<p>“One piece of advice I’ve heard from older adults which I regret not taking was not traveling more during my early-mid-'20s.” – </p>
<p>Well, that would have been nice, but after graduating from an Ivy I put myself through at 26, I then had student loans to deal with. Travel in your early - mid 20s is for the children of the well-off. I completely agree it is the ideal time to do it–good health, willing & able to sleep on a rock, etc—but it is still unaffordable for most.</p>
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<p>Traveling in one’s early-mid 20’s isn’t just for children of the well-off. </p>
<p>My immediate family was far from that considering I received a near full-ride FA/scholarship package which enabled me to graduate with a 3 figured loan which I paid off within 6 months of graduation towards the end of the '90s. </p>
<p>My income and saving habits were such that finances wasn’t something I could use as an excuse after a year on the job. </p>
<p>Moreover, if one is willing to live real cheap, resourceful on their feet, and not expect to live an upper-middle/middle class lifestyle while traveling, traveling on the extreme cheap is quite doable. I’ve done a bit of it myself and some friends and colleagues have exceeded me in this regard. </p>
<p>Heck, some were so resourceful they’ve actually made a slight profit by doing some work/busking while on the trip.</p>
<p>Yes, cobrat, but MOST people aren’t lucky enough to graduate with a “3-figure loan”. </p>
<p>College and the economy changed since you graduated.</p>
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<p>Whoa romanigypsyeyes,</p>
<p>No need to snap at me. </p>
<p>Especially considering I was responding to someone who is recounting her college years from an era earlier than mine.</p>
<p>I was of the “I must make As” type (tail end of the Baby Boomers). I think it’s often a personality thing.</p>
<p>D2 would normally be fine with Bs; however, getting accepted to her desired major has become very competitive, so by necessity she is agonizing over making a B.</p>
<p>I know a lot of kids, who after the graduate, decide to travel for a year or so (not on their parent’s dime, either.) My niece and her now husband, took off to Europe for a year after they graduated and traveled around, working in fields picking, to earn money to move on. Then they came home, got jobs, got better jobs, got married and are having a baby. </p>
<p>One of my friend’s D is in Australia now. She was only going to stay a year but she’s staying for at least another. She is a picker, too. </p>
<p>Some do a more world tour, traveling all over.I have several friends whose kids have done that - they all get jobs for a few months in whatever country they land in, and then move on to wherever strikes their fancy. When they come back they either get jobs or go to grad school. </p>
<p>However, I think the big common denominator is that none of the kids I know had to take loans out to go to college - so they don’t have debt that needs to be paid back.</p>
<p>Yeah, of course the whole “gotta get an A” mantra is totally dependent on the person, too. I think the author of the article I read was generalizing that concept based on the more recent push and significance of standardized testing amongst high school students, thus more of a “is this on the test?!” phenomenon. </p>
<p>I think she based her opinion on the works of Neil Howe and William Strauss, who wrote a book about every upcoming generation. I (nerdily) bought the millennial version after my professor mentioned it in class, and it’s very interesting. It basically depicts Gen Xers as a bunch of slackers who failed to live up to society’s expectations and paints the millennials as the new rising hero generation. According to them, there’s a 4 cycle pattern of generations, each serving a purpose with the oldest one switching out with a newer one. The hero generation “arrives just after an era of society wide upheaval in values and culture” and “fills a void left by the passing of an elder generation known for civic purpose and teamwork.” </p>
<p>Apparently millennials are America’s next great generation like the Glorious generation of 1648-1673, the Republic generation of 1742-1766, the Progressive generation of 1843-1859, and the GI generation of 1901-1924. </p>
<p>It all seems very historical and sensible, but only time will tell, I suppose. :)</p>
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<p>Increasing competition for desired colleges, jobs, and professional schools probably has something to do with changing attitudes toward grades. Grade inflation over the years also has an effect – when the average GPA was 2.5-2.6, graduating with a 2.8 GPA was above average. But now a 2.8 GPA can make it harder to get a job at graduation when many employers use a GPA cut-off like 3.0 as an initial pre-screen of applicants.</p>
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<p>They may have to be, as the previous generations keep kicking the can down the road with respect to such long term issues as Social Security and Medicare entitlement growth devouring more and more of the government budget.</p>
<p>dstark - yes my daughter likes what she is doing (which is bizarrely in her field, although she didn’t realize that she had one…). But I think also, it feels as though it’s what she should be doing. </p>
<p>She’s already compromised, and realized there is no way she can live on her own in our city (SF) and so she is living at home, and looking for places in the East Bay with roommates, which is still unaffordable. There are semi-affordable suburbs about an hour or so out, but honestly, at 23, as a life-long city kid with an active social life and many friends in and around the city, this is not something she would consider.</p>
<p>I wonder if the outlook is the same in other parts of country.</p>
<p>Oh… SF… Near me…</p>
<p>Well someday…the Smart Train may be up and running…But that will be far and not SF.</p>
<p>My daughter lives in SF. </p>
<p>yeah…real estate isnt inexpensive.</p>
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<p>I know part of it is when we look at the government and governmental programs and what sorts of future we see for them. We’re all paying into SS, but how many of us are actually expecting to see any of it? The few friends I have with jobs that offer a good retirement package (mostly government) doubt it’ll be around for them when they retire, either.</p>
<p>SS will be around…</p>
<p>Frankly, many do both. They worked hard and they also party and travel and spend as much time with friends as possible, keeping in mind priorities. Nobody around us just travel (on resources that came nobody knows where). As an example, long traveling trip to Europe was very much incouraged when my S. was in his Graphic Design program way back some 25 years ago. He did it, lived very cheaply, lots of train trips (overnight), we have bought his train pass for entire stay. Well, as far as I remember, his very very cheap traveling Europian trip wiht many nights staing in various dorms and on a train cost us about $3000. Granted he was there for 3 months. Also granted that he has worked, but he was nowhere near to be able to foot this bill, so we paid for it. I imagine that trip like this currently would be 2, 3 folds more expansive (???, I have not investigated this at all). So, some low paying irregular job will foot trip like this? I have hard time believing this. My younger one went to NZ more recently for about 6 weeks. We have also footed the bill, but maybe not, considering that she was on a full tuition Merit at her college and in the year of her trip, received additional $4k in Merit awards. Both got college credits for their trips, although they did not need them, but why not? Many kids are doing that. Some colleges have campuses in Europe, D’s state public had a campus in Lux,but she did not have time to take advantage of it.<br>
Again, the point is, knowing costs even when travelling so cheply that they do not stay in hotels at all, even aver 20 years ago, I just do not see how they can travel on their dime. Not possible. Somebody is supporting them, maybe credit cards? There are 2 unavoidable facts, the laws that are cut in stone:
-Money do not grow on trees
-there is no such thing as a free lunch
-anything to be said operating outside of the 2 above, cannot be true</p>
<p>"I think a more appropriate title would be “I want to relive my early 20s” </p>
<p>I wouldn’t mind living someone else’s early 20s. Otherwise, forget it, I wouldn’t want to relive mine. I wouldn’t want to deal with all the stress and pressure of having to prove myself every two minutes again. I am much happier and more relaxed being older, my family is awesome, and life is good. Though I wouldn’t mind being skinny and wrinkle free again.</p>
<p>I’m with busdriver! </p>
<p>I don’t envy the milenials at all. </p>
<p>We’ve taken so much from them already and the price of gas alone is ridiculous. No other generation besides the greatest has come to adulthood with so many people asking them to do so much for others. </p>
<p>I hope they figure it out and understand they don’t owe the older generations any more than they are already being asked for. I hope they understand they are as important as we seem to think we are, and they manage to achieve their own prosperity in spite of what we continue to take from them.</p>
<p>Yes, Cobrat I guess I am from earlier than you, but my loans were not in the hundreds of dollars total. The repayment was $250/month. Also I had married while in school & my husband was still in grad school, so I was not about to leave him & travel. And when he graduated he had loans too, and he postdocced. </p>
<p>I still say, world travel right after college is for the people who have parent$$. They either are paying for the travel, or they paid for the college. Most of the time it is both.</p>
<p>Why? We’re the first generation expected to be worse off than our parents. College is really expensive, work is less abundant, gas is expensive. Healthcare is insane. Social Security is not projected to be solvent when we retire. The long term outlook for the economy seems dismal. The government’s debt is massive. You know all these things, but you got to build your nest egg before all of this happened.</p>
<p>"I think a more appropriate title would be “I want to relive my early 20s”</p>
<p>Or damn I wish my parents would have let me live rent free in their basement indefinitely.</p>
<p>Vyse, most of the things you listed can be fixed. The job market is one area that is a mess and is hurting millenials. Doesnt look good. Hope is very important to a person’s life and the poor job market can wipe hope out.
People are getting squeezed across all generations. The elderly and baby boomers have more wealth than the younger generations, but they are going to spend that wealth. The elderly and baby boomers dont have the income potential of the younger generations so their wealth is overstated. </p>
<p>Many of us in the baby boomer generation are also in the sandwich generation. It is not that easy to take care of ourselves while helping out the young and the old. A friend of mine’s mother in law has dementia and her care costs 100,000 a year. My dad has dementia and I see some large bills coming. </p>
<p>What has happened is the spoils of the economy have gone to a very small segment of the economy. All generations are affected. If you visit SF, you will see many young people doing very, very well. They are workng in the tech world. I dont know what their futures are going to be like. Housing costs are through the roof. The public school system stinks. I dont know how much saving is going on. </p>
<p>Many of the older folks with supposedly all this wealth are leaving the city. They cant afford to live in the city anymore. They move to Santa Rosa or the east bay.</p>
<p>When I was in NY, it looked to me like the city was dominated by young people. True. The young people live in closets. </p>
<p>Somehow, rising home prices is thought to be a good thing. I think it is a bad thing. Higher home prices raise the cost of living. The millenials strugle with a horrible job market and housing costs in many parts of the country are obscene.</p>
<p>Maybe jobs created by rising housing prices makes the increase in prices worth it. I dont know…</p>