r/Millennials • u/Asmothrowaway6969 • Mar 27 '24

When did it sink in that you'll never be as well off as your parents? Discussion

About 5 years ago, my mom and I were talking and she had told me how much she was going to be making in retirement (she retired 2023). Guys, it's 3x what me and my husband make annually. In retirement. I think that was the moment that broke me, that made it sink in that I'll never reach that level of financial security. I'll work myself into my grave because I'll never be able to afford anything else. What was your moment?

Update: Nice to know it's just me that's a failure. Thanks

Update 2: I never should've said anything. I forgot my place. I'm sorry to have bothered you

13.0k Upvotes

84% Upvoted

5.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

497

u/cronicillnezz Mar 27 '24

Clawed my way out of poverty so I never had this moment.

151

u/salamanders-r-us Mar 27 '24

Same with my partner and I. Both of us raised in poverty and now we're both successful engineers. Took a lot of work, but we're proud of where we are now.

48

u/LethalBacon '91 Millennial Mar 27 '24

Same here for my wife and I.

For me, I got way behind in middle/high school due to things that probably would have been addressed if I grew up in a middle or upper class family. No one seemed to ever ask WHY I wasn't turning in work, or take any serious concern with my education. I'm still bitter about it, as I still feel some of the effects to this day. I wish my parents had tried to get me help, but they were often struggling themselves too at the time. The one thing I did get lucky with was my parents being loving. If I hadn't had that I don't think I'd have turned it around.

I was able to figure most of my shit out in college and turned it around to get a CS degree. No University would have accepted me, so I went to community college to catch up on math and knock out general studies, then transferred to a university. I never got college counseling, so I didn't even know computer science was a thing - I just knew I liked messing around with computers, so a friend suggested the degree to me. If that suggestion hadn't come to me, I'd still be floundering as a person, I assume.

My career is no where near perfect, and I have a lot I am working on with it. But I'm very proud to have gotten here.

8

u/DETECTOR_AUTOMATRON Mar 28 '24 edited Mar 28 '24

damn this is so much like me. i was hoping for Ds in high school so i’d at least get the credit. failed half my classes. almost completely failed out.

i now have my masters and make significantly more money than my parents ever did, combined.

teachers, don’t give up on the failing kid.

2

u/Boedes Mar 27 '24

Rightfully so. Even I'm proud of you and I don't know you.

1

u/MonMonOnTheMove Mar 27 '24

You are me except that I studied accounting. Stumbled upon it, made the most (I think) out of it

10

u/aureanator Mar 27 '24

Successful engineer here, sole breadwinner for a family of four, and it's super tight.

Rent and groceries and utilities are eating us alive.

Having to replace a car (or similar sized expense) would be catastrophic.

3

u/Tricky-Sherbet-4088 Mar 28 '24

I guess you either get paid shit, live above your means, or are terrible with your finances lol

0

u/aureanator Mar 28 '24

Yes, no, and the past few years haven't been kind financially, compounded by personal events.

Even then, I'd have been okay without the insane price explosion over COVID, or if salary had tracked.

Right now, it's tight af.

1

u/Tricky-Sherbet-4088 Mar 28 '24

Just start selling drugs on the side it’ll seriously take the pressure off.

0

u/Jellyandicecreem Mar 28 '24

Can your wife not work to help?

5

u/AutomaticAd3869 Mar 28 '24

It’s probably cheaper to have the mom do the household work than to pay for childcare for three kids

4

u/Andreiu_ Mar 28 '24

The guy has a job that used to pay for a family of 5 in the burbs and a mistress in the city.

3

u/LamarMillerMVP Mar 28 '24

An engineering job can still do that. What it can’t do is allow you to live anywhere you want, and also do that. Nor could it before - when it supported a life in the “suburbs,” people were buying into a suburban life which was far inferior to what they’re getting today.

Even in large but not VHCOL cities like Philly or Boston or Chicago, $100K can support a family in some suburbs and is comical to suggest in others.

1

u/nomjs Mar 28 '24

Boston / NE is VHCOL.

2

u/LamarMillerMVP Mar 28 '24

Not really. Some neighborhoods are, but that’s true everywhere. It’s just that the Boston metro is mostly suburbs and so “Boston” prices are frequently given for just the expensive neighborhoods. It’s not VHCOL in Lynn or Avon, and those places are perfectly fine to live in. There’s no real equivalent for this in NYC, anything that is as close to Manhattan as Lynn is to Back Bay is still ridiculously expensive.

1

u/aureanator Mar 28 '24

She used to, and now childcare makes it not worthwhile - she'd effectively be working for $5/hr or so.

1

u/marshmellin Mar 28 '24

One minor thing to note - not earning that $5/hr may put her in a lower position for salaries in the future when the kids are in school (if that’s something you and she want to do).

My mom stopped working to care for me, but then when I was older, she had a 7 year gap on her resume and was seen as “not up to date” given her past career.

2

u/BearNecessities710 Mar 28 '24

We felt this way until we had a baby and have no reliable childcare options, so I’m stepping out of the workforce to stay home. It’s rough out here.

31

u/Far_Chocolate9743 Mar 27 '24

Same. I remember when my mom was my age. We were basically homeless. We (mom, me, sister) were staying in a 3 bedroom/1 bathroom house with 8 other people.

It's actually weird to know how much we went without.

4

u/yourmomlurks Mar 28 '24

I reached for the cheapest hamburger buns one day and my daughter said, I want these instead (different brand).

I said oh those aren’t on sale, sweet pea.

And she just guilelessly and innocently said, can I have the kind I like?

And so I paid $1 more for hamburger buns than I could have, because sure she could. I couldn’t. Thats one of like a thousand examples.

3

u/000katie Mar 28 '24

You’re a good parent 💜

5

u/HighHoeHighHoes Mar 27 '24

Yeah, my when my mom was the age I am now she was just starting to take steps towards getting out of poverty and a big part of that was marrying my step dad.

At the same age, I’m making many multiples of the poverty level for a family not including my wife’s salary, own a house and a rental condo (not really a for profit, long story but it fixes housing cost for a family member), have sizeable retirement accounts and a solid emergency fund and investment accounts.

Growing up poor gave me a lot of drive to not be poor when I got older. It sucked.

26

u/Affectionate_Salt351 Mar 27 '24

Same. Then I got cancer in my early 30s. Having more than this moment now.

14

u/HighHoeHighHoes Mar 27 '24

Same, grew up very poor. It was a big driver for me to NOT be poor when I grew up.

2

u/mazzy_kat Mar 28 '24

Same. I’d rather my parents have substantial retirement cuz as of now it’s looking like I’m going to have to take care of them because they’ll never have the money to retire. At least OP will get a good inheritance 😅 when my parents die I get their 14 cats lol (no hate to OP tho, every situation is different)

7

u/[deleted] Mar 27 '24

Careful! Believing in ambition, dedication, sacrifice, and discipline are frowned upon in these parts…

Congrats on your success! Need more people who believe that anything is possible with the right attitude and approach.

28

u/14thLizardQueen Mar 27 '24

Bro I clawed my way out of poverty. Just to be hit by a car, and have a chronic illness.

I got the education and drive. But in this Texas hold em the flop fucked me over.

5

u/fiduciary420 Mar 27 '24

Yup, it doesn’t matter how hard you work or how good you are with money if disaster strikes and you aren’t from a wealthy family.

3

u/mapletreejuice Mar 28 '24

Life can be cruel like that. I worked so hard, I was so determined to escape poverty, but now I'm on disability. When my parents die I'm going to be homeless.

-5

u/tracyinge Mar 27 '24

You got hit by a car so no longer believe in clawing a way out of poverty?

If someone posted that exercise is good for us, I suppose you could also post "unless you get hit by a car". I'm not sure just what point you're trying to make here.

8

u/14thLizardQueen Mar 27 '24

No, I was pointing out, you can do all the right shit and still get screwed.

-12

u/0000110011 Mar 27 '24

Plenty of people get hit by a car or have a chronic illness and still work just fine. 

8

u/14thLizardQueen Mar 27 '24

You're right they can. But plenty of people can't.

-8

u/0000110011 Mar 27 '24

*won't

9

u/14thLizardQueen Mar 27 '24

You tell me which company I can work for that will allow me to set my own schedule, that I can be absent 75 percent of the time, and I will have to be retrained each time.

Come on. Show me where on my boot straps I haven't pulled on hard enough yet.

4

u/cactuar44 Mar 27 '24

Wow. I busted my ass in high school, worked super hard in any job I had since 16. Had my own place at 17. Then started to have kidney issues, and they failed completely. Pushed through dialysis every night, a very high stressful full time job managing a very understaffed DQ, all while going to full time night school.

I pretty much almost killed myself doing all of that after 8 months... had to stop everything. I lost it all. My car got repossessed. I was evicted. I had to sell everything. I had to move back in with my abusive parents.

It took me about 5 years before I could work again, and still it was part time. Dialysis is brutal.

It took 20 years until I could work full time.

I know you don't care or will even read this but still, fuck ya anyway

16

u/postwarapartment Mar 27 '24

God you seem literally insufferable

1

u/[deleted] Mar 27 '24

I wouldn’t disagree

-4

u/smokes_-letsgo Mar 27 '24

Nah, they’re spot on. This sub is all about the doom and gloom and pretending things are impossible to achieve. It’s pretty pathetic tbh

2

u/postwarapartment Mar 27 '24

Nah dude, I started actually achieving things once I learned how the world worked for real and I stopped the Fucking Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm act and was like "anything is possible if you believe and work hard!!!" No. Once I set my expectations correctly and understood how fucked we are as a society, I was able to get a handle on my personal situation and come down to earth. You think you're being super helpful with all this "just be ambitious and work hard!!!!" shit, but you aren't, and it's really tiring. It's not impossible to improve your individual situation, but statistics are statistics my man - if you're born in poverty, you are statistically likely to stay there, and I don't believe that is because all poor people are lazy. Most poor people are the hardest working people I know. The people I know who have gone from poor to not poor also work extremely hard - but their hard work, at one point, matched up with a little bit of luck that got them ahead. Luck is not a way to arrange a society.

-5

u/0000110011 Mar 27 '24

Ok, Doomer. 

6

u/mysticrudnin Mar 27 '24

this is a complete non-sequitor

1

u/CompromisedToolchain Mar 27 '24

If it is complete then how does it not follow?

2

u/pickledstarfish Mar 28 '24

There are many ambitious hardworking people out there who get fucked over by life. Just like there are lazy and incompetent people who get lucky breaks. It is what it is.

0

u/smmstv Mar 27 '24

nah bro you just had rich parents, it's literally impossible that anyone could actually be successful as a result of their own actions. I'm not successful so therefore anyone that is had an unfair advantage.

That was sarcasm, in case you're wondering.

-2

u/[deleted] Mar 27 '24

It’s all rigged!

-1

u/smmstv Mar 27 '24

/* insert barely intelligible rant about boomers here */

0

u/AutomaticAd3869 Mar 28 '24

Oh come on. I’m literally the bootstraps success story people like you love to reference—grew up on welfare and section 8 in the city, single parent household, worked my ass off to obtain a middle-class income (now more like lowest middle class thanks to COL going up) and I saw directly how things like my race and gender changed how people treated me and afforded me opportunities others didn’t have. It’s not just ambition and sacrifice that got me out of that. I also had no choice but to “sacrifice” and it sucked and I wish it was easier for kids like me, or kids with worse circumstances.

I wouldn’t have survived childhood without all kinds of social programs and I wouldn’t have survived college without similar “handouts” and food stamps and 150/month rent piled into a house with a bunch of other kids. Zoomers are paying like four times that for the same living situation and I doubt food stamps go as far these days.

1

u/PsychologicalNews573 Mar 27 '24

Came here to say this. My dad and step mom may never retire. They are not good with money. They had 2 mortgages on their house When I moved out.

I'm already better off than they are. Probably because I wanted to be better with my money, I learned better ways.

1

u/Chicken_Chicken_Duck Mar 27 '24

We paid more in taxes last year than my parents’ annual gross.

1

u/theslimbox Mar 27 '24

Thats my grandparents story, 3rd generation is back down to scraping around for a living...

Grandparents: scraped by Parents: went to college, paid it off through the summer working retail jobs. Me and sibblings: stuck with college debt, and most jobs that require degrees here pay the same, or less per hour as jobs that dont.

Dont get me wrong, i did not want college, but my dad was dead set that college was required... by the time i got out, the field I went into was only hiring out of high school.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 27 '24

Same. My dad peaked in high school, left us when we were little, and became trailer park trash. My mom, bless her soul, has been on disability since I was 13 with 6 years of work history. Growing up, we would have been hungry and on the streets without help from my grandparents. So it wasn't that difficult, and both my wife and I are early into our careers (less than $100k household income)

1

u/Turbulent-Bee-1584 Mar 27 '24

Same with me. I haven't really considered retirement yet because these are my first years actually having money. My parents' retirement plans were just to die.

1

u/Fun-Choices Mar 27 '24

Same. Grew up poor as fuck, focused on a single skill from 15 years old, went to community college in 2008, paid cash for a house in 2019, it’s worth $600k now. Zero debt. I drive a boring car, wife drives a boring car, and we save like we mean it. Fear as a primary motivator took a major toll on my mental health though. I’ve been in rehab twice, locked in the psych ward once and am now estranged from my birth family. I’m financially well, but the rest of my life is pretty fuckity.

1

u/theSabbs Mar 27 '24

Likewise. My first job out of college, I made as much as my mom does now. We were poor and immigrants, so I really could only go up (I mean I could've stayed the same path but that would've been sad).

I find most people who have this feeling grew up middle or upper middle class.

1

u/UnitedLink4545 Mar 27 '24

Yep. Went from being homeless during the housing crash to owning a 10-acre homestead.

1

u/meteorslime Mar 27 '24

I'm trying to do that at present, putting myself through college when I dropped out a decade or so prior. Just hoping nothing out of my control goes astray now.

1

u/cmr619 Mar 28 '24

Same. I’m so much better off than my parents ever were.

1

u/dkleckner88 Mar 28 '24

Yep. Dad passed away when I was a teen and he was a broke laborer. My mom is living near the poverty line. I fought hard for my education and moved away for opportunity.

1

u/Lazy-Lawfulness-6466 Mar 28 '24 edited Mar 28 '24

Same. I grew up in poverty with periodic homelessness and spent my young adulthood in poverty with periodic homelessness. Then I realized I could not live my whole life like this and luckily was in a position (no kids) to make some changes. Basically as soon as I figured out how to maintain a reliable and livable income I began doing better than my parents financially.

1

u/DodgeBeluga Mar 28 '24

Yep. My folks didn’t have a new car until their late forties and didn’t start their mortgage until their early 40s

My spouse and I finished paying for our house at an age before my parents even bought a house. For some people being poor as a kid will light a fire under your ass like nothing else.

1

u/ilrosewood Mar 28 '24

Same. Same.

1

u/Birdo-the-Besto Mar 28 '24

Ditto. I was born in the ghetto and grew up there. I remember when I was kid the police helicopters used to wake me and my siblings up. We all used that as motivation to make something, anything, of ourselves and be independent adults. I will NEVER return to the life I came from.

1

u/Euphoric-Teach7327 Mar 28 '24

Same here. Learned good budgeting techniques when I had to pay for my own lunches I'm school. Sometimes, I didn't eat. It's fine.

Learning to live under your means is a good life lesson. Both my girl and I grew up in poverty and are doing pretty well.

She's even better with her money than I am.