Gen X is in charge now, and boomers are being shown the door
businessinsider.com
- Boomers are having their last dance in charge.
- Gen X leaders are stepping up to replace the last of them.
- Younger leaders are taking charge of politics and corporate giants such as Boeing, HSBC, and Costco.
Considering the nature of linear time, I dont know what the alternative could be.
Biden is actually the first and only president from “The Silent Generation”
(Side note: Trump, Dubya, and Bubba were all born in 1946)
Within two months and one week of each other.
Huh, that's interesting.
You know how in school they say “one day one of you will be president.” Well for Bidens generation all of them were wrong except his teacher
It's also possible that Gen X will be skipped over the way the Silent Generation was skipped.
Kamala is the youngest possible Boomer (born in 1964). If she wins and serves 2 terms she'll be out in 2032. At that point Gen X will be between 52 and 67. People might want a candidate younger than that.
I damn well hope so. As an elderly old man, I'm exhausted seeing technically illiterate and wildly socially backwards old men in charge of most parts of our political apparatus.
Time for people who know the internet isn't made of fucking tubes. Or that climate change is on top of us, in the process of burning/melting those things we need in order to live.
The funny thing is that the "tubes" metaphor isn't actually all that bad. Whoever suggested that metaphor to Ted Stephens knew what they were talking about. But, he didn't actually understand what they were saying, so he looked like an idiot when he tried to use the metaphor to explain why an email was delayed.
Granted. I'm one of the lucky such gen X'ers whose parents were prescient and wealthy enough in the early 80s to get me a computer (Apple ][). As such, I'm mystified dealing with people much younger than me who are oddly proud of being technically illiterate... though to be fair it's been a lot of users that I supported during my days as an IT drone, and many of those were real estate bros. Ugh.
I would vote for a vampire, mummy, or other deathless creature.
Dracula was pretty cool...
We could all die in some catastrophic event
God I hope so.
The great leveling🤙
Took way too long. Don’t let the door hit ya on the way out.
I'm fully in support of Kamala, but she's not Gen X. Close, but no cigar. She was born in 1964.
She's Generation Jones. So am I (b. 1963)
Damn, they even have her picture on the page 😆
This reminds me of the Xennial generation that fell between X and Millennial. This also sort of shows how little we can really actually equate from these 20+ year generational spans. Really I am just happy she's not old enough to collect SSI yet.
Hard cutoff dates for generations has always been a stupid concept. Imagine believing that an Xer born in 1980 has more in common with an Xer from '65 than a millennial from '82.
Family context also plays a role. My wife and I are “officially” Xennials, born a year apart in the late 70s. I have a brother seven years older than me, and she was the first born. I skew way more Gen X than she does, to the point where she doesn’t see any point in describing herself as anything other than a Millennial.
Yeah, I was born in 84 but I identify pop culture wise much closer to my step brothers that are 1.5 and 3.5 years older as Xennails than I would my millennial counterparts.
Named generations is a stupid concept in general. It's vaguely useful as a shorthand to talk about people's life experiences based on when they were born and how old they are now. But, it's mostly like astrology, saying that people born under a certain sign behave a certain way.
I turn 40 in September. I don't like it!
I can't tell if she looks young for her age, or if she looks super young compared to everyone else on stage wirh her
Probably a combination of three things. First hate ages you terribly, example Laura Loomer, Alex Jones. Second she is a child compared to Biden/Trump. And third and finally as clichè as it is black dont crack
Also, and this is a biggie, she didn’t have kids. Kids harvest your life force in order to grow.
Preach it sista!
The dates for these generations are not set in stone. Lots of organizations use 1965 to 1980 but the US SSA uses 1965 as the start.
People born around the transition points are going to have more in common with each other than with people born earlier in the date range. Especially when you consider families having kids a few years apart but each is apparently a different "generation".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X#:~:text=U.S.%20news%20outlets%20such%20as,born%20between%201965%20and%201980%22.
The median age of the senate is 65. The article is just cherry picking.
As a member of Generation X, I would say that it's not going to be much better.
Just look at, say, Elon Musk as an example of the kind of people from my generation who get to positions of influence.
Most GenX are the product of the Neoliberal era, so have interiorized the whole "lookout for numero uno" idea of how to be in society and whilst commonly aware of things like Climate Change, they're usually unwilling to inconvenience themselves for the sake of fighting against it, quite the contrary even (just look at how well SUVs sell), and similarly when it comes to Consumerism, they seem to be the most prone to wasteful consumption (the kind of people who replace their mobile phones every year or two).
In summary, Gen X generally are more well informed than Boomers but even less principled than them.
Gen X here, too.
DeSantis is younger than me.
That's all I'm going to say. Gooooooooooo Millennials and Gen Z. PLEASE.
I was born right on the border of Millennial and Gen X. Tory leader Rishi Sunak was younger than me.
Generation really doesn't matter. Greedy cunts rise to the top and always will.
Today's horrible influencers are tomorrows horrible leaders.
Once they hit our age they're be equally shit. The only thing that makes us endearing is that we are a forgotten generation for the most part. No power. No numbers. But fuck me have we got influence.
It's almost like these generational names aren't a monolith and have been divided up arbitrarily!
You could just as well replace these names of the generations with the astrological signs of the zodiac, that would be just as meaningful. It's bullshit.
I'm from the grashopper generation.
Honestly, given the money Gen X has, Gen Z would mostly probably do the same.
While some of our actions can be directed by principle, mostly it's just shrinking income.
I wish we could raise wages AND use them to embrace Buy It For Life items, all while subsidizing public transportation etc etc.
But now it's lack of money that holds Gen Z back, not principles, in my opinion.
Gen z understands that the rich are the cause of their poverty, not immigrants or libs or other poor people. That's a big step in directing action in the right direction.
Fair, though I wonder how much of it is real change and how much is our information bubble. Hopefully mostly the former, but I absolutely do hear all those "fuck immigrants" and "I'm to blame, I just gotta work harder" attitudes around.
Yeah... I guess it's more like, millennials were the first generation to have a majority get it, and Gen z is even better about getting it... But it's still not 100%
Probably a product more of age than of generational specificity.
You get used to your comforts, you probably have investments, you’re consumed by trying to get ahead enough so that you don’t have to die at your job, just in a nursing home what takes all of your money.
Gen X myself, and maybe an outlier, but I’ve probably become more radical as I’ve aged rather than the other way around. I’ve been stuck being poor for decades before finally “making it”, and that has really driven home the awareness of how fragile it all is. That, and just general omnivorous reading that includes a lot of depressing scientific literature regarding climate change. It’s terrifying.
I vote for the left (I would have happily voted for Sanders), support local measures and politicians that lean towards social policy and move towards things like green power, etc.
So yeah…not necessarily a thing you can just pin on a generation, though each generation will have some stronger proclivities than others in certain areas. The millennials will have to watch out, they’re next to fall for circling the wagons to protect whatever they might have, hate on their gen’s billion- or trillionaires.
We won't be next because no one will be. Prove me wrong. Good fucking luck. You won't acknowledge what must be done.
I was born in the 1990s and teenage me thought that the future would be awesome because people like me would be in power.
By now, people my age and younger have reported back, become politicians, celebrities, journalists or otherwise people with more power than me, and said "nah, we are pretty much the same as our parents were, some of us are awesome and some horrible".
The type of people who seek power probably won't change generation to generation... But the voters are changing rapidly as boomers die and millennials/zoomers replace them (far more progressive overall)... The voters will force the change, not the small percent that seek their own glory (ie the list you have there)
Millennials will become the largest voting bloc, and Gen Z tends to follow their lead. I predict the next decade is going to see some massive changes in governments.
The movement we see in the right, the coalition of ultra capitalists, nationalists, and evangelicals is the death throes of the GOP as we know it if they're not successful in seizing power in the way they're trying right now.
This. I was born in the 50s and we thought the same thing in our teen years with the same outcome.
Elon's an Afrikkkaner fratbro social media junky with $200B to his name. That's just not the lived experience of most Americans.
They're nostalgic for the 90s, because it was a time of relative abundance. They're not all Chicago Economics School trade globalists with a hard on for abolishing the minimum wage and privatizing social security, because none of them stand to benefit from any of that shit.
You've got a selection bias. The GenXers who fought the fiercest got crushed the hardest. Prisons are choke full of social revolutionaries who got swept up in the 90s/00s Law and Order era. Hospital wards are full of GenXers pumped full of opioids to treat work-injuries and heavy metal poisoning. Morgues are full of GenXers who died in the service sector job filling lunch orders during COVID or were wiped out in the AIDS epidemic before it was treatable.
Losing doesn't mean you weren't fighting. It just means you were outnumbered, outspent, and outmaneuvered. For every Kamala Harris or Ron DeSantis who climbed up through the bowels of the system to live in its head, there are thousands who got crushed under its feet.
The folks you're seeing are simply the ones that made themselves useful to the ruling class. One thing the GenX crowd was right about - the Revolution wasn't televised. It was a war fought and lost in the back alleys and the boiler rooms and the darkest cells of solitary confinement. If the GenX capitalist class is looking extra cynical, that may be thanks to all of their relatives and neighbors they had to stack up like cordwood to reach these heights.
Whilst I did not live in the US, I did live in 4 countries in Europe (having got involved in politics in 2 of them) and from what I've seen those GenXers who fought for a better World are not the majority, not even close.
As somebody in that cohort and hence having moved along with it over the years through school and work, the general impression I got over time is one of political apathy and consumerist self indulgence.
(Certainly I was generally the odd one out in having strong political beliefs and it's funny that even now in the political party I'm involved in, in my local area only a handful of active members are from my generation, whilst most are from the older generation and the second largest group are from the younger generation)
It really wasn't much of a fighting generation to begin with back at their teenage and young adult years (just compare it to the much more recent Climate movements of the young) and there was a lot of apathy towards the ones amongst them who were (the pinnacle in the US was maybe Occupy Wall Street, which was violently suppressed by Obama - the very same who did the shoving of trillions towards Finance in the first place - and notice how still today so many of my generation think he was a great President).
I agree with you on the outmanouvered point, though that was a lot easier to do because the will was there for a few, not for the many, so when the few got suppressed the many wouldn't lift a finger and often even agreed that those "making waves" should be stopped.
Even if Harris were Gen X, this would be premature.
...yeah, they're going to jump from five baby boomers straight to millennials next change of the guard, and like, whatever, man: we acclimated to disenfranchisement thirty years ago...
At least you got to enjoy coffee and cigarettes
checking the average age of the House, the Senate, and the Gubernatorial slate
Awww...
Kamala was born in the last year of what is considered boomer, but still a step forward to Biden's silent generation
At least she’s under the retirement age!!!
Retirement age is 55. She is 59.
I think it's like 65 or 70 in the US.
Holy fuck it’s 67. We’re fucked
You should have known this at 13. Oh, public education. 🤦♂️
When I was 13 the retirement age was not 67 bud
The full retirement age in the United States varies depending on the year of birth:
However, individuals can start receiving Social Security retirement benefits as early as age 62, though benefits will be reduced for early retirement. Conversely, delaying retirement beyond the full retirement age can increase benefits until age 70.
If you were taught retirement age was 55 when you were 13 you must already be retired or thought you were very close to retirement. It hasn't been 55 since the early 80s.
Yes I’m old thank you for reminding me
Retirement for her is 67.
Generational cohorts care more about events that shaped you in life rather than birth year
Glad the boomers are on the way out. As a Gen X'er, not sure we care enough to take charge.
It's cool you'll get like four years then we millennials will take over.
Please be kind. We're exhausted and broken.
Watching helplessly for 40 or 50 years while your parents' generation destroys everything will do that
and it hurts now to get out of bed.
And to be in bed
You guys are ok with us. Z seems cool too
Millennials seem cool. They called bullshit on a lot of stuff that X just shrugged at and tried to slack our way around. I don’t usually know what Z is saying but they seem to at least have moved in a less overtly toxic direction, and they put weak but real taboos on stuff like bullying that no prior generation did.
It’s all good. I’m gonna go let myself into the empty house and make a PB&J now.
Don't know about you, but I'm out here slackin' away.
Slack Off!
As an aging millennial, I am surprised by how the process of time works.
Like you spend your life acquiring skills and using your knowledge in an ever expanding cornucopia of experiences.
Then followed by a gradual decline to be left only with your memories of who you once were. But then you realize you were only a small part of the existence of others, and ultimately the universe. Yep, the thought of faculties diminishing over time is enough to put the one into an extensional crisis.
Yup. This is a wise time in your life to start your estate planning, medical directives, etc. Find yourself a good lawyer for this. I'm sure the cost varies by location and practice, but mine was only about $1,500 US.
I'm just trying to exist in peace. That already feels like an impossibility.
Gen X is too small to matter. Millennials are stepping up and will compete with Boomers for a little while until they finally take over. Thing about Millennials though is that it is a very K shaped generation. About half have had decent success and are conservative/liberal and the other half have been absolutely crushed so it's kind of a mixed bag and as long as the Boomers have any influence not much is likely to change. GenZ is bigger than Millennials though and should be right behind them. They are very different and much more politically radical, on both the left and right. Things are likely to change with them.
One thing I'm looking forward to with millennial leadership is just people that finally fully understand the power of the internet, big data and what truly distinguishes the information age. If you didn't grow up with it, it's hard to grapple with just how much it truly upended ... fucking everything. They mostly still don't understand that a computer can basically read their mind now, just through indirect data gathering and comparing them to all of the other people. We all get that at a more intuitive level, we've spent too long around these algorithms and seas of semi-anonymous others.
Of course we'll be in some quantum AI room-temp-superconductor age by then, so, y'know how it goes. But we should at least have a better handle on the information age problems, so that'll be nice.
It's almost like generational distinction is meaningless and it's actually about class.
And life stages
There's apparently 65.2 million Gen Xers vs 75 million millenials. Smaller, but "too small to matter" seems like a really weird take.
Spoken just like the boomers. Heads up your own asses just like them.
65 million X compared to 72 millennial. Wow. Carry on.
Whatever.
Are you ok
Are you?
I'm absolutely spiffing, thanks for asking! Yourself?
Adequate.
Fair to middling?
Sufficient to acceptable. Not good—but not bad! I’m… fine.
Sounds perfectly cromulent.
Yes Ms. Hoover
I am not, but I think that's unrelated. Mostly. Or not at all.
In an existential sense?
Boomers? Biden wasn't even a Boomer!
I'm amused with all the people who think there's some hard line where you have to be born before or after some exact year to be of a named generation as if this wasn't all made up. A baby didn't get labeled Gen-X if they were born after midnight on a certain day.
As far as I'm concerned, she's Gen-X. She was 13 when Star Wars came out.
Maybe I am missing something but you do have to be born before or after some exact year to be of a named generation. That’s kind of the definition. Gen X is 1965 - 1980.
Dude, it's all made up and there is no hard definition for the years of Gen X.
I mean if you really want to be pedantic about it, the people we call Boomers these days are the original Gen X.
Or maybe it's people born in the 1950s and 1960s?
Or maybe it's 1965-1980?
Or maybe it's "Gen X is whatever we decide it is."
But those are just think tanks. Surely other experts have a specific range, right?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X
This isn't science, it's categorization based on pretty arbitrary stuff.
Yeah, it’s all made up. That how names work. What exactly is your point? They are made up to label something.
I just showed you my point quite well. That there's no agreed-upon definition of the term like you suggested. All I can think is that you read nothing I pasted.
No, I didn’t suggest that. I asked for clarification because you said it amused you that people thought being born before or after some year made you part of a generation. That is literally the fucking definition! There are certainly different definitions of those generations but regardless they are all based on a person being born before or after a certain year.
Your words:
I showed you very clearly that it is one of many definitions of Gen X. Some of them apply to Harris.
My point was to show that they are defined by a span of years. I see now that this concept is hard for you to understand.
Yes, they are defined by a span of years. An arbitrary span no one agrees on. Thus, Generation X not definitively 1965-1980 as you said. Even the U.S. government disagrees with that definition.
It's anything from the late 1920s to the mid 1980s depending on who you ask.
So you are saying it’s arbitrary and then in the very next sentence make the statement that it is defined as 1920 - 1980? Do you even know what you are trying to say at this point?
You are not reading very well:
Meaning that it is arbitrary.
I’m reading just fine thank you. “Gen X is anything from 1965 to 1980.” What is the difference between that and what you said? Just the date range. It’s obvious this concept is just too much for your brain to handle or you are just being stubborn. No need to message me anymore.
I agree. I think they do pop up every now and then, always for a cultural event. For example, I draw the line between Millennial and Gen Z at remembering 9/11.
Kamala was born in 64. She's a boomer. Also, GTFO with Generation Jones. She's a boomer. X-ers are those who came after the pill became omnipresent after the mid 60s. I am one of those (born in 77). We are relatively few in numbers in comparison to the boomers. Because of the pill. Also GTFO with Generation Jones. She's a boomer.
Trump and Biden also aren't boomers. They predate the boomers. They were born during or shortly after WW2. That's usually called the silent generation. Trump being part of the silent generation is of course ridiculous. But he's the exception of the rule, I guess. But both are born very late in that generation, so they are its last remnants I guess. Soon they will all be gone.
Boomers is short for Baby Boomers which were literally the babies born after WW2 vets came home and had families. I don't know why your misinformed comment has so many upvotes
What's the fact you're objecting to? The only thing wrong is Trump as a Silent as he's born in the very first year of the Boomers. Everything else is following the common definitions.
You might be right there. I'm German. And many a man did come back later, after the war, here. A lot of refugees were forcefully relocated from what is today Poland. Also a lot of POWs came back long after the war was over. So the baby boom was a bit delayed over here.
Then again, you're a computer scientist, not an historian, and therefore excusable :p
It all depends on whether you start counting from 0 or 1!
Where does the common definition of 'Boomer' say it starts after 1946 (the year Trump was born) and stops with the birth control pill (1960)?
I have never seen such a definition anywhere. Certainly not one that says it starts at least two years after the end of WWII.
Huh? I'm saying Trump is Boomer because Boomers start in 1946. And it goes to 1964, which is when the birth control pill was recognized as a contraceptive. I don't know if X is defined by that in the same way Boomers are defined by a specific event, but it lines up precisely.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_boomers
I guess you didn't read down very far since it talks about multiple definitions.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_boomers#Date_range_and_definitions
You literally just asked about where the common definition came from. Read the first fucking paragraph man.
I did not ask anything. I certainly didn't ask that:
Pretty amusing that you're accusing me of not reading though.
You're in the wrong fucking thread. Get it together before you go randomly aggro.
You, in the post I originally replied to:
Okay, sorry about that, but you're still wrong because it's anywhere between 1943 and "mid-1946" as per that Wikipedia page.
That's not true. The birth rate dropped slightly from the low 20s per 1000 in the 40s to the mid-60s, then dropped to the high teens in the Gen X era. Relatively few in numbers implies that there were twice as many boomers or something. The reality is that there were about 75 million baby boomers births, and about 65 million Gen X.
Trump is a boomer (1946, same year as Clinton and Bush), Biden is a "silent generation" guy, born before the end of WWII. He's actually the first (and presumably last) Silent Generation president. The ones before him were all boomers or "greatest" generation.
While those facts might not be wrong in your neck of the woods, they are at least very, very US centric. That is of course ok, as we are talking about the US candidates here. But generally, keep in mind that the world is way bigger than the US. You make up a whole of 4% of the world's population. And those numbers all vary from country to country.
The article and the discussion was US-centric. I'm aware things are different outside the US. I don't live in the US. I'm merely pointing out that for an American to think that the baby boom was some kind of massive shift in population that means the number of boomers dwarfs any other generation is wrong.
Warm bodies outnumber the dead, news at 11.
you'd think so, but boomers had it so good they hardly ever die. the amount of stress they left the newer generations while not giving a fuck themselves made them likely to outlast some millennials let alone xers.
I'll take your comment at face value and see it as a comment on the theory that 'there's more people alive today than have ever lived'.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fact-or-fiction-living-outnumber-dead/
However that seems not to be true. The dead are more numerous. However they are unlikely to vote (unless the republicans find a way).
I do appreciate this clarification. Granted it wasn't my intent, as I was more focused on modern history.
But hey, learn something new every day!
No I didn't read that in your comment, but found it too interesting a tidbit not to share !
https://youtu.be/y2dFN_UVmBg?si=OKcxwIdLM0OVCL2C&t=3m20s
Kick the Boomers out!
Wiki says Gen X is 1965 - 1980. Kamala was born Oct 1964. Boomer.
This headline makes me incredibly happy.
I mean given the passage of time and human mortality this was almost guaranteed to happen at some point.
I’m finally in charge!
What are yer orders boss?
Let’s eat the rich. Starting with Murdoch, Bezos, and Musk. Then let’s send the entire GOP to a for-profit state prison.
Deal, they seem to like to self flagellate. I’ve got the perfect name for it. Hear me out, we’ll call it “Florida.”
Uh i wouldn't boast about Boeing lol
I'm Gen-X and I barely feel in charge of my own life, much less the direction of the nation.
Thanks for this post. It's been entertaining reading.
heck no. millenials can have it.
And that's how you can tell a real Gen Xer
Gen X isnt much better tbh. They grew up during the golden age of the boomer era where society had not started to breakdown yet. Some of them may have progressive views, but I bet it won't be until millenials are in charge that we start to see meaningful change. Gen Z will really get into progressivism I bet.
Can we stop making assumptions of an entire group based on some arbitrary rule? The people that will get to power is based on the population that votes for them and not when they were born, start voting in primaries, supporting candidates that match your values and going out to vote for them during election and you might just get what you want.
Millennials aren't going to be the savior you think they are. Like, I want to be hopeful, but I see a lot of Millennials my age just acting scared. They've finally gotten some stability, they've finally gotten some comfort, and they're incredibly loss averse. I see a bunch of people my age bought a house in the suburbs posting in the neighborhood Facebook group every time there's a loud bang "did anyone hear that noise? What was it?" with people lamenting about how the neighborhood is going downhill.
Ten years ago, millennials were pissed the fuck off and were ready to burn shit to the ground. The ruling class gave them just enough to be scared of losing it.
Said every generation ever.
As a millennial, I think I can speak for all of us and say we're OK with Gen Z taking over early, they might still have the emotional capacity to effect lasting change.
I agree, and since most of us didn’t start our careers “on time” due to the absolute destruction of the economy in 2008, and also being most of the military strength during GWOT, Gen Z can take charge.
Just don’t short us too badly, maybe throw us a little bone here and there. We will happily take it since our Boomer parents were so massively shitty to us.
That's really the answer to any of the "Generation ___ will save us". It's not generations, it's age. If a generation takes over earlier it will be more far looking and less fearful. If it doesn't, it will age into being the same mess all the others have been.
The Boomers dying off might change things merely because they were a huge generation and X is a small one, meaning the average age of a voter should be going down.
The difference is that Millennials seem to be disproportionately tired of responsibility while Boomers hoarded it. What sort of Millennial wants to go through the effort of maintaining a home owners' association or of showing up at town halls to complain about new developments? Just give us some mtg cards and a runescape membership and you can have the White House.
Abrogation of responsibility is still messy selfishness, but it's easier to work around for people who do want to be productive. Those in power are more than old enough that Millennials not replacing them in large enough numbers means reasonably middle-aged Zoomers get those positions instead.
I can guarantee you there are Millennials happily ruling over petty little fiefdoms. No generation is universally petty dictators or lazy gamers. The same sort of assholes are born again and again, just waiting for their chance.
Sure, I'm not denying that, but what matters in a democracy and even a corporation isn't the purity of each generation, it's the relative fraction of different groups. Going from 60% petty dictators to 20% is far more important than going from 20% to 0%, especially when it's just one demographic among several.
Millennials aren't better people, they're just younger, with currently less opportunity to lord over others than people 30 years older have. But as they rise into the ones with the power, they'll be the same humans we've always been.
That proves too much. Boomers and the Silent Generation are better than people born 50 years before them, because Boomers and the Silent Generation (again, as statistical trends) refused to beat their children and decriminalized interracial marriage and homosexuality. Why wouldn't Millenials be capable of similar moral progress?
The boomers grew up in the "Golden age"... Gen x is the boomers first round of kids... Born from hippy free love and mistakes... Then the boomers grew up, got divorced, and started their millennial "real" families... Gen x caught the shit end of the boomer stick for sure, and it fucked them up as a generation... That and the fact that they caught a lot of the boomers pig headedness, probably because they had far less access to information than millennials.
Luckily they're a small and mostly insignificant generation that won't ever be able to prop up the old oligarchy parties the way the boomers have been able to.
I'm Gen X and I can tell you from experience that that is mostly accurate.
We're the generation that was born, came of age, and entered the workforce when Boomers were still far from retirement age and hording all the good jobs. We had to all go to university to study for the leftovers.
It was the generation after us, that second round of kids that you talk about, that came of age and started going to University right around the time that Boomers began to retire, leaving all these well paying jobs for them to pick up now that us X'ers had already settled on the crappy jobs.
A lot of millennials entered the workforce right around the time of the Great Recession. They were not walking out into a land of economic plenty and have been on a worse economic course throughout their lives because of it. I'm in the Xennial range and I'm damn happy I didn't enter the workforce a few years later.
Fuck you buddy. You're right, but still, fuck you.
People raised with the same ideas as their parents/friends/society aren't going to magically change just because they come from a younger generation. When Millennials start coming into power, there are still going to be Millennials on both sides of the political divide. The Republican ones will likely be just as insane, if not worse than the Boomers or the Gen Xers. It's not like Millennials are just magically going to all be progressive and everything changes. Any of them getting into politics are going to become part of the mainstream political culture and internalize their political beliefs as they learn from their elders. The Right is much more organized about maintaining their ideas and pushing their beliefs, that's why they work so hard to suppress the other side.
Millenials might just make it, but if Gen Z is actually like what it looks like, leadership positions everywhere are going to skip a generation.