- Could the Millennials make up this lost ground? Perhaps, if wage growth suddenly and dramatically accelerates, urban cores start to build millions of new homes, and Congress announces a student-loan debt jubilee.
Narrator: They won't.
That's because Baby Boomers have FCKED you over so hard, you don't even know it. I'm a Gen X'er and see it everyday. Granted, my parents are Baby Boomers, but there's so much evidence that they have completely FCKED you it's silly. I wish I were able to post a link (I'm a n00b), but have tons of evidence to show you in that statement. You never had a chance.
Technically if your parents are 'boomers (as in, born after WWII) you are a millennial.
The media prefers to argue about what years are what because then they don't have to think about it but the whole thing goes back to Strauss-Howe Generational Theory. It causes some weird contortions - my wife's parents are a Silent Generation and a Boomer so what's she, exactly? - but the reason for dividing it this way is that we're shaped by our childhood which is shaped by our parents and while the environment you grow up in might be keenly millennial if you're running it through the filter of your Silent Generation parents, you likely have a different experience than all your millennial friends.
Strauss-Howe is a sort of semi-historical Kabbalah in that it supposedly predicted every generation of Americans (if you take "Americans" back to 1640 and ignore the Civil War so really, it's about 8/10) but it's legitimately what caused Steve Bannon to back Trump and it's slavishly adored by a number of big talkers in finance so it's worth knowing the roots.
I think this article is a little bit over zealous in stating that the millenial generation is fucked in regards to the American dream. While yes, we do have less income, this is nothing new. We've been dealing with this shit for a decade. I'm sure there will be millinials that lose their jobs, but a good portion of the working force is baby boomers too who may also lose their jobs. We'll get the short end of the stick and recover. We always do.
It may be nothing new to you but demographically speaking, the income disparity between millennials and other generations at their age is a new factor. When you are attempting to model a system-wide problem, saying that system-wide, millennials have less money means that system-wide, millennials have less resiliency.
The point of the article is that baby boomers who lose their jobs - as a demographic - have more reserves. They have more houses. They have more savings. They have more retirement. They have a greater safety net. It's also worth pointing out that the boomers have been in the process of retiring since 2011; as a cohort they're already halfway to fixed-income. The point is that yes - you'll get the short end of the stick. You always have. And no. You will not recover. Because unlike any cohort dealing with recession before, you have not had the ability to gird your loins against the storm.
This is not a personal criticism. It is a dispassionate analysis of the economics of the situation.
Didn't think it was a personal criticism. Sorry, I guess that came off a little harsh. Yeah we may not recover, but we'll try our damnedest. The ingenuity of the newer generations is nothing to underestimate.
Yes, they have. I am unable to post because I am a n00b even though ilex send me the ability via E-mail (it's didn't work, but I appreciate the gesture).
Query this:
How the baby boomers — not millennials — screwed America
“The boomers inherited a rich, dynamic country and have gradually bankrupted it."
Everyone likes to bash millennials. We’re spoiled, entitled, and hopelessly glued to our smartphones. We demand participation trophies, can’t find jobs, and live with our parents until we’re 30. You know the punchlines by now.
But is the millennial hate justified? Have we dropped the generational baton, or was it a previous generation, the so-called baby boomers, who actually ruined everything?
That’s the argument Bruce Gibney makes in his book A Generation of Sociopaths: How the Baby Boomers Betrayed America. The boomers, according to Gibney, have committed “generational plunder,” pillaging the nation’s economy, repeatedly cutting their own taxes, financing two wars with deficits, ignoring climate change, presiding over the death of America’s manufacturing core, and leaving future generations to clean up the mess they created.