Wealth Gap

I want to show you a graph that I found today, first unedited, and then with my edit.

Image A, original:

All this graph does is show you a "duh" factor.  Of course older people have more money than younger people; they've had time to pay back any bills they acquired as a young person and time to save as their kids most likely no longer live with them.

What's more important about this graph is the following, which goes unnoticed because of the big blue bars in both tables.  Here, let me help you.

Image B, same image, just edited:

There.  That's better.  Now you can see the important part of the graph.  If you still don't get it, I'll explain it.  WTF HAPPENED BETWEEN 1984 AND 2009 WHERE 35 YEAR OLDS (and below) LOST 68% OF THEIR AVERAGE NET WEALTH?!

I'll tell you what.  The average 35 year old in 1984 was able to graduate from high school, get two years of technical training, and get in to a decent job making 50k a year (sure, as a mechanic or a factory worker, but who cares, some people like good ol' fashion manual labor).

The bottom line is that it costs more for people today (that were born in 1984) to become wealthy or successful.  That is a major problem in our economy.  It costs so much more to become wealthy due to college expenses and the lack of jobs that require less education.

Which furthers my point from a post I made a few weeks ago called I Hate Money.  The reason there's less money going in to the economy isn't because we're all broke due to joblessness or low paying jobs.  We're broke because we're paying back our college loans that are much higher than they ever used to be.

43% of students and grads between the ages of 24 and 35 have moved back in with their parents.  And it's not just people in weirdo psychology fields of study.  It's scientists, engineers, and law students.  There's a wide scope of graduates that are just too broke to make it on their own; they can't get a job at McDonald's due to over qualification and they can't get a job in their field due to so few jobs being available.

It's lose-lose for a large portion of my generation: don't go to school, make little money for the rest of your life; go to school, incur massive amounts of debt, and try to get lucky finding a job to pay back said loans.