The Coming Global Generational Adjustment

Here’s what often happens when people start discussing Baby Boomers, Gen-X and Gen-Y online: rash generalizations are freely flung, everyone gets offended and nothing remotely productive results from the generational melee.

These sorts of angry, accusatory generalizations reflect what I call the Generational Monster Id (GMI), the urge to list faults in generations other than our own.

I think the source of generational angst and anger is the threat that the entitlements promised by the developed-world governments will not be delivered as promised.

These entitlements range from healthcare to education to old-age pensions to “a good paying job now that I have a college degree.”

The bottom line is that the promises cannot and will not be kept. The promises were issued in an era of cheap, abundant fossil fuels and favorable demographics: the next generation was considerably larger and more productive (due to more education, longer working lives, etc.) than the previous generation it would support through old age with taxes.

Source: Of Two Minds

This is an excellent and important article about the brewing (and boiling over, in some cases) generational war.

Have you noticed how frequently this topic has been coming up online recently? I have. Have you noticed how bitter and polarized its getting? I have. Do you agree with the author above about how counterproductive it is, and how cliches and generalizations get tossed around? I know I do.

You could probably write a bot to produce some of the bitter online chatter about this subject (from both sides). Yes, it really is that cliche.

The author in the piece quoted above (Charles H. Smith) lays out why this is and provides an excellent and nuanced roadmap for a way out of the shouting-matches to more productive discussion. I agree with his thesis: promises have been made that can't be kept. Promises to both the boomer generation (a comfortable and well-earned retirement and reward for a lifetime of work) and to Gen Y and Millenials (a solid start on real adulthood with jobs and lack of debt that allow youth to become adults like previous generations). And as this reality starts to hit home, the blame game gets ugly, yet less meaningful.

Unfortunately for everybody, these promises can't be kept. The reasons given are various -- from demographics and debt economics to geopolitics and globalization. To might not agree with them all, but the author makes a great case. It's a long read but worth it in IMHO.

Boomers, Xers, Ys, and Millennials: let's see if we can move beyond the finger-pointing and discuss this rationally. You know...like ADULTS.

a reply to: KarensHoliday

Boomers, Xers, Ys, and Millennials: let's see if we can move beyond the finger-pointing and discuss this rationally. You know…like ADULTS.

Thats accusatory and part of the problem. The subject isn't "adult enough". They are being blamed out the gate. They see right thru the blame and return it. Begins argument.

If adults don't show kids how to cope emotionally they won't learn it from schools or gaming. Teach them to be adult like by example. Hard to do though, they don't see much of a future. If they really learn anything at a young age they will quickly realize their path is endless war, debt and dead end jobs.

I'd be pissed , too.

Some things can never be discussed rationally.

People tend to get emotional, instead of logical on things that effect their lives directly, their comfort of living, their cost of living, their homes and families.

Many were taught that your promise was something you kept, not pandered out like IOUs, and then told "tough cookies, I lied".

The American dream is dying, if not dead already, and people are having a hard time swallowing that, because it's what we've been pandered to with for so long.

It also shows corruption, and under-handed things from "Uncle Sam". And many people have been asleep their whole lives, to suddenly "wake up" and discover the pantry empty, when you were told it would be full, is a stark reality many never dreamed of facing.

These same people, still believe what they are told, none the less.. "It's the 1%'s fault!" "It's the boomers fault!" "It's the welfare queens faults!" "It's x/y/z/s fault".. And they believe it.

The sleeping people have trusted the alcohol cabinet's safty to the alcoholic's in power. The cabinet is empty, for many reasons.

I do not know who broke it, but i know it'll take everyone to fix it.

a reply to: KarensHoliday

S&F'd (good light reading, insightful & dark)

divide and conquer;

I do not know who broke it, but i know it'll take everyone to fix it.

..we can't have that now, can we?

a reply to: Cygnis

Your statements rung a number of chords in me. Chords that had first been struck in my head in 1982 by a small group called the Alan Parsons Project. The album Eye in the Sky and one tune set me off my feet. Children of the Moon. Hearing this song for the first time I wept deeply
Here are the lyrics

Pay no attention to the writing on the wall
The words seem Empty cause there's nothing there at all
We let the wise men beat the Drums too soon
We were just children of the moon

No one to turn to
Nowhere to Run to even if we could
Too late to save us but try to understand
The seas were empty there was hunger in the land

We let the blind man lead the Way too long
Easy to see where we went wrong
Nothing to live for
Nothing to die for
We're Lost in the middle of a hopeless world
Lost in the Middle of a hopeless world

Children children of the moon watch the world go by
Children children of the moon are hiding from the sun and the sky
Children Children of the moon watch it all go by
Children children of the moon are Blinded by the light in their eyes

No one to turn to
Nowhere to run to even if we could
Follow the pilgrim to the Temple of the dawn
The altar's empty and the sacrifice is gone
We let the Madmen write the golden rules
We were no more than mortal fools

Nothing to live for
Nothing to die for
We're lost in the middle of a hopeless world
Lost in the Middle of a hopeless world
Children children of the moon watch the world go by
Children children of the Moon hiding from the sky

I see nothing new in that supposedly new perspective. That on-going distinctions--but hardly a break--between generations is nothing new. It is everywhere within any human endeavor, schooling, science, military, government and every level of society. It is a natural phenomena caused not by "promises" made to the up-coming generations and then not kept by the status quo, but by the shifting desires and perceptions of those coming new onto the scene. "Out with the old and in with the new" type of thinking that new blood brings.

What may be "new" to stronger generational shifts these days versus the older times is that now a centralized position can become more focused for a segment than formerly possible. We can lay blame for this to the expanded ability to communicate on all levels these days between those that feel maligned. For examples, we can point to the gay movement, and the Muslin "situation" in the world today versus a few decades ago.

Some of these generational shifts will and have developed into true "surges" that can spin off out of control and become destructive rather than merely introducing rapid shifts into positive advances of societies and cultures.

We dont have enough jobs for American citizens of any generation.
Our boarders are wide open letting cheap labor stream across and
the Liberals demanding amnesty. Our votes do matter. Unfortunately
Bush wasn't any better than Obama on this issue.
Vote for a sovereign border and against amnesty until unemployment
is below 3%. Then examine the issue.

a reply to: KarensHoliday

I know something that most researchers in this field ignore altogether. I can't tell if they ignore this because they are truly ignorant of the phenomenon or if they simply refuse to acknowledge it. But that something is that the whole inter-generational conflict model presumes that both sides of the equation are "present" to participate in the conflict. That isn't happening because as the Boomers graduate to retirement...they are moving away, usually far away from major metro/urban areas and in many cases, out of the US altogether, never to return. There's a huge, quiet, internal migration at work in the US as the boomers move out of high population areas. There are many reasons for this but just as Clinton said, "its the economy"; cities are just too costly to retire to. The other driver is crime.

You said: "The author in the piece quoted above (Charles H. Smith) lays out why this is and provides an excellent and nuanced roadmap for a way out of the shouting-matches to more productive discussion." There won't be much "discussion"; it takes two to discuss something and if one side of the discussion has disappeared, there's not going to be any discussion, productive or otherwise.

originally posted by: Aliensun
I see nothing new in that supposedly new perspective. That on-going distinctions--but hardly a break--between generations is nothing new. It is everywhere within any human endeavor, schooling, science, military, government and every level of society.

Saying its not new is a way of avoid the problem, and it its a bit too simplistic. Yes, there is friction between every generation. But in some times and places it is worse than others -- THAT is the difference, and its an important one. In confucian East Asia, for many hundreds of years there were terrible conflicts of all sorts, but the generational aspect was less of a component to conflict because the relationships between the generations were fixed explicitly by Confucian ideas on filial pity and duty, and cemented with ritual. In the modern world, it has become much more of an important aspect.

Many people are fond of trotting out the old classical quote by Plato complaining about the younger generation as evidence that "nothing ever changes." But that, too, is a way of avoiding the real matter. The generations that built Rome on its way up were very culturally different then the generations that presided over Rome's decadent decline, and they wrestled with different issues.

The nature of generational conflict changes with each generation too. The baby boomers rebelled against their parents and the generation war was more about cultural values and the war in vietnam. Today the war is more about economics and the social contract. Different underlying causes demand different responses and solutions.

a reply to: nfflhome

Bravo!!! Well said, my fellow Texan. The real problem with the generations is, that the younger you are, the more you think you know. At 25, you simply do not have the life experience that someone 50 years old has. I don't know everything about how my smartphone works but, I do know about Humanity, Charity, the value of a dollar, and what's right and what's wrong. You know, it's only natural for a older person to teach younger people about life and living but, they need to ASK. By asking, you show that you're interested and want to learn. I'm not going to try and force you to learn something from me. My criticizing of young people is not something that's in my genes and it's not because I'm just a "crabby old man". My options are based on experience from dealing with younger people, speaking to them, watching them, and working with them. All I can say is that, something needs to change or the people being born this year better grow up knowing how to speak Chinese.