Is that really that surprising? People born in the 1940's would have lived through a massive economic upswing post WW2. While their parents probably experience the Great Depression through their 30's.
Well now we have the "Great Recession" (according to Wikipedia, though technically apparently it ended in 2009), before WW2 there was the "Great Depression". Since the baby boomers are born shortly after WW2, I suppose the Great Depression was brought about by their parents or grandparents. I think people were far worse off back then.
Also, will the kids support the unsustainable retirement lifestyles if they can't afford them? It seems unlikely.
And we still don't know how things will play out. Maybe it was a genius move to take up all that credit.
My grandfather was born in the year 1900 (he had my mom in 1960). I was born in the 80s. I knew about all the wars and the Great Depression by the time I was 8. It was frequently talked about, particularly the Depression, among the elders in my family. And my brother and I were always fascinated with the big wars from a young age. At any rate, my great grandmother would save EVERYTHING. Nothing ever went to waste. No food, no item, was thrown away willy nilly. She had the same appliances for decades (they actually lasted). She would save up bottles and cans and actually turn them in for money. She raised 3 kids as a widow in the Depression. I never, ever got the impression that my grandparents or great-grandparents had it worse than me. I knew by the way they carried themselves. They grew up in a time of scarcity and the influence of that carried with them until death.
The first first, or the first since the prosperity boom in the middle of the 20th century? The generation that went through the Depression surely was worse off than their parents.
Interesting article. A lot of the stuff in there really doesn't surprise me though if you view it through the lens of how tough the times were - if born in 1910, there's WWI and the depression during one's youth and early adulthood.
Every other developed economy was destroyed by the war. The rise of the middle class here was a result of overall economic growth and the economic suicide of the two world wars and the depression. Holding up the 1940's and 1950's as a model removes the context of cataclysmic world events of the 30's and 40's. Also remember that the US had virtually no welfare state at that time and used higher taxes to pay off war debt.
My grandparents spending habits were permanently affected by growing up during the great depression. They talked about their frugality in the context of the depression often. It anchored their entire concept of money. My parents were deeply affected too and often talked about their own childhood and how they were taught to handle money. I feel like I was brought up with a vestige of that great depression mentality and often actively challenge myself to be less frugal. That's 90 years of long run hysteresis right there.
> and so far we've fared MUCH better than the 30s.
There was an entire decade between the Spanish influenza pandemic and the beginning of the depression - it's not obvious to me why we should already presume to have mastered economic effects that trailed the historical "equivalent" by a decade
There is a supportable argument to be made that the Depression/WWII generation pushed for many of the policies which, temporarily, drastically improved life for the average American and effectively created the much-lauded "American middle class". And a supportable argument to be made that their children promptly froze, rolled back or outright repealed those policies and gains upon reaching an age when they wielded significant political power.
Without arguing about terms like "selfishness", the motivation can be laid on the economic conditions those generations faced. Depression-era Americans grew up in a time of great economic hardship, and so pushed for legal and social safety nets (Social Security, labor unions, etc.). Their children grew up in a time of economic ease, and so had no understanding of or motivation to preserve those things, and saw them as impediments to their further enrichment (if we get rid of the union, my business is more profitable; if we slash entitlement programs, my taxes are lower, etc.).
A good parallel is the anti-vaccine movement in the US. The threat of serious vaccine-preventable diseases is fading from living memory, as most parents of young children today have never lived in a situation where such diseases were a realistic consideration. Thus they see no benefit from vaccines, and over-value the rare side effects (and believe, out of fear, charlatans who fabricate claims that vaccines cause problems those parents are familiar with).
And the cities had no help for the entire generation of farmers who lost everything. This time stands in contrast to the "Roaring Twenties", a time of plenty and a booming economy that the US has almost never seen before.
Someone here has been drinking too much of that Rubio Kool-aid. Americans have had plenty of generation-defining tough times in our history. We are strong because of surviving through it, learning about the problems, and working to make the country better afterwards. But that "economical reset" button has been pushed several times in our history.
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In "Game of Thrones" terms, the Baby Boomers were born in the "great long spring", and have only known prosperity their whole life. They were born in a great time, a world rebuilt by the Greatest Generation (who grew up through the Dust Bowl AND Great Depression, then left to fight WW2 and then set the economic conditions for the post-war economic miracle).
But now fall is upon us, and the historians are remembering that yes, Winter is coming. And it is the millennials who have to now work through the winter that our parents don't remember ever existing... but our grandparents may remember the tougher times they had.
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