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The function of Capitalism is to deny money and power to works while solidifying it for the owning/elite/powerful class. So, the fact that 401(k)s ever functioned is a historical and economic anomaly that (surprise) benefits Boomers, almost exclusively. 1/? https://twitter.com/bopinion/status/1285637736880381952
The fact that I am just now getting a 401K in my mid-30s is the reality that I've never been paid enough to justify the removal from my check, or economically stable enough to miss it in my day to day. OR (not my case) worked for someone generous enough to offer one.
It is wild how Boomers benefited so thoroughly from socialist policies while living in constant ignorance of their existence, and terrified of the very word that built their economic and social dominance. 3/?
Cold War propaganda from authoritative figures, mass media, and educational systems blinded America's (at the time) largest population to where they are ignorant of the privilege of their very existence. Unaware of the common sense, and lacking the empathy for anyone after them.
And why? The cultural narrative of building yourself up, and the constant barrage that we need to cut taxes to increase personal wealth - both of which are lies. Therefore, millennial/zoomers simply don't work as hard as time, but in reality lack every single economic safety net.
I dont really think it has settled into the minds of Boomers and those a bit younger that their children will have no functional retirement - we will die as laborers, with no property to pass down and no money to give as incoherence. There are no economic systems in place to help
Imagine how we will functionally have to continue living in apartments with our friends in order to scrape by enough money to function in society - until we are 80. There is a tragic beauty to it - we are the only ones capable of helping ourselves (literally walk down the stairs)
I have bluntly told my parents that I am going to live in inescapable debt until they are dead and their wealth comes down to me. This is a great shame for our country and honestly not something people want to think about - I dont want to be reliant, they don't want my suffering.
And even then, it simply gets me out of debt, not significantly increases my standard of living. Just simply puts me back on a baseline - and who knows when that will be? I hope not soon, for their sake. I can live how I live.
But the fact that our economic system is so fragile where something like a new disease can put MILLIONS of people out of a job and destroys entire sectors of labor and business should really frighten Boomers with children, even if they are adults. But no one seems to care.
I thinking back to simpler times of February when Bernie Sanders was in the lead and had a plan to improve the material conditions of millions of peoples lives and how people in power decided that we couldn't let that happen - and how every one of his policies are necessary now.
And quite frankly, it still wasn't enough. It would have gotten people out of the crushing hell pit, but not enough to give us the proportionately same trajectory of success that the boomers benefited from. All we had to look forward to was being on the ground floor.
When a Bloomberg article ends with this sentiment "The claim that a frog placed in slowly warming water will die without trying to escape is factually incorrect, but too useful a metaphor to discard," I am not really sure what hope we should be feeling for the next 50 years.
Maybe in like 20 years, enough people will run for enough positions in politics, and maybe those positions will still have some semblance of power to where there can be a complete and toalizing change, but really too many of us will have to live entirely without hope until then.
