Lucky for me my parents were both “I didn’t save anything for retirement, my kids will take care of me when I’m older”, so I don’t have to suffer through this.
My mother was a wonderful person, poor, and a boomer. She never had anything handed to her. We need to stop shitting on specific generations (it’s a distraction ) and target our hate towards the class divides between us instead.
My parents worked hard all their lives and have had very little to show for it. As much as I didn’t realise it at the time, I never really wanted for anything, but I’m sure my parents skipped meals on occasion.
Now they’re retired they have a bit of money from state pension and superannuation funds, as well as a bit my mum inherited from her parents. It’s still not a lot, but they’re able to live in the comparative luxury they always deserved.
A couple of year back they splurged and took a trip to the UK, which had been on their bucket lists since before I was born. They seemed to feel like they had to explain why they were spending the money, and I reassured them that it was their money, not mine.
My wife and I are in good, stable jobs and we don’t need their cash. Let them enjoy themselves while they still can.
I think pretty much everyone agrees with your take here. People are just saying that if kids are struggling and parents can afford it, it’s weird for the parents not to help out financially.
Obviously the circumstances matter and if the kid is struggling because they’re lazy or a drug addict you don’t want to enable that but if they have their own kids and are working full time I would always support my kids financially if they needed that and I was able to.
Obviously the circumstances matter and if the kid is struggling because they’re lazy or a drug addict
Trying to explain to a guy with chronic back pain that the relief he’s seeking is self-indulgent and the time he’s spending plotting the death of a CEO could be better spent building a new kind of online gambling website.
if the kid is struggling because they’re lazy
We’re talking about 40 year olds.
And what a convenient excuse to call anyone struggling lazy. So many lazy people with full time jobs that don’t pay enough to pay boomers their inflated rents. Must be drugs.
I’m not saying all people who struggle are lazy. Quite the opposite.
Yes… That is their money. They should spend and enjoy it.
They also voted for Bush II’s wars with money borrowed from a generation that couldn’t vote yet.
I’m just thinking about my own experience, but my parents are blue collar Democrats, so no they didn’t. They just worked hard their whole lives and are enjoying their well earned retirement.
Boomers are a large group of people, hence the name, from diversified backgrounds. I believe people are trying to start a generational war where we need a proper class war.
Yah! Refocus!
That is their money.
In 2022, 65% of people ages 65 to 74 had debt, up from 50% in 1989. In 2022, 53% of households headed by someone 75 or older had debt, compared to 32% in 1992.
In fairness, this article is pure bait. It neglected the rising cost of living for people on fixed incomes and treats these draw downs on savings as a frivolity, rather than a consequence of inflation on senior care and medical needs.
But liquidating household assets via instruments like reverse mortgages and loans against large savings accounts and pensions can mean saddling your children and grandchildren with big debts even after you’re gone.
Yeah, the money is mostly spent on medical care, getting scammed and retirement homes. Capitalism is making sure all that money goes to the 1% before it ever gets to you.
Probably the rest of us won’t last much longer than them now anyway.
It’s not their money. It’s rent money they stole from the next generations by being parasites hoarding property as an investment.
And you have the option to do the same, or you don’t, its up to you
You’re right, oblivious rich 20 year old. Everyone can be a landlord.
Oblivious .ml account
I wouldn’t go that far, but I see little evidence that young people deserve it more.
Lemmy seems to be pretty mad about their allowance, basically. It’s weird, usually the vibe is more that everyone else works at a FAANG.
Honestly, my mother, born 1961, received $250K in 2000 when my great grandparents passed. my grandmother, has always bought things for my mom: cars, car repairs, her insurance, grocery shopping, and a few vacations over the years.
My mother has not so much as ever taken me shopping, not even when I was a kid. My other parent, the broke one, bought us everything. My mom, did stretch her inheritance pretty far, but only because her parents helped her out with month to month stuff. It annoys me to no end.
She’s spent the last 15 years convincing my grandmother, her mom, to spend it all. And she has. For me, two generations ago my great grandparents (second Gen immigrant) had accumulated over a million dollars in straight cash.
I’ll get nothing. If my family actually had love there- if my mother actually took care of me and her other children, I wouldn’t be mad, id understand. That’s not how it went down. My mom spent every, has nothing but a new car left now, the last thing my grandmother bought her, the inheritance gone and she’s now a part time babysitter, after not working 30 years. She was on disability too, this whole time, my entire youth, for get this- mental health. I got to therapy every week still to this day to address my childhood and continued struggles, the same as she did, but she got disability in the 90s when everyone could sign on easily it seems. Her whole life paid for.
I haven’t spoken to her in closet to 7, 8 years now. I can’t imagine my story is unique when it comes to the subject.
My husbands parents are the opposite of my mother, both types of people exist but it’s infuriating to go through what I have with my family. To literally watch your “generational wealth” get flushed.
Make a boomer leisure business, lazy children. EZ.
And that is there choice, and most of what’s left over will go into their care home expenses anyway, that’ll drive them bankrupt either way.
This is a bad faith take that only reflect the experiencs of the wealthiest boomers. There are elderly people struggling with Medicare and social security being cut. Remember, there’s not an age war, there is a class war.
It is a class war but boomers provide political cover the the ruling class to destroy the country
There is no war but the class war, full stop.
The boomer I see sleeping on the sidewalk every morning is more a victim of capitalist fuckery than I’ll ever be. There’s no war but the class war, everything else is secondary.
Than you ever hope to be.
Yes that one boomer is a victim and many of are also victims but at same time they spout what tv told them as gospel when you bring up any issues within system.
If they want ally with the working class good, but as a group of people I don’t see anything like this.
But most of them lack proper education or they think it is not in their self interest to demand any serit reform.
They are not allies as a group of people and many of them nk longer work either. So they don’t care for working class struggle.
There is no war but the class war comrade.
We have more in common with an entitled boomer or homeless man than we do with Elmo or Zuck (or McConnell or Pelosi) or any of the other elite. Everything else is a distraction to class consciousness, don’t fall into the same trap lead-brained and propagandized victims of childhood abuse do. They are not the enemies.
It is a class war but boomers provide political cover the the ruling class to destroy the country
You are trying to generalize so you can make it not a class war because it’s easier. Stop it.
Worth repeating:
Remember, there’s not an age war, there is a class war.
This is worth repeating on basically all things political, social, financial, etc.
There is no “_____” War, there is only a Class War.
It’s a class war, but many boomers are scabs.
Remember when there was a worker shortage and retired boomers went and volunteered at chain restaurants so they wouldn’t have to raise wages to attract workers? Remember all the “millennials are so entitled, they want to be PAID FOR WORK” style posts by boomers, back when some non-boomers still used Facebook so we had access to their posts?
It’s not their fault they’ve been brainwashed by right-wing propaganda, but they for sure are fighting against anything resembling economic justice.
And obviously much like any generation, you can’t make sweeping statements about them. There are right-wing nutters in their 20s and even their teens out there right now and there are obviously boomers who aren’t selfish assholes.
retired boomers went and volunteered at chain restaurants
Source on this? This sounds insane
There were a lot of news articles and social media posts from angry boomers being circulated at the height of the minimum wage worker shortage after covid hit, but I’m having a hard time finding any right now so I must’ve dreamt it instead.
Oh good I was looking for this comment.
If this is really a Forbes article (it’s just a picture not a link), it is one of an endless stream of opinion pieces by monied interests that pit the populace against each other to distract what the billionaire oligarchs are doing.
Don’t forget that if we can’t paint everyone in a group they were born into with a broad brush, we’ll never be able to beat prejudices like racism, sexism, and ableism.
In other words, the rich are eating the middle class. They will buy up all property and normal people will be permanently priced out of the market. They have no reason to sell.
“we set our money on fire and voted for trump. good luck” - boomers
“we love voting for trump despite being poor as fuck because we are complete morons that have been brainwashed by andrew tate and joe rogan clips on tiktok” -gen z men
class issue, not age issue. though i do understand getting frustrated at people who fall for the grift
You guys are getting a good luck?
Yeah my parents:
explicitly told me they’re giving me nothing
told me they’d give my hypothetical grandchildren something because (and I cannot express to you enough that they explicitly stated this OUT LOUD WITH WORDS) that they would love the grandchildren more than me. My mother has talked to me at length about how she already likes these people that don’t exist more than me.
Are constantly critical of my appearance. When I tried to wear makeup as a child they didn’t want me to look “promiscuous” (because somehow using an SAT word makes it ok to tell your 10-year-old they look like a whore). My mother was constantly critical of how short clothing looked on me because I was so tall or how my chest looked in shirts because it was too big. Now that I’ve gotten those tits removed and I dress more masculine even though I never even really “came out” as anything because I just don’t care enough about gender that’s also not ok because I’m not acting my gender.
They don’t comfort me when I’m upset. They either tell me I’m upset about something stupid or say that I should be worried about more other things. I worked in Healthcare while in nursing school through the first half of COVID them graduated mid-pandemic and every time I’d mention stuff about how broken our Healthcare system is they’d want to have a “fun debate” about MAGA shit then make fun of me for getting emotional. One time I was sitting suicide watch because a guy kept ripping the ventilator mask off and begging me to let him die. The only thing that got him to keep it on was me summing up the plots of the last five books I read because after the first four hours I ran out of things to talk to him about to keep him distracted. Y’all. They thought my PTSD flashbacks were funny.
My parents are both rocket scientists but they’re not sending people to the moon or Mars. I don’t know how they reconcile a belief in Jesus with arms dealing but I’m pretty sure those dead Palestinian kids are paying for my nursing degree.
Anyway I unloaded the exact content of all those PTSD flashbacks on them, told them their voting choices were going to lead to them dying in a ditch full of maggots, then dumped all the shit my whole family talk behind each other’s backs in the groupchat and changed my phone number. Its been a year and I haven’t felt the need to drink since.
Love me? You don’t even like me. Die alone, assholes.
Sir, this is a Wendy’s.
Those are the sort of parents I left in the past, I feel you with a lot of that.
As for the grandkids, feel free to use my excuse. “I can’t afford them”. (Partially because I have to support one of them, but also kids are freaking expensive). So they can whine about not having grandchildren all they want. Kids are now 800k+, who can do that?
Well they’ve said they would support me IF-
I just went ahead and told them it’s because they didn’t stop my cousins from doing weird sexual shit to me.
Reading this thread, I feel like having a nice rant:
“Waah, all our problems are caused by the boomers! They’re all rich and selfish, they had the easy life and got all the money and the houses and ruined the environment while our lives were ruined!” Keep believing that and stay distracted! while the oligarchy laughs it’s ass off at you.
Pay no attention to all those poor boomers who could never get a house, who are scraping to get by–those are the exceptions that prove the rule, they must have been especially lazy or stupid boomers, if they’re not rich like the vast majority of boomers! Yeah, that’s it.
Pay no attention to the corporations that have bought up all the housing so they can rent it to you at any price they like, that has nothing to do with housing costs–it’s the boomers who were too selfish to leave you their house when they died who are to blame! Yeah, that’s it.
Pay no attention to the oil companies and big corporations that control congress to keep their profits private and costs socialized so they can spew their effluent into the environment as the world burns and the ice caps melt, it’s the boomers’ fault! Boomers only started the environmental movement and demonstrated and pressured the government into creating the EPA, Clean Air Act, and many more, but so what, all the bad things are still their fault.
Stay distracted! Keep believing what you’re told and blaming who you’re told to blame as you get older and older and the boomers all die, and then enjoy how Gen B and Gen C, etc. hate you and rail against you and blame you for all their problems. Why didn’t you–yes you! stop global warming? You could have, but you didn’t give a fuck. You who had it so easy, living your selfish life with your fresh water and electricity and air conditioning and video games and all those nice things, while their lives were ruined? It’s all your fault!
Never the oligarchs, though. Not them.
[I can also do another version of this for the right wingers, substituting immigrants for boomers].
Yeah, I know of plenty of boomers that have had to delay retirement because they simply didn’t have enough money. I’ve known several that finally retired, late, then passed away a few months later. Never got the chance to enjoy retirement at all.
My parents were working part time jobs, instead of relaxing and enjoying retirement, until a few years ago. Those jobs were having obvious effects on their health and well-being, too; I was convinced at least one of them was going to pass away before long. Fortunately, they’re now in a position now where at least they don’t have to work - but my brothers and I sent them money to replace their HVAC system when it died a few months ago, so it’s not like they’re rolling in dough or will leave us some huge inheritance.
How much would it suck to get to 70 and realize you still have to keep working? I mean, if you enjoy it and want to keep working, great, go for it. But to be forced to do it? That would suck. It doesn’t matter what generation you are.
I want my parents to enjoy the money they worked their entire life for. I believe work allows to live, and not the contrary where you live to work. I would 10000x rather my parents enjoy the effort they put for their money instead of dying of exhaustion without being able to use their money
Posting this as infuriating seems grossly entitled. Many of us in these younger generations won’t have excess to give to the next generation, why should we feel that is owed to us?
You may be right, but at the same time, you getting an inheritance makes it a lot easier for your kids to get one too some day.
So much this. In my country my parents generation could afford buying a house on two middle class incomes when they were end of 20s early 30s. In my generation that is only possible with generational wealth.
I will never be able to own a home because the cost of a down payment goes up with the market, while my saved money’s value stays constant (goes down with inflation). It is literally impossible for me to save it fast enough, even if I saved $1000, which is half of what I pay in rent, per month.
Assuming you’re in the US you should know that first time home buyers can put basically 0% down. You need to pay mortgage insurance until you hit 20% equity in your home but that isn’t terribly expensive when you compare it to the mortgage, insurance, and taxes. The 20% down rule is really only if youre selling an existing property to buy a different one. No bank is expecting a first time buyer to put 20% down.
I want to say the total amount I paid out of pocket at closing for my house was like $3000 back in 2018. So it’s still spendy but the down payment isn’t as much of an obstacle as people make it out to be. The bigger obstacles are just having a good credit score and a history of stable employment.
As much as I dislike not having savings and something to hand down, this generational wealth crap is a big part of the inequality we are living in now. The more this is normalized the harder it makes it for anyone that doesn’t have it to succeed. As someone that doesn’t have it I’d personally like to see society bend toward making things more accessible for those without the silver spoons.
We won’t have it directly because the boomers have decided consistently across the decades to leave younger generations with nothing. This is just the latest version of that, except now they’re doing it directly to their own children and yeah, it can smart. It’s valid to express frustration at a generation that was handed everything, is leaving nothing, and now they’re doing it in a more personal way.
Every other generation before and after them seem to be on the same page as far as accumulating enough to leave for the next generation so they can have better lives than you had. But not the Boomers, never them. They’re going to get theirs and they deserve to have ALL of it. The next gen can earn their own way just like they had to, after all. Even though they voted away all opportunities to do that, and passing along generational wealth has always been a big key to any kind of success.
My grandpa wants to go to space in his lifetime, but doesn’t want to spend everything he’s been saving for my us. I’m like…dude. You worked your ass off all this time. Go to fucking space. I think it’d be badass.
Dying happy and accomplishing your dreams is much better than any amount of money because money is just a number. I have a good job and family and enough money that I don’t really have to think before buying something (even though for most i still do because I don’t like wasting and impulsiveness is a bad thing). I’ve seen and heard way to many stories of people delaying their retirement by “just one more year” and that ends up the year that they either get very ill, hurt themselves or just plain die, always with a huge pile of money. Money also shouldn’t be spent when old, because you cant enjoy it to the same degree
Right? All of us are doing okay. Times are tough, but we’ll make it through.
At the end of the day, I just want to see my grandpa happy and want him to have no regrets. Thankfully, he is comfortably retired and has been for like 15 years, but who knows how much longer he has. I hope he ends up doing it, but I think he feels too guilty.
Sure and that’s fine, but then we need to stop as a society assuming that generational wealth is a thing, and that parents will help their children. Parents do not help with down payments like they used to, or with other major life events, and so we need to assume everyone is starting from zero
What on earth are you talking about? Generational wealth is not a binary thing. There are people rich enough to pass their fortune to their kids and then there are ones who can’t. That’s how it has always been and that’s how it’s always going to be.
Sure, there are those parents. And there are a lot of parents like the ones in the article. Saying it isn’t so and covering your ears doesn’t change the fact that this is an experience a lot of people are having.
Well, that really depends on the society. I don’t live in one that makes such assumptions. It feels a little bit entitled to assume something like that, but that could also just be cultural differences between developed and non-developed countries. The former have social security and safety nets, rendering an inheritance less important and much less prominent. Feels like the only inheritance worth even thinking about is if you have millions in excess of what you need for living, and in developed countries that is very much less prominent than in developing countries
How can we be reaching this conclusion, with all the accumulated wealth in the world? How can we be seriously believing everybody should start at zero? I can’t believe what I’m reading here. Generational wealth is absolutely a thing, we inherit everything from the past. As a species, we inherit the wealth of the previous generation. Where are we imagining it goes? Given that it exists, why are we not entitled to benefit from it? There is so much wealth in the global economy, the issue is of distribution.
The big caveat to this is if it is a lot of money. If it more than a few million it should be passed down and someone can live off of interest and some good investments.
I know a guy who technically doesn’t have to work at all because his family has been passing down a huge amount of money though the generations. I guess his great great grandfather struck it rich and now everyone is set. How the fortune is maintained is though legal stuff tied to the money in the form of wills. Basically it prohibits crazy spending and sets rules.
My dad - who was an amazingly racist conspiracy theorist - gave all his money to 2 redhead women he started fucking after divorcing the woman he married after my mom died.
He chose not to leave me anything because I called him out for using the “n” word any time he talked about African Americans.
I’m out $150k
He is out having a legacy. My kids will never know his name, story, or hate.
Edit: This comment was intended as a sarcastic way to say “Your father’s awful parenting failed to turn you into an awful person”, but it was both phrased poorly and in the event based on false assumptions. Read the replies. I’m leaving it up for context.
Well, at least he fathered a decent kid, it seems. I don’t think it was his intention for you to turn out so decent, so I wouldn’t give him credit for that, but I guess he did something right despite all his efforts.
He didn’t, though.
Foster Care, then they adopted me.
Uhhhh at least… they…
nah, I got nothing. I can’t even muster a sarcastic backhanded defense for poor foster parents. Fuck that guy, and I’m glad you turned out well despite him.
You’re a good person. I don’t normally share, but I feel I should.
I was put in foster care when I was 6/7 (I don’t remember well).
When I was 12, after 7 foster homes, my parents lost all parental rights. I was put up for adoption.
At that time, I was still with one of my brothers in a foster home.
We were told a couple was interested in us. We meet them a number of times, and had a few weekends at their place to test run it. They weren’t great, but they weren’t worse than other foster homes, so we decided to give it a try.
My brother lasted about 9 months before asking to go back to foster care. I decided to stay, because I was tired of moving.
I was adopted at 14, and moved out on my own at 17. I was tired of being reminded I was broken in some ways.
Fast forward to me being 21 and in the navy. We start talking again. By then I was beginning to learn what I now consider my personal morals. He was still racist. I wasn’t.
Fast forward to a few years ago. He’s still wildly racist. More so than before. I am now a very liberal person, advocating for homeless rights foster youth assistance, LGBTQIA+ rights, and equality all around. I have finally had enough. I call his bullshit out. About 2 years passes, and his 14th heart attack takes him.
That was 2 years ago. My oldest is 24. My next oldest is 18. They never met him. I just couldn’t bring myself to introduce them to the old school hate.
I was tired of being reminded I was broken in some ways.
I grew up strongly religious. There’s only so much “You’re a dirty sinner and all your suffering is God’s plan” you can take. I think I know how you feel.
his 14th heart attack
Damn, even Death really didn’t want him, huh?
They never met him. I just couldn’t bring myself to introduce them to the old school hate.
I think that’s the right choice. I wish the best for ypu and yours.
No, some people just raise up to the task.
I hate this idea that parents “did something good” if they are pieces of shit but their kids turn out good. Especially if there is no evidence of it. Why people feel the need to do that is a mystery for me, like protecting the bad guy at any cost.
Oh no, I’m not saying he did good. I’m saying he failed to do bad.
Sorry you got caught in the crossfire, but you did say, out of the blue:
I guess he did something right…
Yeah, you’re right, the phrasing was awkward - the “despite his best efforts” was an attempt to subvert that sentence, but I guess it didn’t land.
No problem, I was probably nitpicking too.
It’s a valid thing to point out, important even to add context and nuance. I can’t know whether my point gets across right unless someone tells me, and I’d rather have someone point out where I could be misunderstood.
Have a nice week!
Right = correct. Not necessarily “good.”
It is the “correct” thing to obey the law, but since not all laws are good laws, obeying the law isn’t always “good.”
You’re missing the point.
No this reasoning is flawed and used as an excuse for bad behavior. My father justified his alcoholism to himself by pointing out how independent all the kids turned out since he was useless, or how good we were with money because we could sense a scam from a young age as he was always trying to scam/manipulate us.
You can teach someone to cross the road by explaining the dangers and process to them, or you can teach them by driving enough cars into them that they either figure it out themselves (and carry the scars forever) or die. That doesn’t make you a good teacher
I think you missed the “despite all his efforts” - I’m trying to make a backhanded defense, along the lines of “You were a shit parent, but hey, your kid was alright, so I guess you failed”, but I phrased it awkwardly.
I very much know your position though. Someone close to me had a similar issue with their parent, who forced them to become self-reliant since the parent in question was neglectful at best.
Congratulations on being a decent person even though your role model was not. It’s hard to break that cycle.
Congrats I guess? You sound hateful and bitter as fuck
Nah.
Not sure why you’d say that, but you can think what you want.
Happy holidays!
*without
Somehow, I grew up in the one neighborhood in the city that hasn’t had a spike in value in the last couple of decades. My mom refuses to move out to a retirement community (at this point she would need assisted living). She likes to talk about improving the property and what color she should paint the upstairs. Watches flipper shows all day.
I don’t have the heart to tell her that I have no interest in inheriting the property and that it will be a huge burden to liquidate all of the ‘antiques’ she has gathered over the last 80 years that now stink of cat piss and many colors of mold.
She’s always been there for me in my darkest hours, though, and so has that shit mid century ranch.
I’ll still let her win at Wheel of Fortune, as long as she can remember my name.
You’re a good kid.
I’ll still let her win at Wheel of Fortune, as long as she can remember my name.
And then, after that, it’s Zeff’s turn to get the free spins.
Who the fuck downvotes this?
More like … “Boomers decide to watch and accelerate the burning of the world because they’re going to die soon anyway”
When my grandparents passed away they left my boomer mother a fully paid off duplex…
Which she immediately reverse mortgaged to fund her retirement because she has nothing.
A house my grandmother designed, and great grandmother financed and built, where 4 generations of my family lived and literally died, will be pissed into the wind when my mother dies.
“Generation Me.”
