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Similar to some people's comments above, I'm very grateful and consider myself very priveleged that things turned out so well for me considering the meager beginnings of my family here in the U.S.
My parents emigrated here in late 1952; and from about the middle of WWII until late '52 they lived in displaced persons camps since they had to leave Hungary (dad) and Yugoslavia (mom) during the war to avoid war-related b.s.; while we aren't Jewish so we didn't have all that trauma to deal with, it was still nasty. My younger brother and I were born in such a "camp/town" in Austria. They came here with an appreciation for the importance of education, my dad was classically educated and trained as a professional artist in Hungary/Europe, and after high school my mom got whatever additional education was required to be an elementary school teacher there. My parents sacrificed and did without a lot of things I saw other parents have so that they could make life better for their children. I can hardly believe they managed to pay for it since it was relatively a lot of money, but my younger sister and I attended local Catholic "preparatory" high schools here since my parents believed it was worth it. They never owned a house until the year I graduated from college, though they could probably have bought one sooner if they weren't so stubborn and believed more in the American way of credit/debt. They never to this day had a credit card.
So compared to that, my kids live in another universe and have almost anything they want. But I'm glad we can give them what we can, and we continually make an effort to have them not take it all for granted. I tell them old family stories about how things were and I think that helps.
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