Photo by Doctor Tongs via Flickr with CC License | Occupy Wall Street | Liberty Park, New York | 10.10.11
Asking only workman’s wages
I come looking for a job
But I get no offers,
Just a come-on from the whores on Seventh Avenue…
–From Simon and Garfunkel and The Boxer
NPR’s senior business editor, Marilyn Geewax reported over the weekend that the housing slump may permanently reduce net wealth for an entire generation: Generation X. The bad news applies to Gen Y as well.
The following quote is probably the grimmest financial analysis I have heard during the past four years of covering Generation X news. This includes all kinds of stories about the Great Recession beginning in September 2008. This is from Geewax:
“It’s kind of changing the narrative for a lot of peoples’ lives. Many grew up hoping to own their own home. They wanted to see their kids throw a football around in their own backyard, but instead, they may be pushing buttons in an apartment building because they can never own. For a lot of younger people this is more than just a phase in life, this is going to continue all the way through their lives into their old age.”
I keep thinking things are going to turn around, but based on this report, things are actually getting worse not better. Once again, foreclosures are on the rise, and right behind them are a variety of societal ills and spikes in public health issues that will create even more demands on government services.
Did you hear there’s been a 50 percent increase in AIDS cases in Greece, and prostitution has also increased significantly since the unfolding of their near cataclysmic financial disaster?
What’s your opinion about the net worth of Generation X?
@YOGI – I agree, Yogi.
@ROSE – I need to go google that speech. thx for the tip.
I am right with Clinton’s Secretary of Labor who spoke at Berkley last night: We must continue expressing moral outrage at these 1%ers actions/attitudes/soul-less-ness in order to have any hope of salvaging even part of our nation’s moral core!
It seems that our economy is fragile. I’m a big “let the market take care of it” kind of guy but I don’t think that it is the right thing right now. I think we need to be helping people.