Personal Finance

6 Financial Benefits Baby Boomers Got that Future Generations Will Likely Never See Again

David Beren

Published: March 12, 2025 9:57 am

If you have even remotely studied the baby boomer generation, you know this is not only the largest group of Americans but also some of the wealthiest in history. Baby boomers were born from 1946 to 1964, after the end of the Second World War, and enjoyed significant economic benefits that are unlikely ever to be seen again. 

This unfortunate news is our new reality, as many of the benefits baby boomers enjoyed, like affordable housing or low-cost education, are likely gone forever. As a result, future generations are unlikely to enjoy the same economic prosperity as baby boomers did for many years. 

Affordable Housing

When you consider today’s housing prices, and the average home price of around $361,000, according to Zillow, you have to compare this to what baby boomers paid. 

It won’t come as a surprise to learn that of the baby boomer population, 34% paid less than $50,000 for a first home, 30% spent less than $50,000 to $99,999, and 23% paid $100,000 to $199,999. The Clever survey providing these results indicated that around 12% paid $200,000 or more. 

Compared to what Millennials are paying now, it’s fair to say that the American dream is increasingly out of reach. Compared to the Zillow average price today, the typical 30-year-old baby boomer paid around $82,800 for a first home, compared to the average millennial paying approximately $313,000 today. 

It’s hard to argue with the disparity here and how baby boomers enjoyed a much different homeowner market growing up. On top of this, you had less strict lending standards, so more people could get homes without needing to make significant down payments. 

Homeownership Levels

What’s notable about the affordable housing question is that while baby boomers owned less expensive homes, they were not too far ahead of other generations. At 25 years old, approximately 32% of baby boomers owned a home, compared to 28% of millennials and 27% of Gen Xers. By the time baby boomers turned 40, 69% of this generation owned a home compared to 62% of millennials. In other words, homeownership levels haven’t fallen off too much, just the payment levels. 

Surprisingly, as much home building is taking place today, baby boomers enjoyed an even stronger boom in home building during the 1970s and 1980s. The only other time America approached the same number of new homes being built was during 2021 and 2022. 

Even more surprising is that most baby boomers earned less than $40,000 when they bought their first homes, with 23% earning less than $20,000. Regardless, homes were still affordable during this time on these salaries, a far cry from where we are today. In today’s world, you must have a much larger salary, like between $75,000 and $100,000 to own a home. This leads to the remaining percentage of millennials who don’t own a home because they don’t have the means to pay a mortgage every month. 

Strong Pension Systems

As baby boomers were working, there was a far more robust pension system, which was a clear sign of the times as companies wanted to take better care of their employees and keep them around for life. Today, anyone who stays at a single employer for their entire career is an anomaly, an exception to the rule as people change jobs far more frequently than ever. 

The result of individuals staying at companies longer meant that they benefited from defined-pension systems that their employers offered. This meant they would have at least some guaranteed income to help maintain their lifestyle when they retired. This was especially true in industries like manufacturing, linework, dock workers, and any other blue-collar field where millions of baby boomers made a living. 

Fast-forward to today, pension systems are less likely to be found at employers as more emphasis is placed on defined contributions plans like a 401(k). Instead of the burden placed on the employer to pay out pension plans decades ago, now the burden is on the employee to contribute to the company to match. 

Retirement Planning

Unfortunately, the days of solid retirement planning that many baby boomers enjoy are gone forever. While there is truth around the notion that there are baby boomers who didn’t plan appropriately for retirement, this is far more true for millennials and Gen Xers, many of whom are far less likely to be able to retire by the time they turn 67 and hit Full Retirement Age. 

Many younger generations are working two jobs to pay the bills, which means saving money for retirement is an unfortunate afterthought. To make their money work for them, millennials have to be more aggressive in the market, which means taking more risk, compared to baby boomers, who were able to put more money away as disposable income was far more common. 

Favorite Education Costs

Can you imagine a world today where the average tuition cost for a single year of a four-year college program was only $2,469? Millennials and Gen Xers would be over the moon if this were the case. Unfortunately, this was the price of college in 1975, when many early baby boomers were first starting their higher education journey.

Fast forward to today, and between rising education costs and inflation, you can expect a single year of college to cost as much as four to eight times more than this number. This means that today’s generations could pay as much as $20,000 for a year of education, before you factor in living costs, books, entertainment, and other miscellaneous expenses. 

Over the last twenty years, education costs have increased astronomically. Private college and fee costs have risen 126%, out-of-state tuition rose by 112%, and in-state tuition increased by 133%. 

Better Job Market

As baby boomers entered the job market, many did so during an economic boom. Jobs were plentiful, and salaries were high as the US was in an expansion period. Even a high school diploma was good enough to help you secure a middle-class lifestyle with a home and family without ever worrying about how to pay your bills. 

This is not the case for today’s younger generations, as the job market continues to be challenging. While unemployment seemingly remains low, a cursory glance at LinkedIn shows that layoffs are still happening daily. This has given rise to the gig economy, with services like Uber and Doordash helping to make ends meet. Even union membership was high during the 1960s, when baby boomers could negotiate lifelong pensions and better wages. 

Baby boomers rarely, if ever, had to consider working two jobs, as the era of a single job supporting a family for life is likely gone forever.