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“I’m starting to not have sympathy for the boomers. I’m really not,” financial influencer Caleb Hammer told Joe Rogan on a recent episode of The Joe Rogan Experience (1).
“If you were 25 in 1990 and made an average U.S. salary for 40 years, saving 5% to 10% per month in the S&P 500, how much would they have now?” Rogan asked.
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“If they just put 5% to 10% a month aside, in the stock market that they had, that they had, they would be multimillionaires,” Hammer said.
Rogan asked Perplexity AI to confirm, and it responded: “They would have around $2 million to $5 million, depending on exact assumptions.”
It’s a provocative claim, and one that’s likely to inflame the persistent cultural narrative that boomers have hoarded money and cut younger people out of both the job and housing market.
But does the math actually support Hammer’s claim?
Moneywise ran the numbers
The math is less explosive than the clip suggests. Based on Social Security Administration (SSA) data (2), the national average wage rose from $21,028 in 1990 to $69,847 in 2024.
Using Slickcharts’ S&P 500 total return data (3) and assuming contributions were made at the end of each year with dividends reinvested, an average earner investing from 1990 through 2025 would have accumulated:
Hitting higher figures would require variables not accounted for in the clip, such as above-average earnings, employer matches, or a longer timeline.
Read More: Thanks to Jeff Bezos, you can become a landlord for $100 — without the headache of actually being one
The power of staying invested
The S&P 500 has gone through crashes, recessions, bubbles and bear markets (4) since 1990. Investors, including boomers, have lived through the dot-com collapse, the 2008 financial crisis, the COVID-19 crash and the 2022 bear market.
And yet, the long-term outcome for disciplined investors has still been powerful. That’s because investing doesn’t require every year to be good. It requires enough time for the good years to overwhelm the bad ones.
Remember, a person saving 10% of average wages from 1990 through 2025 would have contributed less than $150,000 total, but could have ended up with more than $1 million. Most of the final balance would have come from compounding, not from the money they personally put in.
That’s the part Hammer is right to hit home about: Small percentages become large sums when added up over decades. Most investors don’t fail because of a bad stock pick — they fail because they never got started, according to Assante Wealth Management (5).
If you’re worried about making costly investing mistakes, it may be worth speaking with a qualified financial advisor. Research from Vanguard (6) suggests that working with a financial advisor can add about 3% in net returns over time through a combination of portfolio construction, tax efficiency, rebalancing and behavioral coaching.
That difference can become substantial over a multi-decade investing horizon. For example, a $50,000 portfolio that benefits from an additional 3% annual return could potentially generate more than $1.3 million in extra growth over 30 years, depending on market conditions and investment choices.
Portfolios at scale
For those with account holdings of $250,000 or more, platforms like WiserAdvisor can connect you with vetted professionals who specialize in this kind of planning.
Simply start by answering a few questions about your savings, retirement timeline and overall investment portfolio. From there, WiserAdvisor reviews its network to match you — for free — with up to three vetted, reputable advisors aligned with your specific needs.
You can then schedule no-obligation consultations with your matches to determine who is the best fit for your long-term goals.
WiserAdvisor is a matching service and does not provide financial advice directly. All matched advisors are third parties, and specific financial results are not guaranteed.
Of course, not everyone wants to work with a financial advisor. Some investors prefer to research opportunities and build their own portfolios.
Why all this matters for younger Americans now
Younger workers may not have the same housing market or college costs that older generations did. But they do have one advantage — time.
A 25-year-old who starts investing today doesn’t need to predict every market move or perfectly time the next recession. However, finding even a handful of exceptional investments over a lifetime can dramatically change the outcome.
After all, some of the market’s biggest winners have turned modest investments into life-changing wealth. A $10,000 investment in Nvidia a decade ago would be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars today. The challenge, of course, is identifying those opportunities before they become household names.
For investors looking for the next tenbagger, Moby offers expert research and recommendations to help you find strong, long-term investments, backed by advice from former hedge fund analysts.
In four years, and across almost 400 stock picks, Moby says its recommendations have beaten the S&P 500 by almost 12% on average. Their research keeps you up-to-the-minute on market shifts, and they’ll deliver it straight to you.
Plus, their reports are easy to understand for beginners, so that you can become a smarter investor in just five minutes.
Of course, even the best stock pick only works if you actually invest. The key is putting money to work before it disappears into rent, takeout, car payments or impulse purchases.
Unsure how to start?
If that sounds like a little bit too much management, you could instead take a set-and-forget approach to investing. Besides, one of the most commonly held pieces of investing advice is to invest in index funds or ETFs if you’re unsure what to do when you start out on your investment journey.
Even small amounts can grow over time with tools like Acorns, an app that automatically invests your spare change.
Signing up for Acorns takes just minutes: Link your cards, and Acorns will round up each purchase to the nearest dollar, investing the difference — your spare change — into a diversified portfolio. That morning coffee for $3.25? It’s not a 75-cent investment in your future.
With Acorns, you can invest in a dividend ETF with as little as $5 — and, if you sign up today, Acorns will add a $20 bonus to help you begin your investment journey. All you have to do is set up a small recurring monthly contribution.
Building wealth is one challenge. Protecting it is another. As portfolios grow, many investors look beyond traditional stocks and bonds for additional diversification.
Keeping stable through rough markets
Stocks have historically generated strong long-term returns, but they can also experience significant short-term declines. That’s why some investors choose to diversify beyond the traditional 60/40 stock-and-bond portfolio by adding a portion of assets that don’t move in lockstep with the market.
No one investment can entirely eliminate risk. That’s why some investors use physical gold to help balance portfolio volatility and maintain confidence (7) during turbulent markets as an extra countermeasure against inflation or a market drop.
Gold has historically attracted attention during downturns because it isn’t tied directly to corporate earnings, and has often been viewed as a store of value. It also can’t be printed at will by big banks during an inflationary run, given its inherently limited supply.
One way to invest in gold that also provides significant tax advantages is to open a gold IRA with the help of Priority Gold.
Gold IRAs allow investors to hold physical gold or gold-related assets within a retirement account, which combines the tax advantages of an IRA with the protective benefits of investing in gold, making it an attractive option for those looking to potentially hedge their retirement funds against economic uncertainty.
To learn more, you can get a free information guide that includes details on how to get up to $10,000 in free silver on qualifying purchases.
Whether an investor prefers stocks, bonds, precious metals or a combination of assets, the lesson from Hammer’s argument remains the same — the earlier you start building ownership in assets, the more time compounding has to work in your favor.
Hammer may have overstated how much wealth the average worker could have accumulated. But his broader point survives the math: Time and consistency matter far more than most people realize.
A 5% savings rate may not make everyone rich. A 10% savings rate won’t guarantee multimillionaire status. But over decades, small, repeated investments can create life-changing wealth.
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Article Sources
We rely only on vetted sources and credible third-party reporting. For details, see our ethics and guidelines.
Powerful JRE/ YouTube (1); Social Security Administration (2); Slickcharts (3); TradingView (4); Ferguson Financial Planning (5); Vanguard Canada (6); Investopedia (7)
This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.
