Almost everyone has at one point in their life dreamed of living “the good life” with great wealth. They seek a large house, a happy family and lots of money. But this doesn’t happen to most people, even at their retirement age.

Nowadays, it’s not so hard to invest a nest egg and make millions of dollars by the time you retire at a modest 8% annual growth. Even among the young, there were 500,000 new millionaires in the US according to CNBC as of 2015.  

This generation has so many new ways to accumulate wealth, from the humble IRA to higher stakes investing. So why then is the wage gap widening if it’s easy to make it big? Why do people seem so dissatisfied with the amount of wealth in America?

Debate has been focused around the rich recently, but it’s time to step back and look at the other side of the debate. According to a study by howmuch.net, 51% of millennials have less than $1,000 in savings. The numbers get worse when you look at other generations.

That’s not the only indicator of an American finance problem. Consider the Powerball. Why was there so much buzz around it? It’s been covered by media constantly that the chances of winning are less than being hit by a meteor.

Did people buy 20 lottery tickets “just for fun?” No. There’s a common pattern in all this data. Americans (especially the young) live from paycheck to paycheck on $1000 and are guilty of fiscal irresponsibility.

Consider the U.S. government’s debt of 19.3 trillion dollars, the highest in its history, with exception to the World War II era. Is it a coincidence that in the time of some of the most financially irresponsible generations in history that the government is equally irresponsible?

Consider a study on American debt. Bankrate.com reported that 37% (nearly one third) of Americans have debt equal or near equal to their emergency savings that they could not pay off.

This isn’t all to strike an alarmist tone, but to bring to attention an issue that is slowly getting worse. Americans, especially the young, are not saving money. It’s not a problem now, but in a couple decades, when the government is unable to pay for social security that people are relying on, it will be.

For Rocklin students and high school students in general, the issue is even more urgent. Not only are students in the best financial position to begin investing (late teens), but they are also most likely going to accumulate student debts as they attend college in the next few years. Bad financial responsibility is basically a death sentence to anyone with student debts.

The widening pay gap will have negative consequences if it isn’t put under control. The government may be able to legislate away some of the problem, but not all of it. The remainder is up to American citizens, especially the ones whose futures are on the line.