new delhi last week the hashtag millennialretirementplans was trending on twitter the tweets offered humour pragmatism and a range of emotions the young were persistent in pointing out that what worked earlier wont work nowshould we be in charge of our retirement or let the government provide retirement benefits and social security this debate is old and we have lived through the cycles of one school dominating the other the baby boomers born 194664 broke away from handouts and expected their governments to only provide the framework for retirement security the focus moved from benefit to contribution people began to save early invest without touching the corpus and allowed it to grow and fund their retirementgeneration x born 196580 stepped into their work lives during the period of boom and bust making money or losing jobs into their adulthood they were the consumerist generation they got themselves into debt for homes and used credit cards happily they worried when conversations turned to retirement felt guilty about not doing enough but hoped to begin to save sooner than later they wished the government offered some social securitythe millennials born 198196 are not sure what the long term holds the primary marker for the millennials are that they are not in the formal workforce by choice they like the gig economy instead they increasingly dont own homes and cars for they find loans burdensomewhat would an educated generation that works hard but finds the uncertainty they have to deal with too high do retirement would be the last thing on their minds the traditional answer to an uncertain future was savings the baby boomers denied themselves the luxuries to save for the future they saw the savings as their insurance against unexpected eventsmillennials view of their finances revolves around the balance between spending and earning since they are struggling to get past this basic equation of comfort their ability to have a longterm view is limitedthe inequality in income rankles many who posted on twitter they find earlier generations have not only become very rich but have also eliminated many traditional jobs that paid a steady incomehealth is a big concern expressed in various ways in which it affects the millennials lives they see themselves as being afflicted by lifestyle diseases as they keep long hours and eat erratically they worry about falling ill and losing their jobs they dont see themselves prepared nor do they see solutionsthe distaste for savings is to my mind the core problem a small and persistent saving as a habit the modern times are not easy and the millennials stories about uncertain jobs are real how would you solve a problem you do not controlit is the nature of economic cycles to not reveal the trends until we are well into it that one ground rule remains unchallenged through this churnthe precious merit of our little savings that have been invested to protect us when in trouble the millennials need not kill themselves to save but