Sky-high inflation? Blame the millenials

[force majeure]

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/15/millennials-are-to-blame-for-sky-high-inflation-strategist-says.html

[StarBright]

Old Millennial here. I thought the "Millennials are ruining x" articles had finally ended. But I was wrong. Can we start picking on Gen Z soon please :)

I get so tired of hearing my boomer family members and in-laws parroting this crap.

[Sibley]

They're saying there's millions of people who delayed things like buying homes, and it's all hitting at once. And blaming Millennials.

I'm so sorry that it look Millennials a decade or more to recover from the shit economic situation that the Boomers pushed them into. Because 2008 was NOT caused by the Millennials.

[PDXTabs]

The title of the article is "The size of the millennial generation is to blame for sky-high inflation, strategist says." Do you think that they are wrong?

Smead explained that in the U.S. there are an estimated 92 million millennials, primarily in the 27- to 42-year-old age bracket. “The last time we saw what we call ‘wolverine inflation’ — which is inflation that is hard for policymakers to stop — was when 75 million baby boomers had replaced 44 million silent generation people in the 1970s.”

We're the new boomers!

[ChickenStash]

"Millennial generation is to blame" Got to love the click-bait headlines.

[getsorted]

Sorry folks, my bad. Bought my first home in the last two years (using stimulus money!) and am putting off purchasing a new car. You can put this disaster on my tab. What else is it I ruined? Wall-to-wall carpeting? Paper napkins? Diamonds, definitely diamonds.
Love,
Your Friendly Elder Millennial

[Psychstache]

I feel like the onion reusing the mass shooting article, but here is my standard reply to Millennials are killing X.

[less4success]

Note: the article title says that the size of the Millennial generation is to blame. That means it's their parents' fault.

[RetiredAt63]

I will have to tell my daughter that it is all her fault.  ;-)

She sold her (tiny) house and bought a (medium) more expensive one, she bought a new car when her old one was on its last legs.  How inconsiderate of her!

[Morning Glory]

Note: the article title says that the size of the Millennial generation is to blame. That means it's their parents' fault.

I blame the demographers.  The link in the article gave millennials 19 years, and boomers 20 years, vs 15 for gen x and 12 for Gen z. Of course there are more.

https://cdn.nar.realtor/sites/default/files/documents/2022-home-buyers-and-sellers-generational-trends-03-23-2022.pdf

I take personal responsibility for killing fabric softener though.

[farmecologist]

Whew...I'm glad us lowly Gen X'ers are free of blame...haha. 

[PDXTabs]

What else is it I ruined? Wall-to-wall carpeting? Paper napkins? Diamonds, definitely diamonds.

Maybe I really am a millennial set on destruction, because I hate carpet, paper napkins, and diamonds. Not to mention chain restaurants, McDonald's, fabric softener, cruises, casinos, J Crew, the American Dream, the oil industry, hotels, church, department stores, hangout sitcoms, cereal, the car industry, diet staples (whatever those are - less filling than normal staples?), America, the NFL, fashion, Harley Davidson, and wine corks.

[getsorted]

What else is it I ruined? Wall-to-wall carpeting? Paper napkins? Diamonds, definitely diamonds.

Maybe I really am a millennial set on destruction, because I hate carpet, paper napkins, and diamonds. Not to mention chain restaurants, McDonald's, fabric softener, cruises, casinos, J Crew, the American Dream, the oil industry, hotels, church, department stores, hangout sitcoms, cereal, the car industry, diet staples (whatever those are - less filling than normal staples?), America, the NFL, fashion, Harley Davidson, and wine corks.

I must confess, I buy paper napkins once in a while, if I'm having a party. But I compost them afterwards, which is part of my overall strategy to ruin the garbage disposal industry.

[Morning Glory]

What else is it I ruined? Wall-to-wall carpeting? Paper napkins? Diamonds, definitely diamonds.

Maybe I really am a millennial set on destruction, because I hate carpet, paper napkins, and diamonds. Not to mention chain restaurants, McDonald's, fabric softener, cruises, casinos, J Crew, the American Dream, the oil industry, hotels, church, department stores, hangout sitcoms, cereal, the car industry, diet staples (whatever those are - less filling than normal staples?), America, the NFL, fashion, Harley Davidson, and wine corks.

I must confess, I buy paper napkins once in a while, if I'm having a party. But I compost them afterwards, which is part of my overall strategy to ruin the garbage disposal industry.

Hmm, plumbing problems get blamed on millennials and their "flushable" wipes, but equal blame goes to boomers putting grease down the garbage disposal:

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/09/12/550465000/behold-the-fatberg-london-s-130-ton-rock-solid-sewer-blockage

[Dicey]

Never have I ever been so glad to be a Boomer...

[Sibley]

Never have I ever been so glad to be a Boomer...

Ok Boomer.

(just teasing)

[Morning Glory]

Does anyone still drink milk? I blame my parents for ruining that because they forced us to drink it. Can't stand the stuff now.

[Tigerpine]

Whew...I'm glad us lowly Gen X'ers are free of blame...haha.

You know how they call the generation before the Baby Boomers the "Silent Generation"?  We Gen X'ers are the Invisible Generation.  We're routinely overlooked.

[Sibley]

Does anyone still drink milk? I blame my parents for ruining that because they forced us to drink it. Can't stand the stuff now.

Well, a lot of people become lactose intolerant as they age. But yes, I still drink milk. Daily.

[ender]

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/15/millennials-are-to-blame-for-sky-high-inflation-strategist-says.html

This article is hilarious. I'd be embarrassed to have my name associated with it.

[getsorted]

Whew...I'm glad us lowly Gen X'ers are free of blame...haha.

You know how they call the generation before the Baby Boomers the "Silent Generation"?  We Gen X'ers are the Invisible Generation.  We're routinely overlooked.

I remember when they called you the Slacker Generation! You miss those days?

[bacchi]

Whew...I'm glad us lowly Gen X'ers are free of blame...haha.

You know how they call the generation before the Baby Boomers the "Silent Generation"?  We Gen X'ers are the Invisible Generation.  We're routinely overlooked.

I remember when they called you the Slacker Generation! You miss those days?

I do. I embraced being a slacker and only FIREd to avoid a career.

[calimom]

It's the avocado toast!

[4tify]

Whew...I'm glad us lowly Gen X'ers are free of blame...haha.

You know how they call the generation before the Baby Boomers the "Silent Generation"?  We Gen X'ers are the Invisible Generation.  We're routinely overlooked.

I remember when they called you the Slacker Generation! You miss those days?

I do. I embraced being a slacker and only FIREd to avoid a career.

Bravo. As a fellow Gen-Xer I concur. And I’m happy to be overlooked, esp by the media. Keeps me focused on what matters like traveling to cool places, hiking in the middle of the morning while everyone else is driving to work, and eating good produce.

[jinga nation]

Blaming others is so easy but doesn't solve anything.
A tale as old as time.
Also, sky is blue today.

[Tigerpine]

Whew...I'm glad us lowly Gen X'ers are free of blame...haha.

You know how they call the generation before the Baby Boomers the "Silent Generation"?  We Gen X'ers are the Invisible Generation.  We're routinely overlooked.

I remember when they called you the Slacker Generation! You miss those days?

I do. I embraced being a slacker and only FIREd to avoid a career.

Bravo. As a fellow Gen-Xer I concur. And I’m happy to be overlooked, esp by the media. Keeps me focused on what matters like traveling to cool places, hiking in the middle of the morning while everyone else is driving to work, and eating good produce.

Agreed.  In a way I feel bad for the Boomers and Millenials because they get so much hate for nothing more than being born at a certain time.

Plus being ignored is nice because it makes it easier to focus on the person rather than the label.

[dignam]

Yep, a lot of us graduated college in the great recession (I entered the workforce in late 2008), and needed to put off having a family and/or house.  Definitely our fault for now finally being able to make those purchases.

For reference, my first real job offer was $35k for a full time, salaried software developer position in early 2009, with my bachelor's in computer science.  The excuse for the low ball offer was of course "the economy".  I negotiated up to $40k and took it.

[StarBright]

Yep, a lot of us graduated college in the great recession (I entered the workforce in late 2008), and needed to put off having a family and/or house.  Definitely our fault for now finally being able to make those purchases.

For reference, my first real job offer was $35k for a full time, salaried software developer position in early 2009, with my bachelor's in computer science.  The excuse for the low ball offer was of course "the economy".  I negotiated up to $40k and took it.

I sometimes wonder if folks forget how bad the oldest millennials had it in the work force at the time. My DH started at Lehman Bros in 2007 (LOL sob) and my career path also went up in flames in 2008 (performing arts). I took a full time job that paid 22k a year and was working 50-80 hours a week and was feeling thankful to get it at that point. After five years I had doubled my pay, but we were also hiring new people in at exactly what I was making.

Ugh- I try not to dwell on the hit to my lifetime earnings (and health) that the Great Recession caused.

[nereo]

Note: the article title says that the size of the Millennial generation is to blame. That means it's their parents' fault.

I didn’t ask to be born!

[StarBright]

Yep, a lot of us graduated college in the great recession (I entered the workforce in late 2008), and needed to put off having a family and/or house.  Definitely our fault for now finally being able to make those purchases.

For reference, my first real job offer was $35k for a full time, salaried software developer position in early 2009, with my bachelor's in computer science.  The excuse for the low ball offer was of course "the economy".  I negotiated up to $40k and took it.

I sometimes wonder if folks forget how bad the oldest millennials had it in the work force at the time. My DH started at Lehman Bros in 2007 (LOL sob) and my career path also went up in flames in 2008 (performing arts). I took a full time job that paid 22k a year and was working 50-80 hours a week and was feeling thankful to get it at that point. After five years I had doubled my pay, but we were also hiring new people in at exactly what I was making.

Ugh- I try not to dwell on the hit to my lifetime earnings (and health) that the Great Recession caused.

You should feel bad for the young butt-end boomers and older gen Xers who were born in the early 60s to early 70s were in their 40s and early 50s in 2008 (and who had been thru the last big inflation and unemployment during the 1980s as older teens or younger 20 y.o. college grads). Can you imagine having worked a good job for 20 or 30 years, saved, invested, bought a house, kids at home or in college, etc and then BOOM!! all gone in what seemed like overnight? Lose the job. Lose the investments. Lose the house. No ACA so no medical coverage. No or limited government protections to protect assets. And unable to even land a job flipping burgers at Micky D's for minimum wage or hope of getting back into a more lucrative (or former) career years later because agism? I'm gonna blame the millenials for that too ;-)! And covid too. Definitely covid.

For a second I thought you were my Dad :) And then I saw your winky face.

[ChpBstrd]

To be clear, all this talk about boomer and millennial "generations" is about the bottom ripple on this population pyramid. If anyone thinks that ripple, which has been present for decades, explains some one-or-two year change in a market, I will get away with facepunching that person because they are terrible at understanding causation.

[Warlord1986]

Lol, I saw that article. If you'll forgive my glee, I'm going to tip my head back and cackle like a shrew at my own misfortune. Yes, my money doesn't go far, but at last I'm able to pay the boomer's back for the clusterfuck that was the 2008 recession. Mweeeeeheeeeheeeheeee!

[PDXTabs]

Mostly joking but sadly a lot of those in their mid-30s to late 50s DID lose it all in the 2008 recession and many didn't have the time to recover from those loses. Your DH starred at Leman Bros one year before they (and all their shares) went poof. Imagine the 50-something y.o. who worked there for 30 years and had everything invested there. They would have lost everything.  A lot harder to come back in your 50s then in your 20s. Perhaps I am your Dad ;-). I know I know... OK (butt-end) boomer ;-). The younger boomers get to blame the older boomers for that.

If you work at Leman Brothers after the Enron collapse you know better than to put all of your money into one stock.

But I agree that lots of older people lost it all in real estate around then.

[dignam]

Right, several sectors took major hits in 2008, but if you had all your eggs in one of those baskets (God forbid all in one company's stock...), that's on you.

[Sibley]

Mostly joking but sadly a lot of those in their mid-30s to late 50s DID lose it all in the 2008 recession and many didn't have the time to recover from those loses. Your DH starred at Leman Bros one year before they (and all their shares) went poof. Imagine the 50-something y.o. who worked there for 30 years and had everything invested there. They would have lost everything.  A lot harder to come back in your 50s then in your 20s. Perhaps I am your Dad ;-). I know I know... OK (butt-end) boomer ;-). The younger boomers get to blame the older boomers for that.

If you work at Leman Brothers after the Enron collapse you know better than to put all of your money into one stock.

But I agree that lots of older people lost it all in real estate around then.

I think you underestimate the stupidity of people. I'm sure there were some. And yes, it was totally on them.

[ChpBstrd]

The ridiculousness of this whole debate illustrates an important truth:

People are prone to look for explanations, no matter how tenuous, that involve blaming someone else. It doesn't take a massive brain to comprehend slightly more complex explanations, such as inflation is a factor of money supply, velocity of money, and supply/demand factors. Yet, here we are, trying to decide if Tyler's avocado toast is the reason for the commodities squeeze - and unable to stop thinking about that viral idea even though we know it's ridiculous.

[Sibley]

Mostly joking but sadly a lot of those in their mid-30s to late 50s DID lose it all in the 2008 recession and many didn't have the time to recover from those loses. Your DH starred at Leman Bros one year before they (and all their shares) went poof. Imagine the 50-something y.o. who worked there for 30 years and had everything invested there. They would have lost everything.  A lot harder to come back in your 50s then in your 20s. Perhaps I am your Dad ;-). I know I know... OK (butt-end) boomer ;-). The younger boomers get to blame the older boomers for that.

If you work at Leman Brothers after the Enron collapse you know better than to put all of your money into one stock.

But I agree that lots of older people lost it all in real estate around then.

Leman Bros "too big to fail!". Umm...no.

I did lose 50% of my total net worth then (house and investments but no Leman stocks) and had recently FIREd so I'm bit bit more sympathetic. I think I should blame the millenials for my personal loss too. ;-).

I was in my 2nd year of working. The only reason I knew about Leman Brothers was because I was auditing governmental entities, the cash and investments section, and the client I was at the day Leman went down happened to have $40M in Leman bonds on the books. I heard the treasurer talking about it, went back to my computer, googled it, then talked to the audit manager.

[SotI]

Whew...I'm glad us lowly Gen X'ers are free of blame...haha.

Yeah, we suffered enough in the overcrowded 80s ;-) . But seriously, we were probably the first full generation who consciously decided to procreate less. Actually, can't think of anything that the Millenials have done/xperienced that we didn't do first (from hedonistic lifestyle incl. boom-bust cycles to neolib-progressive activism). So, feel free to blame Gen X instead ...

Although, judging by my same-age peer group, we suffer from far fewer guilt-trips than Millenials (talking European perspective here, may be different in the US).  I only blame Boomers for general naivity even to this day, and for the Millenials: you are like us, just a decade or two younger ...

PS: I still have paper napkins that are 20 years old, still wrapped up - they are so rarely used here ...

[getsorted]

Yep, a lot of us graduated college in the great recession (I entered the workforce in late 2008), and needed to put off having a family and/or house.  Definitely our fault for now finally being able to make those purchases.

For reference, my first real job offer was $35k for a full time, salaried software developer position in early 2009, with my bachelor's in computer science.  The excuse for the low ball offer was of course "the economy".  I negotiated up to $40k and took it.

I sometimes wonder if folks forget how bad the oldest millennials had it in the work force at the time. My DH started at Lehman Bros in 2007 (LOL sob) and my career path also went up in flames in 2008 (performing arts). I took a full time job that paid 22k a year and was working 50-80 hours a week and was feeling thankful to get it at that point. After five years I had doubled my pay, but we were also hiring new people in at exactly what I was making.

Ugh- I try not to dwell on the hit to my lifetime earnings (and health) that the Great Recession caused.

I was working in financial services. Crazy time.

We almost bought a house in 2006. We were fresh out of college and my ex's mom offered to make a down payment (she wanted us to stay close by). But my ex went to grad school in another city, and then another one, and then another one, so we rented instead. I was always so glad we didn't buy a house at the peak! I had friends who did who were upside-down in their mortgages for a decade.

[ChpBstrd]

If you believe the Strauss-Howe generational theory is onto something, then GenX is a "nomad" archetype that attacks the old institutions and norms, and Millenials are of the "hero" archetype that comes of age in a time of crisis and tries to rebuild civic institutions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strauss%E2%80%93Howe_generational_theory

The theory was first publicized in 1991 and seems to have been spot-on so far.

[Abe]

For the record, blame the "____" generation articles are so dumb as to not be worth reading. But on another thread people were discussing the accuracy of journalists (though on a different topic) and thought it'd be worth reading this to see how economics articles can be routinely pilloried but certain other topics are not taken with as much a grain of salt.

From the article:

"To be sure, the Federal Reserve’s printing of an unprecedented amount of money since the pandemic began is a major cause of inflation, economists agree. Smead also did not mention skyrocketing energy prices due to geopolitical events and supply issues, which can’t be blamed on millennials."

So there are a few near-term events that have a plausible causal effect, but it's probably a heterogenous group of people who are approximately the same age but otherwise have little in common? Ok.

[lifeisshort123]

The article is absurd.  I’m not quite sure what the correlation is.  They mention housing, but the bigger issue to me was not the millennials who were buying homes (shifting cost from renting to buying), but the fact that everyone in America who owned their home refinanced their mortgage and gave them considerably more money, at the same time the government gave them money upon money upon money. 

All of a sudden people had money to spend - especially those who not only refinanced but did cash-outs on their homes as well that had appreciated considerably at the time.

My view is that it is going to take years for this all to unwind throughout the system.  And unfortunately it is going to lead to a generation of bigger spenders than ever before.  And not just the millennials. 

[Fomerly known as something]

Old Millennial here. I thought the "Millennials are ruining x" articles had finally ended. But I was wrong. Can we start picking on Gen Z soon please :)

I get so tired of hearing my boomer family members and in-laws parroting this crap.

Nope Gen Z will be forgotten soon like Gen X.  Your kids will be the next boggiemen.

[StarBright]

Old Millennial here. I thought the "Millennials are ruining x" articles had finally ended. But I was wrong. Can we start picking on Gen Z soon please :)

I get so tired of hearing my boomer family members and in-laws parroting this crap.

Nope Gen Z will be forgotten soon like Gen X.  Your kids will be the next boggiemen.

I just looked because I was curious about the Gen Z cohort years. While I am an old millennial (Xennial, Oregon Trail, and Jordan Catalano 4eva) my kids will be a youngest Gen Z and an oldest whatever is after Gen Z. Wild to think of my elementary school aged son being in the same generation as the two newest employees I am training. 

Cusp microgenerations are a weird thing. I know it is all bunk and basically buckets for marketing and corporate labor theory - but I find it interesting anyways.

[TomTX]

Old Millennial here. I thought the "Millennials are ruining x" articles had finally ended. But I was wrong. Can we start picking on Gen Z soon please :)

I get so tired of hearing my boomer family members and in-laws parroting this crap.

Nope Gen Z will be forgotten soon like Gen X.  Your kids will be the next boggiemen.

Nah. Boomers made it too tough to get financially stable enough to have kids, especially multiple kids.

https://money.com/child-care-costs-declining-birth-rate/

[Travis]

https://twitter.com/thattrophywaifu/status/1552066568376532992?

[ChpBstrd]

If everything's so expensive, maybe we should just sell the United States, each get our distribution, and move to somewhere else in the world with a similarly weak healthcare system, weak government, violent culture, weak human rights standards, and massive debt.

Would life in Argentina, South Africa, Egypt, India, Russia, or Mexico really be that much different for us? If all we do is stare at cell phones, does it matter where we do it from?

[lifeisshort123]

I think that life in the United States can be expensive, but it can also be less expensive.  A lot of it is what you make of it.

Some aspects are becoming much more expensive - healthcare the biggest among them - which is an assault on middle income individuals on many fronts - less coverage, higher deductibles, more having to share costs with employers in terms of premiums, more employers limiting or reducing the amount of share for non-employee members of the family unit, a preference to employer-based-healthcare which does not benefit the rising “gig economy workers”. 

A lot of the other decisions come down to choices and decisions that families are making - should I get married, should I not get married, how many kids do I want, etc.  Do I want to live in a place with high property taxes because of the benefits? Or do I prefer to live somewhere with less of a safety net in exchange for less services? Do we want both spouses to work and therefore earn more money but have to pay for childcare? Or should one spouse stay home so that we don’t have to pay for childcare?

Overall I side with the idea that choice is a good thing, but it also must be said that it requires you as the individual to take care of yourself and your family’s decisions a bit more proactively.

[PDXTabs]

If everything's so expensive, maybe we should just sell the United States, each get our distribution, and move to somewhere else in the world with a similarly weak healthcare system, weak government, violent culture, weak human rights standards, and massive debt.

Would life in Argentina, South Africa, Egypt, India, Russia, or Mexico really be that much different for us? If all we do is stare at cell phones, does it matter where we do it from?

Well, the difference between Argentina and the USA is that Argentina is trying to get into the OECD and as far as I can tell the USA is trying to get out of it.

We're just the first developed country that is going to go back to developing out of pure apathy and not some other shock like war. But sign me up, how do I sell my shares? Mexico looks nice to me.

[TomTX]

But seriously why the boomer hate?

Boomers have largely been in control of the USA for decades (corporate, government, etc). (Among other advantages) They had the advantages of cheap college and even minimum wage jobs which could pay for said college - and presided over the destruction of that system which supported regular folks making good with a bit of effort.

While Boomers were in charge we went from a society where a single earner, HS-educated family could own a house and raise several kids to one where dual earner (often college educated) families struggle to pay rent and raise just one kid. Plus all the ecological/climate damage accrued from the approaches largely chosen by Boomers.

The Simpsons (or Married with Children) were supposed to be a parody of lower-income, struggling Americans. Today, even mid-income Americans have a really tough time matching that lifestyle: Single, HS-educated earner in a (very) low-status job, stay-at-home-spouse with 3(2) kids, 2 cars, owning a SFH house with 3-4 bedrooms and money left over for vacations.