Unless real action happens soon the cost of adapting to the new realities will be much higher, and guess who will be left with the bills?

What are the new realities?

The new realities are quite simple ... As Australia gets less and less competitive and fewer and fewer real jobs that generate wealth are created then the standard of living for young and old will fall and no amount of politics, taxation, cash distribution etc. will save anybody. The only thing that we do is dig holes and export minerals and grow and export primary produce - manufacturing has been hollowed out to the extent that is will be virtually non existent in a few years time. Service industries and other "parasitic " industries, like health , law, "house flipping" etc. do not produce tradable goods nor wealth that may be used to improve our lot ...how does one pay for a CAT scanner from Germany when all we have to trade are law or medical services?

Hey Sid, do you have a particularly big nose, or is there some other reason you can't see past the end of it? What ever, something is getting in the way of you seeing very clearly.

I don't know what you inherited from your folks, but mine, & those of my generation, after a depression, followed by a world war, did not have all that much even by the end of their lives.

I don't know where you find all these wrinklies running through their homes & wealth, perhaps it's an ex bureaucrat thing. All those I know, are hanging onto their bit of security, just like me, even if it means no holiday trips. It's the kids spending their time & money traipsing around Europe, or Asia. I guess the knowledge that they will inherit a few hundred thousand each insulates them from having to save too hard.

Each of my kids started their ex school life with a reasonably new car from dad. The one who was offered her mothers car tried to let us know, she wouldn't be seen dead in that old nail, without it being a put down. She failed miserably, but got a better car anyway.

The same kid would not rent a house, only slightly newer & better than the one she grew up in. You know, it didn't even have stainless steel bench tops, how could a young lady live in THAT.

They have "DONE" Europe, bought new cars, one twice, although she had bought a house between them, & only lived in up market accommodation. I can imagine the utter horror if asked to live in my first owned home. A 4 room ex farm laborer's cottage with a fuel stove just wouldn't do, I'm sure.

So Sid, I think you have aimed at the wrong target with your rant old mate, perhaps it is the spendthrift youth you should lecture. But in closing, would you please tell me what good the increase in house prices does us oldies. All it does in my experience, is allow councils to increase rates.

I think this image of the idle youth is a middle class thing, there are several young adults in my street who live with their parents and they all work and have done since they were still at school.
The last thing young people need is old people prophesying doom, we had that when I was at school, we were told we'd never find a job and that there would most likely be a nuclear war anyway and we'd be living in some version of the Mad Max movies...that messed a lot of us up more than I think people realise.
Hey Syd! I can see into the future! Do you believe me?...exactly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=594WLzzb3JI

It's hard to argue that the political system doesn't serve the young, while they refuse to vote and or simply blame shift. I have to agree with both Kilimouski and Hasbeen.
It's just not older generation's fault!
I worked extremely hard, and paid tax, up to 68 cents in the dollar!
University was not always free, but only became so, with the election of the Gough Witlam.
I agree, we should be more even handed, and keep education, particularly tertiary education, free!
Or at least means tested, so that the test of entry is ability and merit alone, rather than how rich or privileged your parents were!
As to the other points, blaming people who earned all they have is hardly constructive, particularly, when all we need is a few well designed/crafted reforms, that re-include all those who have escaped the tax net, to pay a fair share!
And if that fair share and reform is less than they currently shell out for tax compliance, then they would lose nothing whatsoever! It Real reform may have many detractors, with considerable skin in the current complexity!
It's just not hard or complex, rather just the opposite.
Something as simple as a universal, unavoidable, inescapable expenditure tax of just 4.8-5% would create much more revenue!
If the young want change, then they need to participate in the political process, rather than simply whine or blame those who have earned and paid for what they have!
Surely we need to reintroduce compulsory national service, if only to ensure, the young become job ready, engage in healthy pursuits, healthy hours and self reliance.
And off the mind bending party drugs, that allow them to simply duck shove personal responsibility?
Today's young generation are just too soft, from just having it all too easy, and need to develop some inherent toughness, some real steel in the backbone, [or just a backbone,] and self reliance.
They'd be none the worse for it!
Rhrosty.

So the youngsters can't get a job or buy a house?

But just try getting them to support restricting or stopping immigration!

Shock horror! They wouldn't want to be "waysist".

YES ITS TIME KING GEORGE LED FROM THE FRONT
wee need generational change..we cant wait.

I'm with Hasbeen on this: anyone under, say, 25 who thinks they're worse off as a generation than the Baby Boomers needs to get a sense of perspective. Yes, there are fewer long-term dead-end full-time factory jobs like the one my father held from 1967 to 1976 -- starting with shift work and eventually moving on to a permanent daytime shift (starting at 7:20 AM) as he got into his sixties: but there are many more part-time and/or casual jobs which often pay better -- like the ones my son is holding now -- it's much easier and more pleasant to work from home, and teleworking for interstate or overseas concerns is a feasible and growing option. Education is much more open and readily available and welfare is at least as generous as it was.

What we have lost is manual work, and with it the opportunity for totally unskilled men -- very seldom women -- to earn a quid. Most of that can be addressed by education, but eventually we will have to acknowledge that there are some people who just cannot produce more value than they cost to employ. Whether we deal with that by lowering the minimum wage, or paying them pensions, or inviting them to move to some country where manual work is still an option, remains to be seen.

...The best motivation for the young to succeed, is a chance for a job, and an affordable home for a family..These basics are a receding dream in Australia for young and old. General education no longer positions the young to achieve those basics.

Where do I begin?

Let's start with the Lima Declaration of '71 (or '72) which,vin very flowering terms, stated that all Western countries should try to move 20% of their manufacturing into underdeveloped countries by the year 2000. It's now 2014, and 80% of our manufacturing is now off-shore. The outcome has been, yes, it has helped underdeveloped countries, but more importantly, has reduced manufacturing costs for big business dramatically, with cheaper labour, power, infrastructure, land, etc, vastly increasing their profits even after transport.

Secondly, it has forced the price of labour down in Western countries by maintaining unemployment, particularly in unskilled and level skill areas.

Then there's the deregulation of banking and business that has allowed everything from senior execs incomes jumping from 6 times the lowest wage earner in the company, to the current 200-400 times the lowest wage earners. Then things like the Subprime Loan fiasco spawned by Wall St, on-selling unsecured loans as AAA investments, leading to the GFC.

We have sold off all our infrastructure, causing government to lose income, increasing the tax burden of the worker, for no other reason than big business is more efficient. Sure, but it's still a loss of government revenues!

We are living longer, with the average life expectancy jumping 20 years in the last 60 years, causing the cost of pension funding to increase nearly exponentially. I can go on, but 350 words isn't enough to list everything. But in short, everything is geared towards corporate monopolies running the show, while we're just the marketplace, the labour, or cannon fodder.

My above post listed some of the areas that our tax dollars have vanished to. So what young voters need to appreciate is that they must be both numerous in numbers and loud in voice to create change...that's what the baby-boomers did. Moratorium marches to pull out of Vietnam, constant pressure for free university, free health, unionism activity, and other vocal protests that were made. The author of the article seems to think it was laid out on a platter for us, and couldn't be more wrong. The younger generation's apathy is their fault, not the fault of baby-boomers who fought for change.

That being said, what change needs to occur? For starters, the re-introduction of regulated business and banking markets, rather than the casino philosophy that has become prevalent. We had no financial crashes when those things were regulated, but since deregulation, we've had the '87 Stock Market Crash, the '91 Stock Crash, the Dot Com Bubble, the Subprime Loan fiasco and the GFC. Go figure!

Secondly, bring back some of the manufacturing that's gone off-shore, while reintroducing tariffs, to make onshore manufacturing more attractive.

Set CEO's incomes as not being allowed to exceed 8 times the lowest income earner of the company...the janitor, and if they don't have a janitor and only high income earners, be forced to employ one.

Higher taxation on the wealthy and high income earners.

Nationalization of infrastructure, rather than selling it off.

Those are steps that would reverse the situation, but anything short of regulation is nothing more than pissing in the wind.