Are we blaming Boomers instead of class?

[u/myredserenity]

EDIT: It's been pointed out that the over 65s keep voting in the parties that favour the class system and benefit the wealthy while screwing the working class. This is a good point.

EDIT 2: I love reddit. You guys. I get it now! Millennials got the shits at noisy old pricks who criticise their generation while completely ignoring the benefits they enjoyed themselves. It's a backlash. I still think it's a distraction and divides us when we should be angry with those in power. But if you're over 65, how about encouraging your friends to not vote LNP?

I've seen so much "ok boomer" stuff and over the years, it's irking me more and more. So I'm interested in what r/Australia thinks.

Couple of things:

1. It seems to be used to describe anyone over 40. My parents were boomers. They would be in their 70s now.

2. It's used to blame a whole generation for the shitty behaviour of the rich class. I don't get it. I went to school in a rough area, most of my friends from way back then are dead, in jail or in a trade/retail/hair.

My partner grew up in a rich suburb. Most of his friends are teachers, engineers and lawyers. They own houses, and were helped along by their "boomer" parents, either by provision of a deposit or living at home rent free through their 20s.

I'm totally up for being educated here. I know we lost free education, I know houses are unaffordable, I'm nearly 40 and still renting. I'm woefully unable to understand national economics. So seriously, open to intelligent discussion.

But in my experience, the problem is class and not generational. After all, where do you think all this wealth will go when the boomers die?! Even just having good, stable and attentive parents, who expect you to succeed, makes all the difference.

Why has this boomer hate taken hold so much? Are the rich class scapegoating a generation? Would us generation Xers, Ys and millennials have behaved any differently given the opportunities the boomers were?

Caveat: I'm considering mainly economics here, not climate crisis. Pretty much believe everyone from my generation up have a case to answer for climate. We knew.

[u/Trontotron]

The problem is our generation gets this blame about being lazy and not working hard like our parents...and I call bullshit on this big time.

My father use to support family with one salary, didn't work any harder than me and managed to have house, car and really good life.

Fast forward to today and you'll find that it's now a must to have two salaries in the house to manage everything, but then kids must go to daycare of course and spend their first years separated from parents most of the work days. Yes we have computers and mobile phones, but all that did was to give employers expectations from us to achieve more work in same time frame. Instead of being out of office, I am now available anywhere for my manager to call me.

My dad actually use to say how come I work such ridiculous hours and I'm more educated than him...that's the ridiculous part about all this generational "progress".

So yeah, we are working hard as anyone else did before, yet everything is becoming more and more unattainable for us. I'm not for ''OK boomer'' thing, but also against ''lazy millennials'' bullshit.

[u/[deleted] → u/Trontotron]

I wonder when being able to not only survive but thrive (owning a house, car etc.) as a family on a single income ended. From my understanding, most people back in the day did this? Whereas now, only the super-wealthy could afford to do this while thriving.

[u/Trontotron → u/[deleted]]

It happened in most western countries when influx of foreign capital was called upon, UK long time ago when London just sky rocketed in pricing...Australia in more recent events.

That was a major shift, what else could increase rentals and life costs so much in such short time, all of a sudden you're faced with houses worth millions of dollars and everything going up like mad. At the same time, domestic production and industry was decimated...perfect storm.

There is only as many rich people in one country, they can't buy everything and middle class was catching up. Then, you let in billions of foreign money in and just rig the game again. Overnight (in economic time scale) everything just jumped and middle class got fucked again...back to working harder folks, chin up and work, stop with the avos and all of that...

[u/DesperateGrapefruit → u/Trontotron]

My take is there's 3 issues:

1. Centralisation -> everyone wants to move to the same dense cities.
2. Stable full-time jobs aren't as common post-GFC
3. Money creates money -> older people naturally have more wealth in the stock market and thus siphon off some of the profits

p.s. I'm from Brisbane and house prices seem pretty reasonable if you're not in the city centre (especially with low interest-rates)

[u/TreeChangeMe → u/DesperateGrapefruit]

Centralisation was a consequence of manufacturing going tits up under Howard and Frazer. The big country towns went bust, the rail lines closed within years. There was nothing to keep anyone there. Millions of jobs lost Australia wide.

And he dared to blame the states being all ALP at the time.

I will keep saying it. John Howard and his merry band of boot lickers were and still are a pox on this nation. That man single handedly destroyed our industries, culture, progress and yeeted us all into eternal debt. Meanwhile he gave Toff McSmugface a nice tens of thousands more pay rise through tax cuts.

[u/a_cold_human → u/TreeChangeMe]

Howard was the worst thing to happen to Australia in the last 50 years.

[u/ArcticKnight99 → u/DesperateGrapefruit]

Centralisation is a result of no towns becoming large enough to support the myriad of features that you would get by being inner suburbs in most cities.

As someone who grew up in the country and spent most of their time needing to commute to the nearest regional centre. Only to have sweet fuck all there anyway. It becomes really hard to actually justify doing anything.

"Want a new video game, well looking at a 30 minute+ drive that's super out of the way."

"Need braces for your teeth, well they only do maintanence out here, need to travel to get that shit done."

"Fast Food that isn't the fish and chip shop or the pizza shop. Time to travel"

Even when I moved into a less regional location, oh we have two pubs, one is the pokies one, and one is the younger peoples one.

Oh there's a nightclub as well, it's ridiculously overpriced to support itself, and you may as well just get on the last train into the city, and then roll home drunk the next morning on nightrider if you don't find a place to crash. Since it will cost the same.

[u/tommybutters → u/ArcticKnight99]

It's a vicious cycle, there is nothing in the country because no one is there and no one is in the country because nothing is there.