The great baby-boomer retirement wave is upon us. According to Census Bureau data, 44% of boomers are at retirement age and millions more are soon to join them. By 2030, the largest generation to enter retirement will all be older than 65.
The general assumption is that boomers will have a comfortable retirement. Coasting on their accumulated wealth from three decades as America’s dominant economic force, boomers will sail off into their golden years to sip on margaritas on cruises and luxuriate in their well-appointed homes. After all, Federal Reserve data shows that while the 56 million Americans over 65 make up just 17% of the population, they hold more than half of America’s wealth — $96.4 trillion.
But there’s a flaw in the narrative of a sunny boomer retirement: A lot of older Americans are not set up for their later years. Yes, many members of the generation are loaded, but many more are not. Like every age cohort, there’s significant wealth inequality among retirees — and it’s gotten worse in the past decade. Despite holding more than half of the nation’s wealth, many boomers don’t have enough money to cover the costs of long-term care, and 43% of 55- to 64-year-olds had no retirement savings at all in 2022. That year, 30% of people over 65 were economically insecure, meaning they made less than $27,180 for a single person. And since younger boomers are less financially prepared for retirement than their older boomer siblings, the problem is bound to get worse.
As boomers continue to age out of the workforce, it’s going to put strain on the healthcare system, government programs, and the economy. That means more young people are going to be financially responsible for their parents, more government spending will be allocated to older folks, and economic growth could slow.
Maybe they’ll fuck themselves over for a change.
You’re telling people who struggled to save for retirement and are facing poverty to fuck themselves because…? The time period they were born in coincides with when a bunch of rich assholes were born? Because you think they all voted for Reagan and Trump? These people were fucked right alongside us, and no, they didn’t all vote for it. You do know that Democrats got elected in the US before millennials could vote, right?
Because every boomer spent a lot of their working years in the biggest golden age of American history and had access to a ton of advantages (unions, pensions, cheap housing, the ability to get a good job without a college degree, etc.) that the generations after them did not have. Sure, there were a minority of exceptions: folks who got screwed by circumstances beyond their control, like becoming disabled or losing their pension due to employer bankruptcy, and obviously actual minority-minorities, who got locked out of most of the benefits because of institutional racism. But for typical white middle-class types, if they couldn’t manage to build up a nest egg despite living their life on a generational easy-mode it’s their own damn fault.
Was born at tail end of baby boom. Never had a single one of those things.
Yikes. That’s a pretty harsh take. Generalising like this is exactly the type of nonsense Republicans spout. Based on the article, these aren’t some insignificant numbers being talked about.
Yeah fuck them.
You’re either ignorant or not arguing in good faith.
Boomers dismantled the safety net, starting with pensions. All through the 1990s, company after company went bankrupt and had a court dismiss their pensions, leaving retirees with nothing.
That is just ONE example of the world they created.
The problem with all of the people replying in this thread who think like you do is you apparently can’t grasp that “boomer” is a generation and not a collective. It’s not a political party or group that you join. It is a label that lands on you based on when you were born. You don’t opt in to being a boomer. And yet you can’t comprehend that what one boomer does has no relation to what another does. You see generational trends and think that, because a majority of boomers voted one way in any particular election they’re all culpable for the consequences of conservative policies regardless of whether any individual actually voted that way.
Boomers were at Woodstock. Boomers were protesting the Vietnam war. Boomers fueled the women’s liberation and civil rights movements. But you think they’re all a bunch of conservatives who deserve to suffer from conservative policies.
A VERY tiny percentage of boomers went to woodstock. A very tiny percentage of boomer protested Vietnam. The majority just went to work and moved on with life. The media has long overrepresented just how engaged in these activities boomers really were and it really is no different than “avocado toast” or whatever nonsense is being spread around today.
Even just taking you at your word, it still means that you believe that “VERY tiny percentage” who did support civil rights and stood up against conservative warmongering deserve to suffer alongside the rest of their generation, because they were born at the wrong time.
The simple end of it is that you’re just an ageist prick who has chosen your boogieman that you’ll pin all of your problems on and can take pleasure in the suffering of.
This is the “you should feel bad for the people in Texas who didn’t vote GOP” argument again. I can feel sad for those few souls while still thinking that Texas is ridiculous and focus my opinion towards the state as a whole being a shithole.
Really, though, it is unclear why you are so passionate on this subject except that perhaps you identify as part of that group and are taking it personally.
Not a boomer, sorry. I’m actually capable of feeling bad for the suffering of people that I don’t identify with.
But you’re right: Texas is a shit hole and yet we can feel bad for those who don’t habitually vote for those who maintain it as a shit hole but have no ability to leave. So maybe you do understand nuance, so understand I was replying to someone telling boomers to “fuck themselves” in response to an article about how countless boomers are facing poverty as they retire. Those who are certainly weren’t benefiting from a rigged system and pulling the ladder up from under them to make sure the rest of us are screwed too. And as I replied in another comment to you, only about half of boomers actually voted for Reagan, who is absolutely the president most responsible for the ultra-capitalist hell hole we’re in today. So maybe extend some more of that empathy to other age groups that you give to geographic locations. Like I said, many of the boomers who will suffer have been screwed just as much as the rest of us, and a hell of a lot of them certainly didn’t vote for it.
Lumping anyone together with the worst members of any arbitrary demographic they belong to, even if it was a (narrow) majority, is how irrational hatred persists.
lol. lmao, even. they’re not done with you yet.
be ready for filial support laws (already on the books in many states) to be enforced with gusto. when the boomers run themselves out of money for real, they’ll be weilding the law as a weapon to pull their care expenses and lifestyle needs right from the paychecks of their children, like child support.
Seriously, fuck them. The whole generation has fucked the world over so much, let’s all let them rot.
Boomers were out protesting against the direction the world was headed in decades before you were born. But because the internet told you they all voted for Reagan and Trump you think it’s okay to treat them all collectively as the cause of all your problems.
I’ve been relatively diplomatic in my replies to this thread so far, trying to get people to realize that there are individuals who fall under the “boomer” label that don’t fit with your mental image of money-grubbing conservatives who bled the planet dry for their own profit, despite the article itself pointing out the poverty many boomers are facing or the history of progressive social progress and protest among the boomer generation. But I’m exhausted, so you can either find the brain power to recognize that these are people, not a collective, or go fuck yourself because you’re an absolute imbecile.
I applaud you fighting back against the hive mind. I have been working on it as well when I have the energy to engage. Thanks for making this point.
Agreed. Blaming boomers for all our ills is the same as blaming all refugees for taking out jobs. Stupid, untrue, but believed by many.
Go to bed boomer.
I’m a millennial but nice try. Y’see, some people don’t need to be a part of a group to feel empathy for them. You’re just an angry person who has chosen your scapegoat to blame everything on and can’t handle anyone poking holes in your reductionist world view.
In fact, you sound an awful lot like a bigoted conservative.
Ok boomer.
Aw, little troll ran out of gas. Go have a nap and your binky and maybe you’ll be less cranky when you wake up from shitting your pants.
Imagine writing that comment while accusing someone else of being a troll.
Imagine thinking you know what the word “troll” means.
Hey you had the chance to let the boomer remover do its thing but some asshat decided we needed vaccines.