Douglas Quenqua reports in the New York Times that the days of the Baby Boomers are numbered as Millennials are set to overtake them as the United States’ largest living generation "Which is obviously terrifying! #Millennials, with their hippity-hop music and their "Snapchats" and their twerks, overtaking that most noble (and by "noble" we mean "populous") generation!" But there is power in numbers, and the size of the millennial generation will carry some benefits for its members. "They are tired of being stereotyped by boomers, whom they view as ruining the world for them,” says Jeffrey Arnett. “This could allow them to demand more respect than they’ve gotten so far.” Perhaps more important, it will give them “more power in the conversation about where American society should go in particular.”
Part of the probem is in determining demographically just what is a Millennial. While Boomers are traditionally deemed to include anyone born between 1946 and 1960, according to Pew Research "Millennials are defined as those ages 18 to 34 in 2015." In other words, those born between 1981 and 1997. “One of the defining events typically associated with millennials is that they grew up experiencing 9/11,” says Richard Fry. But those born in 1997 “would have been 5 years old when the attacks happened,” not usually an age when global events leave formative impressions. Then there's the Gen Xers, projected to remain the “middle child” of generations – caught between two larger generations of the Millennials and the Boomers. Gen Xers are fewer in number than Millennials because the generational span of Gen X (16 years) is shorter than the Millennials (17 years). Also, the Gen Xers were born during a period when Americans were having fewer children than later decades. "For Xers, there’s one silver lining in all this. From everything we know about them, they’re savvy, skeptical and self-reliant; they’re not into preening or pampering, and they just might not give much of a hoot what others think of them. Or whether others think of them at all."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by dyingtolive on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:41AM
As much as I want to hate on the Millennials with everyone else, it's illogical to hate anyone but the people who raised them.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 4, Informative) by frojack on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:50AM
Do not hate those who will fund your health care in your retirement.
Rejoice Boomers, we survived the lazy Xers and their small numbers, and limited earning capacity. We may live to see our Social Security check after all.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:01AM
The fun thing that makes such labels essentially meaningless is the fact that no one can even establish a concrete date. Millennials is a label applied to anyone 18-34, or anyone under 30, or anyone who was vaguely youngish around 9/11, or whatever fits the message intended to be delivered. I suppose you could probably say the same about any generational label.
I'm pretty sure it's all essentially bullshit. Personally, I've noticed I have more in common with people 15 years older than me than I do with people 5 years younger than me, for whatever that's worth. I've seen hypersensitive carebear 40-somethings, and I made a 20 year old almost cry at work.
I think the bottom line is that the vast majority of all people suck, and really don't serve much purpose than filling in the gaps for the remainder's sake. I'm gonna get another beer.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:33AM
The term Generation has taken on many different definitions over time.
In term of years, roughly 30 among human beings, was accepted as the average period between the birth of parents and the birth of their offspring.
Wiki [wikipedia.org] makes a run at defining "Generation" and comes away adding more nonsense and confusion.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:00PM
Yeah, these "generation" tags are increasingly useless. I was born slightly before 1980 as were many of my friends, but I don't really relate to many 80's things, since I became an adult in the mid 90's. And I thought millenials were people born after 2000, is there some kind of generational scope creep going on here?
I consider myself part of the gap between "GenX" and "Millenials" that nobody wants to put a label on.
I also consider generation labels as useless social constructs designed to divide people, just like race is used to divide people.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:58PM
I think the point of the labels is that people in a certain age group will be affected by defining news events in a very particular way.
A typical 90-year-old American today spent most of his/her childhood in the Great Depression, likely knew people who died fighting WWII, and had their young adulthood in the relatively prosperous 1950's. The ideas and attitudes that were good for handling that, like being incredibly thrifty and having a strong sense of duty and honor, are more common among 90-year-olds than 20-year-olds.
That person's kid, the "Boomer", age 65, would have grown up in the relatively prosperous 1950's, and enjoyed a fair amount of economic and physical security if they were white. However, they came of age during the late stages of the Vietnam War, the Civil Rights Movement, and Watergate. The ideas and attitudes that were good for handling that, like a distrust of authority and very intentional anti-discriminatory attitudes, are more common among 65-year-olds than 20-year-olds or 90-year-olds.
So it does make a difference. One of the defining characteristics of people under age 45 or so is that they are the first generation of Americans born into a society where racial, ethnic, and gender discrimination was illegal. A lot of that still happens, but in the early 1970's it became a mark of shame to be hidden from the public eye, rather than something to be proudly proclaimed to everybody in town. That's a major reason why younger white voters are much more willing to vote for non-white candidates for public office than older white voters.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @05:13AM
When we're the ones holding the purse strings you're all going to be very sorry. Mwahahahahah!!11!1!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @07:37AM
Seriously doubt this will be a problem, because from what I see now, the Millennials will probably still be on their parents heath insurance by then.
(Score: 3, Funny) by VLM on Wednesday January 28 2015, @01:07PM
As much as I want to hate on the Millennials with everyone else, it's illogical to hate anyone but the people who raised them.
That's kinda harsh, Spongebob Squarepants is basically a nice guy.
(Score: 1) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:43AM
for shear self-centered stupidity. One generation removed from the great depression and massive world war -- yet they are eager to bomb anything that moves and deregulate banks[and then bail them out], telecoms, blow money on giant gas guzzling SUVs and house flipping.
How better off will the world be once they are worm food.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:48AM
for shear self-centered stupidity.
That should be "sheer". Darn Millennials with their texting and inability to spell! Now get off my lawn! Especially the lawn over my worm food corpse, you whippersnapper!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:21AM
hahah soooo much better off. Unfortunately they may bankrupt everyone before they go with their infinite health care costs by trying to live forever.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @01:57PM
Now that Millennials outnumber Boomers, we could conceivably vote for "not bankrupting the country with essentially infinite healthcare costs".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 29 2015, @06:47AM
younger people are significantly less likely to register to vote or vote. 95% of 60-70 yr olds voted while 70% of people younger than 32 voted. they actually hold votes at my grandmothers nursing home where most of the residents suffer from dementia. the youth vote is disenfranchised and confused about politics - many don't vote because they aren't represented in our two party system and don't want to choose between a 'douche anda turd', and the ones that do usually do it out of obligation it's a waste of time until primaries are open to the public.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @05:21AM
"Who cares about those 10,000 people that company laid off. My stock went up!"
They've reduced everyone to a cog in the machine.
Yet are the first to complain about 'bad customer service' from people taking up a corporate based 'fuck you, pay me' attitude themselves.
Kept wages flat. Yet think that minimum wage pleeb should bend over backwards for them.
I think they're going to be sooooo shocked in their retirement when they find out if they're not actively paying.
Nobody gives a fuck about them.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Friday January 30 2015, @03:55PM
...wait, you're talking about *millennials* here? People who are currently between ages of 18 and 34? Your upper management and goverment types responsible for these decision aren't millennials today, and they sure as shit weren't millennials when these decisions were being made. These were the failures of the boomers and some gen x-ers.
You complain about *millennials* keeping the minimum wage low...on an article about how millennials are just starting to gain political and economic power while at the same point we have a new and growing national movement attempting to *double* this minimum wage. Millennials aren't trying to keep wages flat; we're trying to get them moving again.
The largest gap we've ever had between minimum wage increases was 1997 to 2007. The average age of a sitting congressman is 57. So the people responsible for those stagnant wages were born in the 40s and 50s, not the 80s and 90s.
Not that it's entirely their fault though -- that's probably just the effects of inhaling lead all your life. Maybe all the tree-hugging millennials is the effect of that estrogen-mimicking BPA...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @12:28PM
I'm sure you'll manage.
(Score: 2) by MrGuy on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:11PM
Get over yourselves, millenials. You're no different.
Boomers were also the generation of the peace movement. The first generation that brought down a sitting president for dishonesty and malfeasance in office. The generation that actually stopped a massive overreaching, questionable war through sustained action.
Young people are idealistic and rebellious, and tend to have little patience for existing structures and ways of doing things. They're distrustful of large institutions. They're more willing to overthrow things because they're not invested in them.
Older people (notably those with children of their own) are more protective of their own local families, less OK with change, more concerned about stability. They're more interested in providing for their own families than solving global issues.
The boomers were young once. Then they became old, and stopped doing the same things they did when they were young.
Millenials are young now. Believe it or not, you'll be old some day too, and have a different perspective than you have now. The fact that you want to change the world now is not something that will last forever for you, any more than it did for the Flower Children.
To quote Grandpa Simpson: "I used to be "with it". But then they changed what "it" was. Now what I'm with isn't it, and what's it seems weird and scary to me. It will happen to you."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 29 2015, @01:56AM
Free love, free drugs, rock n roll! fight the power we're going to change the world!
And turned into a worse version of the same ol shit we've always had.
(Score: 1) by NeoNormal on Wednesday January 28 2015, @07:13PM
Generalize much?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by warcques on Wednesday January 28 2015, @04:43AM
I must say don't understand the B.S. overlap and buzzword-fanatic-level zealousness in the constant renaming and respanning of generations every couple of years. This "millennial" lexeme for generations emerged a few years ago, and I'm sure it has mutated and is engrossed in the span it defines since then ; whereas Gen. X Y Z managed to label the same groups before. Must marketing terminology change in the wind in the same degree of the caprice of the cohort it targets ?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @06:40AM
It's Hugh Pickens. slim pickins... whaddaya want?
Ah... Hugh Pickens. I could almost compose a sonnet in his honor. Almost.
At least he drives the clicks here and at that other site.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @12:49PM
I must say don't understand the B.S. overlap and buzzword-fanatic-level zealousness in the constant renaming and respanning of generations every couple of years.
Makes me long for the days when we took sides in platform wars. Any year could have been the year of the Linux desktop, but the FOSS freedom fighters couldn't wade their way through the Mac vs PC ground offensives. When OS X came out with its BSD based core (thanks NeXT!) we were faced with what could have become platform androgyny. No one was really paying attention, and then Android's Linux roots bypassed the desktop all together and the opportunity was lost forever. That younger generation just picked up their phones and sauntered right past us.
Ahh, the stale taste of revisionist nostalgia. Our computing generation was the best.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday January 28 2015, @12:59PM
Generation names are the modern astrology.
Oh you're a Taurus, the newspaper today says Taurus's (Taurii? Toruses?) are feeling caring people who care about workplace ethics and making a difference, blah blah, and fifty other tired meaningless platitudes. That sounds like something out of a bad 70s sitcom, so now when mass media needs a human interest filler story, they shovel it full of generation label talk.
Observation indicates generation talk is roughly as accurate and predictive as a horoscope. Maybe a little less.
If I was a little more motivated, I'd do one of those google meme search graph thingies showing the decline of astrological reasoning and the rise of generational labeling in legacy media.
(Score: 1) by warcques on Wednesday January 28 2015, @01:39PM
(Taurii.)
Good point. If asstrological "reasoning" is so incredibly unreliable, characterizing people born in spans of weeks, then how reliable is a span of 17 years? :)))
(Score: 2) by sudo rm -rf on Wednesday January 28 2015, @02:45PM
Tauruses - although the correct latin form would be tauri. BTW I'm Gemini, wich already is plural, but in english there's also a plural to the plural: Geminis [macmillandictionary.com], wich makes it twins-es. In british english anyway.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:06PM
And its not just the time interval that is weird, or the concept that time of birth has much of anything to do with personality, but the claimed personality attributes are all tired meaningless platitudes that can apply to everyone.
I believe there's also a compensation / distraction thing going on, if you don't like trends in societal attitude toward gay marriage or weed legalization or whatever, then a lot of meaningless fuzzy stuff will be pushed in the media as a distraction, here go talk about being lazy instead of ...
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:04PM
Generation names are the modern astrology.
Brilliant observation. It could also be considered a marketing term as well. The only people that desire to split everyone into easily identified groups want to sell them something. Either products or bullshit.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:18PM
Like divide and conquer... "Hey that crashing economy thing, its not the fault of the 1%, its all because of the (insert named generational group other than you)"
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:59PM
Funny that there is the generation topic today, too.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday January 28 2015, @05:42PM
Well, that's exactly it. It's marketing terminology. I've been in top-5 ad agency ideation sessions on Madison Avenue in my career, not because I wanted to be or because it's where I angled to be, but rather where the arc of my personal professional path has taken me. The way you have characterized it is exactly how they approach it. It's all stereotyping short-hand to make it easier to get their clients to sign off quicker on the latest ad campaign they pulled out of their ass at the last minute because they are running 13 campaigns where they should be running four, tops.
That's it, and that's all. Gen-X and Millenial are marketing terms, because they resonate enough to have cultural currency. That is, somebody is willing to pay money to have things marketed to those terms.
It's exactly the same reason why fashion designers, magazine publishers, and TV producers have jobs, because humans like to feel like they're part of the winning crowd and to be told what to do and how to feel.
You might not like it. I don't like it. I wish it were otherwise. But it is.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Wednesday January 28 2015, @06:35AM
Born in 58, so I've been considered a boomer all my life. I've never felt like one. I was 11 years old when the Beatles broke up for for $diety's sake!
IMHO, to be a boomer you had to be old enough to understand what was happening in the 60s.
My ducks are not in a row. I don't know where some of them are, and I'm pretty sure one of them is a turkey.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @08:55AM
I feel your pain. Born in 1980, but don't consider myself Gen X (which by the definition in TFS I apparently am).
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday January 28 2015, @02:58PM
You're at the very tail-end of GenX. Considering how fuzzy the whole thing is you could just call yourself a Millennial. I'm just inside the Millennial group and have little in common with those born in the late 90's.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:02PM
Wouldn't that be the beginning of GenX, not the end?
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:44PM
The beginning of GenX is the 1960's. My Guess is a lot of people who think they are Boomers actually fall into GenX territory. 1980's is the beginning of the Millennials and the end of GenX.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:54PM
Yeah, I am a moron. For some reason I read his post as "born in 1960."
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:55PM
And I must be getting senile because I was born at the tail end of GenX.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Wednesday January 28 2015, @09:54PM
The "boomer" generation has spread and spread. It was originally the spike of births during and after WW2 ended. A very large spike, to be sure. Not sure how that got extended to 1960. boomers are starting to have their own kids by then.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @10:13AM
As it says on the tin, what is a millennial? Someone born after 2000? Someone who became an adult after 2000?
(Score: 1) by sttot on Wednesday January 28 2015, @02:34PM
err.... it says right there in the summary...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @11:12AM
Yup, us boomers lived ostentatiously off the sweat and blood of the preceding generation, had the finest educations in history, and proceeded to squander every bit of wealth and opportunity we laid our grubby hands on in a 50-year orgy of hedonism and selfishness.
Now we go to our graves in style and comfort, leaving behind a depleted world full of half-educated politically correct screen-swipers to sort it out for themselves on frikkin Facebook.
So bitch and moan all you want, kids. It's almost over. We won, you lost.
Deal with it, chumps. Life's a bitch.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Wednesday January 28 2015, @12:59PM
Well, until they invent life prolonging drugs and medical procedures to keep you alive until the poor demand to eat you...
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:11PM
"Fuck these Boomers.. fuck these Yuppies, and Fuck everybody, now that I think of it. [youtube.com]"
The generation that went from hippies and free love to... well... just like their conservative parent's generation. But those my age decided, "well we are not going to become racist materalistic assholes like our parents, the Boomers."
But now that I am in my 30s, I can see that not only did most become just like their parents... they are proud of it! Fuck everybody, indeed.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 03 2015, @12:06AM
Did you just suggest that the generation prior to the Boomers was somehow similar to how the Boomers are now? I have to wonder how many of them you've met. They fought in WWII, went through the Great Depression, and built this country into the most prosperous nation on Earth...which was relatively short lived, as their spoiled offspring squandered it in a flurry of hedonic temper tantrums because "my parents are squares". They mortgaged the farm to finance their habits, and defaulted on the mortgage, and are now in retirement hoping their children can pick up the tab (except that all of the jobs were moved overseas to save money).
Don't reduce this to a simple matter of perspective. It's not as simple as casting blame either, but there are very real tendencies that arose from the entitlement brought on by the offspring of the Greatest Generation that have resulted in all manner of problems.
(Score: 2) by JeanCroix on Wednesday January 28 2015, @03:59PM