To the editor:
When Michelle Obama spoke at the Democratic National Convention, she said "that most of us will never be afforded the grace of failing forward ... we will never benefit from the affirmative action of generational wealth."
What is generational wealth? It refers to financial assets that are passed down through families to children and grandchildren, etc.
In small towns across the upper Ohio Valley, grandparents, parents and extended family members are followed to numerous fields to see youngsters perform in countless athletic events. Generational wealth is seldom on their minds. I often said we ate my parents' fortune at the dinner table each night and what was left was spent on new clothes each school year and the best toys for Christmas that could afford to be purchased every Dec. 25. That is what the former first lady is getting at -- the average family fell forward on love.
How to build generational wealth and should we?
Buying and owning a home can lay the foundations of generational wealth. My mother worked as a clerk at the local 5-and-10 during her high school years in the1940s, devising a plan of saving $20 from her pay, spending $20 and contributing $20 to her parents' household to help meet the family expenses. That is the key savings part of your pay and allowing the concept of time and money.
Where do we stand? numerous websites offer a glimpse at the median and average wealth in this nation. In most of the cases (57 percent), the fifth generation had less wealth than they inherited. The idea of "shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations, as each generation forgets why the first generation wanted it so much.
One needs to look no further than the downtowns of the local communities with boarded-up buildings and empty storefronts. People simply would rather go to Myrtle Beach in the summer than toil at lemonade stands.
It is better to light a candle than curse the darkness -- 401(k) plans and Individual Retirement Account plans provide workers a chance to build generational wealth. The concept of interest allows a person to obtain the median in generation wealth even if they did not have the earnings median.
If this generation did not enjoy generational wealth, this generation will see to it that the next generation does, through hard work, savings and thrift. A penny saved is a penny earned and a penny saved doubles in five years in a growth mutual fund in a retirement savings.
It was the Obama administration who wanted to eliminate 529 school savings plans for working-class children, while the Obamas sent their children to Harvard.
Again, the Obamas seem to be speaking from above the glass ceiling. They are funded by countless cash donors who donate to both political parties simply unaware of Mary's $20per pay savings plan.
From the working class, I remain.
Michael Traubert
Wellsburg