I’m not Shery - I’m her daughter. I’m a gen. X’er myself. I only have student loan debts, but because of the difficult time trying to hold down enough employment while trying to go to school on my own, since I was 19, has meant that I NEVER had anything saved towards retirement. My parents couldn’t afford to send me to college, and the cost of living in my state is fairly high. That being the case, I couldn’t afford to move to a cheaper state. Plus, I’m from a college town, where you can’t get a job that pays more than minimum wage, most of the time - because they can get college students to that will take minimum wage, so why should they pay anyone else more than that? - that was their mindset. Even with working two or three jobs that paid minimum wage, what little I was able to save toward school always ended up going into my beat-up car to keep it running (repairs, etc.), or to the doctor when I’d get strep throat or something like that. So, I was never able to save anything for college. That’s when I took out student loans, which I had to wait till I was 24 to do. That got me a real late start in school, compared to my fellow peers whose parents were able to help them through school - or my other peers who were not white and therefore able to get all kinds of scholarships or grants that I didn’t qualify for - even though I had excellent grades. They were all able to graduate from college at 22 or 23 or were getting their master’s degrees the following year. So, I went to school sometimes and then had to stop and work a few semesters to get back on my feet financially. Then I’d go back to school and then have to stop again to work a whole lot, again to get caught back up. Each time I was in school, I was still working too. I FINALLY got my lowly A.A. in 2006. STILL working on my B.A. and it’s 2013!!! And by the way, I’m a go-getter type of person. I don’t slack off, and I’m not at all stupid. Finally, I said “forget this!” and went to get an LPN license (to see if I’m any good at nursing). I’m back to working on my B.A. again, and also working on my RN at the same time. Now, I can’t find a nursing job because guess why? I don’t have at least one year’s experience yet. Talk about feeling real frustrated at 40, with not a penny aside for retirement and still all these student loans to pay. Good thing I never had kids! I’d never be able to afford them. So, yes, this is one frustrated gen. X’er who can vouch for the legitimacy of this article - for at least some of us.
Keep trying for your RN...this I do know...the Boomers will have not left this a better country...what Gen X and beyond does is anyones guess....our generation will also have to rebuild our Churchs - if we even have that capacity....what I do resent is Boomers referring to Gen Xers as slackers...not all boomers were hippies or draft dodgers..there are a lot of good ones but in the end the conservative boomers lost the culture war and that will be our ultimate undoing as a nation...