Are any of my fellow Xers feeling a little lost? Holy crap, I sure am! I am fascinated by the different nuances between generations. There, of course, is the Great Generation who were my grandparent’s generation. Then the Baby Boomers, my mother and father’s generation. Then, of course, there is me a Generation Xer. Then the children of the Xers are the Millennials.
As part of my job, I am always reading about the market and general financial trends. Around 50% of the material’s info is geared toward Baby Boomers. The other 50% of the time the strategies and products are geared toward the Millennial generation.
Hello? What about me? It is like my generation doesn’t exist.
We are the generation caught between the enormous wealth of the Boomers, with the unfortunate timing of being slightly too old for the technology boom experienced by the Millennials. Now, depending on where you fall on the Xer scale this can differ. Speaking for myself, we didn’t get our first home computer until ‘86-’87 and it was a Commodore 64. Ah, the fond memories of being screamed at by my dad because I tried to make calls and repeatedly kicked him off the modem. The Xers are kind of caught in the middle; like we are all in a big financial version of The Breakfast Club.
Boomers and Millennials are great. But when is the last time you read anything about Generation X? Right, that’s what I thought.
Here’s the deal, the X Generation was the worst hit by the Great Recession of 2008. Now, depending on when you were planning on retiring as a Boomer, you may have had to work a couple more years before retirement. If you were a Millennial, you had the option to stay in college or put off a major career choice/change until jobs became more available. But Xers, we were smack dab in the middle of our careers. We were/are in our accumulation phase and luckily/unluckily a good portion of us were homeowners. BAM, to put it bluntly, we got our butts handed to us. Many Xers found themselves facing down forced career changes in maybe our late 30s and 40s. And of course, everything else that went along with 2008.
As is common to the financial sector, new products, new strategies, and new ideas come online all the time to help clients achieve their financial objectives. But often my generation is left out. So, here is my plea to my industry; get your crap together and remember the X Generation is still here.
This begs the questions, why do I not write more to my generation? – Well, I do my best-
I am here for you guys. Here to help you navigate a financial world that seems to have left us by the wayside. Xer to Xer if you need help figuring it out, holler at me.
In other blog posts, I won’t be so irritated. If you want to email me with questions or to tell me how great I am you can reach me at mel@hotmoonfinancial.com or you can always hit me up on Twitter @melrocksmoney
-Rock On Mel O CFP®/Rocker Chick Extraordinaire
C-Blocker Disclaimer-The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual.
