December 5, 2024 • 38 mins
Chuck Zodda and Mike Armstrong discuss the ongoing battle between Senators and Airlines over the use of junk fees. Sarah Foster from Bankrate joins the show to chat about workers that got raises in 2024. What are the challenges and joys of employing Gen Z workers? How can parents help their boomerang children without derailing their own retirement?
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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(01:04):
by Veterans Development Corporation. This is the Financial Exchange with
Chuck Zada and Mike Armstrong.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Kicking off hour two on the Financial Exchange.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Chuck, Mike and Tucker with you in stocks taking a
little bit of a pause here after rallying for the
last I don't know a week or so, almost two
weeks that we've seen some positive movement for equities and
not not a huge pause, but the dows off one
hundred points today. SMP's down about eight, nasdac's down fourteen,
so anywhere from you know, a tenth to a quarter
(01:36):
of a percent, it's nothing huge for the major indices.
Tenure US Treasury is up two basis points back to
four point two percent. We've got Oil West Text Intermedia
up thirty seven cents per barrel on news that OPEC
plus is going to be delaying their production increases until
at least April. And we've got Gold today down eleven
(01:59):
dollars in eighty centsnouns to twenty six sixty four and
forty cents.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
So again pretty quiet.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
And this is all an expectation of a jobs report
tomorrow that does have the potential to move markets. Expectations
looking like about two hundred thousand jobs added, unemployment rate
expected to tick up slightly to four point two percent,
and we'll have a whole bunch of discussion of that
and the underlying data when it is released tomorrow. Mike,
(02:27):
let's talk a little bit about this piece from the
New York Times. I think it could best be that
the headline can best be rephrased one man's junk fees
are another man's unbundling.
Speaker 4 (02:41):
So we've had airline executive testifying in front of Congress
on was it just Wednesday or do they have a
multiple multiple days of testimony.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
I think it's been two days. It's usually one in
front of the House and then one in front of
the Senate.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
So here is I've concluded that I think this is
one of the more ridiculous areas of Is this part
of the CFP beat Now it's it's part of the center.
Transportation is the one that's been enforced.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Looking to enforce this.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
Stuff and looking at junk fees has been a key
push from the Biden administration across different areas of the economy.
It's kind of been their response to higher inflation. And
we can talk about industry by industry here. But I
think this is the most ridiculous thing to look at
enforcing or regulating in the airline industry.
Speaker 5 (03:33):
I think it's absolutely silly.
Speaker 4 (03:36):
I think that air travel is cheaper today on an
inflation adjusted basis than it has ever been. There is
still competition, and if airlines want to offer, which many
of them do, like many airlines offer a completely unbundled
option where you get nothing and have to pay for
(03:56):
every little item.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
And then they offer ones where you all so can.
Speaker 4 (04:01):
If I go look at Delta or Jet Blue or American,
there's a basic economy fair that's going to be cheaper
than all the rest where I don't even get to
pick my seat, and then there's going to be a
bunch of higher options where I do get to pick
my seat, and I get a check bag, and I
get a carry on bag, and I get a twinkie
during the flight. Like it's just preposterous that we would
(04:22):
go and look at this and say, yeah, these junk
fees are the cause of inflation or are unfair to consumers.
Speaker 5 (04:28):
They're adequately disclosed.
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Some airlines don't charge them, some of them do, and
let the market figure this out.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
And here is the one issue that I think gets
us to this point. And the problem, in my opinion
is that basically, I mean it really is, the executive
branch over time has abdicated its responsibility and the legislature
too as an enforcer of antitrust. And as such, you
(04:59):
have a whole bunch of routes where there is no
competition or maybe one competitor, and so it's pretty easy
to effectively collude even if you're not you know, calling
up the other CEO and being like, Hey, here's what
we're gonna do on this route. If there's no competition
on routes, then you don't have the ability to find
other alternatives. And I think we've gotten to this point
(05:21):
because in the decade after nine to eleven, when airlines
were you know, really struggling, after you know, a whole
bunch of them went through bankruptcies and things like that,
we allow these giant mergers to happen between Delta Northwest,
between United and Continental, between American and US, and so
you don't have enough competition in the airline space now
(05:45):
to allow for customers who might be unhappy with an
airline to be like, you know what, I am going
to choose someone else because either A there is no
one else who's flying that same route, or B the
only other company that is has the exact same pricing
because they're all huge and they don't need to actually
compete with each other.
Speaker 5 (06:04):
Yeah, I guess that's fair.
Speaker 4 (06:05):
But you know, when I think about monopolistic type businesses,
I think about big, massive, profitable entities. And you're right,
the airlines are profitable these days, some of them are,
but it's not the big ones are. Like this is
my point is when you look at the big airlines
these days, and I'm just gonna I'll pull Delta just
(06:27):
as an example, because they're commonly thought of as like
the gold standard for airlines.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
And look, I've often said that.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
I absolutely would despise owning and operating an airline because
it's generally like a horrible business decade. Delta, aside from
the pandemic year, has not posted a loss since twenty ten,
twenty ten. Yeah, they have not had a trailing twelve
(06:55):
month loss since the first quarter of twenty ten.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Now, I'm not saying that you should consistently have losses
like that.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
That's a bad business, but in an industry that has
high capital expenses, you know, unionized workforce, you know, huge
upfront costs that you have to pay in things like that.
The idea that hey, we can go fifteen years without
having any losses in a hugely cyclical you know, sector two,
(07:25):
that's kind of insane to me. And oh, by the way,
when we do actually have a loss, hey, we're gonna
go to the government cry for a bunch of money.
And then on the back end, when we were supposed
to use that money to keep our people say oh gee,
we couldn't keep enough people.
Speaker 5 (07:40):
Got fire them. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:42):
I don't love the way that this all went down
during COVID. I don't think many people do.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
But even let's let's look at United.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Does anyone look at United and is like, hey, like
that's the paragon of you know, airlines and how they
should be run. No, Like, they're kind of middle of
the road, right, They're just there. They haven't had any
losses since twenty thirteen. And you look at the history
of them going back through you know, the data that
I have is a publicly traded companies going back to
ninety two, and they would you know, kind of consistently
(08:11):
have like five or six years where they'd make money
five or six where they'd lose five or six where
Like you just kind of pingpong back and forth. Because
that's what being an airline was. It was a tough business,
but it was one that, hey, like, sometimes it would
work for and sometimes it wouldn't, and ultimately you'd go
through these reorganizations, you know, on a fairly frequent basis,
and that would be kind of what they do. Not Hey,
(08:35):
you just have a license to print money and not
have any losses because you're so big that no one
can compete with you, right.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
I guess where I get to is, Yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Think it's dumb that we're having conversations about, like should
a baggage fee be included in the flight of a plane?
Speaker 2 (08:57):
What's the real problem that we're causing there?
Speaker 3 (09:01):
But what's the because look, if you want it to
be included in the price of the ticket, ticket prices
are going to go up, right Like, you're not going
to get the same price ticket if you want more stuff.
We like, that's just how it's going to work, because
that there are two costs that airlines have that are
higher than any others, labor and fuel. When you have
(09:22):
more heavy bags on planes, you need more fuel to
get the plane where it's going, which also raises the weight,
which means you need more fuel. So ultimately, if you
want to have baggage included in every ticket, then you're
two hundred dollars ticket. It's probably gonna be two fifty
every time, and that's fine, but like that's what it's
(09:44):
going to be.
Speaker 4 (09:44):
So I how about how about we waive baggage fees,
but we charge by total total price per pound?
Speaker 5 (09:51):
Why do you got to stand with your on the scale.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
Let's let's weigh every passenger. Because here's the thing. By
the way, if you've ever flown down a little puddle
jump or like anya, they do they actually weigh you
so that they know that the plane's gonna fly. Yeah,
so yeah, So I think this is some of the
other stuff where it's like, hey, airlines refusing to pay
you if you've been delayed for a day. Yeah, okay,
(10:15):
Like I could see that as being something where it's
worthy because you like, there's a real problem there this,
Like I don't care how air My only complaint with
how airlines do some of this stuff is that they
they won't show you the full cost of what you've
done until you're done, Like, no, show let me like
add the stuff I want and show me the cost
(10:36):
in real time so I don't have to go back
to another page. But even there, like do I need
to legislate that out? No, I don't know, Like what
did it cost me five minutes a time? Even though
it'll be fair. A lot of airlines booking systems slow.
Speaker 5 (10:51):
But sure don't need to legislate it.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Though we don't need to legislate how slow the systems
are either, So uh yeah, this to me, minor is
that doesn't warrant this level of scrutiny. And ultimately, if
you're gonna say, hey, like all this stuff should be
included in a plane ticket, by the price of the
ticket's gonna be higher, right, plain and simple, take a
(11:16):
quick break here, or if you think you can do
a better job, go start an airline.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
You're gonna get to the same place.
Speaker 3 (11:27):
And we know this because the airlines that tried to
do a better job by not doing this Jet Blue Southwest,
they're moving to this model because they're getting they're having
their lunch eaten by bigger competitors who have market power.
Because they were allowed to merge. Right, let's take a
quick break here. When we come back, we've got uh
Sarah Foster from bank Rate joining us talking about workers
(11:49):
getting raises in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
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Speaker 6 (12:24):
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Speaker 4 (12:59):
Joining us now is Sarah Foster from bank Rate talking
to us about a survey they did of workers who
may or may not have gotten raises in twenty twenty four. Sarah,
thanks for joining us.
Speaker 7 (13:08):
Thanks for having me. It's always great to be here.
Speaker 4 (13:10):
So we're heading into annual review season. I think a
lot of people will be sitting down with their employer
and talking about, you know, what comes next in twenty
twenty five. What did you find in terms of your survey?
How many what portion of people you surveyed did get
raises in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 7 (13:26):
Yeah, you're right. It's a good time to really be
thinking about your compensation at this time of year. And
we found that fifty three percent of workers are actually
confident that they'll get a pay increase of some kind
over the next twelve months. We saw that over the
past twelve months, though, you know, even though the labor
market has been showing signs of slowing, it still looks
like it's pretty healthy because sixty one percent of workers
(13:49):
got a pay increase over the past twelve months. It's
roughly consistent with levels from last year and then twenty
twenty two, and of course we were in the middle
of that great resignation era. There is a slowdown though
in how many Americans are finding better paying positions somewhere else.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
And to be clear, I mean, everyone recognizes that the
pace of inflation has slowed considerably, but the confidence being
that it's a coin toss as to whether or not
people are going to get a get a raise this year,
it doesn't lead to a lot of confidence. That means,
you know, if you're not getting a raise, you are
losing about two to three percent in purchasing power as
(14:26):
we head into twenty twenty or five. Did you find
any trends in who's getting the raises who isn't that
might kind of indicate how people can push for them more.
Speaker 7 (14:38):
Yeah. Yeah, And we you know, we've historically always seen
job hopping as the best way of getting biggest pay bump,
and right now that might not really be the case
of you know, we're comparing data from the Atlanta Federal
Reserve Bank, and they are showing that job switchers and
job stayers are roughly earning about a four percent increase
(15:00):
at this point, which is roughly identical to each other.
You know, all groups actually saw less success this year
than in last year getting better paying jobs. But you know,
some of those other people who did have better luck
than others were those younger generations, probably because you know,
gen zers and millennials are still early in their careers
(15:20):
and not having hit their peak salary band, it's probably
a little bit easier for them to find something new
out there. Lower income workers also, and I think you
could directly trace that back to just where the demand
remains in this labor market, and it seems that companies
are still looking for those in person service jobs, including
food services and then leisure and hospitality.
Speaker 4 (15:43):
Did you find it somewhat surprising that baby boomers are
the least likely group to be experiencing pay increases accoring
to your survey. I think of that as you know, hey,
if I'm going to incentivize somebody that's on the verge
of retirement, I might need to keep paying them more.
Speaker 5 (15:59):
Survey doesn't seem to indicate.
Speaker 7 (16:00):
That it's it's interesting. It's actually something you know, we've
been looking at this data for years now at this point,
since twenty nineteen, we've been tracking who's been getting pay
increases who hasn't, And back then, you know, when I
first looked at that data was something that I noticed too,
that older generations were the ones least likely to be
getting pay increases. So, you know, you could infer that
(16:22):
this is a longer run trend. I kind of speculate
that it's just because they're older in their careers, they've
probably already maxed out their compensation, or at least the
growth rate that they're going to face throughout the rest
of their career is probably a little bit slower than
it was for younger generations and even for them when
they were that age. Even talking with older general or
(16:44):
at least talking with older workers themselves, though, you know,
we learn that there are some consequences here where a
lot of their budgets are stretched. Their budgets have absolutely
changed over the course of their lifetimes. When they were
maybe first in the early twenties, now they're caring for
aging parents and even children. We also saw that those
(17:04):
older generations were more likely to say that inflation has
taken a bite out of their wages. So I think
all of this is kind of related.
Speaker 4 (17:11):
Sarah, I've heard a lot of dissatisfaction with this labor market.
I think a lot of that comes from just not
a lot of movement. Job hopping, as you mentioned, has
been less common according to the Jolt Service. How would
you describe this labor market? Because yeah, I'm seeing some stagnation,
but it does still seem like a relatively robust labor market.
Speaker 7 (17:29):
It's a very valid question, and I think when I
catch myself describing that this job market is healthy, I
always think I need to add an asterisk there because
it's healthy. But for whom, you know, that's the most
important question. The people who are employed, they're roughly still
benefiting from a strong job market because as we see,
layoffs are low, the unemployment rate is still historically low.
(17:52):
They're still continuing to get pay increases at their position. However,
if you're someone who's unemployed, or maybe you're looking for
an new change to leave your current company, that's where
you might start to feel like this job market isn't
so hot. Because we're saying that the share of workers
who've been unemployed for six months are longer is now
the highest since twenty seventeen. The hiring rate is even
(18:16):
lower today than it was pre pandemic. You know, all
of these signs are kind of pointing to the fact
that this job market might be in stasis or at
least kind of approaching a holding pattern. So the message
for job seekers right now really is that, you know,
if you're looking for something new, it's probably going to
require a little bit of patience.
Speaker 4 (18:35):
That's Sarah Foster from bank Rade join us today to
talk about their survey on workers who did or did
not get raises in twenty twenty three and twenty twenty four,
and what's to come for twenty twenty five. Sarah, thanks
so much for joining us, appreciate it, Thanks for having
me taking a look here at markets. We've got the
Dow off about ninety one points, one fifth of one percent,
the S ANDP basically flat for the day, down one point,
(18:56):
the NASDAK currently leading the way upwards, but only up
about fourteen points or one tenth of one percent, and
price of a barrel of oil now sitting at sixty
eight dollars and sixty cents yield on the tenure Treasury
coming in at four point one nine to five percent.
Right now, we are going to take a quick break
(19:18):
coming up here, and when we come back, we'll have
a little bit of trivia for you. And then I
do want to get into this big story that I
continue to hear boomerang children and what parents can do
about it.
Speaker 8 (19:29):
That's next year on the Financial Exchange.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
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Speaker 2 (20:05):
Let's do a.
Speaker 6 (20:05):
Little bit of trivia here on the Financial Exchange on
this day. In twenty nineteen, Saudi Aramco raised twenty five
point six billion dollars in its first public share offering,
which pushed the company's valuation over one point seven trillion dollars. Today,
there are a few companies that are valued at over
one trillion dollars. So trivia question today, how many companies,
(20:29):
not including Saudi Aramco have a market cap over one
trillion dollars? Once again, how many companies not including Saudi
Aramco have a market cap of over one trillion dollars.
Be the seventh person today to text us at sixty
one seven three six two thirteen eighty five with the
correct answer, and you win a Financial Exchange Show t shirt.
(20:50):
Once again, the seventh correct response to text us at
six one seven three six two thirteen eighty five will
be our winner. See complete contest rules at Finanshane Show
dot com.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
Mike, I want to talk about this piece from the
Boston Globe here today. It's titled the Challenges and Joys
of Hiring gen Z Workers. It then also has a
colon and a quote their right hand is their phone,
so there's a lot here. Like honestly, I want to
really dig into this because I think this is a
(21:23):
fascinating piece. The first thing that it talks about is
that one of the things that employers are noting from,
you know, when they interview and try to hire younger workers,
they get ghosted a lot. And if you're not familiar
with the term ghosted, it's the idea that hey, like
you are going through like the process of interviewing someone
(21:43):
and you try to follow up with them and they
just stop responding, not like no, thank you, like I
don't you just never hear from them again.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
And this is.
Speaker 3 (21:54):
Something where I'm curious in your opinion. Do you think
that this is more prevalent with younger workers now again
gen Z at this point, I think would be like
twenty seven or twenty eight and younger. Do you think
it's more prevalent in that demo than in previous generations?
Speaker 4 (22:11):
I think perhaps, But I have a very difficult time
determining if this is a result of a generation and
differences in how they behave or a generational difference in.
Speaker 5 (22:23):
The state of the labor market.
Speaker 4 (22:25):
Like sure, part of it has to be both, because
I bet that if you go take a look at
news stories from nineteen ninety nine to two thousand and
talk to me about how many people were ghosting. You know,
they didn't use the word the term ghosting back then,
but you know how many people were applying to jobs
and not showing up. How many hiring managers were getting
(22:45):
frustrated by how long it took to fill roles. I
think this is at least in part due to the
fact that we are very near all time highs in
terms of the portion of the population that is currently working.
And so I know a lot's been said and written
about the state of the labor market. But when you
have a tight labor market, yeah, you have a longer
(23:06):
time time hiring, You have a tougher time hiring. And
part of it's probably behavioral, part of it's probably just
the state of things.
Speaker 3 (23:13):
So yeah, and I think it's interesting in look, there
might be something where social skills may have developed differently,
and so there's something there. But again, I just think
this is something that's interesting to look at. There's more
in here that I think we really want to dig
into on this, and some of this is not unique
(23:35):
to gen Z. One thing, it says employees note gen
zs bring many positive elopments to the workforce, a firm
grasp on technology and a thirst for learning. Mike, is
that unique to gen Z or is that.
Speaker 4 (23:46):
Just every new generation has a new take on technology
and just able to manage things differently than the previous generation.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
I guarantee you.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
That when Baby Boomers were getting into the workforce in
the sixties seventies, guarantee you that you know, the silent generation,
you know, managers were sitting there going look at these
typing skills. These kids are so right exactly like, Loo,
get out of these kids? Are you know able to
use the punch cards?
Speaker 2 (24:13):
And wow?
Speaker 3 (24:14):
Like this is amazing, Like I guarantee you that that's
what was being talked about. It's not the poo poo
gen Zers, but it's more to say, I come back
to the fact that there's rarely anything that's really new.
It's just kind of a different iteration of what we've
seen before. And that's my take on this is, Yeah,
gen Z is great at whatever the new technologies are today,
just like previous generations were at whatever the new technologies
(24:36):
were then. Now there's some other stuff that that that
I want to get into. There's there's so much here
that I think is is really interesting to me. Uh,
you've got a piece here, and this is talking about
a sign company. One new hire at the Norwood Signage
Company Steel Art Company didn't bother showing up on their
first day, even after going through multiple rounds of interviews
(24:57):
and testing the company's equipment for some and not even
pick up the phone and say hey, I accepted another position,
Sorry about that, or even to answer an email.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
We're like, where'd you go? Dude?
Speaker 3 (25:06):
So yes, that might be something that's unique in this case.
But I I'll tell you just a story about something
that I saw over the last decade or so. It
was someone who I had hired and on the second
day they didn't show up and emailed out to them
like hey, called out like hey, what's going on? And
(25:29):
took like a few times to get you know, someone
actually on the phone, and finally didn't. They're like, oh,
like I'm sick, And it's like, okay, would I rather
have like someone pretty? And clearly they weren't sick, by
the way, like it was one of their situations, and
like clearly they had no intention of coming back the
next day because they didn't come back the next day
and didn't return any phone calls then. So it was
(25:51):
kind of like, Okay, would I rather have like someone
who pretends to be sick when they don't like a
job and this was someone who's like in their forties
at the time, or would I have someone just doesn't
pick up the phone? Like again, I think this is
just a different iteration of something the other thing that
we've seen before. It's it's different, but the fundamental human
nature is not different.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
It's just the way it's being.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
Expressed, I think you can convince me that being a
Let's see, if you're entering the labor force right now,
you were somewhere around seventeen to nineteen years old during COVID.
Speaker 3 (26:29):
And that probably had a huge impact on your social
skills development did then as well?
Speaker 4 (26:33):
Like you were seeing this in grade school kids, how
their math and science and reading skills suck. We're seeing it,
and I think we're seeing it in young twenty year
olds where they did not have the opportunities to socialize
with their peers in the way that even kids just
five years older.
Speaker 5 (26:51):
Than them did.
Speaker 4 (26:52):
And I won't be surprised if, yeah, there's an anxiety
that comes to responding to emails or responding to phone
calls from people that did not exist prior to that.
I think it genuinely screwed some people up pretty badly,
and employers will probably have some annoyances in dealing with that.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Another thing in here that I want to look at.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
Similarly, for many twenty somethings, the workday doesn't bleed into
the night when it's five o'clock. They're done at five o'clock,
regardless of whether the work is done or not, says
Pamela Conway, chief Learning Officer and tell Ze and Woburn,
which creates learning and training videos for someone like me,
I'm gen X.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
That just boggles the mind.
Speaker 3 (27:30):
So this is a place where, quite honestly, I'm on
team gen Z here. Yeah, and I'm on Team gen.
Speaker 2 (27:36):
Z because I feel like.
Speaker 7 (27:41):
It.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
As long as you're not driving, raise your hand. If
you ever feel like you've done work for a company
that then hasn't you know, properly paid you for that work,
or shortly afterwards you got laid off or had something
happened to you where the loyalty that you showed the
company wasn't reciprocated.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
It happens all the time.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
I think it's one of the main reasons why a
lot of Americans are kind of fed up with you know,
what the labor force is these days. It's like, oh,
I do so much for my company and I'm being
asked to work all these long hours and there's no
loyalty for me when things go badly on their end,
but they want all of my time and all of
my effort no matter what. I'm on Team gen Z here,
where your job is your job and granted, Look, if
(28:23):
you want to try to get ahead, and if you
want to you know, have you know, some kind of
supersize role or whatever. Sure like putting an extra effort.
I'm not saying don't do that. But if you are
in a salary job where you're supposed to work hours
nine to five and that's what you're being paid for,
and your boss is emailing you, you know, late at night,
hey can you do this?
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Can you do that? Honestly?
Speaker 4 (28:46):
In the words of Henry Hill from Goodfellas, screw You
pay Me?
Speaker 5 (28:52):
Yeah, they but different words.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
So I am on team gen Z here because all
of it's not fair for to be like, well, I
had to go through all that, So you want all
of these kids to have to go through that suck? Also,
no want I want the workforce to be better so
that they're able to again produce good things, but have
themselves be properly compensated and taken care of, and they
(29:15):
don't get so resentful about employment that they're looking for
the quickest possible exit from it.
Speaker 4 (29:21):
So, yeah, there are generational differences. These same articles were
written in a different way about millennials. They'll be written
about whatever generation. My kids are I don't what's the
one after Z generation alpha because we're just we're just lazy. Now,
we're just, yeah, we need a.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
Better So if you're trying to figure it out, like
what it should be.
Speaker 5 (29:43):
It should be a gen COVID. We should have a
gen covid. No, No, absolutely, absolutely we should absolutely.
Speaker 3 (29:48):
First of all, the first ones were born seven years
before it happened, because because gen Z goes from kids
born twenty nineteen ninety seven to twenty twelve, so the
next one is gonna be from like D thirteen through
call it twenty twenty seven.
Speaker 4 (30:04):
Now, I was thinking we named gen z jen covid.
They're the ones that had truly coming of age during
the pandemic and one hundred years so what I would
give it to them?
Speaker 3 (30:12):
The alternative name for them that actually do think is
a good one because it ties a couple things together
and just we don't need like a constant COVID reminder
like forever, like we don't zoomers. Good name riffs on
boomers a little bit.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
Yeah, But also they came.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
Of age during the time of zoom and it's got
Z in it, so we call it triple on TAM
so I think we really need something better for Generation Alpha,
which I mean the first problem is okay, so like
Jen Alpha, is this one? You really want to be
Generation Beta?
Speaker 2 (30:47):
After that?
Speaker 5 (30:49):
That's worse?
Speaker 3 (30:49):
Yeah, why do we Finally we're gonna get to the end.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
We're like, okay, Generation Omega, Well what do we do now?
Speaker 3 (30:56):
We've done all of the English letters, We've done the
Greek ones, the characters.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
What's next? I don't know?
Speaker 3 (31:03):
So yeah, I think we need something better for Generation
Alpha zoomers. I can I can get behind, you know,
going from boomer to zoomer.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
I think there's something there, Mike. It's kind of catchy.
Speaker 5 (31:15):
Okay, I'll think about it.
Speaker 2 (31:16):
Let's take a quick break here. When we come back,
we got stack Roulette.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
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Speaker 6 (31:41):
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Speaker 4 (32:09):
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Speaker 1 (33:15):
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Speaker 4 (33:30):
Chuck, there's a story I wanted to get to earlier,
how parents can help their boomerang child without derailing their
own retirement. We're seeing a lot more of this today
than we did just a few years ago. According to
Thrivence twenty twenty four Boomerang Kids Survey, which who knew
they did that, forty six percent of parents have had
their adult children's age eighteen to thirty five back home
(33:52):
to live with them at some point. That's up from
thirty five percent last year.
Speaker 3 (33:56):
That doesn't make sense to me, Yeah, it didn't right,
He's by eleven percent in a single year.
Speaker 5 (34:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (34:02):
I don't think there's great data on this, quite honestly,
but I do think it occurs pretty frequently, and I'd
be willing to bet that it's occurring more now than
it did pre COVID for a number of reasons. One
kid's got used to moving back home with their folks,
and two, housing prices have gone insane, and so I
think we are seeing more of this. And I also
think we are seeing a lot of parents that are
(34:25):
probably putting their own personal financial scenario at risk in
the way that they're handling some of this.
Speaker 5 (34:33):
Where do you.
Speaker 2 (34:33):
See kind of the biggest issues on that side?
Speaker 4 (34:37):
I just don't think that there are honest conversations about
what mom and dad can and can't afford, and so
things like the food budget, things like the cost of
insurance on cars and cell phone bills are getting increasingly
absorbed by parents well into adulthood, and a lot of
it I'm going to not lay on the feet. I'm
(34:58):
not really gonna put this on the children in this case.
I'm gonna put this on the parents for just avoiding
difficult conversations. And look, I think we all have this
as parents because ultimately, you know, if you have a
kid with a problem, oftentimes we blame ourselves.
Speaker 5 (35:14):
Right, like did I do the right thing? Did I
raise my kid properly? Uh?
Speaker 4 (35:18):
And so we avoid these tough conversations. But oftentimes the
kids are doing just fine, and if they're if they're
given some budget to work with, can figure out, yeah
I can. I can chip in for the cell phone
in the car, insurance and all these other items that
parents are covering for their kids. Like I said, further
into adulthood, I believe.
Speaker 3 (35:35):
I think it all distills back to the age old
saying raising kids is hard.
Speaker 2 (35:39):
Yo.
Speaker 5 (35:41):
Yes, yeah they do say that.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
Look, it's they're not easy conversations to have, but failing
to have them is still a decision that you end
up making. That it's just you're you're not actually going
through like the conversation of it. So yeah, it's Look
that we all go through this balance of trying to
be supportive of our kids while also wanting them to
(36:03):
develop on their own. And there's no right or perfect
way to do it. Like I'm never going to sit
there and like scold a parent for whatever their decisions
are because it's freaking hard, and you've got your own
relationship with your kids, but it is something where if
you don't there's a reason why when you get on
(36:26):
an airplane, as part of the safety briefingly they say,
if you're traveling with you know, a young child, and
the oxygen mask deploy, please put on your mask first
and then your your child. It's because if you don't
take care of yourself, then you can't take care of
your child. And this is kind of the issue that
you run into with financially supporting a child too long
into you know, their their adulthood, which is, hey, if
(36:49):
it's if it's coming at the expense of your nest egg,
it becomes something where if they haven't been able to
kind of spread their wings and go on their own,
then you run the risk of, hey, now I've exhausted
my money and they don't live on their own. How
what what do I do when I'm reaching retirement age
or if I need you no care and retirement and
(37:10):
things like that.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
So it's there's no easy answer.
Speaker 3 (37:13):
On this, and don't beat yourself up if you're struggling
with it, because it's hard, like it's it's it's something
that takes some time to work through. But find ways
to have those conversations with your kids when when you can,
And even if it's little things like, hey, you're living
at home and next year we're gonna move you off
(37:35):
the cell phone plan, so you're gonna have to figure
out you know that you know, thirty bucks a month
or forty bucks a month, and the year after, we're
gonna figure out, you know how to do you know
you can chip in for utilities. Even if you do
it just gradually. I'm not saying you have to like
do this all at once. Find ways to make progress,
and yeah, you might not make all the progress you
need in one year, but maybe over seven to ten
(37:56):
you're like, hey, I've gotten to where we need to
be and that can be big for you. Taking a
look at markets, still not much movement as we head
towards midday. The DA was off about a quarter percent,
SMP's flat, Nasdaq flat as well, so pretty quiet heading
into a job's Friday tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (38:14):
We're done for the day. We will see you tomorrow.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
We're gonna have all the detail on the jobs reporting,
a whole lot more to wrap up the week
The Financial Exchange is produced by Money Matters Radio and
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(01:04):
by Veterans Development Corporation. This is the Financial Exchange with
Chuck Zada and Mike Armstrong.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Kicking off hour two on the Financial Exchange.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Chuck, Mike and Tucker with you in stocks taking a
little bit of a pause here after rallying for the
last I don't know a week or so, almost two
weeks that we've seen some positive movement for equities and
not not a huge pause, but the dows off one
hundred points today. SMP's down about eight, nasdac's down fourteen,
so anywhere from you know, a tenth to a quarter
(01:36):
of a percent, it's nothing huge for the major indices.
Tenure US Treasury is up two basis points back to
four point two percent. We've got Oil West Text Intermedia
up thirty seven cents per barrel on news that OPEC
plus is going to be delaying their production increases until
at least April. And we've got Gold today down eleven
(01:59):
dollars in eighty centsnouns to twenty six sixty four and
forty cents.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
So again pretty quiet.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
And this is all an expectation of a jobs report
tomorrow that does have the potential to move markets. Expectations
looking like about two hundred thousand jobs added, unemployment rate
expected to tick up slightly to four point two percent,
and we'll have a whole bunch of discussion of that
and the underlying data when it is released tomorrow. Mike,
(02:27):
let's talk a little bit about this piece from the
New York Times. I think it could best be that
the headline can best be rephrased one man's junk fees
are another man's unbundling.
Speaker 4 (02:41):
So we've had airline executive testifying in front of Congress
on was it just Wednesday or do they have a
multiple multiple days of testimony.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
I think it's been two days. It's usually one in
front of the House and then one in front of
the Senate.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
So here is I've concluded that I think this is
one of the more ridiculous areas of Is this part
of the CFP beat Now it's it's part of the center.
Transportation is the one that's been enforced.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Looking to enforce this.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
Stuff and looking at junk fees has been a key
push from the Biden administration across different areas of the economy.
It's kind of been their response to higher inflation. And
we can talk about industry by industry here. But I
think this is the most ridiculous thing to look at
enforcing or regulating in the airline industry.
Speaker 5 (03:33):
I think it's absolutely silly.
Speaker 4 (03:36):
I think that air travel is cheaper today on an
inflation adjusted basis than it has ever been. There is
still competition, and if airlines want to offer, which many
of them do, like many airlines offer a completely unbundled
option where you get nothing and have to pay for
(03:56):
every little item.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
And then they offer ones where you all so can.
Speaker 4 (04:01):
If I go look at Delta or Jet Blue or American,
there's a basic economy fair that's going to be cheaper
than all the rest where I don't even get to
pick my seat, and then there's going to be a
bunch of higher options where I do get to pick
my seat, and I get a check bag, and I
get a carry on bag, and I get a twinkie
during the flight. Like it's just preposterous that we would
(04:22):
go and look at this and say, yeah, these junk
fees are the cause of inflation or are unfair to consumers.
Speaker 5 (04:28):
They're adequately disclosed.
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Some airlines don't charge them, some of them do, and
let the market figure this out.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
And here is the one issue that I think gets
us to this point. And the problem, in my opinion
is that basically, I mean it really is, the executive
branch over time has abdicated its responsibility and the legislature
too as an enforcer of antitrust. And as such, you
(04:59):
have a whole bunch of routes where there is no
competition or maybe one competitor, and so it's pretty easy
to effectively collude even if you're not you know, calling
up the other CEO and being like, Hey, here's what
we're gonna do on this route. If there's no competition
on routes, then you don't have the ability to find
other alternatives. And I think we've gotten to this point
(05:21):
because in the decade after nine to eleven, when airlines
were you know, really struggling, after you know, a whole
bunch of them went through bankruptcies and things like that,
we allow these giant mergers to happen between Delta Northwest,
between United and Continental, between American and US, and so
you don't have enough competition in the airline space now
(05:45):
to allow for customers who might be unhappy with an
airline to be like, you know what, I am going
to choose someone else because either A there is no
one else who's flying that same route, or B the
only other company that is has the exact same pricing
because they're all huge and they don't need to actually
compete with each other.
Speaker 5 (06:04):
Yeah, I guess that's fair.
Speaker 4 (06:05):
But you know, when I think about monopolistic type businesses,
I think about big, massive, profitable entities. And you're right,
the airlines are profitable these days, some of them are,
but it's not the big ones are. Like this is
my point is when you look at the big airlines
these days, and I'm just gonna I'll pull Delta just
(06:27):
as an example, because they're commonly thought of as like
the gold standard for airlines.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
And look, I've often said that.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
I absolutely would despise owning and operating an airline because
it's generally like a horrible business decade. Delta, aside from
the pandemic year, has not posted a loss since twenty ten,
twenty ten. Yeah, they have not had a trailing twelve
(06:55):
month loss since the first quarter of twenty ten.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Now, I'm not saying that you should consistently have losses
like that.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
That's a bad business, but in an industry that has
high capital expenses, you know, unionized workforce, you know, huge
upfront costs that you have to pay in things like that.
The idea that hey, we can go fifteen years without
having any losses in a hugely cyclical you know, sector two,
(07:25):
that's kind of insane to me. And oh, by the way,
when we do actually have a loss, hey, we're gonna
go to the government cry for a bunch of money.
And then on the back end, when we were supposed
to use that money to keep our people say oh gee,
we couldn't keep enough people.
Speaker 5 (07:40):
Got fire them. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:42):
I don't love the way that this all went down
during COVID. I don't think many people do.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
But even let's let's look at United.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Does anyone look at United and is like, hey, like
that's the paragon of you know, airlines and how they
should be run. No, Like, they're kind of middle of
the road, right, They're just there. They haven't had any
losses since twenty thirteen. And you look at the history
of them going back through you know, the data that
I have is a publicly traded companies going back to
ninety two, and they would you know, kind of consistently
(08:11):
have like five or six years where they'd make money
five or six where they'd lose five or six where
Like you just kind of pingpong back and forth. Because
that's what being an airline was. It was a tough business,
but it was one that, hey, like, sometimes it would
work for and sometimes it wouldn't, and ultimately you'd go
through these reorganizations, you know, on a fairly frequent basis,
and that would be kind of what they do. Not Hey,
(08:35):
you just have a license to print money and not
have any losses because you're so big that no one
can compete with you, right.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
I guess where I get to is, Yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Think it's dumb that we're having conversations about, like should
a baggage fee be included in the flight of a plane?
Speaker 2 (08:57):
What's the real problem that we're causing there?
Speaker 3 (09:01):
But what's the because look, if you want it to
be included in the price of the ticket, ticket prices
are going to go up, right Like, you're not going
to get the same price ticket if you want more stuff.
We like, that's just how it's going to work, because
that there are two costs that airlines have that are
higher than any others, labor and fuel. When you have
(09:22):
more heavy bags on planes, you need more fuel to
get the plane where it's going, which also raises the weight,
which means you need more fuel. So ultimately, if you
want to have baggage included in every ticket, then you're
two hundred dollars ticket. It's probably gonna be two fifty
every time, and that's fine, but like that's what it's
(09:44):
going to be.
Speaker 4 (09:44):
So I how about how about we waive baggage fees,
but we charge by total total price per pound?
Speaker 5 (09:51):
Why do you got to stand with your on the scale.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
Let's let's weigh every passenger. Because here's the thing. By
the way, if you've ever flown down a little puddle
jump or like anya, they do they actually weigh you
so that they know that the plane's gonna fly. Yeah,
so yeah, So I think this is some of the
other stuff where it's like, hey, airlines refusing to pay
you if you've been delayed for a day. Yeah, okay,
(10:15):
Like I could see that as being something where it's
worthy because you like, there's a real problem there this,
Like I don't care how air My only complaint with
how airlines do some of this stuff is that they
they won't show you the full cost of what you've
done until you're done, Like, no, show let me like
add the stuff I want and show me the cost
(10:36):
in real time so I don't have to go back
to another page. But even there, like do I need
to legislate that out? No, I don't know, Like what
did it cost me five minutes a time? Even though
it'll be fair. A lot of airlines booking systems slow.
Speaker 5 (10:51):
But sure don't need to legislate it.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Though we don't need to legislate how slow the systems
are either, So uh yeah, this to me, minor is
that doesn't warrant this level of scrutiny. And ultimately, if
you're gonna say, hey, like all this stuff should be
included in a plane ticket, by the price of the
ticket's gonna be higher, right, plain and simple, take a
(11:16):
quick break here, or if you think you can do
a better job, go start an airline.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
You're gonna get to the same place.
Speaker 3 (11:27):
And we know this because the airlines that tried to
do a better job by not doing this Jet Blue Southwest,
they're moving to this model because they're getting they're having
their lunch eaten by bigger competitors who have market power.
Because they were allowed to merge. Right, let's take a
quick break here. When we come back, we've got uh
Sarah Foster from bank Rate joining us talking about workers
(11:49):
getting raises in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Tankst us six one, seven, three, six, two, thirteen eighty
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(12:14):
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Speaker 6 (12:24):
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Speaker 4 (12:59):
Joining us now is Sarah Foster from bank Rate talking
to us about a survey they did of workers who
may or may not have gotten raises in twenty twenty four. Sarah,
thanks for joining us.
Speaker 7 (13:08):
Thanks for having me. It's always great to be here.
Speaker 4 (13:10):
So we're heading into annual review season. I think a
lot of people will be sitting down with their employer
and talking about, you know, what comes next in twenty
twenty five. What did you find in terms of your survey?
How many what portion of people you surveyed did get
raises in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 7 (13:26):
Yeah, you're right. It's a good time to really be
thinking about your compensation at this time of year. And
we found that fifty three percent of workers are actually
confident that they'll get a pay increase of some kind
over the next twelve months. We saw that over the
past twelve months, though, you know, even though the labor
market has been showing signs of slowing, it still looks
like it's pretty healthy because sixty one percent of workers
(13:49):
got a pay increase over the past twelve months. It's
roughly consistent with levels from last year and then twenty
twenty two, and of course we were in the middle
of that great resignation era. There is a slowdown though
in how many Americans are finding better paying positions somewhere else.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
And to be clear, I mean, everyone recognizes that the
pace of inflation has slowed considerably, but the confidence being
that it's a coin toss as to whether or not
people are going to get a get a raise this year,
it doesn't lead to a lot of confidence. That means,
you know, if you're not getting a raise, you are
losing about two to three percent in purchasing power as
(14:26):
we head into twenty twenty or five. Did you find
any trends in who's getting the raises who isn't that
might kind of indicate how people can push for them more.
Speaker 7 (14:38):
Yeah. Yeah, And we you know, we've historically always seen
job hopping as the best way of getting biggest pay bump,
and right now that might not really be the case
of you know, we're comparing data from the Atlanta Federal
Reserve Bank, and they are showing that job switchers and
job stayers are roughly earning about a four percent increase
(15:00):
at this point, which is roughly identical to each other.
You know, all groups actually saw less success this year
than in last year getting better paying jobs. But you know,
some of those other people who did have better luck
than others were those younger generations, probably because you know,
gen zers and millennials are still early in their careers
(15:20):
and not having hit their peak salary band, it's probably
a little bit easier for them to find something new
out there. Lower income workers also, and I think you
could directly trace that back to just where the demand
remains in this labor market, and it seems that companies
are still looking for those in person service jobs, including
food services and then leisure and hospitality.
Speaker 4 (15:43):
Did you find it somewhat surprising that baby boomers are
the least likely group to be experiencing pay increases accoring
to your survey. I think of that as you know, hey,
if I'm going to incentivize somebody that's on the verge
of retirement, I might need to keep paying them more.
Speaker 5 (15:59):
Survey doesn't seem to indicate.
Speaker 7 (16:00):
That it's it's interesting. It's actually something you know, we've
been looking at this data for years now at this point,
since twenty nineteen, we've been tracking who's been getting pay
increases who hasn't, And back then, you know, when I
first looked at that data was something that I noticed too,
that older generations were the ones least likely to be
getting pay increases. So, you know, you could infer that
(16:22):
this is a longer run trend. I kind of speculate
that it's just because they're older in their careers, they've
probably already maxed out their compensation, or at least the
growth rate that they're going to face throughout the rest
of their career is probably a little bit slower than
it was for younger generations and even for them when
they were that age. Even talking with older general or
(16:44):
at least talking with older workers themselves, though, you know,
we learn that there are some consequences here where a
lot of their budgets are stretched. Their budgets have absolutely
changed over the course of their lifetimes. When they were
maybe first in the early twenties, now they're caring for
aging parents and even children. We also saw that those
(17:04):
older generations were more likely to say that inflation has
taken a bite out of their wages. So I think
all of this is kind of related.
Speaker 4 (17:11):
Sarah, I've heard a lot of dissatisfaction with this labor market.
I think a lot of that comes from just not
a lot of movement. Job hopping, as you mentioned, has
been less common according to the Jolt Service. How would
you describe this labor market? Because yeah, I'm seeing some stagnation,
but it does still seem like a relatively robust labor market.
Speaker 7 (17:29):
It's a very valid question, and I think when I
catch myself describing that this job market is healthy, I
always think I need to add an asterisk there because
it's healthy. But for whom, you know, that's the most
important question. The people who are employed, they're roughly still
benefiting from a strong job market because as we see,
layoffs are low, the unemployment rate is still historically low.
(17:52):
They're still continuing to get pay increases at their position. However,
if you're someone who's unemployed, or maybe you're looking for
an new change to leave your current company, that's where
you might start to feel like this job market isn't
so hot. Because we're saying that the share of workers
who've been unemployed for six months are longer is now
the highest since twenty seventeen. The hiring rate is even
(18:16):
lower today than it was pre pandemic. You know, all
of these signs are kind of pointing to the fact
that this job market might be in stasis or at
least kind of approaching a holding pattern. So the message
for job seekers right now really is that, you know,
if you're looking for something new, it's probably going to
require a little bit of patience.
Speaker 4 (18:35):
That's Sarah Foster from bank Rade join us today to
talk about their survey on workers who did or did
not get raises in twenty twenty three and twenty twenty four,
and what's to come for twenty twenty five. Sarah, thanks
so much for joining us, appreciate it, Thanks for having
me taking a look here at markets. We've got the
Dow off about ninety one points, one fifth of one percent,
the S ANDP basically flat for the day, down one point,
(18:56):
the NASDAK currently leading the way upwards, but only up
about fourteen points or one tenth of one percent, and
price of a barrel of oil now sitting at sixty
eight dollars and sixty cents yield on the tenure Treasury
coming in at four point one nine to five percent.
Right now, we are going to take a quick break
(19:18):
coming up here, and when we come back, we'll have
a little bit of trivia for you. And then I
do want to get into this big story that I
continue to hear boomerang children and what parents can do
about it.
Speaker 8 (19:29):
That's next year on the Financial Exchange.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Bringing the latest financial news straight to your radio. Every day.
It's the Financial Exchange on the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
Find daily interviews and full shows of the Financial Exchange
on our YouTube page. Like us on YouTube and get
caught up on anything and everything you might have miss
This is the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
Speaker 2 (20:05):
Let's do a.
Speaker 6 (20:05):
Little bit of trivia here on the Financial Exchange on
this day. In twenty nineteen, Saudi Aramco raised twenty five
point six billion dollars in its first public share offering,
which pushed the company's valuation over one point seven trillion dollars. Today,
there are a few companies that are valued at over
one trillion dollars. So trivia question today, how many companies,
(20:29):
not including Saudi Aramco have a market cap over one
trillion dollars? Once again, how many companies not including Saudi
Aramco have a market cap of over one trillion dollars.
Be the seventh person today to text us at sixty
one seven three six two thirteen eighty five with the
correct answer, and you win a Financial Exchange Show t shirt.
(20:50):
Once again, the seventh correct response to text us at
six one seven three six two thirteen eighty five will
be our winner. See complete contest rules at Finanshane Show
dot com.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
Mike, I want to talk about this piece from the
Boston Globe here today. It's titled the Challenges and Joys
of Hiring gen Z Workers. It then also has a
colon and a quote their right hand is their phone,
so there's a lot here. Like honestly, I want to
really dig into this because I think this is a
(21:23):
fascinating piece. The first thing that it talks about is
that one of the things that employers are noting from,
you know, when they interview and try to hire younger workers,
they get ghosted a lot. And if you're not familiar
with the term ghosted, it's the idea that hey, like
you are going through like the process of interviewing someone
(21:43):
and you try to follow up with them and they
just stop responding, not like no, thank you, like I
don't you just never hear from them again.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
And this is.
Speaker 3 (21:54):
Something where I'm curious in your opinion. Do you think
that this is more prevalent with younger workers now again
gen Z at this point, I think would be like
twenty seven or twenty eight and younger. Do you think
it's more prevalent in that demo than in previous generations?
Speaker 4 (22:11):
I think perhaps, But I have a very difficult time
determining if this is a result of a generation and
differences in how they behave or a generational difference in.
Speaker 5 (22:23):
The state of the labor market.
Speaker 4 (22:25):
Like sure, part of it has to be both, because
I bet that if you go take a look at
news stories from nineteen ninety nine to two thousand and
talk to me about how many people were ghosting. You know,
they didn't use the word the term ghosting back then,
but you know how many people were applying to jobs
and not showing up. How many hiring managers were getting
(22:45):
frustrated by how long it took to fill roles. I
think this is at least in part due to the
fact that we are very near all time highs in
terms of the portion of the population that is currently working.
And so I know a lot's been said and written
about the state of the labor market. But when you
have a tight labor market, yeah, you have a longer
(23:06):
time time hiring, You have a tougher time hiring. And
part of it's probably behavioral, part of it's probably just
the state of things.
Speaker 3 (23:13):
So yeah, and I think it's interesting in look, there
might be something where social skills may have developed differently,
and so there's something there. But again, I just think
this is something that's interesting to look at. There's more
in here that I think we really want to dig
into on this, and some of this is not unique
(23:35):
to gen Z. One thing, it says employees note gen
zs bring many positive elopments to the workforce, a firm
grasp on technology and a thirst for learning. Mike, is
that unique to gen Z or is that.
Speaker 4 (23:46):
Just every new generation has a new take on technology
and just able to manage things differently than the previous generation.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
I guarantee you.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
That when Baby Boomers were getting into the workforce in
the sixties seventies, guarantee you that you know, the silent generation,
you know, managers were sitting there going look at these
typing skills. These kids are so right exactly like, Loo,
get out of these kids? Are you know able to
use the punch cards?
Speaker 2 (24:13):
And wow?
Speaker 3 (24:14):
Like this is amazing, Like I guarantee you that that's
what was being talked about. It's not the poo poo
gen Zers, but it's more to say, I come back
to the fact that there's rarely anything that's really new.
It's just kind of a different iteration of what we've
seen before. And that's my take on this is, Yeah,
gen Z is great at whatever the new technologies are today,
just like previous generations were at whatever the new technologies
(24:36):
were then. Now there's some other stuff that that that
I want to get into. There's there's so much here
that I think is is really interesting to me. Uh,
you've got a piece here, and this is talking about
a sign company. One new hire at the Norwood Signage
Company Steel Art Company didn't bother showing up on their
first day, even after going through multiple rounds of interviews
(24:57):
and testing the company's equipment for some and not even
pick up the phone and say hey, I accepted another position,
Sorry about that, or even to answer an email.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
We're like, where'd you go? Dude?
Speaker 3 (25:06):
So yes, that might be something that's unique in this case.
But I I'll tell you just a story about something
that I saw over the last decade or so. It
was someone who I had hired and on the second
day they didn't show up and emailed out to them
like hey, called out like hey, what's going on? And
(25:29):
took like a few times to get you know, someone
actually on the phone, and finally didn't. They're like, oh,
like I'm sick, And it's like, okay, would I rather
have like someone pretty? And clearly they weren't sick, by
the way, like it was one of their situations, and
like clearly they had no intention of coming back the
next day because they didn't come back the next day
and didn't return any phone calls then. So it was
(25:51):
kind of like, Okay, would I rather have like someone
who pretends to be sick when they don't like a
job and this was someone who's like in their forties
at the time, or would I have someone just doesn't
pick up the phone? Like again, I think this is
just a different iteration of something the other thing that
we've seen before. It's it's different, but the fundamental human
nature is not different.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
It's just the way it's being.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
Expressed, I think you can convince me that being a
Let's see, if you're entering the labor force right now,
you were somewhere around seventeen to nineteen years old during COVID.
Speaker 3 (26:29):
And that probably had a huge impact on your social
skills development did then as well?
Speaker 4 (26:33):
Like you were seeing this in grade school kids, how
their math and science and reading skills suck. We're seeing it,
and I think we're seeing it in young twenty year
olds where they did not have the opportunities to socialize
with their peers in the way that even kids just
five years older.
Speaker 5 (26:51):
Than them did.
Speaker 4 (26:52):
And I won't be surprised if, yeah, there's an anxiety
that comes to responding to emails or responding to phone
calls from people that did not exist prior to that.
I think it genuinely screwed some people up pretty badly,
and employers will probably have some annoyances in dealing with that.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Another thing in here that I want to look at.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
Similarly, for many twenty somethings, the workday doesn't bleed into
the night when it's five o'clock. They're done at five o'clock,
regardless of whether the work is done or not, says
Pamela Conway, chief Learning Officer and tell Ze and Woburn,
which creates learning and training videos for someone like me,
I'm gen X.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
That just boggles the mind.
Speaker 3 (27:30):
So this is a place where, quite honestly, I'm on
team gen Z here. Yeah, and I'm on Team gen.
Speaker 2 (27:36):
Z because I feel like.
Speaker 7 (27:41):
It.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
As long as you're not driving, raise your hand. If
you ever feel like you've done work for a company
that then hasn't you know, properly paid you for that work,
or shortly afterwards you got laid off or had something
happened to you where the loyalty that you showed the
company wasn't reciprocated.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
It happens all the time.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
I think it's one of the main reasons why a
lot of Americans are kind of fed up with you know,
what the labor force is these days. It's like, oh,
I do so much for my company and I'm being
asked to work all these long hours and there's no
loyalty for me when things go badly on their end,
but they want all of my time and all of
my effort no matter what. I'm on Team gen Z here,
where your job is your job and granted, Look, if
(28:23):
you want to try to get ahead, and if you
want to you know, have you know, some kind of
supersize role or whatever. Sure like putting an extra effort.
I'm not saying don't do that. But if you are
in a salary job where you're supposed to work hours
nine to five and that's what you're being paid for,
and your boss is emailing you, you know, late at night,
hey can you do this?
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Can you do that? Honestly?
Speaker 4 (28:46):
In the words of Henry Hill from Goodfellas, screw You
pay Me?
Speaker 5 (28:52):
Yeah, they but different words.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
So I am on team gen Z here because all
of it's not fair for to be like, well, I
had to go through all that, So you want all
of these kids to have to go through that suck? Also,
no want I want the workforce to be better so
that they're able to again produce good things, but have
themselves be properly compensated and taken care of, and they
(29:15):
don't get so resentful about employment that they're looking for
the quickest possible exit from it.
Speaker 4 (29:21):
So, yeah, there are generational differences. These same articles were
written in a different way about millennials. They'll be written
about whatever generation. My kids are I don't what's the
one after Z generation alpha because we're just we're just lazy. Now,
we're just, yeah, we need a.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
Better So if you're trying to figure it out, like
what it should be.
Speaker 5 (29:43):
It should be a gen COVID. We should have a
gen covid. No, No, absolutely, absolutely we should absolutely.
Speaker 3 (29:48):
First of all, the first ones were born seven years
before it happened, because because gen Z goes from kids
born twenty nineteen ninety seven to twenty twelve, so the
next one is gonna be from like D thirteen through
call it twenty twenty seven.
Speaker 4 (30:04):
Now, I was thinking we named gen z jen covid.
They're the ones that had truly coming of age during
the pandemic and one hundred years so what I would
give it to them?
Speaker 3 (30:12):
The alternative name for them that actually do think is
a good one because it ties a couple things together
and just we don't need like a constant COVID reminder
like forever, like we don't zoomers. Good name riffs on
boomers a little bit.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
Yeah, But also they came.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
Of age during the time of zoom and it's got
Z in it, so we call it triple on TAM
so I think we really need something better for Generation Alpha,
which I mean the first problem is okay, so like
Jen Alpha, is this one? You really want to be
Generation Beta?
Speaker 2 (30:47):
After that?
Speaker 5 (30:49):
That's worse?
Speaker 3 (30:49):
Yeah, why do we Finally we're gonna get to the end.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
We're like, okay, Generation Omega, Well what do we do now?
Speaker 3 (30:56):
We've done all of the English letters, We've done the
Greek ones, the characters.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
What's next? I don't know?
Speaker 3 (31:03):
So yeah, I think we need something better for Generation
Alpha zoomers. I can I can get behind, you know,
going from boomer to zoomer.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
I think there's something there, Mike. It's kind of catchy.
Speaker 5 (31:15):
Okay, I'll think about it.
Speaker 2 (31:16):
Let's take a quick break here. When we come back,
we got stack Roulette.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Breaking business and financial news first throughout the day only
here on the Financial Exchange Radio Network. Find daily interviews
and full shows of the Financial Exchange on how are
YouTube page get cut up on anything and everything you
might have missed. This is the Financial Exchange Radio Network.
Speaker 6 (31:41):
Trivia question today was how many companies not including Saudi
Ramco have a market cap of over one trillion dollars?
That will be nine and that includes Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, TSM,
Tesla and Berkshire Hathaway.
Speaker 5 (31:56):
Winner today of.
Speaker 6 (31:57):
The Financial Exchange Show t shirt was Robert from reading
Mass congrass to Robert and We play trivia every day
here on the Financial Exchange. See complete contest rules at
Financial Exchange Show dot com.
Speaker 4 (32:09):
Folks, we've got a brand new guide for the month
of December. It's our last guide of the year, and
if you are working on your plans for twenty twenty five,
this is the quick reference guide that you need to
implement your strategies. It's got all the information that you
need about tax brackets depending on if you're filing single
or married. You've got information here about how much you
(32:31):
are allowed to gift in twenty twenty five without filing
a gift tax receipt. Are you already on Medicare? Are
you worried about IRMA that income related monthly adjustment amount.
We've got the details there. How much you can contribute
to a retirement plan if you're covered by one at
work or not. All of these details and a whole
lot more are contained in our new guide Key numbers
(32:53):
for twenty twenty five. You can get your free copy
by calling us now at eight hundred three nine three
four zero zero one on. But again, this is a
full comprehensive guide on all the key numbers you need
to develop your own personal financial strategy for twenty twenty five,
and you can get a copy by calling the Armstrong
Advisory Group at eight hundred three nine three four zero
(33:13):
zero one.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
The proceeding was paid for by Armstrong Advisory Group, a
registered investment advisor. Nothing in the ad or in any
Armstrong guide a specific financial, legal or tax advice. Consult
your own financial tax into state planning advisors before making
any investment decisions. Armstrong make contact you to offer investment
advisory services.
Speaker 4 (33:30):
Chuck, there's a story I wanted to get to earlier,
how parents can help their boomerang child without derailing their
own retirement. We're seeing a lot more of this today
than we did just a few years ago. According to
Thrivence twenty twenty four Boomerang Kids Survey, which who knew
they did that, forty six percent of parents have had
their adult children's age eighteen to thirty five back home
(33:52):
to live with them at some point. That's up from
thirty five percent last year.
Speaker 3 (33:56):
That doesn't make sense to me, Yeah, it didn't right,
He's by eleven percent in a single year.
Speaker 5 (34:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (34:02):
I don't think there's great data on this, quite honestly,
but I do think it occurs pretty frequently, and I'd
be willing to bet that it's occurring more now than
it did pre COVID for a number of reasons. One
kid's got used to moving back home with their folks,
and two, housing prices have gone insane, and so I
think we are seeing more of this. And I also
think we are seeing a lot of parents that are
(34:25):
probably putting their own personal financial scenario at risk in
the way that they're handling some of this.
Speaker 5 (34:33):
Where do you.
Speaker 2 (34:33):
See kind of the biggest issues on that side?
Speaker 4 (34:37):
I just don't think that there are honest conversations about
what mom and dad can and can't afford, and so
things like the food budget, things like the cost of
insurance on cars and cell phone bills are getting increasingly
absorbed by parents well into adulthood, and a lot of
it I'm going to not lay on the feet. I'm
(34:58):
not really gonna put this on the children in this case.
I'm gonna put this on the parents for just avoiding
difficult conversations. And look, I think we all have this
as parents because ultimately, you know, if you have a
kid with a problem, oftentimes we blame ourselves.
Speaker 5 (35:14):
Right, like did I do the right thing? Did I
raise my kid properly? Uh?
Speaker 4 (35:18):
And so we avoid these tough conversations. But oftentimes the
kids are doing just fine, and if they're if they're
given some budget to work with, can figure out, yeah
I can. I can chip in for the cell phone
in the car, insurance and all these other items that
parents are covering for their kids. Like I said, further
into adulthood, I believe.
Speaker 3 (35:35):
I think it all distills back to the age old
saying raising kids is hard.
Speaker 2 (35:39):
Yo.
Speaker 5 (35:41):
Yes, yeah they do say that.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
Look, it's they're not easy conversations to have, but failing
to have them is still a decision that you end
up making. That it's just you're you're not actually going
through like the conversation of it. So yeah, it's Look
that we all go through this balance of trying to
be supportive of our kids while also wanting them to
(36:03):
develop on their own. And there's no right or perfect
way to do it. Like I'm never going to sit
there and like scold a parent for whatever their decisions
are because it's freaking hard, and you've got your own
relationship with your kids, but it is something where if
you don't there's a reason why when you get on
(36:26):
an airplane, as part of the safety briefingly they say,
if you're traveling with you know, a young child, and
the oxygen mask deploy, please put on your mask first
and then your your child. It's because if you don't
take care of yourself, then you can't take care of
your child. And this is kind of the issue that
you run into with financially supporting a child too long
into you know, their their adulthood, which is, hey, if
(36:49):
it's if it's coming at the expense of your nest egg,
it becomes something where if they haven't been able to
kind of spread their wings and go on their own,
then you run the risk of, hey, now I've exhausted
my money and they don't live on their own. How
what what do I do when I'm reaching retirement age
or if I need you no care and retirement and
(37:10):
things like that.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
So it's there's no easy answer.
Speaker 3 (37:13):
On this, and don't beat yourself up if you're struggling
with it, because it's hard, like it's it's it's something
that takes some time to work through. But find ways
to have those conversations with your kids when when you can,
And even if it's little things like, hey, you're living
at home and next year we're gonna move you off
(37:35):
the cell phone plan, so you're gonna have to figure
out you know that you know, thirty bucks a month
or forty bucks a month, and the year after, we're
gonna figure out, you know how to do you know
you can chip in for utilities. Even if you do
it just gradually. I'm not saying you have to like
do this all at once. Find ways to make progress,
and yeah, you might not make all the progress you
need in one year, but maybe over seven to ten
(37:56):
you're like, hey, I've gotten to where we need to
be and that can be big for you. Taking a
look at markets, still not much movement as we head
towards midday. The DA was off about a quarter percent,
SMP's flat, Nasdaq flat as well, so pretty quiet heading
into a job's Friday tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (38:14):
We're done for the day. We will see you tomorrow.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
We're gonna have all the detail on the jobs reporting,
a whole lot more to wrap up the week
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