Your parents are lucky: Apparently they have been able to continue for decades in salaried jobs. Here is a bold, blunt fact of life for salaried jobs in the US economy: Only a small fraction of such jobs can last for the 45 or so years of a working career.

Then, here's another problem: A marriage with a working wife is not a very stable situation: Apparently about 1/3rd of marriages end in divorce. So, with the 2/3rds, the situation is already bad. But there is more that is worse: It is politically incorrect to note that a large fraction of women really are house mice and find anything in work outside a home surrounded with a white picket fence too stressful. So, they need to be in a one income marriage (maybe do some volunteer work to save the world, whales, poor people in Africa, or some such), not a two income marriage. Next, for a large fraction of women successful in the world of work, they conclude that they no longer need a man to take care of them and leave. That your parents have two incomes and stayed married is also unusual.

Then there is another fact: Quite broadly in the US economy, and nearly without exception for technical positions, the subordinate needs to be younger than the supervisor. So, by age 45 or so, a large fraction of people have to be CEO or be unemployable.

So, net, for a stable career, need to be a CEO. Exceptions? Sure, MD, LLB, tenure in academics, and a few more. DDS? Typically they do own their own business. MD? Commonly they own their own business or are a partner in a partnership that owns a clinic. Academic tenure? They don't have to have their salary keep up with inflation.

Put more simply, the main path to financial security in the US economy is for someone to own their own business. Mostly those are Main Street businesses; these businesses typically have a great advantage, a geographical barrier to entry which means if do well against competition in a radius of 100 miles then can do quite well. Commonly another advantage is not just a few, niche customers but many customers drawn from quite broadly in the community so that, in economic ups and downs, if the community is not devastated, then the business still can continue. In bad times, sure, roughly, first-cut, get less revenue but also pay less for supplies including labor and need less money for yourself. Also, with many customers, usually one unhappy customer does not seriously hurt the business. For owning your own business, technology might help; still, it is next to crucial to OWN your own business.

If get started owning your own business early in life, then that's an advantage. If then can also use technology to become independently wealthy, even better. Whatever, it's from important up to essential to own your own business.

Is this situation new? Actually, yes: Big businesses mostly don't have good geographical barriers to entry and, thus, in the US, growing over the past 40 years or so, have faced devastating competition from globalization. So, maybe someone had a good career with GE before GE discovered that competitive products from Japan were selling in US retail for less than the cost of production at GE. Similarly for autos, steel, really most of old manufacturing, and more.

So, due to such global competition, we get some curious situations: A Ph.D. in electronic engineering is essentially for a career with global competition while a licensed electrician in Poughkeepsie has no such competition. So, a Ph.D. in electronic engineering can wish they could swap their Ph.D. for an electrician's license.