Holy *. The amount of complainypants in this thread is ridiculous. Yes, Border's two people making 50k each out of college is maybe not the NORM, but it's certainly not an extreme outlier.
As far as the actual topic from the OP, the idea of "wealth" being halved in a decade, let's stop talking anecdotes, and move to hard data. The OP was hard data: "Those born in the early 1980s have an average wealth of £27,000 each, against the £53,000 those born in the 1970s had by the same age"
Alright, cool.
Now let's use some data to explain why. Is it lower income? Is it higher unemployment? Is it lower home ownership rate?
The explanation put forth by nereo makes some sense to me.
There's a lot of data to back this up too: single-family homes are larger today than in the 1980s. The percentage of people who take overseas vacations has gone way up. The amount spent on restaurants is much higher today.
The bottom line is that real-median income of people in their 30s is slightly higher today compared to where it was in the 1980s. The money is simply being spent and not saved. Not surprisingl given the personal savings rate went from 9-10% in the 80s to around 4% today (and current 30-somethings saving at/around 0% of their income).
If the median income of people in their 30s is HIGHER in real dollars, yet they have less net worth to show for it (while at the same time overseas vacations are up, restaurant spending is up, etc.) since the 80s (let alone a decade ago), this doesn't seem to be a fault of the economy, but a matter of fact based on the choices people are making. Savings rates are down from 8-10% to 3-5% or so, and compounded over a decade, that's real value in net worth. That savings rate (when wages are the same or higher in real terms) is a choice, as it's done with discretionary income.
No, I'm not hating on Millennials; had any other generation been in the same position, I think they'd have acted the same way. Millenials get more consumeristic messages. Remember the concept of "keeping up with the Jonses?" We have that today, fiercer than ever. A decade ago, Facebook was barely launched. Instagram didn't exist. Etc.
Now they see peers taking pictures of food from fancy restaurants, of their fancy vacations, etc. and posting these to social media, and there's enormous pressure to keep up. It's not due to a character flaw with Millennials, but rather due to the circumstances.
I think those circumstances, though, are marketing and social media based. Not economy based. With real wages being HIGHER, I think the higher spending (and corresponding lower net worth) is a choice (though somewhat of a forced one--they may not know any other option, like MMM presents).
I think, despite real wages being the same or slightly higher over the last few decades, net worth, and savings rate, has continued to decline. That's not a problem with Millennials; same thing happened to Gen X. It's a problem with our consumer society.
That's what it seems like to me, based on the data, rather than anecdotes. Anyone want to put out an alternate theory, based on data as well?