patrick.net

I hope to hear from Ellie Mae on this!

Boo - hoo. No... let me rephrase that... Boo - fucking - Hoo.

terriDeaner says

Boo - hoo. No... let me rephrase that... Boo - fucking - Hoo.

Easily said, unless you're in that position. The examples that they used in the story weren't exactly typical. I've seen many examples of mulitple family members under one roof - they need the senior's income to keep the household afloat and try to care for her on their own rather than send to nursing home. And with jobs scarce out west (here) adult children living with mom & dad is common.

What do you all think?

Nobody is forcing you to have kids, so this problem is easily avoided.

terriDeaner says

Boo - hoo. No... let me rephrase that... Boo - fucking - Hoo.

Yeah, I agree. The boomers have gotten cheap housing, cheap education, good benefits, 25+ years of relative prosperity to grow their investments before they dropped only slightly more recently (and came back quite a bit if you held on), many have pensions, etc. All of this was on Gen X and later's backs, who will pay for this stuff. I'm not really feeling a lot of sympathy here. It's time they give some back.

Also, these stories don't seem typical at all, as elliemae said. There are always some extreme stories.

Bologna Sandwich, hellz yes!

My parents are pure boomers. My parents divorced in the mid 80's and went their separate ways and are now back together. They are on both sides of the spectrum. My Dad was a prudent saver who took a decent hit on his retirement account. My mom was a worker and spender and has no savings and will rely solely on social security.

I am a GEN X along with my wife. We are doing better than when we were kids. However, I question the future and my daughters’ opportunities.

I still hold out faith that we will go through a period of austerity and then come through with new priorities.

@Truthplease,

Thanks for the story. I have been busy lately so sorry for the bried comments...

Get Michelle on this, don't they know about the fresh produce alternatives? I hope they tax balongna people shouldn't eat that stuff, not when there's $3.00 tomatoes just ripe for the picking at Wholefoods.

Is Sandwich Generation, the one where Michelle & Sarah get in the kitchen and makes me a sammich? That's something I can get behind.

Sob..Sniff!

Please take care of your family members who need some help! Stop whining! Do you see us gen xers whining about helping others out, especially our children and parents? We're losing our houses, our retirements, and more due to your generation driving up housing prices, yet we get to hear about how the boomers are being squeezed. Please.

The boomers are in charge of the government and the corporations (and refusing to leave their positions to let us gen xers in), and look what they've done with the place. (think Bush, Obama, CEO's, and all their friends)

If history is recalled accurately, the boomers will be remembered as the generation which caused the downfall of this country.

proudtobegenx says

If history is recalled accurately, the boomers will be remembered as the generation which caused the downfall of this country.

OH, I see. It's all about when you were born. I thought it was about too many idiots who for decades thought that tax cuts for themselves more than offset deficit government spending. The whole "deficits don't matter" or "starve the beast" crowd.

I think you're just envious of the boomers. Soon you'll be dying your hair grey so you can be more like us.

Obligatory:

marcus says

I think you're just envious of the boomers. Soon you'll be dying your hair grey so you can be more like us.

I'm not envious of boomers. They were preceded by the greatest generation and were given great opportunities. Now that they are retiring, they are leaving a steaming dung heap for the rest of us. Thanks. It doesn't matter if a boomer was a leftwing or a rightwing nutjob - as a group the sum total of their efforts (or lack thereof) has been abysmal.

proudtobegenx says

Please take care of your family members who need some help!

Exactly. Unfortunately, the boomers taught their children how to treat the elderly in particular - toss them in a nursing home and visit them every other holiday. Someone once wrote "you reap what you sow..."

Truthplease says

However, I question the future and my daughters’ opportunities.

Don't worry. The boomers will be dead by the time she is an adult and we can close that sad chapter in history.

Certainly that can become more common but multigenerational housing was the norm not that long ago.Prior to the expanding of the government families were the primary support network (and religious groups)

When my parents get too old to care for them selves, I plan to take care of them as well. I can't decide if a plastic bag or a bullet is more painless.

I see it as a split. The greatest generation for the most part seemed to be magnificent savers and non consumers generally speaking. I bet you could say that was probably a 75 percent majority there. However, their kids who became hippies seem almost split down the middle.

For instance, using generalities here in regards to my family and my wife’s family, this is by no means an official study.

With the exception of my father, all my aunts and uncles are massive consumers who lived their lives in debt. On my side of the family, baby boomers were hippies who bucked the institution and did the protests, experimented with drugs, and had great hopes. Well, most of them now have overleveraged themselves in debt living for the here and now. I would consider them the 60 percent of this generation from my observations. I have no statistics for this. Now mind you, my side of the family is pure republicans who have massive debt, some have been foreclosed on, and some live off government programs.

My wife’s side of the family is completely the opposite. They also were raised by the same generation of parents but are very conservative with their money. They paid off their houses within 10 years and have owned their houses since the 80’s. They save their money and are not consumers by any means, probably non consumers when compared to my family. My wife’s parents are strictly democrats who believe in paying higher taxes for better schools, better roads, and better social services.

With all that said. It is quite the thing to ponder when I think about it.

Now, looking at the Gen X and Gen Y folks which is me and people I know. We grew up under very different households. A lot of us had parents who both worked. My family worked to spend while my wife’s family worked to get rid of debt and save for the future. However, I know people in the Gen X realm who have also made poor decisions in regards to finance as I have before. I learned a quick lesson in my 20’s about debt. When it took me 3 years to pay off a credit card I had maxed out, I learned fairly quick that 20 percent interest on a credit card with 10K on it is a BITCH.

Other friends of mine are learning that lesson the hard way through bankruptcy and foreclosure.

In the end, what Gen X and Gen Y is thankful for is time. While we may have followed our parents’ path of consumption and debt, we have time to recover from our mistakes and learn the lesson. Over half of the Baby Boom generation has just fucked themselves. Time is not on their side in this environment. Gen X has some very big challenges coming up. We have a wrecked economy and government. We have at least half of our parents who are willing to throw our grandparents in homes quickly. Should we do the same? We have the same half also extremely debt ridden with no hopes of changing their futures.

What do I think will happen?

I think the combination of people in poverty already and the Baby Boom decimation will move Gen X and Y into a position to either be the next greatest generation or turn us into a rabble who plunges this country into Chaos. I am hoping we don’t choose the mob route as it will most likely lead to a very authoritarian leadership with strict and tight controls over the population viewed through a fogged lens of democracy.

So guess what Gen X and Y…. At some point you will have to put down that video game because a massive shit storm just came threw and we have a lot of cleaning up to do.

TechGromit says

When my parents get too old to care for them selves, I plan to take care of them as well. I can't decide if a plastic bag or a bullet is more painless.

It's too bad that Dr Kevorkian is dead.

TechGromit says

When my parents get too old to care for them selves, I plan to take care of them as well. I can't decide if a plastic bag or a bullet is more painless.

Where's an ice flow when you need one?

LOL! Ice flow.

Well, you would have to travel farther north. Global warming is getting to be a real bitch for the Eskimos. Now Mr. Eskimo has to endure relentless nagging from his mother in law who would have been on the ice flow 10 years ago if it wasn't for global warming.