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Millennials Set To Earn Less Than Generation X (bbc.com)
Reader AmiMoJo writes: Millennials are set to become the first generation to earn less than their predecessors, new research suggests. The Resolution Foundation found that under-35s earned 8,000 pound ($10,600) less in their twenties than Generation X workers. If wages for millennials follow the same path as Generation X, average career earnings will be about 825,000 pound ($1.1m). That would make them the first generation to earn less than their predecessors over the course of their working lives. Research found that some of the pay squeeze was due to under-35s entering the job market as the recession hit, but it also concluded that generational pay progress had ground to a halt even before the financial crisis struck in 2007/8.
The generation after the long IT boom inaugurated in the early 1980s and finishing off in about 2001 is going to earn less than their predecessors. Color me unsurprised. We squandered the fruits of that on peak socialism. Now the long slide since 2008 will continue until some disruptive element creates economic opportunity. I'm not exactly holding my breath.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
But what really matters is standard of living. Sure, they might make less money, but in the 1980s a cell phone cost thousands and barely worked, compared to what you can get for a few hundred bucks and $30 a month. Earning less money != worse life.
IMHO, these are the big issues causing this"
1) The wealth gap today is close to what it was in the "Roaring Twenties". /rant
2) College is in a bubble due to government subsidies; raising the cost of college for everyone
3) Entire industries are no longer being created like they used to (Railroad, Oil, Automobiles, Planes, Computers, etc...)
4) Technical innovation is just "Uber-izing" everything. Jobs that can be automated, will be. Companies of the future will just be a CEO and a CTO. Everyone else not creating or automating things will earn less and less income.
5) Globalization is feeding the wealth gap more so than ever before. The wealthy ruling class are turning governments into corporate oligarchies.
6) The career ladder is more about where you were born that what you can do. Meritocracy, to a large extent, is becoming more and more of a myth. If you were born in a rich neighborhood and go to a private school.
That "reform" you and your parents pulled off of Social Security in the mid-80s was a nice trick. Create a "trust fund" and then spend the trust fund on regular expenses, making sure future generations get to pay for your day-to-day. Also, thanks for all of the free trade deals that don't take into account the warping of the free market due to the inability of labor to freely move around. You even have "free market" people believing that free trade == free market. I bought it hook, line, and sinker in my teens and 20s. Nice job.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Cause and effect: they only sound entitled to assholes like you because they're actually getting screwed and complaining about it! Jeez, it's like Oliver fucking Twist around here!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I think I should point out how addicted to TV Generation X is/was. I think your backwards-vision is rose tinted.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Make no mistake, this didn't start with the Millennials. We started firmly down this path in the 1930s; WWII saved our grandparents, the cold war saved our parents, and the advent of the "Computer Age" saved Gen-X.
Unless the Millennials can pull a similar rabbit out of their hats, should it really surprise us that FDR's pyramid schemes (yes, plural) have finally run out of new suckers and can only head one way from here?
This is the exact reason Brexit happened and why Trump will probably win. Living-wage jobs have been methodically destroyed on both sides of the pond by the greed-pig class. The result has been both the Oxbridge toffs and the Koch Brothers have completely lost control of the rabble they so easily roused over the last decade, paving the way for unhinged pricks like Farage and Trump.
Just think: all those people with worthless degrees probably would have gone straight to work after high school or learned a trade, if it weren't for dumbass Boomer and Gen-X parents and guidance counselors blatantly lying to them about how "necessary" a college degree (any college degree) was!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
All those jobs will be automated.
The real minimum wage is $0.
But why are you getting less? Too many Grievance Studies majors? Companies seeking skilled labor, from developers to the skilled trades, are still see labor shortages, so why the disparity? Too few skilled workers? Too much immigration?
The UK in particular had a huge wave of immigration, which may have destroyed the ability to make a living wage from unskilled labor, and put a lot of pressure on semi-skilled workers. Is that the problem?
Or maybe we have a generation that never learned to stick it out through adversity to get to the goal? Maybe. Point is, everyone thinks they're getting screwed, but only losers rest behind "the man is keeping me down, and there's nothing I can do".
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
The economy has been growing quite steadily over this period, including since 2008. If that new wealth was divided up among American workers in the same way it was in the 1980s, then millennials would be better of than previous generations.
So the problem is not that we need a disruptive source of economic opportunity, it is that the existing disruptive sources of economic opportunity are generating wealth that is simply accumulating among current holders of wealth, to the exclusion of new workers.
Incidentally, such an in-equal wealth distribution could not - by definition - occur if the USA was the socialist country you seem to think it is.
But why are you getting less? Too many Grievance Studies majors? Companies seeking skilled labor, from developers to the skilled trades, are still see labor shortages, so why the disparity? Too few skilled workers? Too much immigration?
Another term for 'labor shortage' is 'salary increase', and nobody's seeing that happen.
Chuuch. Preach. Tabernacle.
Translation: "I got mine, so fuck you!"
Well, fuck you too!
You goddamned Boomers and Gen-Xers didn't "work;" the Boomers got paid fat union wages for doing jack shit and then the Gen-Xers got paid corporate-raider bonuses for dismantling the unions and outsourcing the jobs! The older generations have executed scorched-earth economic policy, then hypocritically blame the Millennials when they complain that there's nothing left.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I see a lot of "grumpy old man" posts (I'm 40 for context...) on this subject blaming entitlement and other reasons for this. I don't see it that way...I haven't run into any of the stereotypical Millennials with a capital M that the media describes -- remember, Generation X were supposed to be "slackers" in the 90s also. So, I don't think it's the people. I think it's the work environment. Work is very different from the golden age of the 50s through the 70s in the US...
- After WW II, a family could live comfortably on a single income, and there was a reasonably good chance someone could keep their job for life and/or be promoted from within and gain success that way. And this is any family -- from the janitor to the CEO (relatively speaking of course.)
- After the great corporate downsizing wave of the 90s, it was still possible to graduate from any college, with any degree in any field, and still find entry-level work. While it was less possible to do the single-income thing and required lots of sacrifice to do so, the opportunity existed.
- Now, entry level tech jobs don't exist or are done offshore or by H-1B labor. The economy has fully adjusted to two-earner families, so it's basically impossible to be a single-earner family unless you live in a really cheap part of the country (where, consequently, there are no jobs anymore.)
So, don't blame the Millennials. They're in a tough spot. I was very lucky in my early career to be able to work my way up from an entry-level support job to where I am now...that opportunity is much harder to come by now.
Just think: all those people with worthless degrees probably would have gone straight to work after high school or learned a trade
Unless you're going to be a plumber, there aren't many of those jobs left. The US has exported most of its low-skill manufacturing, and the low-skill construction and agricultural and custodial jobs tend to go to illegal immigrants because permanent residents want a higher salary. Go figure.
What we have, despite you feeling entitled and being the special snowflake and superior to everyone coming after you (typical for people of the current generation), is for the first time, the next generation (which will also think that the generation after her will be lazy, whiney, overconfident and not knowing what hard work is) will be earning less than you.
Sure, let's take a look at how "fine" salaries are today. Here's some numbers.
So, over the last 47 years, we've got a whopping 21% growth in the median salary. That's a roughly 0.4% annual growth rate, on average. That's all we've gotten from widespread automation, swapping out typists for software engineers, etc.
If these remarkable advancements in technology are only giving us 0.4% annual growth in salaries, is it even worth it? Society sure seems to get more than 0.4% more complicated every year. Work seems to get a lot more than 0.4% demanding every year.
Chuuch. Preach. Tabernacle.
Whilst it is true that WESTERN millennials are getting paid less than than parents generation, across the whole world, the opposite is the case. The raising of hundreds of millions from poverty in Asia and to a lesser extent Africa and Latin America means that the truth is far more complex. And this helps reveal the problem; given that increased competition from these areas exists, it is not a surprise if workers who are, in effect, in competition with these masses get to be paid less.
Which doesn't mean that our own people don't have a problem, but any explanation which focuses on it as an unalloyed BAD THING is defective. Yet that is the message that is being presented by Trump and echoed to a lesser extent by Hilary. The result could be nasty.