want all sorts of things. They just can't afford them.

While I do actually hope that their parents are raising (did raise) them to be frugal, rather than conspicuous consumers, by and large people are people, and they usually desire more than they have, and can be lured into buying junk as long as it's trendy junk, to satisfy a different need, that of 'fitting in'.

But with stagnant incomes, more low wage jobs than higher ones, and greater college debts, they simply can't get those high ticket items.

Sub $10/hr wages in a $15+/hr cost of living city doesn't leave much.

So many are so out of touch that it's laughable in many ways.

What I find interesting is that so many want to 'study' the Millennials in such a way that attempts to analyze their consumer habits not because they sympathize with the economics of the generation, but how to further exploit them.

Absolutely The Millennial are suffering the economic consequences of the free market run muck.

However their desire to impact their communities through the use of co ops, mass transit, lower impact housing opportunities and equitable purchasing power with the capital that they do posses.

This is what impacts a community far greater than the retail district model which requires much greater effort to utilize these retail selections.

It's not about marketing to many of the Millenials. It's a trend that's been bucked, and those who are blaming the Millenials, are due on the unemployment line themselves if they refuse to implement the new direction being created by forcing an old, broken system on those who wish no participation within it...

Wake up!

While I'm not a millenial ( several generations removed actually ) I've always been annoyed over the years by these "studies" that think they know what makes this or that generation tick. Rarely if ever are the studies done with sociology in mind. It's always about how to best exploit Generation X, Y or millenials as consumers only. The worst ones are business media ( as if there was a difference ) condescending sneering and basically saying "We can sell you anything..." or somesuch rot.

Before then, they'd been fairly middle of the road and had a challenging cryptic crossword on the back page. Once they turned to the far right, they dumped the crossword. They knew no conservative would be able to do it, so they might as well save the money.

currently wrap the millennials into this wretched financial system like they did their parents.

The oligarchical structure can only survive with exploitation of the youth. Fresh meat is needed to perpetuate the system now racked with fraud and corruption by TPTB. It is so damn DUH, the oligarchs can't seem to get that they wrecked the financial system, there is no fresh meat entering the system to quench their hunger and exploration needs for financial gain.

Have you noticed the influx of car rentals by dealerships, as one example. They can't sell their overpriced hulks so have to try the rental angle to make revenue while sugar coating it as a benefit.

Housing is at least triple what I would be willing to pay and new cars are at least double. Student loan debt is more than enough to debt slave me for the rest of my life, I do not need any more debt.

There are $300,000 houses around here, and more just across the river (where I went house hunting twelve years ago (and ended up on this, the more affordable side of the river)) but there are also still houses under $50,000. In fact, my own house is STILL assessed at under $50,000.

The one guy that was quoted on the news story said he did not even WANT a house. His "American Dream" was about being mobile, not about putting down roots.

for your next job.. House-buying inhibits people if they have to move suddenly and often..

The only 50k houses where I live have bullet holes in them and rusty cars in the yard. It is 200k to get into anything in a neighbourhood that you would want to live in.

Decent cheap houses are available but only in neighborhoods with nightly shootings.

That isn't a criticism either. Just seems that they have money and put it somewhere other than cars and homes.

They seem to take on the bills they can afford to pay, that's all.

You can even get a smartphone for free if you're willing to take an outdated model (as little as two years old) and sign up for a $20 a month plan. (Keep in mind that it's probably their only phone and maybe their only connection to the Internet.)

you allow yourself a little splurge here and there -- a pricey coffee, a tattoo, whatever.

Or you think houses cost much less than they do.

A tattoo or a piercing is a one-time expense. And it's hard to work these days (or have kids in school for that matter) without a phone and some technology - they're necessities, not extras. And all of those costs together don't come anywhere near the cost of a house. They might make up the cost of one house payment.

IF they're lucky enough to be able to go to college, they owe more in student debt than I owed on my first house. There are fewer and fewer good paying jobs and the boomers (of which I am one) can't retire to make room for them because our life savings and pensions were ravaged by the last planned Great Recession. Real wages haven't gone up in decades but housing and food hasn't gotten any cheaper. Those high-paying jobs to which many of us aspired in the past have all but dried up. The .001% can't rape a country's wealth and then whine that people aren't spending money in order to make them even wealthier.

like my older nieces. My oldest niece owns two houses (one that is upside down and she cannot sell) and travels the world in her job. My 2nd oldest niece doesn't have the high paying job of her older sister, but just got back from a trip to Rome, Vienna and Neuschwanstein. My third oldest niece bought a house last month. My fourth oldest niece is getting married next summer and her fiance is already employed. My fifth oldest niece was offered a teaching job before she even graduated (she turned it down).

The just scraping by does not seem to be universal.

their situation is not universal.

They have to pay those off before thinking about anything else.

The fact that the press is ignoring their financial restraints is just weird.

which makes splurging on cars and houses less likely. I was typically pretty broke until my 30's myself, though one way or another I managed to do plenty of travelling and clubbing and so forth. One thing I really regretted was buying a new car I couldn't afford - it took about 8 years to get out from under that mistake, and I decided I'd never buy another car I didn't have the cash for.

Both of my brothers went to these schools, and my brother who graduated medical school does a lot of charity and philanthropic work, and he'll probably never pay everything back.

especially of big ticket items like new cars and home ownership. Cheap means having the money and not spending it; broke is broke.

for income in one state and rent where your job takes you.

By the way the Boomers weren't exactly rich in their 20s either.

I'm also a boomer, and I didn't feel that I was actually getting anywhere until I was 40, when I bought my home. It also helped that I worked for the State.

you could support a family of four in true middle-class lifestyle in a decent home on one decent income, afford a new or newish car maybe once a decade, get a vacation now and again, get a true "free" public school education for your kids (unlike today where we subsidize to the tune of hundreds and hundreds of dollars every year), send your kids to a very affordable public university, and so on.

That is no longer the case.

I know two of them who are patching together a living with part-time jobs. One of them does not own a car and gets around by bicycle. I don't see either of them buying a house anytime soon--and that's a prudent approach.

Government Intervention makes sure that the spoils of a booming economy go toward the people rather than just the rich. Most of the middle and working classes spend the money much more than the rich do, which feeds the economy. A booming middle class is willing to spend a lot more money on products, and along with social engineering like a harsh top tax rate, allow workers of those companies (if they are in the U.S.) to make more money because the employer would rather pay their workers more than give the money to the federal government.

Without government intervention, the economy and the people suffer because most of the money goes to the rich.

skulls. They vote to enable those that F them over to do so even more. The sheer stupidity in much of America is appalling. The guppies falling for the propaganda is staggering. Just looking at some of the close races in the coming election, it is amazing how many Americans have such insatiable desires to be fleeced by politicians and their cronies on the take even more.

They bought the Republican ideologies hook line and sinker. It took the newer generations not experienced with the roaring 20's and the subsequent Great Depression to buy into already proven failed and disastrous policies. The WWII Generation was shown by FDR of the benefits of "big government" and they witnessed the evils of right wing economic ideologies.

Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. - Winston Churchill

We are late 40s/early 50s now and we SUCK.

They are quite aware of the massive environmental problems caused by our society's mass consumption. They do not wish to continue that 'progress'.

They look around and see the rush hour traffic, and the shot nerves, and the broken families due to the quest for more, more, more. Wisely, they are deciding not to travel that path.

The grow-or-die capitalists are freaking out over this because well, it is a grow-or-die society, and the kids these days are like: chill out, stay home, and live clean and simply.

greed, the fake politicians, the exclusionary club we call a government, oligarchs seizing every open door they can to enhance their wealth and power grip.

The best, is to turn ones back on all of this sheer nonsense of "the grow-or-die capitalists" telling them to F off, that we can create and have a better society by ending stupid capitalistic competition and focus now on cooperation, providing a better society for all than just those that have gamed the system.

I have no problem with the accumulation of wealth, but, what we have today is few controls on outrageous capitalistic growth yielding a radically skewed distribution. Some thinking they are part of that wealth have no F'en idea what they are talking about. They are so far from that club they can't even comprehend it exists.

Last edited Sun Nov 2, 2014, 07:15 AM - Edit history (2)

or Arizona or New York City and make a go of it on a shoestring budget and in time be established and possibly even a property and/or business owner. The only people who finished college with $50,000 in debts were doctors who would be able to quickly make the money back - If I remember correctly even in the early 80's going to San Francisco State for a California resident cost less than $800 per semester for tuition and books and other fees. Hell I rented a one bedroom apartment in the Castro for $325.00 a month in 1982. Any Spirit wishing to incarnate into America today better hold off until they can find a wealthy family - you won't be able to afford to live or even to die otherwise.

etc. the system back then worked quite well. The first few steps were huge, but not insurmountable. Today, it's difficult to even see the first step. Unless one is really born into wealth the old story of rags to riches is a total bunch of bullshit. Today, we have a society where the gap is growing wider and wider and wider.

Unless Americans wake up and start engaging their brains rather than hot button emotions when they vote, there will be little left of what we thankfully had when young.

What I find amazing is how middle of the road teabaggers and the like have been so gullible for the propaganda fed to them that they do everything they can to suppress themselves and the future for their kids.

raise the damn minimum wage already