Older generation have the cash

I totally agree with oracle on this one.
My biggest complaint in this regard is that nightclubs & discos are all aimed at the younger generation. If it wasn't for pubs putting on live bands we'd have nowhere to go for a boogie every now & then!
It's particularly bad in holiday resorts. There seems to be nothing between the awful music that passes for dance music these days & bingo for the seriously elderly!

Because,

1. Youth typically have more disposable income because they *dont* have mortgages, children etc.
2. Todays youth have been indoctrinated in hardcore capitalism and are more willing to spend (and get into debt doing so).
3. Most advertising is "aspirational" - most healthy adults still probably feel 20-something inside and so "young" adverts will reach them too.
4. Most of those with real wealth don't watch much TV or read the magazines/papers "the masses" do (too busy earning/spending/living or have a superiority complex).
5. Old rich people have been through at least 1 World War, weren't indoctrinated with the "you can buy happiness" mantra when young, and so are *very* spendthrift as a result.

I don't have definate proof but being in the age range you are talking about I would like to give my thoughts to your gripe. From what I can gather and have experienced, manufacturers target the 20-30 age range not just they suspect they have money, but because they have a high "disposable income". What I mean is that they are likely to have multiple credit cards that they juggle every month without much concern about paying the bulk back. Another thing is that a lot of them are still living with their parents because buying a house is out of the question in todays current housing climate. Now, it takes harsh parents to charge their "grown up" kids a realistic rent, so they save a lot of money here! The 20-30 age range will throw money about like its going out of fashion with a "live for today attitude" believe me - I am one of them!

It's always a surprise to me that, whenever I send a gripe to this excellent site,
subsequent correspondents get the wrong idea about what I am writing. Every
time they seem to go off on a tangent and end up contradicting points which I
never made. Must be my fault for not expressing myself clearly: I'll try harder.

This particular gripe was only intended to attack manufacturers who were
targeting the wrong market for their products. I never had the faintest intention
of criticising the Youth Generation for the way they spend their money.

Nor was I boasting about wallowing in cash, as some of these comments are
implying. Yes, I'm better off nowadays than I used to be and, as all my debts
and mortgage are settled, I have a bit of money to spend.

But, as some of the writers guessed, I sure earned it! My early years began in
real poverty (not the misleading "relative poverty" we experience nowadays)
and there was no Welfare State to protect my family from harsh reality. I left
school at the age of 14 years, 11 months - couldn't go to university as I had to
start work immediately, or we wouldn't have had food on the table; have
worked every day of my life ever since; and am still working. All taxes paid all
my life and not a penny taken back in benefits. It's not a bad record

And a special word to Peace keeping middle class tree-huggn hippie. It's a
pleasure to read something from someone in their 20's expressed with so much
colour, style and clarity. I was beginning to despair about your generation but I
can see there's hope yet. And thanks for placing me in the Beat and 60's
counterculture but, ouch, I pre-date them.

Oracle,

I am in my 20's and I side with you...I realize and don't even care that most of my generation will make the baby boomers and depression era babies look fab-tab-u-lous in comparison! I say way to go. I know I will have to earn my keep and bust my ass- I have a long, long ways to go...very long ways...until I can speak like you. I say congratulations for arriving to that destination. Especially when you've seemed to arrive competent- unlike many of your Beat & 60's counterculture peers who did not make it for the drug induced coma that they put themselves in...by not knowing when too much acid or coke was enough.

Congrats mate. You seem to speak as if you earned it...and who can fault that...
And for the record, to the comment: what's wrong with Keith Olberman's Countdown-?

We're rich when we are old, because "we are worth it".

" Everything was geared towards the younger generation's unattractive, cacophonous, un-musical dirges.
I left the store without spending a penny. Nice to know that the record companies are so well off they don't want my custom. "


I think that says more about your taste in music than anything else?


But hey, if you're complaining about having so much cash whilst us younger generation are so poor, feel free to share...by all means.

I'm sure you've earned your welloffness though. congrats.

What a miserable gripe this one is. It almost seems anti-youth in tone! Watch daytime TV, including Countdown and The Weakest Link, all the TV advertisements seem to be geared to the older generation - step-in baths, denture fixent, whole life insurance policies, etc etc. What more do you want? Stop being so miserable and get yourself to Spain!