
Why are millennials burned out? Capitalism - minikites
https://www.vox.com/2019/2/4/18185383/millennials-capitalism-burned-out-malcolm-harris
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rfinney
Young people have exalted notions, because they have not been humbled by life
or learned its necessary limitations; moreover, their hopeful disposition
makes them think themselves equal to great things - and that means having
exalted notions. They would always rather do noble deeds than useful ones:
Their lives are regulated more by moral feeling than by reasoning - all their
mistakes are in the direction of doing things excessively and vehemently. They
overdo everything - they love too much, hate too much, and the same with
everything else.

– Aristotle

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big_bad_sean
Aristotle didn't even have avocado toast, what does he know?

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roenxi
The theoretical safety valve of capitalism is that workers can invest in
capital and become capitalists. They have the technical know-how. This allows
the sort of bloodless revolution that maintains stability.

We have a problem in recent history because "inflation" has been defined as
"consumer prices rising for basically no reason", and I'm not sure if there is
a well known word for "price of assets rising for no reason", which appears to
be happening (the amount of money in the economy is rising, but inflation is
low).

This is distorting decision making power (and resources) away from competent
people towards people who happen to own assets (who tend not to be young). It
should be that assets are diverted to competent people; because incompetence
should be punished with bankruptcy.

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war1025
There is nothing stopping anyone from buying assets with their savings. I'd
argue it's actually easier than ever. The problem is people have no savings.
There is an underclass of people who legitimately have no ability to build
savings. For the rest, they just have a broken view of the world that causes
them to spend more than they bring in and build debt rather than assets.

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Simulacra
Capitalism is one allowed me to start my own business and discover what true
freedom is. No other form of economics or government in history can hold a
candle to the benefits and possibilities of capitalism. It’s not perfect, but
I live a pretty good life and make a good living.

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melenaboija
Maybe this article should start with "defined as people born between 1980 and
2000 in western countries". I think a deeper discussion would be why are
millennials burned out while same generation in other regions do not have any
expectation of improvement.

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Aeolun
Probably because we can see how easy it would be to bridge the gap.

We also see it getting wider though, so in a little while we might be just as
well off as those outside of western countries.

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johnisgood
Capitalism? Are we really going to continue bashing capitalism for what is not
its fault, but people's? Seriously?

I recommend:

[https://mises.org/library/left-right-and-
state-0](https://mises.org/library/left-right-and-state-0)

and

[https://mises.org/library/anti-capitalistic-
mentality](https://mises.org/library/anti-capitalistic-mentality)

Should clear up the misconceptions, that is, if you really want to have them
cleared up. :)

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tombert
Ugh, I am so sick of this grouping of "millenials". Didn't Time Magazine run a
story about how Gen X is the "lost generation" like thirty years ago?

Maybe we shouldn't group entire groups of people entirely by the year they
were born.

As a semi-socialist myself, I get annoyed when people just look for artificial
reasons to crap all over capitalism.

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war1025
"Capitalists" here seems to be defined as "people who are doing well
economically". I would guess the vast majority of people who read HN fall into
that category.

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CyberFonic
I have a narrower interpretation of the word "capitalist": a person who
invests money into an enterprise where others do the majority of the real
work. That is, a mostly passive form of income generation.

By "real work" I mean all activity that creates tangible value. Managing
rarely adds value and in some cases destroys the value produced by others. In
its most benign form, managing is a form of assisting communication and
possibly actually fostering a motivated workforce.

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nipponese
Yes, "capitalism" and definitely not the press and media influences selling a
"broken world" crisis every 72 hours.

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Justin_K
Let's not forget the broken promise from our University system that if
ignorant students take out a 250k loan for school, they will get a great job.

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cloverich
Government prevents bankruptcy, the normal mechanism that requires
institutions to evaluate risk before making a loan. There's plenty of blame
and alternatives all around, but I question whether any alternative is viable
without fixing this first.

