OK Boomer

or how Millennials and Gen Z went from being apart of the system to being ready to tear it down

If you aren’t aware of the OK Boomer trend, then you need to be. OK Boomer has become the default insult for anyone who is old, out of touch, or just not liberal enough to understand the systemic economic problems faced by the younger generation. However, besides being yet another trend that started on 4 Chan, Discord, and gaming, it is also emblematic of the generational divide between a large generation that was given everything and 2 generations who were given very little and told to like it.

Millennials and Gen Z have been the subject of so many think pieces about why they spend money differently or how they are killing industries like casual dining, napkins, housing, and malls. They have been criticized for being on their phones too much and having a poor work ethic. The latter criticism is standard from the older generation to the younger generation. Seneca complained about slovenly young people. The reality is that younger people have had to make some tough decisions and face some tough difficulties. This systemic outrage has been encapsulated in a singular phrase: OK Boomer.

OK Boomer: Education

It’s hard to believe now but at one time a college education was fairly cheap. Many state schools were cheap or low cost. The University of California system was entirely free and this attracted America’s best and brightest regardless of their ability to pay. Any fees and expenses could be covered by a part-time job with studying as the primary goal. A whole generation of people were able to go to school. For those that weren’t so academically inclined, plentiful jobs abounded.

Millennials and Gen Z have had no such luck. Education for these generations has been expensive leading to $1 trillion (plus) of debt. Rather than starting out life with education and a good salary, millennials started out life in a recession worse than the Great Depression and many of those who graduated between 2008-2011 have been permanently left behind. Today’s under-35 crowd has had to suffer under contract labor, shifting schedules, and stagnant salaries. Many have to move jobs in order to get a raise.

OK Boomer: Jobs

This is an area where Boomers and Millennials have some solidarity. Boomers saw the job market change dramatically over the course of their working life. Many boomers came of age in the early 1970s when the economy and the job market was a mess. The Bretton Woods agreement had fallen apart, the oil crisis had strangled growth, interest rates skyrocketed and stagflation strangled finances. Difficult economics would affect boomers well into the mid-1980s when the economy took off again and would enter one of the greatest expansions in American history. Boomers also saw the end of pensions and an assured retirement. They saw the rise of the commodified job market but never had to really live in the consequences of it. The Boomers were able to live through the dot com bust in the late 90s and still hang on to their gains through to the Great Recession. The Boomers didn’t have a great economy the entire time but their lot was far better than those under 35 today. Their share of wealth stands at 3%. Boomers had it better at 5%. In real terms, that might not seem like a lot but stocking up wealth in early working years leads to big gains down the road.

A difficult economy is something that Millennials know better than anyone. Gen Z is coming into a difficult job environment with wages but the overall picture is robust and unemployment remains low. The terrible days of 2008-2011 are behind us as far as that goes. However, thanks to those low wages savings are non-existant and many younger people are ill-prepared for the next recession which can really happen at any time. For Millennials and Gen Z, a great expansion hasn’t reached them. The Obama recovery never reached the worker’s paychecks in any meaningful way. Household income is up a modest 15% since 1990. That’s not even faster than inflation. The Boomers were able to recover, Millennials haven’t had that chance yet. Part of the reason that hasn’t happened is debt.

OK Boomer: Debt

Because of the aforementioned cheap education, most Boomers started out life with little debt. Boomers took on debt in the form of housing which would become a tremendous investment vehicle which would later cause a certain nasty recession around 2007. Credit card debt could be discharged and while many people lost houses and investment property in the mortgage crash, many still were able to retain other assets or retirement funds. The poor had it worse than the wealthy of course. For Millennials and Gen Z, they have started out life in debt and have struggled to service that debt and get ahead. If they wanted to declare bankruptcy on their student debt, they couldn’t anyway. Instead, the best that they can hope for is income-based repayment with eventual forgiveness. For many with parent-plus loans or private loans, they could die with that debt.

The Real Problem

In a few short years, Millennials went from asking for jobs to being ready to embrace democratic socialism as a way to solve their problems. The reality is that many aspects of criticism that people under 35 have faced have little to do with them being bad people but instead of being people making the best of their decisions. What Boomer would have bought a house or a car in 1978 with 11% mortgage interest rates? What Boomer would be ready to go to college and then work at a coffee shop? I’ve personally watched many people my age make the best of bad situations. They’ve taken jobs they could have gotten without college. Millennials are the most educated generation in American history. These were people from whom great things were expected. From birth, Boomers embued their children with a love for education and a desire not only to do well but to do very well and yet through neo-liberal economic policies and wealth hoarding made it nearly impossible for that dream to become reality for the vast majority. Millennials have done their best with a sad situation and Gen Z is trying to figure out how to make it in this new paradigm. The economy has changed, the world has moved on and the only people clinging to the past are the Boomers who expect their children to continue to live as they did despite not passing on any of the benefits that they enjoyed. Millennials have had to make practical, hard, tough decisions and in my estimation, they’ve done a pretty good job. No one is perfect. There are plenty of people who’ve done plenty of stupid things or made stupid decisions. But I’ve also seen people transcend circumstances, make tough moves (both physical and otherwise) and try to the best that they can. Millennials have had to forego homeownership, children, and much more just to adjust to the economic circumstances they find themselves in. Rather than heap more criticism on their heads, we should be making changes for working families and understanding what has gone wrong with our system and if that is simply too much to handle, well, OK Boomer.