This article discusses the spending habit of millennials and addresses the notion that millennial are over spenders and under savers. Many articles regarding millennial spending habits are anecdotal, and not using data to backup their claim about millennials. This particular article looks at millennials in Britain, and finds that they are actually saving just as much as older generations. In fact, many millennials aren't to blame for their lack of wealth relative to their parents or grandparents generations. The reality is relative wealth and financial stability isn't so great for them right now. Many older generations can be critical of younger generations because they do things differently from "the old ways" of doing things, but that doesn't mean young peoples decisions are necessarily going to leave them worse off. For full article click below.
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This was a really informative article. It is interesting to actually see some data on the topic. The finding by the NS&I that since 2004 there has not been a single year that those between the ages of 16-24 fell below the average savings rate was especially impressive. The conclusion that millennials have poor job prospects and a questionable housing market, but are still financially responsible goes against what I think a lot of us have always heard from older generations.
ReplyDeletePeople live up to the expectations others have of them, and if older generations keep reiterating our generation's lack of fiscal responsibility, many may live up to only that. Context must be taken into account when comparing generations, as well as what was passed down to us. I think its fascinating to see the dichotomy between talk and practice, like you mentioned above.
DeleteIt is interesting to see the comparisons between our generations and generations of the past. Fractl, a digital ad agency, recently surveyed Milennials regarding their saving habits and found that our generation actually saves more than previous generations, such as generation X and the baby boomers. Around 10% of the people surveyed said they saved around 50% of their paycheck, which is 7% higher than people from generation X. The article also discusses how Milennials are moving away from the stock market and are putting their money elsewhere, which many believe is a troubling idea.
ReplyDeleteThis is a very interesting article for millennials to read. From the comparisons of older generations to now, it makes a lot of sense as to why this generation again is saving as much or more than they are spending. Most of us witnessed the 2008 crisis and saw how it affected our families and the business world. The crisis served as a wake up call for a lot of Americans who were not saving as much as they should. A lot of economics and psychology classes at OWU show cycles in generations where one generation behaves in one way and the next behaves in the exact opposite way. It would seem from the data that this is what is occurring here and our generation will resort to more saving as a result.
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting to see how millennials are spending more. However, they what I do not think was taken into consideration was what the economy was like during our parents and grandparents generations. When they look at our grandparents, they lived through WWII where living conditions were tough and saving was a much greater focus. Millennials experienced a strong economy in the early 2000's and except a couple rough years during the recession the economy has bounced back since then. Additionally, with such low interest rates in the US, there was only more of an incentive to spend. It will be interesting to compare that factor to Britain's economic history.
ReplyDeleteAlthough this doesn't surprise me, it was still very interesting to see the actual data that supports the notion of millennials how choose to spend rather than to save. Similar to what people have said before me, I think it should be taken into consideration the fact that our country and economy has been relatively stable during our lifetimes. This could be the main proponent why we feel that we don't have to continually be saving, because we don't foresee any catastrophes that would require us to have excess amounts of money saved up.
ReplyDeleteI like that people looked into this. I always hear that this generation is screwed because they aren't saving money, or they aren't doing things like older generations have in the past. It's nice to know that things haven't changed in terms of saving and spending, although we do things differently than the other generations have done.
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