Quote:
Originally Posted by Laker14
I am not directing my observations specifically at your offspring, but having observed mine, and those of close relatives and friends, I see many of them feeling put out by how hard it is to become wealthy. However, I see a lot of decisions being made that are making it harder than it needs to be.
Included among these are choices to live in high cost-of-living areas. True, the jobs pay more than they might in lower cost-of-living areas, but by the time you factor in costs of commuting, in time and money, and how much of that extra income gets chewed up in taxes and real estate costs, one might often do better living somewhere else.
More obvious to me is the tendency to refuse to "do without". I know young people who aren't saving a nickel for retirement, but must drive late-model Audis, or BMWs, and whose kids must participate in expensive activities, and they absolutely must take vacations to Disney World, and must "upgrade" the home they could barely afford in the first place,,,etc etc you get the point.
I know this makes me sound like my depression era dad, but living within one's means means occasionally saying "nope, can't do that"...and a lot of young people complaining about how hard it is to grow wealth simply haven't learned how to do that.
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Hard times create strong people
Easy times create soft people.
Be thankful that the boomers had parents from the Great Depression (GD) who taught us how to survive and passed along a strong work ethic.
I was broke at the age of 40+, 10,000 cash, 10,000 IRA, $15 VISA bill, no income.
with two kids, a witch of an XWife and needing to put 2 kids through college. Did so, and recovered all the money lost, and still have not received any inheritance or massive lottery winnings, or any direct monetary support.
worked my ass off with technology skills, took care of my aging parents, whatever they wanted / need while i lived in my high school bedroom, saved everything, paid off college loans early, and continuing through last year when I had enough.
My dad was whining once when recovering in a skilled nursing facility. I went right to :
You don't get what you want; you get what you work for
he started working towards recovery versus just wanting to go home. My wife passed this along to her deadbeat sister, who without anybody to leach off, did find a job but they also did not like her boomer follow rules mentality either. .
good luck, we deserve our hard work rewards