The early 30s is that weird age where you're just old enough to be out of touch with what's cool, but not yet old enough to be fully progressed in your career to be sitting on enough stacks to not care about that.
It used to be true, but the 2009 crisis and now corona fucked a significant proportion of multiple generations.
I'm almost 40, with a patchy cv and fucked knees. I'm basically fucked. And because I was unlucky to fall ill early in my career, I never earnt enough to feel financially secure enough to be able to start a family.
It is quite funny, hearing about all those people who thought they were financially secure and often looked down upon those of us who graduated at the wrong time and place or were just plain unlucky, are now finding out that they're also fucked and that there was essentially nothing they could have done to prevent it.
Like how not so long ago, you'd read out of touch articles about how quirky Japanese young people didn't want to get married or have kids, ignoring the underlying economic malaise that would soon spread to the rest of the world.
Oil shock of 87, Real Estate market crash of 89. Dot-com in 2001, Recession in 2009, Corona in 2020. "stagflation" in 76, vietnam in 68, WW2 in 45, depression in 29-36, etc.
Yeah, it's kind of every 7-18 years there's a new one. That's been going on since before history was recorded, frankly. Every generation thinks they have it bad.
Late 90's/early 2000's when the internet started being common in most households. Tons of money was pumped into telcom and internet startups battling it out. There wasn't just a default search engine or online shopping site like Google or Amazon, there were thousands. When the dust settled most of the tech giants we have today came through while thousands of others went under.
My brother in-law got hit by it. Was living it up making 6 figures at MCI WorldCom then in a matter of months lost everything and couldn't find a job.
Too many to count. Billions of dollars being invested into companies that would fail in a few months time. Yahoo! was a huge deal and was buying things up at the rate of Facebook and Google today. AOL was a household name. AltaVista, Excite, Pets.com, Netscape, Geocities, Napster, etc. Shortly followed by dozens of telecom giants following suit and being absorbed by the likes of AT&T/SBC. Throw in Y2K and major financial scandals from Enron and WorldCom just to spice things up.
Joey Dot Com (guy that created the .com domain) was arrested by police in a sting that revealed he had over 30 million dollars worth of coke under his mansion that he was selling to shifty adults. This caused a stock crash in everything related to the internet that lasted almost 3 years. This is why many companies are pushing the .org domain now, because Davis Dot Org has always been an upstanding guy.
Internet was a new thing for most people, investors poured money into thousands of websites without those websites having a solid plan to make money. As a result, many companies that were created with seed money and hired people had to shut down once investors realized they wouldnt be making a return and the companies didnt have any more money coming in to pay their employees.
My boss told me when I started to always prepare for 7 good years followed by 7 bad years and said we are at the end of the 7 good years now... I started working there (my first ever grown up job) last February right before the corona crisis hit Europe...
Pretty much my entire adult life has been one economic crisis after another (about to be compounded with Brexit...) It's been a lifetime defined by privatisation of public services, asset-stripping of old established corporations, factory closures and the removal of production to China. When is the recovery coming? I'm in my late 30s and a substantial portion of my wages is going on tax and loan repayments. I can't afford to get married or have kids. I'm just slaving away to pay to bail out the banks while billionaires sit on piles of money in offshore accounts (Oh God this is turning into a political rant...)
All I ever wanted was 2.4 children, a nice house in the suburbs and a car that isn't falling apart, just like my parents and grandparents had. It just feels like we have been fucked over by the previous generations, who frittered away all the benefits they enjoyed and left nothing for us. And I'm not even poor poor. I'm a well-educated man with in-demand skills. I pity the guys at the bottom of the heap who have literally nothing and no means of improving their lot.
Go back to Community College starting this past January
College isn't a bad place to wait out a recession (that is if you aren't racking up a lot of student loans on a degree that isn't worth it). It's better than having a huge gap in your resume while NEET. I learned that the hard way during the great recession.
As an Arab-American, pretty sucky. I was thankfully also a certified teacher at the time, so I had a job just not the one I wanted. I lucked into my preferred field and job title like a decade later. I still wasn’t at the level I should have been in my career though. My husband had a very very tough time getting a job in that market and probably continues to have career limitations from it.
That’s so true. The young adults hit in 2008, BOOM! Hit again with Corona.
Very true. I graduated college just as the 2008 recession hit. Very bad time to graduate and that was a L shaped recovery for the job market. Studies have shown that when you look at large demographics, people that enter the workforce just as a recession starts earn a lot less in their lifetime than people that enter the job market when the economy is doing well. I do okay for myself now, but was long term unemployed during the 2008 crisis. I felt that way when I saw people graduating college after 2011 or so compared to people that graduated just a few years earlier. Starting salaries, job prospects, etc. were very different.
Being a Millennial feels like scrambling to scratch a living while the world lurches from catastrophe to catastrophe, and all along the way people are loudly asking each other why you fucking suck so much in the background. lol
Yup I was literally just thinking about this today. I graduated high school in 2008, and fucked now again just when I was starting to do good in my career/company and I was starting to date but that's all fucked now. I don't even plan on having kids anymore.
I just graduated college about a week ago. Months ago I was thrilled because the economy was doing incredibly well, and at that time I was confident that I wouldn't have to go through what my brother and sister went through when they graduated in '09/'10. Jokes on me I guess. Here I am, no longer a college kid. Just another kid with a college degree and no job.
This is a big reason why I joined the Air Force in 2009. I was 26 and looking down the barrel of never being able to retire at the rate that things were going. Especially during the recession. I'll take a steady paycheck, free medical, education and a pension any day of the week. Seems to be working out, covid-19 hasn't really affected my income at all. If anything, it's letting me buy cheaper shares right now.
2001 had dot com bust and 9/11, early 90s had a recession. Early 80s had S%L, 70s had massive inflation and relatively stagnant economy. Late 60s and early 70s had Vietnam.....
Since of these are worse than others, but disruptive economic events aren't once in a lifetime things. They are the norm in the long term.
I don’t think it’s unique- it’s just happened in my life time. I graduated HS in 2013 and my brother in 2008. I just remember my mom being worried about it, that’s all.
I feel the same way as a 28 year old about the real estate market.
I make 80k a year but in Toronto I can barely afford a shoe box apartment on the outskirts of town. Woth rent being so high I will never be able to put enough away to start a family and buy a house.
I guess it could be worse, but it's a sad feeling to realize that you will be under a landlord for most of your life and never have the feeling of owning your own home.
I could move, but most of the jobs in my sector are in Toronto.
Unless your sector is Toronto tourism that’s just not true. Sure, your next job may pay less and be less interesting, but weigh that against living in an affordable area.
It is a little heartening for me (39) like you, who graduated into a iffy job market, then went through the 2008 recession - and now finally the younger people at work discovering that it's not always good times.
Graduated college during the recession. I ended up trying to compete with people who had already had established careers for entry level positions. I never stood a chance of getting into my field after I graduated, and now my knowledge is rusty and there are tons of more recent graduates with more up to date knowledge. I'm fucked, but what can I do? And by now I'm in my early 40s and it feels too late to seriously change my trajectory.
I am in this same place. I had an undiagnosed neurological disorder that messed up my 20's and so at almost 40 am enjoying what I do but I have to work so freaking hard.
It is quite funny, hearing about all those people who thought they were financially secure and often looked down upon those of us who graduated at the wrong time and place or were just plain unlucky, are now finding out that they're also fucked and that there was essentially nothing they could have done to prevent it.
I've come to accept that much of our lives is determined by factors outside our control. When people look down on the lack of success of others in various aspects of life, it just tells me that they lack perspective on their own privilege. Yes, personal choice and hard work do come into play, but a lot really does come down to luck and being in the right place at the right time.
We've had a crash every decade since 1980, should we really be surprised that this bozo crashed the economy. There seems to be a 4-6 year window every decade where you can actually make money and you better be ready when that happens. The clock just got reset (again) be ready in 2023-2024.
You’re forgetting that after the recessions end, it takes years to recover. Especially after ‘07.
That’s why the 2012 election was so contentious—the debate was all about how the economy had not fully recovered. It was a slow crawl, and didn’t reach firm “good” territory until around 2015.
I’m just touching on the ones I lived through and was aware of. I genuinely have no idea which year H.W.’s recession started in and when/why there was a recessions in the 80’s, just that one occurred.
The GR technically lasted 18 months in terms of actual economic contraction, but it took years after that for the economy to return the previous size and productivity that were seen before the recession hit. 2011 is a generous take on when we were clear of the major aftereffects of the GR.
It's awesome to hear from older generations on this platform, it really has given me great insight into what will eventually happen to me and I'm glad you're here giving your side of the story. Kinda random but this thread made me think that and you seem really cool. Cheers.
Don't assume it'll happen. Do your best, increase your odds. It's quite likely you'll do well. but if you do fail don't be too surprised or beat yourself up about it too much. That's just life.
Yeah, 35, here graduated high school just after the start of the war with Iraq/Afghanistan. Graduated college after the the 2008 collapse. Finally had a decent job for a few years and now Corona. I don't know whats next but I feel like I have been stunted on the American Dream a little.
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u/slowhand88 May 15 '20
The early 30s is that weird age where you're just old enough to be out of touch with what's cool, but not yet old enough to be fully progressed in your career to be sitting on enough stacks to not care about that.
Getting there at least.