Do you think you will make as much money (in real non-inflation adjusted dollars)

[SunnySong]

This decade as you did in the nineties?


Honestly I made less last year than I made in 9 of 10 years in the nineties and this year isn't looking any more cheerful. So many people I know are getting jobs with the same salaries they started with twenty or thirty years ago. And the benefits are either much worse or non-existent.

This is supposed to be my prime earning years when I sock away for retirement instead I am paying my car insurance and wondering if I should downsize even more.


It isn't a lack of skill or work ethic. (I am more skilled and a lot less off a lazy bastard than I was twenty years ago) it is the lack of decent jobs that pay more than the minimum they can get away from.

In the nineties I was once paid bonuses for starting a new job now I feel I should slip the HR director a couple of thousand for putting my resume on top of the pile.

I have it better than many. I am simply underemployed rather than unemployed and the mortgage will be paid on time today. But I am not getting ahead; I am not socking away; and I am not getting any younger.

[Ozymanithrax]

1. I make more now...hands down..

After I left the military in 1995, I worked for under $28,000.00 a year, rented my home, and could not afford to own a car.

There is simply no comparison.

[Ozymanithrax]

2. deleted...posed twice. n/t

[xchrom]

3. This is the point of it all - not that it's right.

They want you to 'down size'.

And it's a cryin shame.

[Enrique]

4. i wish

if I end up making a similar amount, I will be happy. I'm not counting on it. My expectations are scaled back drastically.

[leftofcool]

5. In real dollars we are making more money

but, not getting as much interest on savings and certainly our 401K's tanked. They are coming back but not at nearly the speed we had hoped before we both retire which is this year. We decided that instead of retiring, hubby would semi retire, work another 4 years from home so we could save a bit more. We are definetely downsizing though, in home, in car insurance. We gave away a ton of stuff so we could cram what little we really needed into a small 3 bedroom mobile home on the lake. Simplify, simplify, simplify! That is my new motto.

[guitar man]

6. no

Not even close, I made some OK money in the 90s and in '00 and '01, started down the toilet in'02 and haven't been able to come close to making half as much ever since no matter how hard I work. The Bu$h years took us down the crapper and I'll be damned if I can figure out how to climb back out. :(

[anarch]

7. yes and no

I myself make more in both adjusted and unadjusted dollars now, but since my gf lost her job a while back, the overall household income vs. expenses ratio is appalling in comparison. Also, I work much longer hours now, for which I am not compensated anything extra, so frankly my previous, relatively care-free but underpaid time in the nineties seems like halcyon days when I look back.

Oh also I took out loans and finished school in the meantime, and also later had some medical issues, so now I'm in an awful lot of debt, which I don't expect to ever pay off. This certainly was not the case back in the nineties. Yay, progress!