But they do seem to be going for the Restoration Hardware et.al. fake antique, the industrial chic (freight carts as coffee tables, plumbing pipes as bookshelves, etc.)

 

https://www.marketplace.org/2017/08/15/business/one-vintage-thing-that-doesnt-appeal-millennials-furniture

Edited December 5, 20178 yr by Ron Dudelston
tags added

My heart bleeds for those poor millenials. NOT

 

 

20 minutes ago, Gene Howe said:

My heart bleeds for those poor millenials. NOT

 

 

Gene, your son is on the phone, he says he wants to move back home.   But just for "a little while." 

1 hour ago, kmealy said:

Gene, your son is on the phone, he says he wants to move back home.   But just for "a little while." 

He must have the wrong number. 

Put a touchscreen on the old stuff and see what happens.

16 hours ago, Gene Howe said:

My heart bleeds for those poor millenials. NOT

 

 

 

Hey Gene, you got to remember that they will be deciding which nursing home you end up in!

 

Since my wife & I "delayed" kids, we have two that are smack in the middle of the millenials (28 & 25).  True enough, they both see most things very differently from me.  I do not know if they are "normal" for that generation, heck - I do not know that I am "normal" for being smack in the middle of the baby boom generation (I am thinking not).  I do know this, I thought about things very differently from my parents.  And in all seriousness, along with my brothers and sister, we are right now wrestling with how and what best can we do for our mother as she is having great difficulty taking care of herself.

 

Back to the kids - mobility is the key.  They have "career paths" - but have no expectation of being able to stay in one job/one location/one employer from now to retirement.  That right there is such a different mindset.  I can repeat it.  I can understand what they are saying.  I still have difficulty grasping the whole concept and the ramifications.  My mindset in my 20's was to find stable employment to last a career.  I might move a few times, but it would be with the same company and once "settled in" I anticipated staying put until retirement.  I anticipated my retirement income to be what my employer provided plus whatever I might be able to sock away in an IRA.  A lot of companies do not even offer a retirement package any longer.  With the exception of manufacturing, many companies do not even hire long term.  As a result, your "retirement years" depend entirely upon your ability and smarts to get a good IRA going and hope like heck the market never "corrects".  During that 2007-2008 "correction" my IRA lost about 50%.  If I were totally dependent upon that, I would have been pretty "upset".  That is just retirement.  Throw in health insurance stuff when you have to be mobile.  Throw in long term debt repayment, etc.  They live in a very different world than the one we inherited.  Not of their choosing, the world we are living in today was due to our (baby boomers) choices.

 

Off my soapbox...

Cal

Oh, how I could tell you some stories...

 

Don't show up for work, on-time, because they were tired and couldn't get out of bed.

Couldn't be bothered with staff meetings because they had other "things to do", instead.

"I don't work for you", ah, no, but YOUR boss does...

On and on...

 

No concept of saving money...everything was immediate gratification. No contributions to a 401k where the company LITERALLY match the first 7% of whatever percentage was contributed.  Contribute 10% of your salary a year and they would match 70% of that amount.  It was FREE money and they had no interest!

 

I have a very impressive 6 figure fund of company match money sitting in my 401K. All because I gave up a little money up front.

no idea about delayed gratification.  2 day wait for something?  that seems like a long time to them.

 

save money to buy a hand crafted item from a skilled woodworker?  eh, just check the Ikea website for something similar, have a "put it together party" with your friends, try not to destroy it before the night is over.

 

learn design and joinery?  why, they'll just push a button on an app and things will somehow arrive on time via a large truck from "somewhere"

 

hand select wood for a project?  why, just use "distressed" wood from some old pallets, no finishing required, and when you grow tired of it, you are only into it for $2 worth of screws, to the curb it goes.

 

and on and on.....

for many years, i did without.  lived simply, didn't buy too many "toys", saved money on a regular basis.

 

do that for many years, and one day, when you get laid off at 45, you can look around, consider things, and decide that tomorrow is a good day to retire.

 

that happened 8-1/2 years ago.  i'm still here, bills are still paid on time, and i'm my own boss.  haven't made a dime doing woodworking, but enjoy it anyway.

1 hour ago, schnewj said:

Oh, how I could tell you some stories...

 

Don't show up for work, on-time, because they were tired and couldn't get out of bed.

Couldn't be bothered with staff meetings because they had other "things to do", instead.

"I don't work for you", ah, no, but YOUR boss does...

Yep, yep, & more yep...spent more time dealing with this petty stuff than performing my assigned job...a totally different mindset.

Actually as I think about the M group not liking the old stuff, I consider that good news. The prices on these items have really skyrocketed due to demand. Maybe if a bunch of folks don't buy the prices will come back down to where folks besides Warren Buffet can afford them.

3 hours ago, clhyer said:

They have "career paths" - but have no expectation of being able to stay in one job/one location/one employer from now to retirement.

Yes, but that whole "you won't stay in one job" was started by the big businesses, NOT by the employees.   Now, with outsourcing and off-shoring of jobs you never know if you will have a job tomorrow or not so you best be able to pack up and move cities/states to find  new work; therefore who wants to take a chance setting down roots and trying to buy a house (unless you're stupid rich)? 

 

For my kids it's keep your skills current and your resume hot off the press updated.

2 hours ago, DAB said:

you are only into it for $2 worth of screws

Yeah, but that's only for furniture.   Save the nails for chairs. 

more than once i've posted a pic of something i've made for our house.  last i recall it was our coffee table.  white oak, 48"x18", about 18" high, lower shelf and 2 dovetailed drawers.  beautiful piece.  all traditional mortise and tenon joinery.  several hundred dollars of lumber alone before i started cutting.

 

and someone would comment, "nice work, how much?"  and i'd tell them i'd start talking to you at around $4k.......oh...well, thanks.....

 

have a nice trip to Ikea, support those swedish guys, not us American guys!

 

4 hours ago, clhyer said:

 

  They have "career paths" - but have no expectation of being able to stay in one job/one location/one employer from now to retirement.  That right there is such a different mindset.  I can repeat it.  I can understand what they are saying.  I still have difficulty grasping the whole concept and the ramifications.  My mindset in my 20's was to find stable employment to last a career.  I might move a few times, but it would be with the same company and once "settled in" I anticipated staying put until retirement.  I anticipated my retirement income to be what my employer provided plus whatever I might be able to sock away in an IRA.  A lot of companies do not even offer a retirement package any longer.  With the exception of manufacturing, many companies do not even hire long term.  As a result, your "retirement years" depend entirely upon your ability and smarts to get a good IRA going

 

I am now retired and have reached SSA's FRA. 

 

The concept of lifetime employment was  never even a consideration for me. starting in 1974.  Not only was it not necessarily good for my career (think technology and wage stagnation) but companies I worked for would have regular lay-offs, or maybe worse, put you into a dead-end job.   So the street went both ways.  We were as loyal to them as they were to us, maybe more so.

 

I had a 401(k) with no company contribution (always promised a match, depending upon corporate profit, but because it was a privately held company,, they could determine what the profit was.) 

 

My wife's last job was at an insurance company that was 30 years behind times.   Lots of lifers there, but every few years, they'd change the retirement benefits.   We get about enough to cover our health insurance.

 

One of my uncles was a union steelworker.  Not only are those type of benefits gone, so is the job.   When I'd visit home in the '80s they were shuttering the mills left and right and many people had no job nor a good prospect for one, having always done the same thing for the same company in the same industry.