradford area, trust me, there was foreign food, Lumb Lane and the Norman Arch spring to mind.

Ryan air didn’t offer €10 flights in the 70s.

My basic Sky package is £10 a month & I don’t like or drink coffee.

Yes I know that I'm simply using it as a potential explanation for why people of the ops ( and mine ) generation feel like it's harder to get on the property ladder for example .

YABU because the economics of everything were very different then.

House prices were much more in line with wages.

However, conversely, holidays/meals out were comparatively more expensive. It's not just a question of BBs being 'better at saving'.

Careers nowadays take longer to take off because more are going to university (with the accompanying debts).

Every generation has their challenges. However housing is a very big problem for millennials and the knock on consequences (long term renting/retirement) are really worrying.

I hate it when people try to lump an entire generation into a group and then insist they have / had it easy. I feel the same whether it’s said about spendthrift millenials or house-pincher baby boomers tbh.

Specifically when it comes to housing, or lack thereof, though, it is a little bit worrying. Especially where I live, (near London).

True, though, that the food shortages and bombings which I would have had to think about if I’d grown up during WWII sound pretty worrying too! But, seeing as that’s history, it’s not such a pressing matter. Maybe we just shouldn’t bother comparing hardships. Seems a bit of a pointless exercise. So, in the nicest possible way, I think you might BU to start this thread tbh!

Millennials or Gen Y: Born 1977 to 1995

I've never seen people born between 77 and 82 be referred to as millennials.

I think YAB a bit U. Im in a similar position to you, but it’s not because I’m not prepared to graft, but more about the sheer lack of career opportunities many face.

I never went travelling. I went from uni straight into a (very poorly paid) internship which, due to government cuts, didn’t lead to the job I was promised at the start of it (it was a feeder program).

I was then forced to move back in with my parents for a number of years because I simply couldn’t support myself. Whilst living with my parents, I worked several part time jobs as well as volunteering AND running my own business. At one point I was juggling 6 employments (waitress, cashier at Asda, shop assistant in a local town, guide at a tourist attraction, I was volunteering at my county museum, and running my jewellery business on Etsy). But despite all this my pay wasn’t reliable enough or high enough to allow me to move out.

During this time I was applying for no end of graduate jobs, as well as PhDs. I was accepted to Oxford(!) but we couldn’t obtain the funding - that still breaks my heart to this day.

It wasn’t until I was 27 that I was offered a temporary job with my old employer - the internship one - to cover maternity leave. During this time I finally managed to get myself onto a graduate scheme, which is what I’m doing now.

At nearly 30, I am having to retrain and restart all over. But it’s not for my lack of trying, or a poor millennial work ethic! The only foreign holiday I had was when my parents paid for me to go with them. Of course I contributed what I could but there’s no way I could have afforded to go off my own bat.

For much of this time I was also living very rurally. I would see friends about once a year when we had uni reunion gatherings. I spent most of my evenings for 4 years during my 20s sat on the sofa with my mum :( I was hardly spending money on fancy cocktails or exotic restaurants. I certainly wasn’t dating either - there was no one around to date!

I am scared because I am only now able to save into a workplace pension and try to put away savings of my own, but my graduate salary doesn’t allow for much wiggle room after rent and travel costs. It will only be in a couple of years when I’m fully trained that I’m able to save properly.

I don’t “want everything now” and I don’t think I’m anything unique or special. What I wanted was a fair crack at the whip. My parents (baby boomers!) always brought me up with the mantra that if you work hard and apply yourself and try your best then you will reap the rewards. Instead what I got is a 4 or 5 year pause on my life which stunted my life horribly.

Yes there was a short time in recent history that it was good high employment and many could afford to get on the property ladder

But lives were different many stayed at home to save less consumerism less luxuries and less opportunities

And then growing up in the 50’s and 60’s wasn’t all like it is in American films kitchen sink dramas represented the vast majority of people’s lives far higher rates of poverty, discrimination was normalised, very little support for single parents, dv was ignored and very much a society where you knew your place

I've never seen people born between 77 and 82 be referred to as millennials.

Occasionally I've seen it go down to 80, but not often. 1982 is the usual cut off.

In the baby boomer's day, you could buy a house on an unskilled wage in your early 20's without too much bother.

Took me a bloody sight longer to buy myself, I (just about) fit into the millenial age bracket.

There was some foriegn food around, but let's not kid ourselves that it was plentiful or common or easily available.

My parents used to make special trips to the Swizz centre in London twice a year to stock up on salami and continental cheeses, as these weren't available where we lived.

Putting garlic in food was considered very foriegn (not a complement), and dressing a salad was very avant garde (it was supposed to sit on the plate dry with a sad little spoonful of salad dressing to help it down).

I have a clear memory of the arrival of the first sweet peppers in the local greengrocers in 1977. Friends of my parents made a salad with them and it was the centre-point of an actual party - all the neighbours came round to admire and try them. Same thing happened when someone got one of the first generation microwaves.

The past truly is another country.

Baby Boomers were able to save because decent jobs were easily available with full employment rights and unions etc. Try saving anything while working in a minimum wage zero hour job! And yes there are more things available nowadays like gadgets, foreign holidays, restaurants, clothes, etc - but a lot of young people don't have those things because they can't afford them.

It annoys me when people say they've worked hard, saved and done without to afford a house. Some of us work hard and do without but still have no money left over to save because our pay and conditions are crap. You're very lucky if you have enough money to be in a position where you can choose whether to do without or not! Some of us have no choice about whether to do without!

Oh come on you don’t have to go to university to get a “good job” there’s plenty of other ways like apprenticeships and work based training that you can do to get a job that earns a very good wage.
Experienced plumbers here in the SE can earn around £40k per year.
As others have said unfortunately people want things now they don’t save and then buy it.
It’s very hard to listen to someone I know complaining how baby boomers had it easy to buy a house and millennials will never have the same opportunities when they’ve got a new car on finance, a new phone on contract, designer clothes and go on holidays and weekend breaks once every couple of months but can’t afford to move out of their parents house.

When you look to what retirement is going to look like for both generations the differences become stark. Whatever about what millennials are getting up to now, it's difficult to see how they'll fund the kind of retirement that many baby boomers are enjoying now, given the demise of workplace pensions, uncertainty round state pension, not owning their own homes, etc.

Also, no one talks about Gen X. They're like the forgotten generation.

I don't think many millennials would be keen on barely ever having the heating on or having the same plain food day in and day out

Do you really think there aren't people who are forced to do this because they have no money?

Experienced plumbers here in the SE can earn around £40k per year.

That doesn't sound like very much when average house prices in Surrey are around the half million mark.

I think yabu. I would be quite happy to do an 'unfulfilling' job if it meant that I could afford a decent mortgage and have savings with it. As it happens, I have quite a stressful job, with a long commute which means that the juggle between maintaining my reputation at work and being there for my family is challenging at times. I wouldnt like to be a SAHP but a straightforward job ten minutes from home, even if deathly boring would suit me.

I also think that many millenials spend their money on holidays and a social life because in many areas, a deposit just seems so unattainable. I don't agree with the logic but i can see how people may take the decision to enjoy their 20s with more short term plans rather than squirrel every last pound away.

We live in more throwaway times. My grandparents still have lots of the furniture they had when they got married. They've had the same kitchen in since the 70s. It's all well looked after and tidy. They don't feel the need to be constantly renovating and updating, so their money hasn't been spent in that way.

Well lets see. My DF had free University education and walked into a management training position with a bank, that came with a clear career path, a good pension and they would grant a mortgage without a down payment, this was at 22.

At 22, I was $50,000 in debt (the cost of his first house), and I couldn't get a job because there was a recession and I was competing with 40 year olds who had 20 years of experience in the field, whilst I (who had been working since 16) only had customer service and volunteer experience.

For DF a Bachelor's degree meant something. For me, it was a standard, and I've just dropped the cost of a small house on a Master's Degree as well so I can continue to move up.

I pay more for a 2 bdrm apt in rent than my parents ever spent on a mortgage for a 4 bdrm house.

Not to mention, the Boomers are living longer, working longer and have completely effed the environment, and we have to pick up the tab for these things.

So YABU, you can't talk savings if you start out in the negative.

I completely agree regarding pensions Laurie

YANBU.

I’m a late gen X rather than millennial. I got on the property ladder late do have a high mortgage, but we’re on it. I don’t know how some people get on it.

But we do not get into any debt other than mortgage. I see a car as a luxury not essential. Our sofa needs replacing but we’d never get store credit so it’ll probably have to last another 8 years or so. My previous sofa was donated by friends.

My parents were baby boomers and definitely had much better availability of jobs. But there was much more workplace discrimination. There was no wage equality for part time work. No paid maternity leave.

Comparison is the thief of joy and all that. Some things are better, done things worse.

The baby boomer generation got a good deal on housing if they bought a house, and degrees if they were clever enough to pass the 11 plus and work hard. They also got the fall out from ww2 as children (sweets were rationed until my mum was five), recessions, pit closures, poll tax and all the other shit that comes through living a life through a certain era. They are now getting Ill and dying at a real fucking low point in the NHS, so sadly for a lot of them, those pensions will never get used. I actually pity the baby boomers needing heart operations and hip replacements right now.
The millennials struggle to get mortgages but want a 'forever house' like their parents, they have rarely if ever seen what a proper pay rise looks like, but they are at least mostly employed for now and keeping their heads above water. Things have certainly not improved in the last thirty years but that generation was a direct consequence of a war. I for one would rather be where we are and avoid a war at all costs.

Interest rates also went up to around 16% I am sure I remember 13% been seen as a good deal

Anything is that we hear a lot more about people’s struggles as we can all chat about it on the internet

I remember my grandparents, my mum and my aunt really struggling it wasn’t really discussed much as that wasn’t the thing to do plus they were brought up to feel grateful for having even a low wage job and they certainly didn’t have a platform to express their frustrations/concerns/worries