The housing crisis, the economy, and Gen. X

I may be weird (I freely admit it) but I found this article about how Gen X is, in some ways, responsible for the economic meltdown to be pretty interesting.

(Disclaimer: I'm a Gen X-er whose parents are still together, as are my husband's). (Though I did let myself in with a key starting in 5th grade)

My summation from quotes from the article:

"What this seems to mean is that the collective feeling was, basically: screw stocks, invest in a home, pay for it when you get back on your feet. This seemed like a no-brainer for phoenix-like Gen-Xers. After all, in spite of the pronouncement of a much-cited 2004 study of generational differences that Gen-X "went through its all-important, formative years as one of the least parented, least nurtured generations in U.S. history" — and that half of all Gen-X children's families split, and forty percent were latchkey kids — we'd always not only landed on our feet, but kicked some serious booty, too.........""Evidently, we were so sure of our own phoenix-like capabilities that it didn't strike us as odd that the banks should be so magically sure of us too.
In a Psychology 101 way, it kind of makes sense. One of the notorious legacies of Generation X's home-alone childhood is an abiding suspicion of authority. All this has been well-documented, i.e. we hate ass-kissing the boss, so just let us do our thing because we rock as self-starters. But when the whole house bubble started to swell, the dynamic shifted: Enter the banks, as approving parents.

They gave us a home! It's almost as if we became giddy children, finally getting the apology and consolation prize we'd always secretly hoped for: You didn't get a real home as a kid, but you worked hard, succeeded on your own steam, and now we're going to give it to you and your children. The 1980, 1990, and 2000 GSSes reflected our self-satisfaction. A whopping 66.4 percent of Generation X affirmed the statement: "People get ahead through hard work, not luck."

The Economy

LOL at this post from The Mommy Blog about explaining the economy to a kid:


Tuesday, November 18, 2008 Family
So there I was, in the kitchen, explaining the economic downturn to a 10 year old.
And boy, are my arms tired!
What are you people telling your kids about the financial crisis? Any of it sticking? I was having the hardest time explaining why the simple solutions my kid was coming up with—while insightful—wouldn’t do jack.
“But why can’t we just fix it? Why can’t you just go out and get a job?” Wait—that was last month’s question. And the previous month’s.
“But why can’t we just fix it? Why can’t the government just make more money if everyone needs it?”
“Well, sweetie, if you flood the market—with money, or gas, or marbles—suddenly the value of that item goes down. Then you’ve created an inflation problem. Usually we see inflation in the form of gas prices, which were artificially jacked up, but it can also happen with a sudden and significant influx of cash.” I actually said “influx of cash” without laughing my head off.
“But why can’t they just fix it?”
“Because it’s the economy, not a wand. If it were that easy, people way smarter than us would have already solved it and we wouldn’t even be talking about the price of marbles.” Ever.
“But I don’t get why they can’t help.”
“You mean like they helped the failing banks? Like that? Well, sweetheart, people way greedier than us put one over on the rest of the world. And the government is helping. A LOT. But that doesn’t just come out of thin air, it comes out of our taxes.”
“WHAT?”
“What did you think we paid taxes for? It costs money to run a government and to serve five hundred dollar bottles of wine at a dinner party for world leaders meeting to discuss the crisis. Taxes and the redistribution of them are helping us get by right now. Without taxes, there’s no unemployment benefits and no free school lunch program.
“Let me put it this way: let’s say you had five apples, and the lunch lady wasn’t there to set everything up. You could probably sell those apples for twenty bucks apiece because everyone would want one.” And they’d pay it too, with all the pocket money or gold bars kids in this neighborhood seem to have access to. Better yet, do you take American Express? “But if you had a thousand apples, you might get twenty apiece for the first couple sales, but then people would notice that big stack of apples behind you and wait until the price came down. And you’d lower it in a hurry to sell all those apples before they went bad. In fact, at some point you’ll be thinking about paying kids to take them away because you don’t want a great, stinking, rotting pile of apples left over. That’s because people would buy what they need and then walk away. Once they don’t need your apples, you’ll be dropping that price like a To-Do List just to make a few more sales.”
At this point, his eyes were kind of drifting over my shoulder to the opposite wall where he could see the reflection of Flapjack in a framed print behind us. So I continued, “And that’s when my leg fell off and I had to staple it back on.”
“What?”
“Hellooo. You just stopped listening. I was talking about supply and demand and apples.”
“Oh. Why would I sell apples?”