TRYING to glean differences among the generations makes for an interesting parlor game. But this week, three reports by big financial institutions offered insights into how investors in their 40s and 20s — known as Generation X and Generation Y — think about their personal finances in the broadest way.
The reports by Fidelity, U.S. Trust and Pershing show how the younger generations want to set themselves apart from the baby boomers. The reports yielded tips from which any...

On most weekday afternoons, Jason Franklin is frenetically busy in his crowded office on West 38th Street in Manhattan, fielding calls or pushing projects forward as the executive director of Bolder Giving, a nonprofit organization that promotes philanthropy.
But for several days in mid-August, Mr. Franklin, 32, decamped to a radically different environment, the bucolic Sundance Resort near Park City, Utah, where he happily unplugged to attend a biannual conference sponsored...

JESSIE SPECTOR was determined to give away her inheritance as soon as she received it. She said her parents intervened and advised that, at 23, she should take time to think about it. What if she wanted to buy a house one day?
When Naomi Sobel learned at 20 that she would receive a large inheritance, she said she knew it was a lot of money, and for her, too, it raised questions about a house: would it be enough to buy one? She laughs at this today, since it would have paid for...

TRADITIONALLY people who set up private foundations — either during their lifetimes or through an estate plan — envisioned an entity that would carry on their philanthropy for generations. But lately, some founders or their immediate successors are spending their full endowments and closing down. Other donors are creating new foundations with a limited life span.
What brought about these changes? Endowments were battered by the recent financial crisis. And for...