While the younger generations have realized that they might never be able to afford to buy a house or an apartment or even find a decently paying job, the older generations haven’t caught up to it yet and think the kids who haven’t moved out of their parents' houses by 18 are lazy.
This 22-year-old on Reddit is annoyed with his grandparents who are disappointed that he still lives with them despite seeing how hard he works at his 2 jobs, and when he constantly lends them money so he isn’t able to save much.
This guy's grandparents just told him that he "failed to launch"
Image credits: daryl_mitchell (not the actual photo)
Despite him being only 22 years old and them seeing him work in two jobs and lending them money on top of that
Image credits: sadz6900
It frustrates the young man how his boomer grandparents can't realize that it's not him who has failed, but the system that has failed him
The Original Poster (OP) lives with his grandparents, because the wage he gets from his 2 jobs only allows him to pay $100 rent that he is asked by them. He often only gets one day off a week and usually works at least 9 hours a day.
However, that all goes unnoticed by his grandparents and they just told him that he “failed to launch.” The grandparents told him that despite seeing what long hours he works and borrowing money from them when they can’t afford their medicine.
It hurts the OP that the grandparents don’t understand he is trying his best and is always looking out for better jobs because he actually has a degree in computer information systems, but the problem is that there are no positions in his area and when there are, they ask for experience so they never call back even to set up an interview.
People in the comments commiserated with the OP and shared similar things their boomer parents or grandparents said. Although, there were a few people who were of the same generation as the OP’s grandparents who acknowledged that the times have changed and young people have it harder than they did at the same age.
But from what we can see online, it seems that there are quite a lot of boomers who consider the younger generations lazy and simply put, losers, for not being able to afford a house, luxuries or even live on their own.
Image credits: Neil Conway (not the actual photo)
Various research shows that they are wrong for being so judgemental. A study published by New America revealed that millennials earn 20 percent less than baby boomers did at the same ages despite 40 percent of millennials 25 to 37 having at least a bachelor’s degree compared to only 25 percent of baby boomers, as Pew Research Center discovered.
College education becoming more common made it a default requirement for getting a job and it is one of the reasons why millennials often don’t find a good job until they’re in their early 30s, as Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce found.
They say that “Young adults generally need at least some postsecondary education and work experience to have a decent chance of getting a good job.” That leads to longer searching periods for good jobs and higher educational debts so “young adults today accumulate less wealth than the previous generation, with disparities in wealth by race/ethnicity and gender.”
BBC Worklife adds that it’s even worse for Gen Z: “In the US, despite general wage increases throughout the past five decades, the cost of living has far outstripped the pace of pay rises. It’s particularly acute for the youngest generation: some analyses show that in the US, Gen Z have about 86% less buying power than Baby Boomers did at the same age.”
It’s because many of them entered adulthood during the pandemic, which was a hit to the economy and jobs were scarce. The inflation is getting bigger by the day, there’s an energy price crisis and banks are increasing their interest rates.
So if you dig deeper into the current economic situation that young people need to become adults in, you feel less inclined to blame them for not being able to afford things as they can’t control the most important factors from which their wages and well-being depend.
Do you have an explanation why older generations fail to understand it? Why don’t they believe it when the proof is right before their eyes? Do you think it’s even necessary to own a home? Do you think it’s what people really want, or do they only want it because they are supposed to want it? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
People in the comments also wished that older people would realize the economy is not like it used to be when they were young
Image credits: Mike Schmid (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Kindel Media (not the actual photo)
