My dad is of the boomer generation but isn't a “boomer”. I realize many people in that generation are “boomers”, but I only call people boomers when they have the stereotypical boomer mentality. My dad fortunately understands the shit we go through.
I talked to him today and he told me before he retired in the year 2000, he was making $15/hr at a rubber hose factory. Just a factory worker, nothing supervisorial or in management.
With inflation, that's $25.55 an hour. Now my dad had been there 30 years, and so I'm sure his pay had been increased a couple times…but my dad's neighbor's son works at this same factory my dad worked out and even today only makes $17/hr, and has been there about 5 years.
My dad retired with a pension, which is only a paltry $800/mo..but they did away with pension plans and just do 401k now.
To put the cherry on the cake, my dad told me a year before he retired (and thus ineligible), they did away with health insurance for retirees.
So this means in 1999, you could of made the inflation adjusted amount of almost $26/hr with no college degree, have a pension that you could count on unlike a 401k that can erase thousands of dollars of value if a crash occurs, AND have health insurance paid for by your employer after retirement.
Today, you make almost $10/hr LESS, pay into a 401k, and receive no employer paid healthcare after retirement.
It just blows my mind how shittier and shitter jobs are getting. I hope soon people rise up to this bullshit.