Boomer writes a letter to newspaper explaining why the economy is working against young folks

Inflation is a growing problem affecting the current economic condition as a whole. What used to be affordable a few decades back is now out of people's reach. Whether it is about housing, jobs or anything else, everything that is required to ensure a comfortable livelihood is expensive. It is why many younger folks struggle to put a permanent shelter over their heads and pay the rent despite having a considerably high-paying job. John Searle from Grantham, England, summed up the crisis through a letter he had written to a newspaper.

Lawyer Peter Stefanovic–who goes by @PeterStefanovi2 on his X (formerly Twitter–shared a snapshot of the published material from a newspaper in 2017, but it seems a lot more relevant in recent years. "Mission impossible. In 1965, I was a fireman earning about $1,284 a year and I bought a house for $4496 with a mortgage of three times my salary," the newspaper clipping read. "Today, the very ordinary property is valued at $835,120. So, a buyer would need a $64,240 deposit and an income of $256,960 a year. This shows how utterly impossible the situation is for young people."

The post was reshared on Reddit by u/Green__cat and the community had to share their struggles to adjust to the changing economy. u/El_ha_Din wrote, "Back in 2016, I bought my home for $156,316, I made around $40K/year gross. After the market went crazy and my house has just been valued at $377,315. My pay is $50K/year gross. I have been lucky to buy my house at the lowest point of the market." u/-boatsNhoes commented, "The worst thing is that the majority of houses won't even hit the market after boomers die. The nursing homes and facilities will take them as collateral and rent them out."

u/throwaway0918287 added, "In 2013, we bought a 2,500 sq ft house, 4 bed 3 bath for 260k. Beautiful colonial 2-story house but sitting vacant for two years because it was 'overpriced.' At the time, combined me and my wife were bringing in about $50k. It was right at the bottom after the 2009 recession before home prices started going back up. I remember we put in a lowball offer, no other offers, so they accepted. The mortgage is about $1500. And we refinanced right before COVID hit at about 2.5%. Zestimate now says $600k on the low end."

As we shift our attention back to the new generation, we will find them "doom spending" pretty often. Instead of investing in houses and stability, they chose to invest in various experiences. Maria Melchor—who goes by @firstgenliving on TikTok—is a Yale graduate sharing financial videos for the younger generation, remarked that boomers and Gen X might have been able to afford their properties and live a comfortable life while building a family but the younger generation is not following in their footsteps.

In one of her popular videos, she mentioned that young people afford nice things and take foreign vacations despite not having enough money on their name "It's because we can't afford anything else." "Homeownership or starting a family is so out of reach that we're using that down payment or kid money on whatever it is we can't afford that'll bring us a semblance of the kind of adulthood we were promised," Melchor continues. "When houses are a million dollar plus and an older couple will likely outbid us anyway, we're gonna relinquish any lingering delusions about homeownership." She jokes about using that money to give their pets the most "enriched" life instead.

This article originally appeared on 2.19.24.