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| Topic | Playing Catch-Up in the Game of Life - Millennials Approach Middle Age in Crisis |
| SK8T3R215 05/21/19 3:15:43 PM #10: | For richer, for poorer Millennials, as a group, are better educated than any generation before them. About four in 10 ages 25 to 37 hold at least a bachelors degree compared with about a quarter of baby boomers, and three in 10 Gen Xers when they were the same age. Those college diplomas have come at a high price. The average student-loan balance for millennials in 2017 was $10,600, more than twice the average owed by Gen X in 2004, according to Mr. Kurz and his Fed colleagues. For the Cochrans, the price was personal. Joseph Cochran, a real-estate manager, proposed to Tasha Brown in 2012. She said yes. Then Ms. Brown, a consumer finance attorney, realized that combining their salaries as a married couple could drive up their income-based student-loan payments. They ditched their wedding plans but forged a life together. Each wear wedding rings. Ms. Brown, 36, legally changed her name and became Ms. Cochran. The couple run a financial-advice website, whittling away at their combined student debt of $377,000. If we had zero student loans wed be married, Ms. Cochran said. We have to be far more strategic and creative in order to try to fit everything in around our student loans. Their strategy included moving from Philadelphia to Maryland four years ago. Ms. Cochran struggled to get pregnant, and the couple chose a state that mandated insurance coverage of in vitro fertilization, she said. The Cochrans now have a 3-year-old son. Ms. Cochran also has a 17-year-old daughter from a previous relationship and has promised to pay for college as long as the teenager studies at an in-state school. Last fall, the young woman enrolled in community college to get a head start. Her teenager likes the idea of being able to graduate without having any student loans, Ms. Cochran said. The family takes a more practical view of higher education, based, in part, on hard-won experience with jobs and school loans. We tell her to think a lot about how much is a given major going to pay, Ms. Cochran said. The financial strain faced by many American millennials is driving shifts in their political views, reflecting a feeling that as a citizen the system is not really operating as you expect it to, said Mohamed Younis, editor in chief of Gallup. A Gallup poll last summer found that millennials were the only generation that favored socialism over capitalism by a slight margin. The survey didnt include Generation Z, people born in 1997 or later, and who are mostly too young to vote. Tough times for millennials struggling to reach a more comfortable middle-class life have triggered support for populist candidates and promises of universal health care and free college education. Tony Mancilla, a 31-year-old hospital maintenance technician in American Falls, Idaho, voted for Hillary Clinton, a Democrat, in 2016. Now, he is interested in Sen. Bernie Sanders, of Vermont, a self-described democratic socialist. Mr. Mancilla, who earns about $35,000 a year, said he cant afford the more than $600 a month it costs to insure his wife and two children on his employer plan. His children rely on a publicly subsidized plan. His wife is uninsured. These health-care worries pointed Mr. Mancilla to Mr. Sanderss Democratic Party primary campaign and his way of looking at health care, trying to get that for everybody, taxing the rich, he said. He might have the best interest for the American people rather than just one class. As millennials approach middle age, more are asking for help from their employers. Ford Motor Co. two years ago expanded its financial-planning services after internal surveys found that the top monetary concern of millennials was saving for retirement. Fords planning services include one-on-one reviews of employee investments. All 80,000 U.S. workers are eligible. --- New York Knicks, New York Jets, New York Yankees. ... Copied to Clipboard! |
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