• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Ask Liz Weston

Get smart with your money

  • About
  • Liz’s Books
  • Speaking
  • Disclosure
  • Contact

baby boomers

3 steps to keep ‘solo agers’ happier and safer

July 16, 2019 By Liz Weston

Retirement coach Sara Zeff Geber visited several Northern California assisted living facilities to interview “solo agers” — people, either single or coupled, who don’t have children to help them as they grow older.

At many facilities, she couldn’t find any. That puzzled her until she realized that adult children are often the ones pushing the move into long-term care facilities.

“Who is it that gets mom or dad to move out of the two-story, single-family home?” says Geber, founder of LifeEncore coaching service in Santa Rosa, California. “The kids badger and cajole.”

In my latest for the Associated Press, how ‘solo agers’ can protect themselves and live a happy life on their own.

Filed Under: Liz's Blog Tagged With: aging, assisted living, baby boomers, solo agers

Friday’s need-to-know money news

October 7, 2016 By Liz Weston

o-CREDIT-REPORT-facebookToday’s top story: How to buy your kid a good credit score. Also in the news: What keeps us awake at night, what low-income families lose by not having bank accounts, and finance lessons Baby Boomers could learn from Millennials.

How to Buy Your Kid a Good Credit Score for $200
Starting them off on the right foot.

Money, Safety and Privacy Keep Us Awake at Night
What we worry about when we try to sleep.

Low-Income Families Are Most Likely to Skip the Bank Account — and Pay the Price
Losing interest and protection.

5 Finance Lessons Baby Boomers Could Learn From Millennials
Taking advice.

Filed Under: Liz's Blog Tagged With: baby boomers, Credit, Credit Score, financial advice, kids and money, millennials, money worries

Your post-holiday financial recovery plan

December 30, 2015 By Liz Weston

best-credit-cards-for-holiday-shopping-2013Holiday overindulgence can lead to throbbing heads, expanded waistlines — and piles of credit card bills. In my latest for MoneyWatch, some suggestions for getting back on track if you overdid it on the holiday spending.

In my latest for Time, a look at what Baby Boomers should do with their finances as they approach 70.

Filed Under: Liz's Blog Tagged With: baby boomers, credit card bills, Credit Cards

Friday’s need-to-know money news

June 5, 2015 By Liz Weston

taxesToday’s top story: How to save money on your taxes by deducting work-related expenses. Also in the news: Learning about financial therapy, decreasing credit card limits, and financial advice for baby boomers.

How IRS Form 2106 Can Save You Money on Taxes
Deducting the work expenses your employer doesn’t cover.

What You Should Know About Financial Therapy
Getting to the deeper root of money issues.

The Average Credit Card Limit Is Dropping: What It Means for You
Lower limits across the board.

Five Easy Pieces of Financial Advice for Baby Boomers
Planning for the road ahead.

5 Reasons Every Boomer Should Stick to a Budget
More important now more than ever.

Filed Under: Liz's Blog Tagged With: baby boomers, budgets, Credit Cards, credit limits, financial therapy, tax deductions

Wednesday’s need-to-know money news

May 13, 2015 By Liz Weston

Zemanta Related Posts ThumbnailToday’s top story: The right way to close a credit card. Also in the news: Financial tools you no longer need, determining how much college tuition you can afford, and how baby boomers can survive retirement.

What’s the Right Way to Close a Credit Card?
How you say goodbye matters.

5 Financial Tools You No Longer Need
Some of these may surprise you.

How Much Tuition Can You Really Afford?
Time for a reality check.

How Boomers Can Avoid Going Bust in Retirement
There’s still time to get your act together.

Filed Under: Liz's Blog Tagged With: baby boomers, college tuition, Credit Cards, financial tools, Retirement

Why millennials aren’t saving

November 10, 2014 By Liz Weston

DrowningSavings rates for adults under 35 plunged from 5 percent in 2009 to a negative 2 percent, according to Moody’s Analytics, and the consequences are potentially huge. Here’s how a Wall Street Journal writer put it:

“A lack of savings increases the vulnerability of young workers in the postrecession economy, leaving many without a financial cushion for unexpected expenses, raising the difficulty of job transitions and leaving them further away from goals like eventual homeownership—let alone retirement….Those who don’t save are unlikely to be wealthy in the future, meaning American angst over wealth inequality seems poised to persist if most millennials are unable to save or choose not to.”

Unfortunately, the two “real people” quoted in the story both have college educations and decent jobs. The first has credit card debt (a synonym for “frivolous spending”) and would rather spend on “her social life and travel” while the second finds investments “too complicated.” These two reinforce the narrative that the only reason people don’t save is because they don’t want to.

In reality, most people under 35 don’t have a college degree. They have a higher unemployment rate than their elders and much smaller incomes–the median for households headed by someone under 35 was $35,300 in 2013, down from $37,600 in 2010. As the WSJ article notes, wages for those 35 and under have fallen 9 percent, in inflation-adjusted terms, since 1995.

(Millennials, by the way, also don’t have much credit card debt. In the 2010 survey, the latest for which age breakdowns are available, fewer than 40 percent of under-35 households carried credit card balances, and the median amount owed was $1,600.)

Saving on small incomes is, of course, possible–and essential if you ever hope to get ahead. But any discussion of savings among the young should acknowledge how much harder it is to do in an era of falling incomes. Today’s millennials have it tougher than Generation X did at their age, and way, way tougher than the Baby Boomers. It may comfort older, wealthier Americans to imagine the younger generation is just more frivolous. But that does a disservice to millennials, and to our understanding of the real causes of wealth inequality.

 

 

 

Filed Under: Liz's Blog Tagged With: baby boomers, falling incomes, generation x, incomes, millennials, net worth, Savings, savings rates, wealth, wealth inequality

  • Page 1
  • Page 2
  • Go to Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

Search

Copyright © 2025 · Ask Liz Weston 2.0 On Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in