Are you financially better off than your parents were at your age?
 

Simple question, multifaceted answer. Do you think you're better off, worse off, or about the same as your parents were when they were your current age?


Poll coming, and I promise not to tell your parents.

Yes. Thanks to them.

Way better.


They are both excellent parents, but I learned everything about making money and business on my own and through advice from successful people.

My parents had a kid at my age. I'd say I'm doing better.

My parents were long divorced by the time they were my age, so I'd have to say yeah, I'm far better off.

I'm curious because I hear statistics that younger people tend to be behind due to job changes, school debt, and the recession. But I think that Boomers tend to be ahead. It'll be interesting to see if that turns out to be true around here.

I think check boxes would have been better, so you could answer for each age group.... but yeah, my parents both work in areas that are more rewarding than profitable.

Way worse.

Difference in generations. They didn't make what we now, but scrimped and saved. Now we have 401k. With retirement from the service my parents live better in retirement than they did when dad worked. Am I better off? Probably.

So far everybody's parents sucked !

Edit: except for prison bitch . Imagine that!

Younger people are just going to be, generally and for now. I earned a couple of degrees (thanks mom and dad) but my enrichment came with age, experience and continued education. Job change should increase pay, IMO.

Also, finally figuring out what I really want to do, and am skilled at, came after college.

**** NO, but I'm working on it.

I'm sorry, I said "work". I realize that is hate speech to some here.

Because of their wisdom and financial assistance during college and the 2 years following, I am 29 and am now making more than they ever made, combined.

I owe everything to them.

But, everything costed a nickel.

I'm making significantly more than they ever made in their lives. My brother is, too. Not that we grew up poor but he and I have both just been extremely successful financially over the past few years.

Not counting student loans I'm worlds ahead

I am ahead of my parents at my age. Neither of us had kids at my age but I'm doing better financially. My wife and I combined already make more money together than my parents ever did in a year combined. I however did not grow up poor either. That being said, my parents were frugal and retired at 55 having not made a ton of money in their careers. They are the epitome of money smart.

The big difference in my situation is that my wife has a career with a comparable salary to my own. While my mom worked once I got into school, she worked as an administrative assistant that paid considerably less.

I'm much, much worse off. I have not owned a car since April (totaled in an accident), I have no savings and I don't expect to ever get out of debt as I don't believe there's any way I will ever make more than 25-30 grand in any given year, if I can even earn that much. Decades of bad life choices combined with no social or networking skills and zero marketable work skills just don't paint a very pretty picture of the future. I'm lucky to have a job that pays ten an hour at this point.

Thanks, Obama.

My Dad never had a lot of money very humble life as a rural mail carrier, tv repair man, electrician, firefighter, football gang chain & Scout Master in a small Ks town community. He built his own home and the only debt he had was from mom having cancer. Maybe some of you remember I was adopted by my Grandparents.

My life, I've made my mistakes and still paying for them but have turned things around and am on track to be ok but it's taking time & a hell of a lot of hours at work that is sometimes more than I bargain for.

My problem is impulse & wanting to do more than I have money for.

We all made our mistakes. Props for turning it back in the right direction.

Your dad is a man, man.

No.

Yes he was and I miss him very much, my home town misses him too & that says a lot about the man.

Thank you eDave

That sucks. Hang in there! You never know when things can turn around for you.

Justin Houston sure as **** is.

My mom worked at IBM for 32 years.

Not even close.

He should vote.

Holy shit. Hopefully she leaves you some of those stock options.

I did find that after all the kids left the house, my parents did have some lettuce. We give them shit about that all the time. We lived VERY conservative. I'm better for it.

Im doing a little better, but I work a hell of a lot more, at a higher paying profession, and im definitely not doing better than my grandparents where at this age.

That's interesting

I suspect that global situations are as large or larger than our own abilities. I'm better off than my parents were at my age, but they got caught in a societal vice. They grew up in a rural area and never really had the opportunity to go to college, and then got caught by the move from a blue collar economy to a services economy. They started out strong in the old economy, but then got left behind when the economy changed.

I, on the other hand, grew up in a perfect window of time to have access to a college degree, and to have access to an inexpensive college degree. While I will give myself some credit for career planning and financial planning, I was born into a great window of time in society compared to my parents' time at the same ages.

Grandpa and grandma where both prison guards, both where former military, marine, and seamstress, had an extremely large and nice house (which he built) and a nice chunk of land out by Eldon, and had no debt etc. They even pulled this off with a gaggle of kids running around.

my fathers $1 was worth way more than my $1

Id say about equal.

Endorsed. My dad had very stable work, low risk. I do better and Y2K, and daddy funded college, catapulted me but it ain't stable for darn sure. Not many of us have stable employment anymore.

I suspect the next generation will be less fortunate. That's why Sanders is their guy right now. They are rabid over him.

We were poor. It was a low economic bar to jump over.

I'm kicking my parent's ass

My parents divorced when I was young, my pops was never there for any of us. Mom raised 4 kids on her own so we didn't have much of anything growing up. So I am definitely way ahead of where I came from.

probably about the same

I said about the same. We are probably better off but it sure doesn't feel like we are.

Way way ahead.

A good amount worse, though I was heading for about the same, the person I chose to marry did not help at all. I should have handled it better but I ruined myself financially trying to save the marriage where I should have 'Curly Billed' her years before I actually did. Though it was 'for the kid' if not for that I probably would have. Now I am single income in a double income world and have child support on top of that. Some of it is on me, due to my actions at a previous job that got me on the lay off list in a bad economy, it was hard to catch up much less get ahead. Spent three years in career hell, but am finally coming back from that. Also making the good financial choices I was making before the disastrous marriage, actually probably even better. I have worked hard and done well at my current job, one career step away from making things much better and knocking on the door of the 'about the same' category again.

Depends on the measurement.

My parents got started in careers faster than my wife and I did, so maybe were a bit better off at my current age. But they also had two kids were my wife and I don't have any yet.

I don't know if I'd qualify it as better or worse, but their generation certainly could start quicker than my generation seems to be doing. We'll eventually out earn them probably because my wife will earn more than my mom.

Looking long term, father knew he would retire at 55 when he was 31 (and he did) I know that I'll eventually retire. Point goes to father.

I do really well, but the problem in this context anyway, is that unless I had become a pro athlete or actor there was no way I was going to catch my dad financially at this age. He was a business wizard. I make more than he does now, but not by much and he's almost 70 and works like a couple days a week.

At my age my dad was supporting a family of 4 plus a dog, but he also lived in the UK, so taxes were higher. He also worked in manual labor on an offshore oil rig. I have a desk job.

I'm going to guess, accounting for inflation and currency values, he made 10-15% more than I make right now, but I have a much nicer TV, live in a nicer city and don't have to buy diapers, so while he probably comes out ahead in gross income, I'm surely winning in disposable income.

Long term he will surely win though. I don't think I can compete with a 40-year career in the oil services industry. That's mad bank.

At this age my mother was a single mom w/ no support from my dead beat dad

I'm doing better

I'm light years ahead. My parents were handicapped and worked blue collar jobs while I had the benefit of college and a post-graduate education.

I said I was better off, but I'm not sure now that I think about it. I make a lot more than my dad did, but my wife makes a lot less than my mom did. We're probably about the same, but my parents really started to earn a lot when they reached my age or a little older. I don't think I will ever earn as much at my peak as they did at theirs.

Son of 2 rural district school teachers. So, yes.

This.

The long and short of it: I'm financially well ahead of where my Parents were in life, but I'm still trying to measure up to them as human beings. I hope to get there one day.

Yes, peak earning years, and whether or not there are any post-retirement benefits (read: pension) can make a huge difference. You can be 35 and making much better bank than your parents did, even adjusted for inflation, but if you parents were in job with a high degree of job security, and with steady raises, their peak earning years might have been pretty late in life. IIRC, studies have recently found thta peak earning years are happening earlier -- usually people do the best when they are in their 40s or so.

And if your parents spent 30 years somewhere and had a nice pension, well, that's the gift that keeps giving.

My father was a farmer who acquired loans in the 80's. I'm way better off than he was then although after he's doing well now.

better
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a tricky question.

Far better off in terms of salary, but due to them having pensions vs. our 401k I still am uneasy about retirement.

Also, college. My parents were able to pay for my college as I got Stafford loans and some scholarships. Due to our higher income, I don't think my kids will have this, and given tuition cost increases, I don't see how we'll be able to do that same for our kids.

The pension thing actually works in our favor, believe it or not. I've got a couple of defined benefit plans, and my wife is a teacher, so she can retire in her early 50s if she wants to. She doesn't make much (mid $50Ks), but the benefits are great. That makes it harder to calculate the 'better off' part.

That said, I wouldn't be shocked if someone told me that I've pretty much peaked in terms of my earning potential. I've decided that I'm unwilling to take on more work/stress/etc. for more money unless the money is dramatially higher. Right now, my job is cake. I work about 30 hours a week, I come and go as I please, I've got less than a 20 minute commute, and I can wear jeans, a polo, and tennis shoes most of the time. By the end of the month, I'll pretty much be working from home, so its a pretty good gig.

I don't make a ton of money, but I certainly don't struggle. Short of doubling my pay, I feel like I'd be making a mistake if I gave all of that up for more money. Still, it feels strange to be in my mid 30s and feeling like I'm done trying to move up the chain.

So if we're a typical group of people and we're all self-aware and responding to the poll without bias, all of the hype about younger people falling behind their parents is untrue.

Let's see, when my dad was my age he was about two years removed from a car crash that left him a paraplegic and killed my mother's 18 month old son and twins that she was nine months pregnant with. So he had no income and and constant barrage of medical expenses and legal expenses(the crash was his fault and he was intoxicated) and I believe my mother was trying to take care of him and cover expenses working at a glass factory or something. They both lived with my grandmother. No vehicle.

I'm currently 3 months removed from two years of incarceration, I have a slightly above minimum-wage paying job, own a vehicle and live in a rented house in "the hood" with one roommate splitting expenses. My only debt would be a small amount of student loans and a moderate amount of mental health expenses.

Not sure who's on top at age 26. I'd say we both suck.

Mid 50's is a lot in my area. Where do you live?

Just keep moving forward and not backward, and you will be fine. Time and patience.

I would say probably about the same. My dad owned his own business at my age, and my mom was a Registered Nurse with a BSN. I work for my dad, and my wife is 23 as a registered nurse with a BSN. I think money wise we maybe a bit better, because we are just now expecting our first. We bought a house, my school loans (I have a BBA) are paid in full, we owe 8k on hers, and she has a newer car 2014. Outside of the house, car and 1 student loan, we have no debt.

My parents got divorced when my dad was around my current age. Before that, even with a 2 income family we weren't doing real well. After that, we were really poor for awhile living with my mom and my dad doing some but not nearly enough in child support.

I feel my kids have it made. We are not rich or even high middle class by any means, but we are doing alright. They have a lot of advantages that I didn't. Both of my boys (19 & 22) seem to be doing okay in their young, independent, financial lives. They both are hard workers and that makes me proud as a parent. My daughter is only 13 so we will see how that goes.

Johnson County, KS I'm sure.

I'm doing well but my mom and step dad were both doing 6 figures in their early 30s (20 years ago that meant something). They may not have quite been there at 33, but I'm pretty sure by 35-36 my mom had started her new job and my step dad had gotten into the mortgage industry at the height of the re-finance craze (so he was doing 250-350K/yr for about 4-5 yrs there).

They bought their house right before the housing market exploded upward in the late 90s so they got a 4K square foot house in an upscale neighborhood in the northland for about $175K and because of those years my step dad had, they had it paid off in about 8 yrs. It's doubled in value and they've not had a mortgage payment in 10+ years.

I'm doing pretty damn well, but ultimately they just timed pretty much everything almost exactly right. My mom retired at 45, went back to school and took something of a 'hobby' job to pass the time in a field she loves. My step dad is in software now and still makes good money. They had the house paid off young, got both kids out of the house by 45 and bought a friggen 56 ft Carver because they didn't have any monthly payments on anything and no kids in the house.

Despite my best efforts they will probably kick my ass financially all the way to the end. The downshot was that they struggled quite a bit for my early years as a young family with 2 kids (and a mid-stream divorce didn't help), but right around the time I went off to school, things pretty well shot out of a cannon for them financially.

Southern Johnson County Kansas. It's nice for a second income, but she'll never make what I do, and she won't ever come close to earning what my mom did at her peak (neither will I, for that matter).

Then again, she makes double what her mom made while raising 4 kids without the help of her deadbeat dad, so it's all relative. The studies I've seen indicate that you need roughly 75k a year to reach optimum happiness. After that, you pretty much have to double your income in order to have it make a significant impact. I think that seems awfully low, but I have certainly reached the point of diminishing returns. An extra $50k a year wouldn't change my day to day life any. I might stay at nicer hotels when I take vacations, and I would certainly retire a little earlier, but it wouldn't have near the impact on my life today that $10k would have had ten or fifteen years ago.

Yeah, at this point. Dad's financial stability hadn't kicked in yet when they were my age. The wife and I are both doing pretty well.

However, when you have some of the bills we have it makes it tougher.

When I'm at his age now? I won't be close to where they are. He made some pretty wise decisions in the communication field so they're pretty well of.

Yet they couldn't football the bill for dental school. Bastards

Yeah, we've hit that point as well. Spoiled first world problems for sure, but my wife just wrapped up her masters and doubled her income. My firm is doing nicely as well - all told we got about a $50K income boost over where we were 2 years ago....no change in lifestyle to speak of. Now we've been able to throw a fair amount of money into savings and we're considering a fairly substantial upgrade in homes, but even that makes me wonder if it's worth the trouble. Do I really need to spend another $250K to add an extra garage and have an open floor plan? I friggen love my 2.75% 15 yr note - do I really feel like swapping that out for 30 yrs at 4.25%? And suddenly my monthly nut would nearly triple and I'd be a lot less free in what I can do. Is that worth the headache? I have a pretty nice home with a good yard in a fine neighborhood...what am I really gaining?

Then again...I can't take it with me either. Like you said, there's a middle ground there where you have a lot more freely spendable money...but not quite enough to make a 'leap' without it really hurting so you don't really want to do it.

It's the snootiest of snooty bullshit. It's just an odd spot to find yourself in. You work hard for promotions, raises, etc... but like you said, once you hit a point, the money doesn't actually make any difference in your lifestyle.

Well to be fair, if compared to my wife's parents we are behind. It's also hard to compare the different eras. For instance, we currently have 7 TVs in our house, and we only had 1 color and 1 small black & white growing up. But that stuff is cheaper now and they last longer so it's not that unusual to have one in the garage or on the back porch, it was unheard of back then.

The retirement thing that some have mentioned is a good point as well, I do believe the baby boomers are going to enjoy far better retirements than any of the subsequent generations. Just because we may be doing equal or slightly better at this point in time, it doesn't mean we are better off overall.

Wow, that would be crazy to be able to say that. An extra 50k a year and I would feel like Warren Buffet.

Probably a pretty skewed sample for a question like this. People who are on here are more likely to be white-collar workers who are at jobs where they can surf the internet. People who have low incomes are 1) more likely in labor jobs where they can't be online during the day in the first place and 2) less likely to have time to be on the internet in general if they're far enough down the socioeconomic ladder that they're working multiple jobs (or can't afford internet at home).

What the **** do you have seven TVs for?

Whenever the wife and I think about buying something expensive these days, I literally say out loud to her, "If we don't spend that $1,000 we can retire a week earlier." That's what I'm all about right now.

both my parents were dirt ****ing poor, mom still is, dad has done better financially lately but he still lives in the house he paid 10K for in 1989. so there is a reason.


financially i kick their asses, everyone else in my family's too.


just think they all told me i was a ****ing idiot to want to work on cars,in their minds i should have just taken that warehouse order puller position my pops had a set up after high school...

a wise old man once told me that if you do any real estate loan for more than 15 years you are a mother ****ing idiot

Learned a trade, lost my job in 2009, union shop went out of business the same time, couldn't compete with those guys for a new job, went back to college and I'm still going and broke as ****. Not sure how my parents were doing at my age but I'm going to say they were better off.

My dad was a highly successful dentist. I'm a teacher, and my wife quite her job and started her own business 3 years ago.

You do the math.

To watch TV on?

About the same.
My dad and mom had just gotten divorced. My dad was working for GSA making good money, but my mom had ruined his credit, so it was a few years of living lean when he and my step mom got together.
I'm settled in a good job, bit not really high pay. Same with my wife. We will do ok, but probably never make what my dad did, without major career changes, which neither of us want.

Many times I wish I had went that route. If you are good at it and can fix complicated issues, pretty good income and job security there.

OMG Justin Houston posts here