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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
Harris poll for Guardian finds people reconsidering major life events such as having children or buying a home
Americans are reconsidering major life events including marriage, having children and buying a home amid economic anxiety in the opening months of the Trump presidency, according to an exclusive poll for the Guardian.
Six in 10 Americans said the economy has affected at least one of their major life goals, according to the Harris poll, citing either lack of affordability or anxiety around the current economy.
Though Donald Trump’s tariff policies have only been in place for a few weeks, and though he has temporarily walked back on some of his harshest policies, the findings are a sign that Trump’s economic agenda could have long-term effects.
I’m an elder millennial. I feel like my life has spent more time on hold than otherwise. Economic crisis, plague, not-really-a-war-but-war, more economic crisis, watered down dictator. . .
Can I just die already?
It’s like our lives are written like a book about Russian history where every chapter ends with “… and then it got worse”.
Gen X, here. Feel the same. Move forward two steps, stop. Back up one, stop. Take three forward, take 4 back. Move up one. Etc. X got lucky with cheaper college and sometimes you could find affordable homes, but damn. It feels like treading water and maybe occasionally swallowing some since forever.
No you can’t die! We need more hard workers in the workforce! How else will your boss and bosses boss afford that extra house, car, and vacation time?
If you need hard workers, I am not your man.
Fn same
Millennials are also the first generation to really lean into child free lifestyles too, usually out of necessity not because we hate babies. We got fucked and had the audacity to throw a wrench in the machine of not following orders and being clones of our parents
I feel this. I also used to believe in and not mind the idea of reincarnation, but Jesus Christ would I hate to come back. I didn’t procreate because I know there’s nothing good on the horizon for future generations. It’s become a nightmare to think I may ever have to come back again.
“A crisis is coming!”
Well I’ve been in crisis since I got laid off at Christmas so everyone, welcome to the show.
Before that I’ve been trying to come out of my crises since Covid fucked my life up, still not fixed that.
And then going back, my life is still hugely derailed from the past 2.5 decades of crises, macro and micro.
So yeah it’s just more of the same over here.
I’ve been trying to get back to the life I had before it blew up in 2008. My 26 year old son says that the Bush Economic Crash of 2008 looms large in the lives of his friends. Many in his generation had their entire lives thrown into chaos in the middle of their childhoods, giving them a wired in sense of foreboding toward their future. They know that no matter how good your life is, the government can destroy your life with mindless policies designed to benefit a tiny few elites, at the expense of everyone else.
No wonder that so many young people are thinking that Socialism/ Marxism/ Communism sounds like a reasonable alternative to whatever arbitrary system we have now.
The entire image of America sold to me as a child was a lie and I’m having a very difficult time rectifying that.
Plenty of societies have demonstrated that socialist policies do work. It’s sometimes called the “Nordic model”. We have the blueprint, but America is neoliberal (aka oligarchic/neo-feudal) and those who hoard all the wealth and power will not give any of it up without a fight.
Marxism/Communism has noble ends - a classless, stateless, truly equal and equitable society - but there no viable means to such an end, as history has demonstrated, due to the innate wickedness and selfishness of human nature.
The successful systems are the ones that still reward innovation, ambition, effort, and vision, but use regulation to prevent too much consolidation. Even the founders of the US recognized this, which is why we have “anti-trust” laws, a trust being any kind of captured control that stifles competition. Unfortunately, they have been left to rot on the vine, gone unenforced, and even deliberately weakened by neoliberal policy that aims to strengthen and cement an anticompetitive, consolidatory, neo-feudal caste of ur-nobility.
My faith that things could be better was snuffed out during COVID. I watched the true empathy gap between myself and those who couldn’t be bothered to do the bare minimum without whining like a 5-year-old throwing a tantrum. What optimism I had for a better life for my child vanished in 2020. I’m a shell of the person I used to be.
I don’t know what the future holds, but if it gets much worse, I don’t know how I’ll survive.
Try voting Republicans out.
I keep waiting for everyone to catch up. The solution isn’t hard. 🤷♂️
Do you think anyone here has been voting Republican?
No but it’s likely many people here simply didn’t vote or aren’t Americans.
Amazing seeing these responses. 2/3 Americans either voted for Trump or didn’t think it was important enough to bother with.
I do my best every two years or so. It’s like trying to put out the sun with a mouthful of water in this state.
The message isn’t for you, then, but for the 2/3 Americans who got us here.
someone posts about basically being suicidal
HMMM TRY DOING THIS THING THAT HASN’T WORKED AND YOU PROBABLY DID ALREADY! HMMM HMMM I’M SMARTER THAN EVERYONE ELSE, IT’S LIKE, DUH, THAT’S THE SOLUTION HA HA EVERYONE ELSE SHOULD CATCH UP HA HA I DON’T CARE THAT YOU’RE IN SO MUCH DESPAIR YOU WANT TO DIE, MY SOLUTION ISN’T VERY HARD🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️
Sometimes even empty platitudes of hope can help a deeply depressed person.
If only it was one