Quote:
Originally Posted by CliffFletcher
Let's play Mutually-Compatible Facts:
- Housing is increasingly unaffordable.
- Millennials spend more on discretionary items like food, drink, and travel than previous generations.
In a sense, they're related. It used to be that once you were earning decent money (anything more than poverty wages) you moved out of home, started paying rent or a mortgage, and shortly thereafter started a family.
Today, because housing is out of reach, many 28 year olds with decent jobs live at home rent-free and so have loads of discretionary spending that goes to food, drink, and travel.
Would they all own their own homes if they dialed back the $300 a week drinks and eating out lifestyle? Probably not. Doesn't change the fact they spend more on luxury items than Gen Xers or Boomers did at the same age.
When I head out to 17th ave or 4th street these days I'm always astonished at the number of 25 and 28 year olds I see casually splashing out for $16 cocktails and $17 appetizers.
How many pricy restaurants and bars catered to 24 to 34 year olds back in the 80s and 90s? Precious few. I lived in this city then, and you had bars and restaurants that catered to 20-somethings, bars and restaurants that catered to people willing to splash out a lot of money, but they were not the same places. A high-end bistro catering to 20-somethings would have been an oxymoron in 1995. |
I don't entirely disagree with this.
I think a lot of people in their 20s especially have basically just said F-it, and given up on savings/careers in order to leach of their parents and spend time at restaurants. I don't blame them, honestly. The alternative is staggering.
I even have a friend my age state to me that his plan to buy his first property was simply to borrow $300k from his parents' property, which is now worth 2.5 million. I bought my property about 6 years ago, and it's now worth 200k more than I paid, so I can't complain about the issue either. Overall, though it doesn't seem right.
Basically, we're eliminating social mobility. Moving up and affording even a basic property is becoming more and more difficult...unless you were fortunate enough to have parents with enough wealth to lift you up. And yes, theoretically, someone from nothing could save up and have that same $200-$300k, although it would require someone with both extreme success and extreme saving ability, and they'd probably still end up at the very lowest level. This was far from the norm a generation ago.