Before you call hipsterism a fad, consider this comment from kleinbl00. Hipsters are our version of '60s counterculture, which was their version of the beats, which was their version of the Horatio Alger prototype -- the noble tramp. Etc. -- Fuck aiming for uniqueness. I'm going to aim to live as simply and cheaply as possible so that I can enjoy my youth to the greatest extent. Maybe this means that next time I travel I figure out long distance carpooling and hostels instead of flying to a hotel. Maybe it means I spend a lot of my time in a free coffeeshop bumming wifi and occasionally making someone a drink to assuage my guilt. Could mean a lot of different things to a lot of people. But it's not a fad to everyone; I can guarantee you to some of us it's a lifestyle, and as kb mentions, it's a reaction to circumstances beyond gen x's control.The kids are all right. That "social safety net" described in the linked article is a strawman. It's not steady-state. For one thing, unemployment doesn't last forever (trust me, I know). For another, the United States is busily dealing with "structural unemployment" - a lovely technical term for "jobs that are not coming back ever." It's going to be a long slow decline. Part of it is caused by those very "hipsters" - they don't buy much. They don't need cars. They use "irony" as an excuse to shop at thrift stores (hey, whatever works!). They support "hipster" restaurants, which is code for "keeps money closer to the point of sale" (85% of money generated by a franchise restaurant leaves the zip code of the franchise). And they deeply believe in the shit they buy, to a zealous degree. It's not exactly an anti-consumer mantra, but it certainly protects the local at the expense of the global.
Bill McKibben (GenX) argues in Eaarth that the way forward is distinctly hipster-like: Travel less, buy less, eat local whenever possible, use less energy and cultivate online relationships. Shannon Hayes (GenX) argues in Radical Homemakers that the way forward is to freeload until you have enough resources to live self-sufficiently off your own land.