16 Mar Millenials, the trends, how’d we get here???

The millennial generation gets a really hard rap from those in the generations that came before them and most notably from the boomers.  There is a distinct difference in the millennial crowd that I’ve personally witnessed (by the way I’m one of you), but guess what, there’s a distinct difference in and about every crowd and generation.  Part of me wants to give credit to recency bias as the millennials have been ushering into the work force for years now and boomers are on their way out and thus both are on such opposite ends of the spectrum that there is nearly zero relatability to the two groups.  It leads me to wonder if we had the internet in full force when Xers entered the workforce or even during their teenage years what level of thrashing they’d received.  Finally before we dive in, there is this weird in-between generation labeled Xennials and are defined here by our friends at Wikipedia:

“Xennials (also known as the Oregon Trail Generation and Generation Catalano) are the micro-generation of people on the cusp of the Generation X and Millennial demographic cohorts. Researchers and popular media use birth years from the late 1970s to early 1980s or as late as 1985 as their defining range.”

If I’m being honest I am a little bit salty that they don’t stretch that birth year to 1986 because that is when I was born and candidly when reading about this in-between group, I align and identify with them far more than the millennial crowd.  In any case, I’m one of you millennials and we’re all in this thing together.  So what do the older generations have wrong about us millennials after all? Candidly I think the comment about not having any work ethic or skills and all we want to do is use our phones all day long is probably the most obvious one to hit an attack.  Afterall, while the millennial generation didn’t invent the FIRE movement, they’ve sure capitalized on it and done quite well with their ability.  Additionally, its pretty tough to retire early by NOT working hard and NOT delaying gratification in exchange for financial freedom and flexibility.  While this I believe to be true, there is certainly a fair amount of head scratching moments I have and witness amongst my generational peers that helps me understand why the elder generations have such a scathing opinion of our group.

In some capacity I think the older generations’ opinions of us is maybe more a lack of understanding than anything.  Its easy to lack understanding in a rapidly changing world to begin with, but frankly we are very different than they are and often in peoples’ minds different equals bad.  We are different, we are getting married later, delaying buying homes, finding value in experience over things and trying to accomplish life with a pretty severe income gap.  I don’t want to get political but there is an income gap as a comparison to GDP and economics of the past versus the present.  On the flip side, if you’ve read my posts about a tale of two recessions or the overall theme of this blog, those who came of age and out of college in 2007-2014 had a serious opportunity to build wealth but its hard to see it if you don’t know what you are looking for.  The appropriate question is probably “why are we so different”? It’s not that hard to figure out, we were parented based on what our parents saw of their parents.  While our parents probably adopted a lot of what they liked from their parents, they then in turn omitted what they didn’t like and surely there would be themes across the world shaping the next generation and then the next and so on.  The result, shocker, we are different and it’ll continue to be different.

A real world example I think we are seeing take shape and will see the results of in about 10-20 years is the helicopter parent reversal.  While as millennials our parents allegedly did everything for us, and there’s a reason for that stereotype, the result is a nearing over-correction as older millennials with kids are viewing that as a problem and choosing to reverse that trend instead of replicate it.  I find this to be a very positive change to make and one that requires some balance of course.  I didn’t have a helicopter parent, I had quite the opposite as I grew up in a single parent home and my mom worked varying hours including nights and weekends pretty regularly.  We often fended for ourselves for dinner, homework and making sure chores and things were done that needed to be done.  The result was a form of independence and recognition that I had no safety net and knew that no one else was going to take care of me except for me.  As an adult I struggle to find that balance between giving my son everything he could want or need within reason because we have the means, and also letting him learn you don’t always get what you want.  He’s almost four, so I’ve got time to figure this out.

One example of that is our first rental property which has been earmarked as his college fund, or business startup LOAN fund.  In either case its my house, I own it, he can request a loan against it and he can pay it back to me.  It’s part of my retirement plan that can dually support his goals and needs toward advancing his future in his early adult years.  Additionally, we hold a cash value life insurance policy on him that will have cash in it when he’s old enough to borrow against, buy his first house, etc. and then he’ll be able to increase his insurance levels for life regardless of health.  These are two examples that will absolutely give him a head start in life above his peers, however between then I plan on having him involved in our real estate and businesses we hope to own and grow.  We intend to have him earn commissions for jobs he does and work performed, I plan to allow him to learn about the movement of money so that as he gets older he can see opportunity and capture it.  My hope is that whatever generational trends and stereotypes surround his age group, he will certainly carry some traits but hope he stands out as on that wants to forge ahead and build something great.

So what does this all have to do with the older generations opinions of our work ethic and how we carry ourselves? My hope is it begins to shape our minds to recognize that our children aren’t going to be who we are, hopefully they take some of our better attributes while omitting some of our worst.  Hopefully they don’t over correct in one category or another to a level that is detrimental to themselves or their children’s.  My hope is that while we can’t change the mindset of those in the elder generations that have formed an opinion about us as a whole, maybe we can be the stand out individuals that live an example of hard work ethic, energy, and extreme focus on individual goals that make at least one or two consider that we aren’t all so bad.  My hope is that we’ll be the generation that understands and recognizes that while future generations are going to be different, it doesn’t mean different is bad, and that if there are some trends that disappoint us and leave us scratching our heads, we’ll realize and recognize it is partially our fault as a result of overcorrections compounding over time.

As a side note something I’m pondering on but haven’t concluded my thoughts on is the passing down of wealth from the boomers and beyond.  In my friend circle I have friends that have been instructed by their parents to do very little in regard to retirement because they’ve built enough of a nest egg that will be passed down and they may as well live life and enjoy it.  While my wife and I have planned for FI to be able to have flexibility in our 40s, in the back of my head the concept that if something changes and we don’t reach FI in our 30s or 40s we’ll be way ahead and worst case we’ll have an excellent traditional retirement.    Additionally I often joke that as long as my wife doesn’t divorce me there’s a pretty healthy inheritance coming her way from her parents (hopefully not for a very long time, a good 20 years or more, my son needs his grandparents!) which will surely push us into earlier retirement in our 50s.  I’m sure others have this same financial windfall coming their way in some capacity as we have multiple generations in retirement or entering retirement with fully funded IRAs, 401ks, Pensions, and Social Security pumping up their net worth and as long as they live wisely will have more money than they need to live out their retirement years.

While I don’t think anywhere near the majority of our generation has that wealth hand down in their future, I think many do and may contribute to decision making on large contributions to retirement and future planning.  At the end of the day, there has always been a lack of savings and retirement gap amongst Americans so why pick on us?  Work hard millennials, stand out, achieve and let the story fall how it may.