BabyBoomers: Life's Hard?

[Bateluer]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/10/04/baby.boomer.suicides/index.html?hpt=C2

"So many expected to be in better health and expected to be better off than they are," said Julie Phillips, lead author of the study assessing recent changes in suicide rates. "Surveys suggest they had high expectations. Things haven't worked out that way in middle age."

How did we go from the 'Greatest Generation' to this? The sense of entitlement from such numbers of baby boomers is appalling to me. You expected to be in better health? Did you, I don't know, do anything to make sure you'd be healthy in you middle ages? Exercise, healthy diet, etc? Expected a solid job? Good house? News flash! You don't expect those things. You earn them. They aren't supposed to fall into your lap.

 

[bfdd]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/10/04/baby.boomer.suicides/index.html?hpt=C2



How did we go from the 'Greatest Generation' to this? The sense of entitlement from such numbers of baby boomers is appalling to me. You expected to be in better health? Did you, I don't know, do anything to make sure you'd be healthy in you middle ages? Exercise, healthy diet, etc? Expected a solid job? Good house? News flash! You don't expect those things. You earn them. They aren't supposed to fall into your lap.

Then they went on to continuely spoil further generations into the same mentality. Pathetic.

 

[Zebo]

I call them the credit generation and destined to fail. They are all about to be Maddoffed even if they have 401k since all securities depends on successful servicing of debt.

 

[JSt0rm]

life is hard. Thats how it is. But we all know the baby boomers are the weakest generation.

 

[mmntech]

Well at least they've got generation y to pay their debts off. Heck, they're already talking about raising pension contributions on paycheques because so many boomers can't afford to retire.

 

[Zebo]

Then they went on to continuely spoil further generations into the same mentality. Pathetic.

Least they have youth so when shooting starts you can drive behind a berm and fend for yourself. If you read fourth turning kids today will be greatest gen again.

The Fourth Turning offers this bold prophecy:

Just after the millennium, America will enter a new era that will culminate with a crisis comparable to the American Revolution, the Civil War, the Great Depression, and World War II. The survival of the nation will almost certainly be at stake.

Strauss and Howe base this vision on a provocative theory of American history as a series of recurring 80- to 100-year cycles. Each cycle has four "turnings"-a High, an Awakening, an Unraveling, and a Crisis. The authors locate today's America as midway through an Unraveling, roughly a decade away from the next Crisis (or Fourth Turning). And they recommend ways Americans can prepare for what's ahead, as a nation and as individuals.

As Future Shock did in the 1970s and Megatrends did in the 1980s, this groundbreaking book will have a profound effect on every reader's perception of America's past, present, and future.

http://www.fourthturning.com/html/fourth_turning.html

 

[Zedtom]

This rebellion against the older generation stuff is really original. Americans of every age group are looking around and thinking: How the hell can we be doing so much that is good yet doing so much that is bad?

 

[Moonbeam]

One thing is for sure. Their descendants are garbage.

 

[Bateluer]

One thing is for sure. Their descendants are garbage.

Curious, when were you born?

 

[Lemon law]

Don't think of us baby boomers as having it hard, when us baby boomers were one of the last generations to really benefit from US government stupidity.

As baby boomer myself, I reserve my sympathy for future generations of Americans who will have it far tougher than we had. As we robbed the future to pay ourselves now.

With a little luck I will be dead before the bottom drops out, and what me worry, will I even notice when future generations pee on my grave?

 

[MJinZ]

Don't think of us baby boomers as having it hard, when us baby boomers were one of the last generations to really benefit from US government stupidity.

As baby boomer myself, I reserve my sympathy for future generations of Americans who will have it far tougher than we had. As we robbed the future to pay ourselves now.

With a little luck I will be dead before the bottom drops out, and what me worry, will I even notice when future generations pee on my grave?

No need to worry US just bombs creditors and we A_OK

 

[woolfe9999]

Second thread on this topic:

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2108849&highlight=boomers

- wolf

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Maybe they are getting tired of their kids whining so much about them?

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

life is hard. Thats how it is. But we all know the baby boomers are the weakest generation.

You're the guy who hates his parent's, right?

 

[GuitarDaddy]

Second thread on this topic:

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2108849&highlight=boomers

- wolf

whew! I thought I was having flashbacks again

 

[ShawnD1]

How did we go from the 'Greatest Generation' to this?

Uhh wrong generation I think. The greatest generation was the people who fought in World War 2 and the Korean War. Baby boomers are the children of the greatest generation.

edit
I think the greatest generation is supposed to go back as far as the beginning of the great depression. They are the greatest because they really did suffer through hard times, they've seen economic hardship, they've seen world wars, and they conquered it. The boomers and the generations after didn't really deal with any of those problems. I guess you could count Vietnam if you really wanted to...


edit edit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greatest_Generation

"The Greatest Generation" is a term coined by journalist Tom Brokaw to describe the generation[1] who grew up in the United States during the deprivation of the Great Depression, and then went on to fight in World War II, as well as those whose productivity within the war's home front made a decisive material contribution to the war effort. The generation is sometimes referred to as the G.I. Generation (a term coined by authors William Strauss and Neil Howe who are known for their generational theory).[2] It follows the Lost Generation of the 1920s who fought in World War I and precedes the Silent Generation of the 1930s who grew up during World War II.

So people who were old enough to fight or make tanks in factories during WW2 are the greatest generation. People who were children during WW2 are the Silent Generation. People born after WW2 ended are called baby boomers.

 

[*kjm]

"The boomers and the generations after didn't really deal with any of those problems. I guess you could count Vietnam if you really wanted to..."

Yep I would think if you had bullets flying at you you could count it

 

[Bateluer]

Uhh wrong generation I think. The greatest generation was the people who fought in World War 2 and the Korean War. Baby boomers are the children of the greatest generation.

edit
I think the greatest generation is supposed to go back as far as the beginning of the great depression. They are the greatest because they really did suffer through hard times, they've seen economic hardship, they've seen world wars, and they conquered it. The boomers and the generations after didn't really deal with any of those problems. I guess you could count Vietnam if you really wanted to...


edit edit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greatest_Generation

So people who were old enough to fight or make tanks in factories during WW2 are the greatest generation. People who were children during WW2 are the Silent Generation. People born after WW2 ended are called baby boomers.

Greatest Generation is in bold type. Baby boomers are pretty much the children of the Greatest Generation.

 

[Moonbeam]

Curious, when were you born?

It doesn't really matter, one is to honor ones father and mother regardless of when you were born and the reason you honor your father and mother is that your father and mother are you. This absurd contempt for various generations is the product of folk who feel worthless and want to hand that feeling to somebody else. Only scum puts down others.

 

[Moonbeam]

Greatest Generation is in bold type. Baby boomers are pretty much the children of the Greatest Generation.

Stop with the sentimental sniveling about some imaginary great generation. It is great because it wrote the books on how great it was. Todays children are every bit as great or worthless as any other generation.

 

[LunarRay]

The greatest generation will be the one that can take what garbage the ones before have littered their Planet with and provide their kids with a step in the right direction... I don't see that having happened since the folks back in 1787 did their thing getting our Constitution adopted.. and subsequently agreed..

 

[JSt0rm]

You're the guy who hates his parent's, right?

I dont hate anyone.

 

[Zebo]

Adversity makes you stronger or so I hear, lets face it boomers had none. Their parents OTOH saw nothing but shit - WW1, depression, WW2 where plenty of friends died and wanted their children to live charmed life they never had. I think this raised largely irresponsible and narcissistic peoples. Pay now or pay later but you always gotta pay.

 

[JSt0rm]

Adversity makes you stronger or so I hear, lets face it boomers had none. Their parents OTOH saw nothing but shit - WW1, depression, WW2 where plenty of friends died and wanted their children to live charmed life they never had. I think this raised largely irresponsible and narcissistic peoples. Pay now or pay later but you always gotta pay.

This is exactly right.

 

[Zebo]

"The boomers and the generations after didn't really deal with any of those problems. I guess you could count Vietnam if you really wanted to..."

Yep I would think if you had bullets flying at you you could count it

If you had any money you did not have this problem. ie people today in board rooms and office running us into the ground.