WEBVTT - This is How Economic Crisis and Precarity Shaped the Millennial Generation 0:00:14.000 --> 0:00:17.759 Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots Podcast. 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:22.440 I'm Joe Wisenthal and I'm Tracy Allaway. Tracy, I always forget. 0:00:22.440 --> 0:00:25.840 Are you a millennial? I knew, I knew this was 0:00:25.840 --> 0:00:27.960 going to be the first question that you asked me 0:00:28.280 --> 0:00:32.200 on this episode. I am, I believe what is known 0:00:32.240 --> 0:00:37.599 as an elder millennial basically sort of on the cusp 0:00:37.920 --> 0:00:42.040 of the millennial generation, depending on where you um define it. 0:00:42.120 --> 0:00:45.000 But you know, if you define it as kids born 0:00:45.040 --> 0:00:47.879 from the eighties onwards, I'm definitely there. And if you 0:00:47.920 --> 0:00:51.920 define it as the children of baby boomers, I'm definitely there. 0:00:52.920 --> 0:00:55.600 You're sorry, you're an older millennial. I'm I was born 0:00:55.600 --> 0:00:58.520 in so I think I missed it by that definition. 0:00:58.720 --> 0:01:01.319 But here's my question. Did you use Facebook when you're 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:07.440 in college? Yes, but only because only because our college 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:10.720 got it early. To me, that is the like, in 0:01:10.760 --> 0:01:15.600 my view, that is the crucial dividing line between millennial 0:01:15.720 --> 0:01:18.640 and Gen X because obviously, like so much of the 0:01:18.680 --> 0:01:21.920 modern eras defined by you know, everything that the Internet 0:01:21.959 --> 0:01:24.000 and social media and all that stuff, And I really 0:01:24.040 --> 0:01:27.040 feel like if you didn't have Facebook get in college, 0:01:27.280 --> 0:01:28.920 you're not a millennial. And if you did you are, 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:32.640 and so I guess you are and I'm not. Look, 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:34.679 we can go back and forth on the definitions. I 0:01:34.720 --> 0:01:37.240 actually like the way you define it because I think 0:01:37.600 --> 0:01:41.560 the Internet has been clearly so crucial to the experience 0:01:41.680 --> 0:01:44.240 of a lot of millennials, and creating your own online 0:01:44.280 --> 0:01:48.840 identity has been quite important as well. So it makes sense. Yes, Okay, 0:01:48.880 --> 0:01:53.240 I'm a millennial, but I'm an older one. Yeah you're 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:56.800 still good. But beyond the Internet and beyond like the 0:01:56.800 --> 0:01:59.800 way social media and all that is changing everything. One 0:02:00.000 --> 0:02:04.520 of the sort of like persistent frameworks or tropes, sort 0:02:04.520 --> 0:02:08.840 of themes that happens when people talk about millennials is 0:02:09.160 --> 0:02:13.120 um the economic situation. And you hear a lot about 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:17.040 millennials being late to foreign families or by homes, that 0:02:17.160 --> 0:02:20.720 their distrust of the stock market. Uh, the millennial generation 0:02:20.760 --> 0:02:23.440 has sort of came of age, at least the sort 0:02:23.480 --> 0:02:26.400 of middle to late millennials, during a period of labor 0:02:26.480 --> 0:02:30.560 market procarity. So in addition to everything that we were 0:02:30.560 --> 0:02:33.040 talking about with Facebook and all that, there really is 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:36.560 this sort of very big economic dimension to how we 0:02:36.600 --> 0:02:40.320 talk about this generation. Right, so many millennials hit the 0:02:40.400 --> 0:02:43.160 job market precisely at the wrong time, which would have 0:02:43.200 --> 0:02:46.720 been after the two thousand eight financial crisis, and uh 0:02:47.160 --> 0:02:51.119 have sort of had their entire labor market experience defined 0:02:51.240 --> 0:02:54.160 by that. And of course you've seen all this tension 0:02:54.360 --> 0:02:58.760 that's bubbling up between millennials and boomers characterized or crystallized, 0:02:58.800 --> 0:03:03.400 I should say, the Okay, boomer movement now seems to 0:03:03.400 --> 0:03:05.200 be a thing, a thing. You know what I think 0:03:05.280 --> 0:03:07.560 is lame though, how millennials want to side with gen z. 0:03:07.639 --> 0:03:10.000 It's like, come on, Momornials are all too It's like, 0:03:10.200 --> 0:03:15.480 don't pretend your young anymore. Okay, okay, okay. But all 0:03:15.560 --> 0:03:18.760 that being said, um so let's talk about the millennial 0:03:18.880 --> 0:03:21.679 economic situation. But before we do, remember a couple of 0:03:21.720 --> 0:03:23.920 weeks ago, or like maybe a month ago, we talked 0:03:24.000 --> 0:03:28.359 to Karen Ho of the University of Minnesota about her 0:03:28.600 --> 0:03:33.360 anthropological take on Wall Street. Yeah, the anthropologist who worked 0:03:33.360 --> 0:03:36.800 at a at a major bank. Yeah. Well, I'm excited 0:03:36.880 --> 0:03:39.880 because today we are speaking to another Karen Ho, the 0:03:39.960 --> 0:03:42.880 other one. Uh, there's probably several more, but this is 0:03:42.920 --> 0:03:45.520 the other really prominent one if you look online. And 0:03:45.680 --> 0:03:49.080 so we'll odd lots. In a matter of like five 0:03:49.120 --> 0:03:51.840 episodes will have spoken to two Karen Ho's, but this 0:03:51.880 --> 0:03:54.480 time instead of talking about Wall Street, we're going to 0:03:54.560 --> 0:04:00.600 talk about the economic and investing condition of the millennial generation. Yeah, 0:04:00.880 --> 0:04:03.080 you wait for one Karen Home and then to come 0:04:03.080 --> 0:04:06.920 along all at once? Yeah, all right, what's that would 0:04:06.920 --> 0:04:10.080 further ado? Let's bring in uh Karen How she is 0:04:10.200 --> 0:04:12.680 the She's a freelance writer. She's written a lot about 0:04:13.120 --> 0:04:17.120 business cultural thing. She's also the editor of the Significant 0:04:17.160 --> 0:04:20.200 Digits newsletter for five thirty eight. Karen, thank you very 0:04:20.279 --> 0:04:22.920 much for joining us, Thanks for having me. You're aware 0:04:22.920 --> 0:04:25.720 of the other Karen Home before this, right, like how 0:04:25.800 --> 0:04:28.400 much that I get a lot of her emails and 0:04:28.760 --> 0:04:32.160 so I literally have her email address bookmarked and I 0:04:32.520 --> 0:04:36.120 have to remind people constantly are you asking for? You know? 0:04:36.200 --> 0:04:38.560 The people have told me that they're like, I love 0:04:38.600 --> 0:04:40.640 your book, and I was like, I'm not that person. 0:04:41.000 --> 0:04:44.679 And so it was really funny when Laura, your producer, 0:04:44.680 --> 0:04:46.320 reached out to me, I was like, are you sure 0:04:46.400 --> 0:04:48.560 you want to talk to me because there's this other 0:04:48.680 --> 0:04:52.200 Karen Home that's a big expert on wallst. And She's like, yes, yes, 0:04:52.240 --> 0:04:54.560 I want to talk to you. So I was really 0:04:54.560 --> 0:04:56.840 thrilled and I've been friends with Joe for a couple 0:04:56.880 --> 0:04:59.039 of years, so it was a great opportunity to come 0:04:59.080 --> 0:05:01.760 and chat about something that I a topic that I 0:05:01.800 --> 0:05:04.279 hold really near and dear to my heart. Did she 0:05:04.320 --> 0:05:06.920 ever get your emails? I don't think she's ever told 0:05:06.960 --> 0:05:09.520 me that, but um, I think there has been one 0:05:09.560 --> 0:05:11.719 time where I emailed her and I was like, I 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:13.480 get a lot of your fan mail. I just want 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:17.120 you to know that. So before we start out, do 0:05:17.200 --> 0:05:21.880 we have our definition of millennials roughly correct? Like? What 0:05:22.000 --> 0:05:24.760 is the group the generational group that aren't that we 0:05:24.800 --> 0:05:27.280 are talking about here? I think both of you are 0:05:27.320 --> 0:05:30.160 correct in that I would say the upper tier of 0:05:30.800 --> 0:05:33.040 the current age of I would say an older millennial 0:05:33.080 --> 0:05:36.279 is around thirty eight. Any older than that I would consider, 0:05:37.800 --> 0:05:39.119 you know what I mean? You know it's like thirty 0:05:39.160 --> 0:05:42.039 eight because under the definition of like you said using 0:05:42.279 --> 0:05:47.400 Facebook in undergrad I would say especially, And then I 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:51.400 would say the youngest millennials I would say are maybe 0:05:52.680 --> 0:05:55.159 twenty eight, because anything younger than that it's a totally 0:05:55.200 --> 0:05:57.880 different circumstance when it comes to the labor market and 0:05:58.000 --> 0:06:00.240 in terms of the age of their parents. And I say, 0:06:00.279 --> 0:06:03.160 my I have boomer parents, but they had me very 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:05.280 very lately. You know, my mother was almost forty when 0:06:05.320 --> 0:06:08.040 she had my younger sister, and so like when we 0:06:08.080 --> 0:06:11.880 talk about generations as defined by economics, the older generations 0:06:11.880 --> 0:06:14.520 has much longer spans than the way that we are 0:06:14.520 --> 0:06:17.000 defining Gen Z, and even the generation after gen Z 0:06:17.120 --> 0:06:19.880 it's much much narrower. And I always find that really 0:06:19.920 --> 0:06:22.920 interesting because there's no consistency in terms of the time 0:06:22.960 --> 0:06:26.400 period between these generations. Yeah, it's interesting to think about, Like, 0:06:26.440 --> 0:06:31.920 if you're Gen Z, you've basically, unlike millennials, your entire 0:06:32.040 --> 0:06:35.480 working career has been economic expansion. You have that. If 0:06:35.480 --> 0:06:39.640 you're twenty eight or twenty six or younger, you graduated 0:06:39.680 --> 0:06:41.960 in the last I don't know, four or six years, 0:06:42.000 --> 0:06:46.920 Like it's basically been economic expansion that whole time. Maybe 0:06:46.960 --> 0:06:49.960 not the best labor market, but not terrible. But Millennials 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:53.680 are really in large part facebook aside by the sort 0:06:53.680 --> 0:06:57.880 of like long stretch of economic procarity. Absolutely, how is 0:06:57.920 --> 0:07:02.160 that to find the generation interview? So having personally graduated 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:07.400 undergrad in that generation has entirely started in the whole 0:07:07.440 --> 0:07:11.440 everything from your graduating into the market where they're freezes 0:07:11.520 --> 0:07:14.440 there are mass layoffs on Wall Street and in Bays Street. 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:17.960 And the problem is right now, so you are starting 0:07:18.000 --> 0:07:21.400 at at a place where the compound interest racks up 0:07:21.440 --> 0:07:23.360 in the period where you're supposed to see your career 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:26.760 rapidly increase. You know, whether it be in terms of earnings, 0:07:26.760 --> 0:07:29.600 whether it be in terms of income potential, UM, you know, 0:07:29.680 --> 0:07:32.400 future investment decisions, even in terms of even the way 0:07:32.400 --> 0:07:34.840 that you date, right the way that you spend money 0:07:34.880 --> 0:07:39.080 while dating, and then you're making long term plans for uh, 0:07:39.120 --> 0:07:43.080 investing in real estate, having a family, or even um. 0:07:43.120 --> 0:07:45.640 If you're in a job that is automatically doesn't include 0:07:45.640 --> 0:07:49.400 a pension, or doesn't include an investment opportunities, or doesn't 0:07:49.400 --> 0:07:51.360 even have benefits, then you can't set aside the money 0:07:51.400 --> 0:07:53.120 that you need in the long term to take care 0:07:53.160 --> 0:07:58.440 of things like your health or for retirement. So can you, 0:07:58.680 --> 0:08:01.920 um give a bit more detail on that statement? So 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:06.800 what exactly is the job market or the employment benefits 0:08:06.840 --> 0:08:10.440 that most millennials have encountered, and how did they differ 0:08:10.640 --> 0:08:15.360 from generations previously. I think the millennial generation is much 0:08:15.400 --> 0:08:18.760 more hyper aware of the jobs that we've seen a 0:08:18.760 --> 0:08:22.000 lot of economic coverage of the gig economy or or 0:08:22.040 --> 0:08:25.320 you know, you have these really tenuous circumstances where you're 0:08:25.400 --> 0:08:28.840 essentially given full time hours without any benefits or permanancing. 0:08:29.200 --> 0:08:31.240 You know, if you are laid off, there's no such 0:08:31.280 --> 0:08:33.360 thing as severance, or you know, a period where you 0:08:33.400 --> 0:08:36.800 have health benefits for a week or two, and then there's, 0:08:36.840 --> 0:08:41.400 like I said, no defined contributions to pensions or investments, 0:08:41.880 --> 0:08:46.760 and there's no offset for or contribution to health and 0:08:47.120 --> 0:08:50.600 health insurance or other benefits. And so all of those 0:08:50.600 --> 0:08:53.880 costs are put on the millennials themselves, everything from you know, 0:08:54.000 --> 0:08:56.680 basic things like gym memberships all the way to health 0:08:56.679 --> 0:08:59.080 savings plans. They don't get any of those cumulative benefits 0:08:59.120 --> 0:09:03.720 from stable employment and uh financial security. And then on 0:09:03.800 --> 0:09:05.679 top of that, you know, this is the start I 0:09:05.720 --> 0:09:08.680 would say, of a very noticeable year over year increase 0:09:08.720 --> 0:09:13.360 in terms of the cost of education and health, especially 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:16.400 in the United States, but in other countries as well, 0:09:16.640 --> 0:09:19.160 where you're seeing I think from the period in which 0:09:19.200 --> 0:09:21.079 I graduated, and I checked this right before coming in 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:23.880 just in Canada, which you know has a much higher 0:09:24.000 --> 0:09:27.040 tax base and is seen as a much more affordable place, 0:09:27.200 --> 0:09:30.720 yet higher education, the cost of tuition at the undergraduate 0:09:30.800 --> 0:09:33.439 level for a domestic tuition has risen anywhere from thirty 0:09:33.480 --> 0:09:37.360 to in ten years. So one of the things that's 0:09:37.400 --> 0:09:40.520 become something of a trope is this notion of millennials 0:09:40.559 --> 0:09:47.160 as entitled, ungrateful workers in the office. Is it possible 0:09:47.440 --> 0:09:50.280 that instead of just being you know, spoiled and entitled, 0:09:50.559 --> 0:09:53.040 that what a lot of them are actually asking for 0:09:53.120 --> 0:09:56.880 are things that the previous generation was given without asking 0:09:56.920 --> 0:10:00.840 for explicitly, I'm always really interested in question those statements 0:10:00.840 --> 0:10:03.200 and the specific of those statements in terms of what 0:10:03.360 --> 0:10:06.880 is entitlement when it comes to circumstances, because I think 0:10:06.960 --> 0:10:10.160 even in terms of the conversation regarding treatment of women 0:10:10.160 --> 0:10:13.200 in the workforce, you know, some of those demands or 0:10:13.280 --> 0:10:15.680 requests in terms of we would like to not be 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:18.440 sexually harassed at work, we would like equal pay, we 0:10:18.440 --> 0:10:21.920 would like to consider, you know, policies regarding maternity leave. 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:25.800 The people making those policy decisions and workplace, you know, 0:10:25.920 --> 0:10:29.720 employment decisions can argue that these are entitlements or or 0:10:29.760 --> 0:10:33.000 attitudes of entitlements, but it's also in terms of what 0:10:33.040 --> 0:10:36.240 we know the demands that millennials are asking for in 0:10:36.320 --> 0:10:41.120 terms of things like contracts that are very clear regarding diversity, 0:10:41.160 --> 0:10:44.560 pay gaps. Uh, you know, severance if someone is laid off, 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:48.640 especially in industries where layoffs are incredibly common and have 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:52.319 happened in huge waves. I'm really interested in who defines 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:55.520 these entitlements, like who are the financial writers, who are 0:10:55.840 --> 0:10:58.720 who is saying these statements in the press and saying 0:10:58.720 --> 0:11:01.960 these millennials are entitled. It's usually you know, people who 0:11:02.000 --> 0:11:04.200 feel like they have been mistreated in the workforce, and 0:11:04.200 --> 0:11:06.720 that mistreatment needs to continue to happen. You know that 0:11:06.760 --> 0:11:10.000 they survived that mistreatment to get to where they are. Uh. 0:11:10.040 --> 0:11:13.959 And there's a level of Stockholm syndrome that they survived 0:11:13.960 --> 0:11:16.439 a kind of hazing for for lack of a better term, 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:21.480 and there's this fear that they didn't survive that mistreatment 0:11:21.880 --> 0:11:24.800 for their own benefit, and you know that there's a 0:11:24.880 --> 0:11:28.760 duty to continue that. Going back to is you point 0:11:28.760 --> 0:11:31.679 out there's all these costs. There's a sort of too 0:11:31.720 --> 0:11:34.040 a couple from an economic standpoint, There's a couple of 0:11:34.080 --> 0:11:36.560 things that, as you put it, have characterized this generation. 0:11:36.600 --> 0:11:40.240 There's the financial procarity, the labor market, and then also 0:11:40.600 --> 0:11:43.880 just all these added costs that have been put onto 0:11:44.040 --> 0:11:48.000 millennials in terms of healthcare, paying for their education and 0:11:48.040 --> 0:11:50.880 so forth. And what I'm curious about, and what I'm 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:53.920 always trying to wrap my head around, is to what 0:11:54.080 --> 0:11:58.400 degree does this change financial behavior? Is such that even 0:11:58.440 --> 0:12:01.280 if one is in the position where they're able to 0:12:01.320 --> 0:12:04.360 build up savings, even if they're in the position where 0:12:04.679 --> 0:12:07.480 they have a good paying job they could easily cover 0:12:07.520 --> 0:12:12.200 their rent, etcetera, that changes their willingness to say invest 0:12:12.360 --> 0:12:15.920 or they're spending decisions because there's so much uncertainty. If 0:12:15.960 --> 0:12:18.600 they have a health crisis, then that will cause their 0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:21.720 um you know, that will deplete their savings, and it's 0:12:21.760 --> 0:12:24.720 sort of unwillingness to make the same like sort of 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:29.040 savings and investment choices of someone from a previous generation 0:12:29.320 --> 0:12:32.160 who may have also been in the same economic situation. 0:12:32.600 --> 0:12:34.840 I think you're starting to see a lot of mimicking 0:12:35.080 --> 0:12:37.680 that unfortunately happened on Wall Street and this hyper focus 0:12:37.679 --> 0:12:41.199 on the short term gains. I mean, there's endless jokes 0:12:41.240 --> 0:12:44.400 regarding self care and the millennial spending on self care 0:12:44.600 --> 0:12:48.680 or tourism. You know, all these derogatory statements regarding how 0:12:48.760 --> 0:12:52.280 much millennials spend on eating out or coffees and things 0:12:52.280 --> 0:12:54.600 like that. But I think it's a reflection of what 0:12:54.720 --> 0:12:56.840 has happened on Wall Street for decades, which is this 0:12:56.920 --> 0:13:00.640 hyper focus on the short term gains and in it 0:13:00.679 --> 0:13:04.280 benefits rather than long term sustainability. And so if Wall 0:13:04.280 --> 0:13:06.400 Street is teaching this to everyone that is really about 0:13:06.480 --> 0:13:10.520 quarterly returns, and we're an earning seasons right now, then 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:13.559 why would the millennial generation be inclined to think anything 0:13:13.600 --> 0:13:17.520 differently when everything is about cost of good sold, right 0:13:17.559 --> 0:13:20.040 And it's the same thing when you think about reducing 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:22.240 your expenses, you know, on a day to day basis, 0:13:22.280 --> 0:13:25.319 if I'm hyper focused on reducing my expenses, then I'm 0:13:25.320 --> 0:13:28.800 going to think about not necessarily, you know, rather than 0:13:28.840 --> 0:13:31.440 setting aside money because I need that money to reduce 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:34.080 my expenses right now. So I think that that's one 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:35.920 of the things that I think has been a big 0:13:35.960 --> 0:13:39.120 picture trend that people really forget these are financial lessons 0:13:39.120 --> 0:13:41.840 because financial literacy is not necessarily a core component and 0:13:41.880 --> 0:13:44.360 say high school and middle school education, especially in the 0:13:44.400 --> 0:13:47.080 United States, you know, where else are you getting these 0:13:47.080 --> 0:13:49.400 financial lessons? And then I also want to remind people 0:13:49.440 --> 0:13:53.800 that for better for worse, like reducing pay inequality, especially 0:13:53.800 --> 0:13:57.640 among women and visible minorities, increases the cost of good sold. 0:13:57.840 --> 0:14:01.839 Like there's no inclination if Wall Street is not inclined 0:14:02.280 --> 0:14:05.400 to reduce these pay gaps and increase you know, say, 0:14:05.840 --> 0:14:09.760 employee satisfaction or with these benefits, because that is not 0:14:10.160 --> 0:14:13.480 what corporate finance teaches in NBA programs, because it increases 0:14:13.520 --> 0:14:16.400 cost of good sold. And that's something like when I 0:14:16.440 --> 0:14:20.280 was really listening to U Karen's episode regarding the ethnography 0:14:20.360 --> 0:14:22.720 of Wall Street, especially prior to the crash, like right now, 0:14:23.040 --> 0:14:26.920 this hyper focus, especially in tech, right especially when you're 0:14:26.960 --> 0:14:30.800 incentivizing paying people in stock rather than in money that 0:14:30.800 --> 0:14:32.840 they can take home right away in their salaries and 0:14:32.840 --> 0:14:35.720 benefits they're going to incentivize, like I said, also these 0:14:35.720 --> 0:14:39.960 short term behaviors that reduce expenses and uh. And also 0:14:40.000 --> 0:14:42.440 they're going to make decisions that are not necessarily in 0:14:42.520 --> 0:14:45.160 the long term interests of both themselves and then the corporation. 0:15:02.800 --> 0:15:06.200 I definitely feel like one of the big I'm not 0:15:06.280 --> 0:15:09.400 sure if it's political per se, but one of the 0:15:09.440 --> 0:15:11.760 big things that we know about sort of younger generations, 0:15:11.760 --> 0:15:15.400 whether it's millennial or maybe gen z as well, is 0:15:15.400 --> 0:15:19.600 a significant focus and concern about climate and climate change 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:22.800 more than previous generations, and something I've always wondered about 0:15:22.840 --> 0:15:25.760 and I'm curious your take on it is, does the 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:29.520 sense of impending doom that is a growing, a growing 0:15:29.560 --> 0:15:33.920 sense I think among many people in your view change behaviors, 0:15:33.960 --> 0:15:36.400 and that if someone says, like, Okay, well, you know, 0:15:36.600 --> 0:15:39.840 you invest in this four oh one K and maybe 0:15:39.840 --> 0:15:43.320 your twenty five, and you retire at sixty, so it's like, Okay, 0:15:43.320 --> 0:15:45.560 you're not gonna be able to touch it for forty years. 0:15:46.160 --> 0:15:49.200 Put backs out your four oh one K. I'm curious 0:15:49.200 --> 0:15:52.800 whether this growing sense of climate doom in your view 0:15:52.920 --> 0:15:56.160 changes the calculus about whether even a forty year weight 0:15:56.520 --> 0:16:00.200 on an investment vehicle is makes sense. I think it's 0:16:00.280 --> 0:16:04.480 one of several factors. I think, even before our understanding 0:16:04.520 --> 0:16:08.840 of how climate change will affect the likelihood that this 0:16:08.920 --> 0:16:11.480 generation will be able to retire or or set these 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:14.000 benchmarks for how much of their income they're supposed to 0:16:14.040 --> 0:16:17.920 set aside for various investments, there's the basic fact that 0:16:18.800 --> 0:16:21.160 there is still the day to day of like credit 0:16:21.160 --> 0:16:25.560 card bills, student loans, your monthly rent, buying basic groceries. 0:16:25.760 --> 0:16:28.600 Those are still day to day concerns or monthly concerns 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:32.400 long before investments that millennials are trying to stay above 0:16:32.480 --> 0:16:36.720 water for. And unfortunately, like credit card companies do not 0:16:36.920 --> 0:16:40.160 care about the impending climate crisis. They care if you 0:16:40.200 --> 0:16:42.520 are late on your credit card payments or your student 0:16:42.520 --> 0:16:45.720 loan payments, right like Navigant does not care if you 0:16:45.800 --> 0:16:49.400 are anxious through the roof and are trying to pay 0:16:49.480 --> 0:16:52.360 out of pocket for therapy or medications in order to 0:16:52.440 --> 0:16:55.480 deal with, you know, this climate crisis. They care if 0:16:55.520 --> 0:16:58.320 you're making your student loan payments on time for an 0:16:58.440 --> 0:17:01.080 education that is right now very difficult to get a 0:17:01.200 --> 0:17:03.840 job for. I read a report this morning from CNBC 0:17:03.920 --> 0:17:06.680 talking about the inverted deal curve. You know, all these 0:17:06.680 --> 0:17:10.639 economic indicators are saying right now people are girding themselves 0:17:10.640 --> 0:17:15.199 for a recession. So millennials, regardless of even thinking about retirement, 0:17:15.240 --> 0:17:16.919 they're just worried about the fact that if they can 0:17:17.000 --> 0:17:19.840 even get a new job or keep their current job 0:17:19.960 --> 0:17:23.560 right now, Like, the problem is this generation is burdened 0:17:23.600 --> 0:17:27.920 by so many other legitimate concerns in regards to these 0:17:28.000 --> 0:17:31.679 economic factors, and if they'll be able to afford getting married, 0:17:31.800 --> 0:17:34.520 buying a home having children. Right. There was another report 0:17:34.600 --> 0:17:36.879 over the weekend from the New York Times estimating the 0:17:36.920 --> 0:17:39.679 cost of a child at two hundred thousand dollars. You know, 0:17:39.760 --> 0:17:41.760 I'm at the perfect age where I have to consider 0:17:42.359 --> 0:17:44.760 egg freezing or you know, if I'm going to use 0:17:44.760 --> 0:17:47.800 that money for a work visa, like all of these things, 0:17:48.359 --> 0:17:52.080 and so there's that combination. But it's just unfortunately another 0:17:52.640 --> 0:17:55.359 thing on top of the pile in terms of climate change. 0:17:55.400 --> 0:17:57.280 But I think that's a huge concern. It's just like 0:17:58.040 --> 0:18:01.040 I've seen several jokes on Twitter saying, do I really 0:18:01.080 --> 0:18:03.840 have to put aside money for retirement? Like who knows 0:18:04.000 --> 0:18:06.040 if if we're even going to have a planet, if 0:18:06.080 --> 0:18:08.479 everyone's trying to boost up and go to Mars, if 0:18:08.640 --> 0:18:11.760 all the rich people are investing in Mars, one ticket, 0:18:12.359 --> 0:18:15.800 gotta gotta save up for a ticket to mark Um. 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:18.040 I feel kind of bad asking this question because you 0:18:18.119 --> 0:18:21.439 just laid out a whole host of economic anxieties for millennials. 0:18:21.480 --> 0:18:25.160 But I'm curious it does the bowl market that we've 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:28.879 basically seen for the past ten years in stocks and 0:18:28.920 --> 0:18:32.639 a bunch of other assets, does that factor into or 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:37.880 offset any of the reluctance of millennials to actually invest, 0:18:37.960 --> 0:18:41.400 because year after year after year, for the most part, 0:18:41.920 --> 0:18:44.919 have they just invested in an index fund PEG to 0:18:44.920 --> 0:18:48.040 the SMP five hundred, they would have made a decent return. 0:18:48.200 --> 0:18:51.440 Is there not a sort of fear of missing out 0:18:52.160 --> 0:18:55.920 among some millennials or are they just so overwhelmed with 0:18:56.200 --> 0:18:59.560 their other economic needs that it doesn't even come into play. 0:19:00.440 --> 0:19:02.520 So I preface this by saying, I'm the child of 0:19:02.560 --> 0:19:05.320 two bankers who worked for TD for twenty years each. 0:19:05.560 --> 0:19:07.880 I am literally the perfect example of someone who grew 0:19:07.960 --> 0:19:11.320 up with financial literacy from birth. If you're saying, you know, 0:19:11.359 --> 0:19:14.560 with the bull market, I was, I chose an industry. 0:19:14.640 --> 0:19:18.520 Unfortunately that I was not given the breathing room to 0:19:18.600 --> 0:19:21.720 continue to either have a savings cushion or add to 0:19:21.760 --> 0:19:24.439 that savings cushion during the period of the bull market. 0:19:24.560 --> 0:19:26.520 You know, to invest in the bull market, you have 0:19:26.600 --> 0:19:29.600 to have capital in order to put in and if 0:19:29.640 --> 0:19:33.159 we've seen continuously, the millennial generation does not have this 0:19:33.320 --> 0:19:36.360 excess capital either. They could not access the loans. They 0:19:36.359 --> 0:19:40.280 were either discriminated against, especially if there were women and minorities, 0:19:40.400 --> 0:19:43.719 for accessing these loans for mortgages, personal finance or they 0:19:43.720 --> 0:19:47.480 were charged significantly more for car loans and education and 0:19:47.760 --> 0:19:51.359 personal finance loans. Then there's the fact that they started 0:19:51.359 --> 0:19:53.880 off with education loans and they couldn't immediately pay them 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:56.639 off in the first five to ten years following graduation 0:19:56.680 --> 0:19:59.440 the same way that previous generations could, even with gen 0:19:59.640 --> 0:20:02.200 X is experience of their own recession, right with the 0:20:02.240 --> 0:20:04.800 dot com boone in the nineties. Then there's also the 0:20:04.800 --> 0:20:07.159 fact that you're just like crawling yourself out of that 0:20:07.240 --> 0:20:10.320 hole over and over again. And so even the bullmarket, 0:20:10.359 --> 0:20:13.840 it's really about watching which organizations continue to look for 0:20:13.880 --> 0:20:18.960 efficiencies and either crawling back pay raises or in terms 0:20:19.000 --> 0:20:22.480 of new hiring or even benefits. Right there was continuous 0:20:22.760 --> 0:20:26.320 union busting or in terms of reducing the portion of 0:20:26.359 --> 0:20:30.320 benefits everything from define pension plans and to find benefits 0:20:30.440 --> 0:20:33.120 or even the contributions that they were making too four 0:20:33.160 --> 0:20:36.639 O one case, and the Canadian and UK equivalents imagined 0:20:36.720 --> 0:20:40.240 someone listening to this, maybe their gen X, not me, 0:20:40.800 --> 0:20:43.040 but you know someone maybe they're a little older gen X, 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:47.040 or maybe they're a boomer, and the millennials, it's like, yeah, 0:20:47.200 --> 0:20:49.439 there's all this stuff that's been difficult for them, But 0:20:49.520 --> 0:20:52.640 we had our own difficulty. You we had like inflation 0:20:52.720 --> 0:20:55.320 in the seventies, we were terrified of the Cold War 0:20:55.600 --> 0:20:57.719 and we had to duck and cover, and we were 0:20:57.760 --> 0:21:01.800 worried about a nuclear bomb annihilated the world. They would say, like, 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:04.280 we had all kinds of things, you know, we had 0:21:04.280 --> 0:21:06.840 our own issues, We had our own college costs to 0:21:06.880 --> 0:21:09.679 deal with whatever it is. What are the sort of 0:21:09.800 --> 0:21:12.600 data points that you look at, They would say, yes, 0:21:12.760 --> 0:21:17.280 of course every generation has its anxieties, but substantively, this 0:21:17.359 --> 0:21:20.119 is how why millennials like really did start deeper in 0:21:20.400 --> 0:21:23.880 a whole than other generations. So I think going back 0:21:23.920 --> 0:21:27.880 to the subject of capital um and capital investments, so 0:21:28.280 --> 0:21:30.000 to go back to the Boomer generation and even to 0:21:30.040 --> 0:21:32.959 a small degree, Gen X, the boomers could access capital, 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:36.199 whether it be through wealth building, through real estate, and 0:21:36.240 --> 0:21:40.520 as well in terms of there's intellectual capital through education, 0:21:40.680 --> 0:21:45.120 those definitive costs, and remember using the concept of compound interest, 0:21:45.640 --> 0:21:49.159 they were able to benefit in a multi decade experience 0:21:49.160 --> 0:21:51.719 in the way that the millennials will never have. And 0:21:51.760 --> 0:21:55.040 the Cold War is a real concern, right like nuclear 0:21:55.240 --> 0:21:57.600 disaster is a real concern. The problem is it's the 0:21:57.640 --> 0:22:00.000 millennial generation that has to deal with you know, say 0:21:59.880 --> 0:22:02.200 the toxic pool of waste right now in the Marshall 0:22:02.200 --> 0:22:05.679 Islands that could be uncovered due to climate change, and 0:22:05.840 --> 0:22:07.879 gen Z to a larger degree will also have to 0:22:07.880 --> 0:22:11.120 deal with this. And so it's the wealth that boomers, 0:22:11.200 --> 0:22:14.119 especially white boomers in several countries, have been able to 0:22:14.119 --> 0:22:17.159 build up and benefit from compound interest, whether it be 0:22:17.240 --> 0:22:23.080 through capital investments in property and in uh financial investments. 0:22:23.400 --> 0:22:25.800 They had the excess capital in order to invest in 0:22:25.840 --> 0:22:28.600 the bowl market over the last decade and benefit from 0:22:28.640 --> 0:22:32.200 those gains. And then they were able to also benefit 0:22:32.240 --> 0:22:34.560 from the low cost of education, right like my mother 0:22:34.640 --> 0:22:38.200 talks about going to university for the cost of a car. 0:22:39.040 --> 0:22:41.520