[quote=flyer]I think it’s very hard to generalize about any particular generation, so I’ll share a little about my own life experience as a Boomer (and similar to most I know) only to help dispel common misconceptions about my generation.
As mentioned before, both my parents (whom, contrary to many comments here, I wanted to be exactly like, with no latchkey kids in either generation) and my wife’s parents, encouraged and emphasized establishing financial freedom ASAP in our lives as they had, and I was involved in investing in real estate even before I went to college. Everyone in my family was into real estate investment, among other things, so it came naturally.
This, among other things, gave us the freedom of not having to be tied to jobs, or at the mercy of employers–unless we chose to pursue careers we enjoyed–which both my wife and I did–she in film, and I in aviation, but we still had, and continue to have quality personal and family time for everything we need and want to do.
I could go on, but my point is, no generation has a “lock” on how to live. Believe me, there are people from every generation and in every age group who are living and have lived the lives they want to live, and some are not–it’s all individual.[/quote]Yes, I agree that we’re generalizing too much here … me included. But flyer, you’ve posted before here that you were a (represented) pilot for a commercial airline and now collect a defined benefit pension which is no doubt heavily contributing to your day to day “security” now. In addition, you’ve posted here that you and your spouse are able to avail yourselves of a nationwide healthcare plan (PPO) negotiated by your union. And rightly so … you deserve it.
Therefore, you have “paid your dues” with an “establishment” job which you had to “show up for” in earlier decades of your life.
You are very fortunate, flyer, in that your same healthplan IS offered by MY retirement association but it would cost me over $2100 month and that is far more than my monthly pension! Hence, I have an “obamacare” plan and all of the several-times-per-year BS that Covered CA puts me though in order to keep my plan “active.” It’s absolutely ridiculous and I HATE having to deal with it. I wish I had my old (grandfathered) plan back that was taken away from me due to the ACA. The PTB could have just dealt with the group with pre-existing conditions and figured out a way to get THEM coverage and give THEM a subsidy to pay their high monthly health plan premiums. They didn’t need to mess with the plans the rest of us had. We in the group which had to “medically qualify” for our plans were happy with them.
