I’m a tad bit over 30 …. and I just might take this advice.
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If you’re reading this and under 30, let me be absolutely clear about oneindubitable point: your government is going to sacrifice your future in order to pay for its own mistakes from the past. [If that kind of future does not sit well with you] then get out of Dodge. Stop playing by the same rules of the game that used to work in the past because the old playbook of “go to school, get a good job, work your way up the ladder” simply doesn’t apply anymore. [This article outlines what is being laid out as your future unless you take independent action and, in conclusion, outlines suggestions on how to make a better life for yourself. Feel free to share this article with one and all - and the video at the end of the article.] Words: 1058
So writes Simon Black (www.sovereignman.com) in edited excerpts from his original article* entitled Young people: get ready to grab your ankles.
Lorimer Wilson, editor of www.FinancialArticleSummariesToday.com (A site for sore eyes and inquisitive minds) and www.munKNEE.com (Your Key to Making Money!), may have further edited ([ ]), abridged (…) and/or reformatted (some sub-titles and bold/italics emphases) the article below for the sake of clarity and brevity to ensure a fast and easy read. The author’s views and conclusions are unaltered and no personal comments have been included to maintain the integrity of the original article. Please note that this paragraph must be included in any article re-posting to avoid copyright infringement.
Black goes on to write, in part:
Refuse to be enslaved by the idea that it’s your civic and moral responsibility to pay off the debts of your government’s failures. Cast off the yoke of their control… and summon the courage to live a life by your own design. The path to prosperity in the Age of Turmoil depends on this ability to reject the old system, declare your economic independence, and carve your own path.
Under 30s – You Will Experience Brunt of Financial Ramifications
To give you an example, students in London came out to the streets in droves last Friday to protest the British parliament’s most recent austerity measures which tripled the cap on their university tuition to $15,000.
Sure, Britain is imposing all sorts of austerity measures on its citizens… and while I won’t get into a discussion about the absurdity of government controlled education, I will point out that students are having their benefits cut far more drastically than any other segment of the population.
Are pensioners seeing their costs triple? No. Are middle-aged workers seeing 50% tax hikes? No. Aside from the very small segment of high-income earners who will be forever robbed and pillaged of their wealth, the younger generation is next in line to receive the butt end of the crisis fallout.
Younger folks have comparatively lower incomes, benefits, job opportunities, and political clout than their seniors, yet they are increasingly expected to assume a disproportionately larger burden of the consequences of government folly.
It’s the younger generation that is called on to go fight and die in pointless wars in faraway lands; it’s the younger generation that is forced to assume the debts of their forefathers; and it’s the younger generation that gets relegated to the back rows of the political amphitheater and dismissed by the establishment.
Meanwhile, retirees aren’t seeing massive benefits cuts, and middle-aged wage earners income earners are being protected from above by politicians.
Under 30s – This is What Life Has In Store For You
Let’s take a minute and look at the looming fate of the average young person today:
1) Your government-run university tuition is going to go through the roof, saddling you with unfathomable debt before you even enter the world as an adult;
2) Once you graduate, you’ll be the last in the hiring queue;
3) If you do get hired, you’ll be the lowest on the totem pole and the first to be let go when tough times befall your business;
4) Once the labor market eventually stabilizes, you’ll enter your prime earning years with some of the highest tax rates ever seen as your government continues to cannibalize your generation to pay off its largess and indebted entitlement programs that benefited older generations;
5) For your entire working life, you’ll pay into a pension system that is going to be bankrupt by the time you’re qualified to draw on it;
6) More than likely, you’ll never achieve the standard of living that your parents achieved;
7) Whatever wealth your parents accumulated won’t be left to you– the bulk of it will be confiscated by the state (unless your folks were smart enough to plant multiple flags) due to a host of death taxes.
If you’re in the millennial Facebook generation, this is going to be the standard storyline of your peers. The system that’s in place right now– the failed cycle of debt and consumption fed by continuous government intervention– has stuck you with the bill.
Under 30s – Here’s How to Make the Most of YOUR Life
Fortunately, there’s a silver lining (as always). Younger people are generally less anchored and more mobile than their elders, hence it’s much easier to opt out of this perverse system.
If you’re angry that your government is saddling you with the responsibility to pay off generations of bad decisions, then:
- Get out of Dodge. Stop playing by the same rules of the game that used to work in the past– the old playbook of “go to school, get a good job, work your way up the ladder” simply doesn’t apply anymore.
- Don’t stick around a society that has completely forsaken you and is waiting with knife and fork in hand to carve up your earnings once you finally enter the labor market… get out of Dodge now, while it’s easy to do and you have little to risk.
- Go explore the world and get an education based on experience, not expensive academic theory. Seek opportunities in thriving, frontier markets overseas… places like Kurdistan, Mongolia, Botswana, Kazakhstan. Soak up the local intelligence and become the grease guy on the ground who can make things happen.
- Find people whose lifestyles you want to emulate and make yourself indispensable to them as an apprentice… this will be the only time in your life that you can afford to work for nothing in exchange for a valuable, first-hand education.
- Most of all, stop playing by everyone else’s rules. Refuse to be enslaved by the idea that it’s your civic and moral responsibility to pay off the debts of your government’s failures. Cast off the yoke of their control… and summon the courage to live a life by your own design.
In conclusion, refuse to be enslaved by the idea that it’s your civic and moral responsibility to pay off the debts of your government’s failures. Cast off the yoke of their control… and summon the courage to live a life by your own design. The path to prosperity in the Age of Turmoil depends on your ability to reject the old system, declare your economic independence, and carve your own path.
AWD says:
Good article Stuck. The youngsters are so fucked it’s mind boggling, and they don’t know it, and most don’t care. As long as they have their iphone and WI-fi they’re happy. The puppet masters have saddled them with $1 trillion in debt that is non-dischargeable. Therefore, they are debt slaves, and, given their job and income prospects, they will be debt slaves most of their lives.
That said, they are the one’s who are going to be relied upon to fund the ponzi schemes known as Social Security and Medicare, not to mention the government and the massive increase in taxes they (and us all) will have to bear. Good luck, geezers, getting any blood out of the youngster turnips. They’re in debt up to their eyeballs.
Techno-narcissism had been their modus operandi, and it’s only going to get worse. As long as they have a device in front of their faces, they don’t care what is happening around them. I question their ability to think rationally and their ability to communicate. They live in techno fantasy land, video game fantasy land, and given the real world, maybe it’s better they stay there (or in their parents basement).
The corporations have sent their jobs overseas. Yet, they continue to buy Japanese cars and piles of Chinese and Korean crap. We keep shipping $600 billion overseas every year, money they could be making at jobs. They have no idea how the economy works, nor do they care. They’ve been indoctrinated in public schools, and brainwashed in college to believe in liberal moral relativism and feel good progressive, multi-cultural and gender ideas, the effects of which are always to their detriment. And you know they are brainwashed completely as they voted for Obama again. They drank the kool-aid; they are brain dead. In a word, the are screwed.
The only good news for youngsters is the world and economy the oldsters created is going to collapse. If the web and cell service shuts down, you are going to see youngsters wandering the streets, like they just woke up from a coma. Or, they’ll just stand there like deer in the headlights as the mobs rob and kill them. They didn’t get the memo about preparing for the collapse.
They are already slaves, they just don’t know it. Everything the elites and oligarchs has strived for has been perfected in the younger generation. The MSM brainwashing, the educational system brainwashing, and a hundred other forms of brainwashing. They truly are livestock, and many (like their parents) even resemble livestock. They will never get out of the web of debt and fantasy, and being controlled by debt. The government owns their debt, at least their $1 trillion in student loans, and therefore the government owns them. Very Orwellian, very sad and tragic. They better hope things collapse, and quick.
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25th December 2012 at 9:48 pm
Makati1 says:
I didn’t see it when I was living there. Too close to the trees to see the forest, I guess. But, since I have been in the Philippines for 5 years, I can view from a distance, my kids and grand kids, and really see the changes when I go back to visit every few years. I feel sorry for them. and I cannot seem to open any of their eyes. After all, the entire system is always telling them to go back to sleep, nothing to fear or see here. I am going to help my oldest daughter get passports for herself and her son so they can come here and visit for a few months some summer. I’m hoping she likes it and stays. But my hopes are not high. My other daughter is too blind to reality to even look at the possibility of relocating.
Yes, the under 30s are fucked. The 30-50s are not much better as they have no retirement to look forward to either. Just a collapsed system and a lot of struggle to survive in a world that has suddenly become too real. Us over 60s will have a few more years to prepare, but our future is going to get really bumpy also. We live in interesting and exciting times.
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25th December 2012 at 10:14 pm
anotherjuan says:
stop panicking. they said the usa was screwed when henry ford killed the horse drawn buggy.
sure, the usa exported its jobs to china, but it also exported the pollution. let the rest of the world trash their land to manufacture goods to sell to the usa. as long as they are willing to take our fiat currency, we can relax in economic splendor and drink clean water, shower everyday, eat healthy food and wear clean clothes. did any king from old times live so well as we do? i don’t think so.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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25th December 2012 at 10:32 pm
sangell says:
Problem maybe that powerful governments go on the prowl. Look at how our government is shaking down Switzerland and other offshore banking centers. ” You can leave but you can never check out” maybe the future. The G-7 maybe broke but it is not powerless and vowel deprived places in Central Asia have their own kleptocrats.
This maybe the better solution.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3AWbZcLpGw
Nashville Teens, 1965 Tobacco Road,
Bring dynamite, and a flame, blow it up start it over again.
Build a town you’d be proud to know,
Give it the name, Tobacco Road.
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25th December 2012 at 10:43 pm
anotherjuan says:
i never get a thumbs up maybe because of my minority point of view, but i read somewhere that when everybody thinks alike, nobody is thinking. if i thought just like everybody else here, i would have to sign on as anotherjohn.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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25th December 2012 at 11:02 pm
SAH says:
@AWD – I disagree with only one thing you had to say: I think there is more hope for the youth to wake up and get real. Everyone loves to point out that the majority of the Millennials voted for Obama. While this is true, we also saw the most enthusiasm for Ron Paul amongst the youth of this country. So what that the Boomers gave an edge to Romney – he is a shit bag who’s only real appeal compared to Obama is that he has nicer hair and is a non smoker. A Boomer vote for Romney is no different than a Millennial vote for Obama, it was a vote for the status quo. A smaller percentage of oldsters support trashing the whole system – between OW and Ron Paul it is clear that the youth are ready, willing and able to make drastic changes that oldsters will never let happen on their watch. As young people get screwed harder and harder, more will turn on the system.
It has been the youth who have been the driving force behind Occupy Wall St and the youth who really put their hearts and souls into the Liberty movement. Amongst whom did Ron Paul have the greatest percentage of support? The military – made up of Gen X and Millennials. Ultimately people will all fight for their own best interests, which means Boomers will fight to the death for Ponzi schemes that they have a vested interest in such as Social Security, Medicare and the Stock Market. None of these things benefit the youth nor ever will, and while the solutions have not yet become clear to a majority of the youth, they are those with the most at stake and will have to find solutions to survive the long future, while Boomers hope to just keep the currrent system running long enough to live out the remaining couple decades they have left. It is young Gen Xers and Millennials who are having kids right now, and have the parental instinct and drive to make sure our babies survive. We have the most skin in the game. We are the hope of the future and there is no other. Boomers will not change, and they will go to their graves fighting to maintain the system because the continuation of the system benefits them. The system does not benefit the younger generations and that is something that is widely aknowledged by the youth, although the ultimate solutions have not yet been determined.
Being 35, and having spent the late 1990s on a wildly liberal Ivy college campus, I see a huge shift in the love of liberty and true conservative values among the college kids of today. They still make up a minority on campus, but not the freakishly small minority that libertarian college kids made up in my day (we were 15 kids on a campus of 5,000 undergrads). And the far left kids, the OW types, are 10 orders of magnitude better than the PC shit eating liberal kids of gen X. Change is in the air, and anyone who can’t smell it is just old enough that their olfactory senses are slipping. The worse things get, the faster change will come among the youth, and the more tightly oldsters will try to hang on to their bullshit. I’ve got my long board waxed up, and I’m looking forward to riding the wave as 80 million American Millennials crash this bullshit like a tsunami. It’s gonna happen… I would say “for better or worse” but previous generations have turned America into such a shitpile that it can really only get better.
Lastly, this article says “leave” and move to Botswana or Mongolia or some shit? Sorry, that is a Boomer solution. Most of us under 40 are way too poor and/or have young children and infants and aren’t going anywhere. Plus the immigration and economic policies of our Boomers have ensured that the third world came to us. I do encourage Boomers to exodus to the third world though, the more who leave the faster they get out of the fucking way and the clean up begins.
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25th December 2012 at 11:40 pm
Stan says:
Those under 50 are also in trouble. About the time us 50s turn 65 , ain’t gonna BE no more SS and Medicare left.
At least them under 30 still have youth. Us old geezers got trouble ahead
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25th December 2012 at 4:37 am
Reverse Engineer says:
Simon Black is a Jackass. He runs around the world hiding his money in various tax havens for the filthy rich, and he couldn’t give 2 shits about under-30s. They don’t got enough money to buy one of his condos in Cheelay next door to Speedy Gonzalo Lira..
Gotta love this piece of advice:
“3. Seek opportunities in thriving, frontier markets overseas… places like Kurdistan, Mongolia, Botswana, Kazakhstan. Soak up the local intelligence and become the grease guy on the ground who can make things happen.”
There’s a great idea for a young white guy, be a Grease Guy on the ground in Botswana. In other words, grease up your ass as an on the ground “apprentice” of Simon Black.
Anyhow, when was the last time you saw an Ad for Grease Guys to work in Kurdistan or Mongolia on Monsta.com? Yea, there’s just TONS of opportunity for Grease Guys in Kazakhstan, if you are good at dodging Bullets anyhow.
How about Somalia, Simon? Need a Grease Guy there? Short of Grease Guys in Libya these days?
Go Grease it yourself. What a Jackass.
RE
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25th December 2012 at 4:44 am
Mike says:
I’m one of the lucky ones i think ( I’m 28). I was born and raised in Michigan, my entire family was union auto. Things started getting bad and the writing on the wall became easy to read when i was in elementary school, my parents knew that the factory jobs were going away. they just didn’t realize what was happening with the universities. Fortunately for me I was too busy drinking myself into a coma in my teen years to attend classes and get myself into any bad debt.
The dregs of my generation that will prosper will be the do-it-yourself types. those who can keep the governments hand out of our wallets by going to farmers markets, trading/ bartering, gun shows, under the table employment… These will be the vehicles to a better standard of living.. as long as they can maintain the appearance as a fellow Cog to their would-be snitches.
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25th December 2012 at 5:05 am
Zara says:
If I were still a kid, I would definitely forgo college in order to become an apprentice goatfucker in Kazakhstan.
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25th December 2012 at 5:12 am
AWD says:
SAH,
I agree there are some youngsters with ambition, intelligence, and spirit directed at freedom, but they are what, less than 5%? The puppet masters have done away with Ron Paul and will do away with anyone not allied with their agenda. The collapse will come soon enough, then they will grab utter control and power. As far as where to live, China has all our money, and the camel jockeys, maybe move their. The have nice, new cities and plenty of jobs.
The Chinese are spending our money on infrastructure.
new 1400 bullet train in China
We’re spending (borrowing) money for beautiful free housing for the FSA
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25th December 2012 at 9:48 am
AWD says:
Generation Y Wakes Up From The American Dream, Faces An American Nightmare
Three and a half years after the worst recession since the Great Depression, the earnings and employment gap between those in the under-35 population and their parents and grandparents threatens to unravel the American dream of each generation doing better than the last. We have noted a number of times that these divides are growing and warned of the social tension this could create and, as Bloomberg notes, it does not appear to be getting any better, Generation Y professionals entering the workforce are finding careers that once were gateways to high pay and upwardly mobile lives turning into detours and dead ends. “This generation will be permanently depressed and will be on a lower path of income for probably all of their life – and at least the next 10 years,” as middle-income jobs are disappearing. A 2009 law school graduate sums it up rather succinctly: “I had a lot of faith in the system, the mythology that if you work really hard you can achieve anything, and the stock market always goes up. It was pretty naïve on my part.”
Via Bloomberg:
Generation Y professionals entering the workforce are finding careers that once were gateways to high pay and upwardly mobile lives turning into detours and dead ends. Average incomes for individuals ages 25 to 34 have fallen 8 percent, double the adult population’s total drop, since the recession began in December 2007. Their unemployment rate remains stuck one-half to 1 percentage point above the national figure.
Three and a half years after the worst recession since the Great Depression, the earnings and employment gap between those in the under-35 population and their parents and grandparents threatens to unravel the American dream of each generation doing better than the last. The nation’s younger workers have benefited least from an economic recovery that has been the most uneven in recent history.
which is leading to an increasingly disenfranchised generation:
“This generation will be permanently depressed and will be on a lower path of income for probably all of their life — and at least the next 10 years,” says Rutgers professor Cliff Zukin, a senior research fellow at the university’s John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development. Professionals who start out in jobs other than their first choice tend to stay on the alternative path, earning less than they would have otherwise while becoming less likely to start over again later in preferred fields, Zukin says.
Only one-fifth of those who graduated college since 2006 expect greater success than their parents, a Rutgers survey found earlier this year. Little more than half were working full time. Just one in five said their job put them on a career path.
As the dream fades:
“I had a lot of faith in the system, the mythology that if you work really hard you can achieve anything, and the stock market always goes up,” says 2009 law school graduate Elizabeth Hallock, 33. “It was pretty naïve on my part.”
And fingers are pointed:
Hallock is the named plaintiff in one of 14 lawsuits against some of the nation’s best-known law schools, including her alma mater, the University of San Francisco School of Law. The civil complaints, filed in 2011 and 2012, accuse the institutions of overstating graduates’ job-placement results and incomes.
Young Americans are struggling to reconcile their lack of economic rewards with their relatively privileged upbringings by Baby Boomer parents and the material success of their older peers, Generation X, born in the late 1960s and 1970s…
But whose fault is it?
“It’s a generation that had really high expectations, in some part driven by the way they were raised by their boomer parents,” she says. “Yet in the past five years they have had reality slammed in their face by the employment situation.”
As…
The same housing crash that hammered young architects and loan officers also slammed lawyers. Law schools are turning out about 45,000 degree holders a year for about 25,000 full-time positions available to them, according to the National Association for Law Placement Inc. in Washington. The class of 2011 had the lowest placement with law firms, 49.5 percent, in 36 years.
“It is not the perfect path to wealth and success that people may have envisioned,” says Robin Sparkman, editor in chief of The American Lawyer magazine in New York.
Which is leading to lawsuits – by the new lawyers against their schools…
“It’s hard to look at the information the schools were putting out and say it’s not misleading,” says Derek Tokaz, research director of the nonprofit Law School Transparency initiative. It published research showing that the chance of recent graduates getting permanent full-time work in law was far lower than the 80-95 percent total employment rates the schools typically boasted.
But for some – a new different life is peeking through…
“As it is, all of my possessions still fit in the back of my truck,” she says. “I can pack it in a couple hours, pick up the trailer and horses and move anywhere the gas tank will take me at the drop of a hat. What can the system take away from you when you have that kind of freedom?”
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25th December 2012 at 10:38 am
Roy says:
Winning a lawsuit against the “Justice” system would be a miracle. There is a fine line between rape and seduction. Guess which side the rapist Justice system would support?
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25th December 2012 at 11:11 am
AWD says:
“Law schools are turning out about 45,000 degree holders a year for about 25,000 full-time positions available to them, according to the National Association for Law Placement Inc. in Washington. The class of 2011 had the lowest placement with law firms, 49.5 percent, in 36 years….Which is leading to lawsuits – by the new lawyers against their schools…”
This is the best news I’ve heard all week. Any asshole can get into law school, and half the graduates can’t find jobs and are suing the law school. I hope these lawyer parasites eat each other alive.
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25th December 2012 at 11:26 am
NickelthroweR says:
Greetings,
I see things playing out this way:
1. As taxes increse, the economy will move underground. I live in California and it is believed by the officials that at least 1/3′rd of our economy is underground – I think it closer to 50%. As California goes, so goes the nation. Taxes are so high in California that only a fool would operate above ground.
2. The government will flat out panic once the economy moves underground. It will have to ramp up its police state to the point where private transactions (garage sales, craigslist, etc) will be outlawed. Those operating in the black market will be deemed as terrorists by the state. Those still working for paychecks will get the shock of their lives as the state confiscates 60% of their earning to fund the agencies that are trying to stop the underground economy thus putting even more people in the underground economy.
3. In the final act of this play, the government will have to choose between funding its entitlement programs or its police state. The 100 million Americans that do not contribute will freak the hell out when the EBT cards do not work and the SSDI and unemployment stops. This is where things will get very interesting and predicting what will happen after that is anyone’s guess. World War, Civil War, Currency collapse – it is all possible.
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25th December 2012 at 11:33 am
Brazil66 says:
I think R. Engineer hit it the nail on the head with his assessment of “Simon Black.” The guy doesn’t even use his real name. Swashbuckling gonzo globetrotter or trustafarian rentier fraudster. I think I’d put money on the latter.
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25th December 2012 at 11:43 am
chen says:
Taxes are so high in California that only a fool would operate above ground.
how high are they?
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25th December 2012 at 11:44 am
Hollow man says:
I hope the young let me finish life in peace. I am not sure I would do the same. I am part of the generation that screwd them over. So sorry. At least I tried to help change direction once I figured out what we wre doing. It took to lng for me to figure it out sorry about that too.
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25th December 2012 at 11:51 am
sangell says:
You can live in the underground economy ( for now ) if you don’t make too much but it gets harder to stay off the tax radar as your income gets above subsistence levels. Governments can and do search auto and other data bases for anomalies. The $20,000 income with a $50,000 car. $100,000 flowing through a bank account belonging to a ‘disabled’ person. Over in Europe now they are starting to crack down on cash transactions. I think Spain put a $2000 limit. They can go lower too or change money itself to force those with lots of cash to surrender it or have it become worthless. Better be able to explain why you have $25,000 in hundred dollar bills if you want to get the new ones. Then there was that 1099 scare for any transaction over $600 they trial ballooned a year ago.
It’s like I say, governments desperate for revenue get creative and ruthless as they try and extract the revenue they need to stay in business. They will plug loopholes, close doors and force above ground underground transactions or put your ass in prison AND confiscate your property.
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25th December 2012 at 11:56 am
AWD says:
The FSA are masters of the “underground” economy. They get their government checks, disability, SNAP benefits, EBT, free housing, healthcare, meds, phones, internet and computers. But they also line up for free food from food shelters, sell their SNAP and EBT for cash, and work off the books at a myriad of jobs. I’ve known disability recipients that were roofers, sold produce, were fence installers, worked on cars, at convenience stores, you name it. All cash dealings. You can report them to the government, and the government will do nothing about it.
We have a lot to learn from the FSA.
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25th December 2012 at 12:12 pm
AWD says:
Once austerity kicks in here, like in Europe, youth unemployment will reach 30% or 40% (like in Europe). I wonder if they’ll do anything, like protest, or if they’ll remain techno-zombies.
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25th December 2012 at 12:14 pm
IndenturedServant says:
“I had a lot of faith in the system, the mythology that if you work really hard you can achieve anything, and the stock market always goes up,” says 2009 law school graduate Elizabeth Hallock, 33. “It was pretty naïve on my part.”
And fingers are pointed:
“Hallock is the named plaintiff in one of 14 lawsuits against some of the nation’s best-known law schools, including her alma mater, the University of San Francisco School of Law. The civil complaints, filed in 2011 and 2012, accuse the institutions of overstating graduates’ job-placement results and incomes.”
Oh yeah, grab that free shit before it’s gone. The message this chick got was “if they won’t hand it to me on a silver platter, then I’ll take it by force”. Why can’t people just research job place ment and pay for themselves. These whiny little fuckers are too lazy to look out for their own interests. How the hell are they going to turn anything around?
““As it is, all of my possessions still fit in the back of my truck,” she says. “I can pack it in a couple hours, pick up the trailer and horses and move anywhere the gas tank will take me at the drop of a hat. What can the system take away from you when you have that kind of freedom?””
BWHAHAHAHA! “What can the system take away from you when you have that kind of freedom?” BWHAHAHAHA! Having that kind of “freedom” will indeed be a good thing going forward but it will more likely be a burden than a freedom. I sincerely hope she (and I) never find out what the system can take away from us.
I_S
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25th December 2012 at 12:55 pm
Pirate Jo says:
I saw the Zero Hedge article this morning, as well.
The one thing that really ticks me off about these articles is that they all try to make it sound like this is a new development – like it just started four years ago.
The Baby Boomers were the last generation to have things better than their parents.
In the 1960s/1970s, a blue-collar guy with no college degree could still support a wife and two kids on his income alone and without a bunch of credit cards.
In the 1980s, the wife had to get a job and they started using their first credit cards, but it looked like their lifestyles were improving.
In the 1990s/2000s, you have to get a college degree in order to land a job that will pay enough to get you a place of your own – blue-collar jobs have either gone overseas or been filled by illegals. Even then, you have to choose between having kids or having a retirement, and two incomes is a foregone conclusion.
2010s, For the first time, you’re better off not getting a college degree. If you do, you’ll still be working for minimum wage, but will be saddled with college debt for life. You will be lucky to ever move out on your own at all, and will never be able to afford kids OR a retirement unless you get on welfare.
This isn’t new! These developments have been in the making for a long time.
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25th December 2012 at 1:05 pm
IndenturedServant says:
Sangell said:
“It’s like I say, governments desperate for revenue get creative and ruthless as they try and extract the revenue they need to stay in business. They will plug loopholes, close doors and force above ground underground transactions or put your ass in prison AND confiscate your property.”
I know that the overbearing nature of governments in situations like ours is well documented through history. The inevitable collapse of fiat currency and the misery that will result is nothing new but I wonder if a well armed population, like we have here will mitigate the overbearing nature of govt?
Have any well armed populations experienced currency and govt collapse? There are none I’m aware of but if they existed, what was the outcome? In my mind, Americans will tolerate an inordinate amount of bullshit and remain relatively peaceful. However, I have to wonder if a tipping point can be reached where an armed population says, no more! It is an interesting thing to think about but I keep thinking Americans are too lazy and ignorant to take back the country. I think the upcoming gun debate (if it actually happens) will be very telling. I think the current panic buying of guns and high cap. magazines is very telling. I’ll bet TPTB are sitting up and taking notice.
I think the worst thing we can do is let this mess devolve into a civil war or any kind of war. If that happens, the yutes will become cannon fodder as yutes always do.
I_S
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25th December 2012 at 1:42 pm
chen says:
OMG you are so dramatic Hollow man, do you also say things like: we should have built you a better ship? Boomers are not responsible for all the problems of the world! i was 13 or 14 when Woodstock was going on. It was the entertainment industry that jumped on the bandwagon and exploited immorality. (Why do i never read about someone getting physically ill at the commercialization of immorality?) The decay really got rolling in the 80′s with eddie murphy and george carlin cheerleading for the apocalypse. Now i read about (today) single moms with 3 kids from different baby daddys and how that has contributed to crime in the good ole usa. We boomers didn’t buid the Titanic, we just drew up the plans, this generation is buiding it.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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25th December 2012 at 1:55 pm
OF says:
“As it is, all of my possessions still fit in the back of my truck,” she says. “I can pack it in a couple hours, pick up the trailer and horses and move anywhere the gas tank will take me at the drop of a hat. What can the system take away from you when you have that kind of freedom?”
Gas, for instance. Can happen in a day.
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25th December 2012 at 2:09 pm
IndenturedServant says:
chen said:
“We boomers didn’t buid the Titanic, we just drew up the plans, this generation is buiding it.”
Why draw up the plan in the first place?
I_S
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25th December 2012 at 2:46 pm
IndenturedServant says:
OF said:
“Gas, for instance. Can happen in a day.”
Exactly! The brilliant part of their plan does not require them to actually take something away from us. They simply need to make it unobtainable like $20/gallon gas. Same with Social security a la Greenspan, the FED will guarantee any amount of money needed. They cannot guarantee the purchasing power of that money however.
I_S
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25th December 2012 at 2:50 pm
Novista says:
anotherjuan … ” if i thought just like everybody else here,”
You get down thumbs because you’re fucking stupid. We’re “on the same page” for some things but otherwise, it’s like herding cats. If you did not perceive that before, now you know.
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25th December 2012 at 12:07 am
anotherjuan says:
i’m proud of my ideas sometimes and other times i wish there was an erase feature becuase i don’t like what i wrote. my comment may be fucking stupid but i am not, at least i don’t think i am, and i don’t know anybody here well enough to trust their opinion. maybe you don’t like my opinion at the time but like groaner jokes, you remember and it may help you formulate a better version of my idea. or you can quote it as the most asinine thing you ever read. i know i repeat stuff i read here, maybe i forget the source but i know i got an idea here, i tell my friends, i read somewhere…
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25th December 2012 at 12:27 am
Novista says:
anotherjuan
OK, I will rephrase: ” if i thought just like everybody else here,” was a stupid statement.
As you yourself said, ” i don’t know anybody here well enough to trust their opinion,” so you cannot make a judgment about “everybody else here” (i.e., think the same.)
It’s quite a spectrum: two Silents, a host of BBoomers, Xers, Millenials, a spook, a couple of ex-pats, drive-by progressives, a 1%er, male, female and the undecided, a majority of INTJ (a phyle?) and some whose profile is unknown.
Into the vortex, friend …
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25th December 2012 at 7:08 am
chen says:
i’m sure by ‘spook’ you mean a government watchdog. what profile are you talking about?
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25th December 2012 at 12:48 pm
ThePessimisticChemist says:
Much as it pains me to say this….I still feel like its possible the Gen-X/Y group can right the ship.
A slim chance, but a chance.
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25th December 2012 at 1:03 pm
anotherjuan says:
chicken littles gotta chill out. the world was crumbling long before it became boomerville and it will still be crumbling after. fiscal cliff and titanic are figures of speech used to describe a complex situation. if you recall the saying, with great power, comes great responsibility -stan, cool. but the one i want to remind you of now is, a great crisis is a great opportunity – rahm
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25th December 2012 at 1:45 pm
objuan says:
you had it right when you quoted stan lee, these gene X/Y types are champing at the bit to run things but you can see we have uncle joe there to keep an eye on things before they go too crazy with plans they would not appreciate so much if it was their own bacon in the pan.
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25th December 2012 at 2:26 pm
ThePessimisticChemist says:
@objuan – “before they go too crazy with plans they would not appreciate so much if it was their own bacon in the pan”
How is ours not in the pan? We have to somehow save for the future all the while paying for the older generations to retire because we KNOW that we will receive zero benefit from retirement programs.
The reason a Ponzi Scheme is a scam and not a sound investment plan is because it royally fucks over its “investors.”
SS is a ponzi scheme, as is medicare/medicaid and most other welfare programs. Everybody keeps crying to get “their fair share” when the reality is that they were screwed too, they just didn’t realize it. Now they are pissed that their successors recognize the hardcore screwing for what it is and refuse to pay up.
Sorry I’m not as blind staggering stupid as those who accepted this idiotic “social contract.”
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25th December 2012 at 2:47 pm