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Boomers have socialism. Why not Millennials?
The simple fact is that young people live and work in a very different economy from their parents. And one good way to see this is to walk, beat by beat, down the road to adulthood.
Start with college. Millennials are the most educated generation in U.S. history to date. They “did what they were told,” as Sanders once said. “They got an education and worked hard. But instead of being rewarded, Millennials are now being punished with crushing student debt.” ...Next, there’s the labor force. While the unemployment rate is low, wage growth has fallen behind its historical trend line, putting the American dream at risk. ...Finally, and perhaps most important, there’s housing. Even dutiful penny-pinchers who make their own morning coffee and avoid avocado toast may still find homeownership out of reach. Young people in their late 20s and early 30s today are about one-third less likely to own a house than their parents were at the same age, according to the Federal Reserve. The homeownership rate among young black Americans has fallen below 30 percent, its lowest rate in 60 years.
This gap is crucial, because houses account for almost all wealth for the bottom 50 percent of Americans. Without a home, Millennials are cut off from their most important source of wealth building. The Federal Reserve summed up their plight in seven words: “lower earnings, fewer assets, and less wealth.”
For young Americans, there is a mounting sense that whatever the ladder to adulthood is—or whatever traditional or normative markers of financial independence have been historically associated with adulthood—it’s been shattered by modern American capitalism. This is why Sanders appeals to young voters when he says, “If we don’t fundamentally transform our economy, we are facing—for the first time in the history of this country—the possibility that our young people will suffer a worse future than their parents had.” Whatever you make of their argument, it’s rich hypocrisy for beneficiaries of Social Security, Medicare, and housing subsidies to argue that a little socialism cannot help the U.S., when it has so obviously helped Boomers become the most financially secure generation in history.
How Capitalism Broke Young Adulthood - The Atlantic
While I doubt enough Americans are forward looking enough to respond positively to dragging our country into the 21st century after electing a president who want to take us back to the 1800s, it is our best hope for the future of this country.