Throughout the years, it seems, older generations have criticized younger ones for being soft. Whether it’s baby boomers or Millennials, many of their elders think they haven’t measured up in terms of dealing with life and its setbacks.
BlackRock President Rob Kapito, 65, expressed similar sentiment in a talk at an energy conference Tuesday, Bloomberg reports. BlackRock is the world’s biggest money and asset manager.
Kapito framed his comments in terms of the impact of inflation, including product shortages. Consumer prices soared 7.9% in the 12 months through February.
“For the first time, this generation is going to go into a store and not be able to get what they want,” he said. “And we have a very entitled generation that has never had to sacrifice.”
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It’s not clear which generation Kapito had in mind. In terms of shortages, the comments could apply to almost every generation since the Greatest Generation, which includes those born in 1901 to 1927. To be sure, Baby Boomers, those born in 1946 to 1964, did face gasoline shortages in the 1970s.
The most recent generations that now include adults are Generation Z, those born in 1997-2012; Millennials, those born in 1981 to 1996; and Generation X, those born in 1965 to 1980.
Meanwhile, young adults show pessimism about retirement in Fidelity Investments’ recent State of Retirement Planning report, cited by Fortune. Among workers in the 18 to 35 age group, 45% don’t see any reason to start saving for retirement “until things return to normal,” the study says
The report doesn’t define “normal,” but obviously the longer young adults wait to save for retirement, the less time their savings will have a chance to grow.