Who is in the 1%? How are people under 30 doing?

I totally believe that the situation of young people today is much worst off than the last 50 years of the 20th century.

I'm really loving those replies about people working their asses off to make 30k a year and then say that the situation ain't that bad and that you just have work harder...

Well no, you're getting screwed too.

We just aren't playing at the same table than the super rich. ( more like the .3% )
It's all planned so that we are pawns to a system that will never help humanity achieve everything we could become.

So yeah, all's fine just work harder buddy!

reply to post by AndyMayhew


"The Balmoral and Sandringham Estates aren't that big - there are plenty more wealthy landowners in Britain!"

I don't mean there U.K retreats. LoL

I'm refereeing to the vast tracts of land they own in places like America, New Zealand, Australia and Canada. Plus numerous other places.

Heres an interesting link you might all like which allows you to enter your income and asset worth , it then ranks you world wide

www.globalrichlist.com...

example below using myself

Income based
You’re in the top
0.07%
richest people in the world by income.

That makes you the
4,378,124th richest person in the world

Asset Based
You’re in the top
1.44%
richest people in the world.

That makes you the
63,058,653nd
richest person on earth.

I'm doing terrible. I'll turn 30 in oct. Went to college through pell grants and finished with my undergrad for teaching (cant afford the rest of the college for b.a). My parents are older, like three generation older, 60 & 70. I been through job to job and went where the economy went. I was a janitor, direct care worker, meijar worker, cnc metal (only five month training and teacher stopped helping), assembly, factory, e coating..

My dream was to be an audio recordist and intern two years with the guy not doing anything for me...at the end.
Right now i am unemployed in detroit and probably going to settle for a 8.50$ job somewhere. Even though i could probably do a 20$ job an hour if taught properly. The more you make the less you do.

I also wanted to be a electrician, but i broke my foot and couldnt do the training
Im mad, mad at the world, mad at the u.s, i seethe anger. I'm pissed off and feel failed by the world.
I struggled with a minor a.d.d and dysgraphia (loook it up) disability and battled and fought my way ontop in the work place and school.!!!

congress cut my unemployment as of dec 28th. I was on the second teir for it, now I'm waiting to live off my tax return.

Im in my parents basement

MouldyCrumpet
Heres an interesting link you might all like which allows you to enter your income and asset worth , it then ranks you world wide

www.globalrichlist.com...

I like things like this that put things into perspective. I think that a large part of my problem is that I am not able to meet what I perceive the older generation's expectations.

TorqueyThePig

Not trying to criticize you or argue laws, but I hope that experience was an eye opener and you are no longer spending money on that.

Nah, I'm looking for legal and more positive ways to spend my time. Also working on covering my bases first. It was an eye-opener, yeah. Luckily, I wasn't that involved.

TorqueyThePig
reply to post by projectvxn

 

Star for you. I think am similar to you.

I come from a broken household. My father left when I was two, and my mother has only a high school education. She has been a full time waitress since I was a tot. She still is today. I was raised in an eighteen foot tow behind camper until I was about 5. My mom was then able to purchase her grandmothers house. A small two bedroom. So needless to say I do not come from money.

Fast forward to today. I am only 30 and own my own house on .25 acre. I own a newer used car. I go on vacation once every two years. I eat well. I have a man cave with an Xbox One, and enjoy numerous hobbies. Needless to say I have a damn good life.

I am not going to sit here and argue that times aren't tough, because they are. However, there are still opportunities out there.

I like your situation. My family situation is complicated, rich parents, I was sheltered, I went to a liberal arts college (where I got a good education) but ended up with little practical life experience. It is good to hear of your story on this thread. I think what scares me is my lack of practical life experience.

reply to post by darkbake


Bottom line many people under 30 bought in the progressive mindset. The pride many people have about taking handouts and working hard is lost when this mindset is present. And no not everyone under 30 bought into this lie.


Many parents let there children do anything they want and tell them they are winners no matter what. This is why the under 30 crown is failing and might never pull it together. I was raised to learn from failure......I had strict parents......I pay my own way.



If you are a parent and let your child think they are a winner no matter what and let them rule the house you had better be prepared to take care of them the rest of your life. The progressive mindset is failure in real life.

reply to post by darkbake


Screw the older generation's expectations. They slaved away and wasted their lives pursuing crap objectives, only to end up with mid-life crises, realizing they wasted their lives accumulating crap, and never bothered to actually enjoy life. Don't let their narrow-minded selfishness strip the joy from your own life. Success isn't about having a big job, 2.5 kids, an SUV, owning a house, and crawling your way up some slimy ladder in a job that deep down, you truly hate. It's about making peace with yourself, and finding fulfillment and purpose in whatever path you take through life. Otherwise, no matter how much you make, you'll never be happy.

It is not any easier for people who are older. I just turned 40, and I live a pretty spartan existence. I'm about to get my second part time job. I do not want to spend my days working my butt off, I've already been there, and found it to be pointless and unrewarding. But I also live within my means, which is a pretty Spartan existence. My car and apartment are nothing to write home about, but they serve their purpose. I rarely go out, my belongings are quite old and often recycled. But these are acceptable trade offs. In having less and working less, I have more time and energy to devote to the things I value: people, animals, nature, volunteering. It's a matter of determining your priorities, accepting trade offs, and living within means. You'd be surprised how little you truly need.

I really don't care about the 1% or their wealth, they can have it, and choke on it for all I care. So long as they stay out of my way, and are limited in what they are permitted to do to the rest of us, I could care less about their wealth. Let them keep it, I have no interest in it. This is why I could never get the OWS movement. That sort of rage is for people who are trying to pursue the empty illusions the 1% wave in front of us. No one is entitled to anything, and that works both ways for the 1%. While no one is entitled to take their money, they should not be entitled to buy, own, or control any damned thing they please. So long as they are stripped of the power and influence to disrupt and control the avenues of existence for other people who wish to live outside of the rat race, then they are of no consequence to me.

So long as there are proper limits and safeguards to prevent them from total domination of all resources and means, then they should be of no consequence to the rest of us.

Never let anyone dictate where you need to be in life, parents included. be realistic, and be true to yourself, and be prepared to sacrifice realistically.

andy06shake

I'm refereeing to the vast tracts of land they own in places like America, New Zealand, Australia and Canada. Plus numerous other places.

They don't own any such land.

Nor do they own Buckinham Palace or Windsor Castle in England.

Crown Estates and property do not belong to the Queen, they belong to the country.

reply to post by AndyMayhew


The United Kingdom is still, at heart anyway, a monarchy not a democracy. You and me both are nothing more than subjects. So essentially our royalty still lord over us however benevolent it may seem. The property's in question may very well be owned by our country but in turn our nations still belong to Queen and the royal family.

These people don't just have a finger in many a pie, they have there fist well and truly shoved up the bakers back passage!

"They" are not just in control, "They" are control, period.

reply to post by Skadi_the_Evil_Elf


Thanks Skadi, you guys are giving interesting and useful feedback.

reply to post by AliceBleachWhite


Really, I agree with you, there is no way these people should have that much wealth. But please realize that it's not just a pile of money in a bank account. It's spread in all sorts of places as investments, these people just have control over it. If we tried to liquidate their collective wealth, the market would react violently, which would generally be a bad thing.

I'm in my early 20's and I never went to college despite even my school principal having a conference with me asking why I didn't want to go to college with 3.65 GPA. Simple answer: I made a few bad choices and couldn't afford it, and it was unnecessary for what I wanted to do in life anyway. I got a job in a body shop when I was 15, basically as an apprentice and I've learned all I know about collision repair there. I had a son while I was still in high school, was disowned by my family, then got married just because I felt like I had to. Ended up nearly homeless, we lost custody of our son, and we went our separate ways after a long, troublesome two years of marriage. My son was placed in the care of my parents.

I made amends with my family, moved in with my grandparents for a little while until I repaired some floors in an old trailer to move into. Lived there 3 years, saved up money by working hard in the body shop I've had a couple of raises and learned a lot more. I bought a new car to get out of the 1980's scrapheaps I had been driving. Then I took out a loan to do major repair work that needed to be done to my trailer, ended up tearing it down and I'm still finishing rebuilding it, will hopefully move in soon. I had helped my cousins restore an old Mercury for their dad, and they're helping me with my house... er... trailer. We worked so well together and got so much done we just opened our own restoration & auto repair shop, where I'm co-owner.

Now I have a nice car, I'm about to have a nice place to live, and have part of my own business. I still have a lot of debt, but I'm making ends meet because I'm using my resources wisely.

What's that about a bad economy again?

reply to post by Aldakoopa


And at your current pace it will take how many lifetimes to reach the 1%. Debt is not wealth, you have what you have as long as you pay the debt.

All i read was anecdotal evidence that do not address any of the information that you presented.

The issue is not black and white it is not easy to start a business the USA is no longer building anything but military weapons.

Someone directly address the evidence or take your anecdotal evidence elsewhere.

projectvxn
All on roughly 30 grand a year.

30k/year isn't that bad, that's more than 3x what I earn. In some areas of the country jobs literally don't exist. The college I currently work at (it also happens to be where one of my degrees is from) is holding a job fair coming up in March. I saw the email and got excited, then I opened it and looked at who was going to be there... it was all gas stations and convenience stores looking for part time cashiers.

darkbake
Now here is where the real problem starts - Americans under 30 have taken a gigantic hit (including me) from the economic crisis of 2008. I will tell you a bit about myself, I am barely able to afford renting an apartment, food, gas and internet - and most of my friends are in the same situation. My college calls me and asks for a donation, which I cannot afford to pay.

I'm 31 so slightly out of the demographic, though I was extremely ill from 19-23 so I got a bit of a late start on college, as a result I count myself in that demographic. I understand completely where they're coming from. I'm told all the time that I need to work and take bad jobs. I've done that, I've held the same job for 3 years now with no raise and no promotion (minimum wage job that requires a college degree... go figure). I work on designing software on my own in my free time, but that has yet to result in a finished product I can sell.

To afford college I went homeless, sleeping on benches or sometimes in libraries between classes, and spending nights after the campus closed dodging the police who decided being homeless is illegal. In the end I ended up with multiple degrees in 6 years only to find that there are no jobs for me. In other areas of the country there are plenty of jobs. But getting there requires money, transportation, and so on... all things I cannot afford.

I'm not unwilling to work, and I'm clearly not opposed to short-medium term hardship to get what I want, but what I want literally doesn't exist around here, and I'm getting really sick of all the propaganda that everything is fine. If things were fine we wouldn't have a real unemployment rate of 31% and college graduates wouldn't consider themselves lucky to land 25 hours a week at minimum wage.

MouldyCrumpet
Heres an interesting link you might all like which allows you to enter your income and asset worth , it then ranks you world wide

You have to keep in mind what things buy too, $1 goes much further in a third world country than it does in the US. According to that site by income I'm in the top 17% in the world. My net wealth of a total $800 is so low that that website won't even rank me. World wide I recognize that there's still about 2.5 billion people out there that are worse off than me in absolute terms, but for being educated and living in a developed nation though? It's absolutely pathetic. I work, sacrificed, got an education and am still in the bottom 1% of the country. I recognize that 1 out of every 100 people is going to be in the bottom 1%, so why not have it be me? It still doesn't feel right though.

darkbake
I like things like this that put things into perspective. I think that a large part of my problem is that I am not able to meet what I perceive the older generation's expectations.

It was already said but who cares about the older generations expectations? Aside from our grandparents who maybe lived through the depression, is the older generation really in a position to relate? It's often the older generation that says to live without and accept minimum wage. When they were taking minimum wage however it bought a whole lot more. I don't think I need to rehash those arguments right this moment but they could pay rent and buy a months groceries with 40 hours of work per month. Today we need closer to 90 hours to do the same thing... and they would actually get 160 hours of work per month while we can only get 100.

The older generation was there in our golden age... now we're in one of the worst times ever, of course things aren't going to go as well. Personally, I've given up any hope of ever earning more than minimum wage, owning a home, being able to afford to raise kids, being able to buy healthcare, afford a vacation, own a car, or be in a position to retire. It doesn't mean that I'm not going to try and make the best that I can out of my life, but I've made peace with the fact that my quality of life and future were stolen by the bankers. As a result, the only expectations I have are goals for myself... I want to build some great pieces of software, I'm never going to get rich off it but personal fulfillment is still a thing. Atleast I do something rather than nothing.

LDragonFire
reply to post by Aldakoopa

 

And at your current pace it will take how many lifetimes to reach the 1%. Debt is not wealth, you have what you have as long as you pay the debt.

I don't care to ever reach the 1% level. It's a shame that so much wealth is concentrated in the hands of so few, but it's their money now, so to hell with it. As long as I get by with a little extra to save for retirement/my son's college/rainy days, that's all I care about.

Yeah, I have debt and that's a burden on my shoulders until I pay it off, but I'm getting by just fine and I'm not drowning it debt. I took out loans knowing fully that I could afford them. There was no other way. I desperately needed a reliable, fuel efficient vehicle, and I desperately needed a lot of repairs done to my house so I would actually have a counter top and stove to prepare food with, and so I wouldn't have to dump the water out of my microwave when it rained or step over the holes in my floor or watch the paneling peel up when the wind blew rain water in the cracks of the aluminum siding or spend a fortune on heating and cooling with space heaters and window units because the insulation was washed out from under the house from the flooding of hurricane Irene and the windows wouldn't shut completely nor open at all.

I do what I have to do, even if it means incurring a little bit of debt that makes the wealthy elite more money. Anything above my needs is nice, but completely unnecessary and I can live without.

Let the rich be rich. I do not see why everyone is so fired up about rich people. The divide between rich and poor has been the same for millennia, we are not special. Do not waste your energy. Instead, let us invest that energy into ourselves.

Unfortunately, a college education is not enough. I have two Master’s (MBA/MSF) – and rely heavily on what I learned outside of my education. (1) Reading Mises, Hayek, Rothbard, Friedman and many others in fields relating to economics. (2) My interest in Logical Fallacy. (3) My sales experience. Oddly enough, sales is the one subject you will never find in any coursework relating to a business degree, yet is the driving force behind all businesses. This, like many things in life is self-taught.

This thread is a perfect example of why we fail; because we would rather complain than actually take responsibility and make the change. The fact is, in this job market more experienced workers are accepting lower wages due to the lowered supply of jobs. This forces the younger, less experienced out of the job market altogether, or if lucky to be grossly unemployed.

ConspiracyBuff
Unfortunately, a college education is not enough. I have two Master’s (MBA/MSF) – and rely heavily on what I learned outside of my education. (1) Reading Mises, Hayek, Rothbard, Friedman and many others in fields relating to economics. (2) My interest in Logical Fallacy. (3) My sales experience. Oddly enough, sales is the one subject you will never find in any coursework relating to a business degree, yet is the driving force behind all businesses. This, like many things in life is self-taught.

I have multiple degrees as well (4 of them, but not Masters) and out of all four of them what I really learned after supposedly obtaining all of this knowledge was really only three things:
1. In reality no one really knows anything, at best the less intelligent just think they do.
2. Most of the people that you think are so much better than you, are for the most part just average, many of them even below average. By definition this means you (as in anyone) is most likely average too.
3. The only people who really understand something are those who figure it out, almost everyone else is just practicing imitation because they see that it works.

Anyways, I don't have a masters in economics but outside of some basic supply and demand correlations which only exist because of profit motive there's not really a whole lot that they've figured out. I made my own economic system which would work great according to psychology and game theory, but goes against what economics teaches. Personally, I wonder who is right.

This thread is a perfect example of why we fail; because we would rather complain than actually take responsibility and make the change. The fact is, in this job market more experienced workers are accepting lower wages due to the lowered supply of jobs. This forces the younger, less experienced out of the job market altogether, or if lucky to be grossly unemployed.

Lack of opportunity is a real barrier to success. Some areas honestly and truly don't have opportunity. A friend of mine is an engineer with 5 degrees but little experience. He has been looking for work for nearly 3 years, he just got a job and is elated. Know what job he got? Delivering pizzas for 10 hours a week. That is life in America.

reply to post by theMediator


You are correct sir.

When merely assets to dollars and income are treated as an ultimate victory or success, we have lost as a society.
We can't all choose to be at the top. Well, we could, but comfortable life would collapse as service sectors go empty and everyone waits for their carriages to arrive with their hired companion and backrub.

Quality of life due to technological limitations and to our cost of living is not ready yet for a time where everyone can be comfortable. No matter how bigoted some people may become in their moments of financial glory or financial envy. Money isn't the solution and never will be.

The main benefit to a money economy is competition which should more-so but only slightly improves product quality and quality of life today. We've stagnated as a society where cures and solutions aren't strongly considered anymore by the powerful entities with financial backing to hire scientists.

So people should never speak for all when they're suggesting to go and make a great quality of life. We have so many measures that keeps the social margins pyramidal and frozen in order to preserve the social structure.