We really have gotten turned around. We have gone from parents and grandparents helping their kids start off in life with a down payment on a house or money for furniture to the point where the grandparents and parents take 7% to 10% of their kids’ and grandkids’ checks every week to support themselves.
And, in part, it is an unintended consequence of the destruction of the extended family. Families used to live together and all chip in for expenses. A son lived with his parents until he got married. He didn’t sit on his ass without a job like some of today’s kids do. He worked and paid some of the expenses while still being able to save for a down payment on a house when he got married. And then when the parents got old, they moved in with the kids.
At some point in the 60s that changed to the point where neither parents nor kids want to live together. And the result is that the parents need Social Security to live a decent life. The brutal truth is that America can’t afford it anymore. We are not the wealthy nation we were. We squandered the wealth over about 40 to 50 years. Parents and kids are going to have to live together again because we, as a society, can’t afford to subsidize them living separately. It won’t impact today’s seniors. There is still enough borrowing power to let them live as they are. But within the next 20 or 30 years, its going to be blindingly obvious that we are broke and the credit card has been maxed out.
I already told my kids they better study hard, so that they can afford a nice, big house, because we're moving in.
I'm 100% in agreement with you, up until this last part. 15 years is the absolute furthest our society is going to remain solvent if we remain on our current trajectory. 20-30 years simply isn't possible without an immediate and massive restructuring of our financial and political system.
5-10 years is probably closer to the mark. We're facing a systemic threat to our economic system, which means that as certain parts fail, they'll bring other parts down with them much faster than anyone was anticipating. It will be 'unexpected', but it is coming.
Anyone who is elderly, or planning on becoming elderly in the near future, will be alive to see it. The only people that won't are those on the tail end of being elderly.