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.
When people pass on generational wealth, I read its usually gone within 3 generations.
Probably not true for billionaire level wealth, but for the people that work up millions or tens of millions.
The worst part, the absolute worst part, is that it’s a house my grandmother designed and my great grandmother financed.
4 generations of my family have lived there, and it will be gone when mom kicks off.
Have you tried bootstrap pulling? I hear that’s a great way to make an extra million or two.
My wife’s grandparents and their parents were very very wealthy but my mil and her siblings have literally waited every cent of it and im talking millions of dollars. One aunt is a forever student, she has never had a job, never earned her own money in any way and has constantly used money for her own education while never earning any degrees. One uncle spent the vast majority on gambling and alcohol.
Some people actually like being perpetual students, but to not earn any degrees while doing that is crazy. Like, get PhD or 2 if you want to spend forever in school and if you ever get bored of it then you’d have something to use. Also if you’re good at it, you can even get scholarships or grants along the way.
Ya thats not what she did. She just took classes that sounded interesting and never got anything to show for it. Being a full time student would be fun but not at the expense of fucking over everyone else.
I think it’s true at all levels. Dropping from billionaire to millionaire isn’t as sympathetic though.
That’s usually because often the second generation grew up seeing and learning (and possibly expereincing) the work that initially generated that wealth.
The 3rd generation only saw and experienced the lifestyle that comes with already having the wealth, and doesn’t really have an innate understanding of what it took to generate it.
You’d think knowing this trend is persistent and why, that most people with generational wealth would set up trusts so it couldn’t be destroyed.
Here, Iive a lifestyle with this perpetual allowance that probably gets persistently better as the wealth grows.
But i guess people just trust their children too much.
The Chinese even have an idiom for this exact phenomenon, the saying goes, “富不过三代”. Translated literally, it says wealth does not persist beyond three generations.
Wouldn’t it just be because it’s divided among all their great grand children and spouses? If everyone had 4 children, the wealth would be divided 4^3=64 times. So, $1 million becomes $15k (assuming none is spent by the first 2 generations).
It was talking about wealth levels where passing it down to your children wouldn’t kill it. (Edit 1 million is a lot of money, but at the same time it’s not a lot of money. In many places its not enough to live a comfortable life off with a family indefinitely)
Like you have 40 mil and 3 children and give to those 3.
13.3 mil is with a very safe 3.5% withdrawal is 465.5k a year for each child to spend. At 3.5% that wealth will probably become much larger and be able to grow indefinitely as it’s below the 4% safe rule.
By the time you die it could be 30-50 mil or more and you then give it to your kids. You maintained the generational wealth and passed it on
But instead these children are spending it poorly and they each die with 4 million.
That’s still over a million each for each child of the child, even with 3 kids each, and each of those kids could probably turn it back into generational wealth but then they also spend it poorly.