Are the generational beefs really a thing? And are Black folks part of the fight? And in this corner . . .
The war of words between Baby Boomers and the younger generations is like a never-ending wrestling match.
This tussle is seen frequently in the workplace, where Baby Boomers and those generations slighter in age clash over work styles and differing approaches to life. Baby Boomers complain that among other things, their more junior competitors are lazy, too sensitive, and believe they should get credit just for showing up for their jobs. While younger workers say that Baby Boomers are totally inept when it comes to using information technology, social media, and almost anything modern. Baby Boomers are workaholics who misunderstand the meaning of, or respect for work-life balance, say the less ripened employees.
In the years ahead, these generational differences may begin to play out on the national political stage, as older folk move out and the more contemporary groups run for national elected offices. In previous years, Baby Boomers dominated Congress and the presidency. The last four U.S. Presidents, including the current one, are Baby Boomers. This age cohort had been the majority of U.S. Senators and Representatives, but that is starting to change.
Current 119th Congress members are skewing younger. According to a recent Pew Research Center study, the median age of House Representatives is 57.5 years. The median age for senate members is 64.7, but the median age for the 11 newly elected senators is 53.9. Included in these numbers, four of the 11 senators are in their forties.
For representatives, the median age of 48 of the 61 of representatives coming in as freshmen is 50.2. Compare this to the previous 118th Congress, the median age for first-time representatives was 46.3.
As Congressional committees hold hearings on a range of national concerns over the economy, climate change, health care, and other pressing matters, the younger legislators, like many generations before, might scapegoat their legislative elders. Whatever is wrong in the nation right now, has been a go-to for some. Blame the Baby Boomers.
“It’s all their fault.”
During the last six years, an increasing number of print and broadcast news, along with social media platforms, have surprisingly targeted one generation as the source of all that ails us: Baby Boomers, people born between 1946 and 1964.
Baby Boomers are said to be roundly despised by junior cohorts such as Generation X (born between 1965 and 1980); Millennials (born between 1981 and 1996); and Generation Z (born between 1997 and 2012). According to a Yahoo article by writer Danielle Sham, the post-Boomers indict Baby Boomers for everything from global warming to affordable housing shortages.
Take Bruce Gibney, a 49-year-old Generation X venture capitalist whose wealth stems from investing early in Facebook and PayPal. In 2017, he wrote a book entitled “A Generation of Sociopaths: How the Baby Boomers Betrayed America.” Gibney accuses Baby Boomers of causing “slowing economic growth, decelerating innovation, tremendous fiscal imbalances,” and other issues.
He believes the “feud” between American Boomers and the youngsters began during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the vaccine was first made available to elders. Age-related weak immune systems made them more at-risk for catching the deadly virus. “It just sort of encapsulates the whole sense of unfairness, where it’s always the Boomers first and their kids last,” Gibney asserted in a 2021 “PBS Newshour” segment.
At the same time, Gibney’s ire against the senior population is not extended to those who are Black. “I excluded Black Americans from my definition of Baby Boomers,” Gibney responded to Ark Republic in an email. “[T]heir experiences and expectations were so radically different from those of the white, fairly middle-class Boomer majority (were remarkably homogen[e]ous, as far as big, dispersed populations go).”
Gibney goes on. “And because my argument was in large part about how white Boomers gained and then manipulated the levers of power to their benefit, my analysis didn’t really apply to Black Boomers at the national level – though, of course, then-majoritarian Boomer policy had plenty of consequences for Black Americans (and most other non-Boomer Americans, including all future Americans).”
Cosigning Gibney’s point is Millennial author Jill Filipovic, 41, a former columnist for The Guardian and an attorney. “[He] put into great context how the narratives around Boomers are really about white Boomers, and don’t fit the Black experience,” Filipovic wrote in an email to Ark Republic.
In her 2020 book, “OK Boomer, Let’s Talk: How My Generation Got Left Behind,” Filipovic, unlike Gibney, interviewed Black Baby Boomers, among them a longtime family friend. “Black Boomers were not cut in on the American Dream the way whites were, and we see the ripple effects of this in things like family wealth, housing, and on and on.”
Filipovic, a Brooklyn-based writer, said she sensed that the children of Black Baby Boomers are not angry with their parents [like their white counterparts]. She explained that each generation of African Americans experienced racism and segregation as barriers against living anywhere they chose, attending any grade school or college, and being hired for any job for which they had the education. As a result, said Filipovic, younger Black people are not condemning their Boomer parents for their own social and economic plight. Reflectively, “. . . Black Boomers also don’t feel the same antagonism toward the young, perhaps because they, too, often had it pretty hard, and understand what it means to be cut out of the American promise.”
This disparity between Black Baby Boomer wealth and white Baby Boomer wealth shows significant gaps. Photo credit: JSP/UnsplashBoomers versus Millennials. Black generational animosity?
Baby Boomers used to be the largest generational cohort in the U.S. But as of 2019, Millennials surpassed them. Added to Millennial numbers are immigrants who tend to be of childbearing age.
Because many Baby Boomers continue to remain in the work force and are unretired, they must compete with up-and-coming generations for jobs; resulting in older workers, more often, being passed over in employment bids. One fear for employers: Boomers are less familiar with using computers or handling social media, and that they are slow to learn new technologies. Added to the trepidation of bringing on more senior staffers, it is more than likely that older workers will retire soon, so employees hire younger, thinking they will remain on the job much longer than an older employee.
Salient in the workplace are generational clashes often based on different work styles, and differing expectations regarding work rewards. Boomers view Millennials as ones who expect frequent praise and recognition from employers, and think the younger workers want a pat on the head whether they deserve it or not. From the other side of the coin, Millennials view Baby Boomers as workhorses who stand in the way of work promotions because they remain in their jobs longer. Further, Boomers tend to respond to feedback with a tone deaf callousness.
They also compete with Baby Boomers for inexpensive housing. Baby Boomers tend to remain in the homes purchased when they started their families. Many have paid off their mortgages, and are “aging in place.” There is also an economic consideration; interest rates are much higher. Selling a home and buying a new one means being saddled with another mortgage, which older people, especially retirees, cannot afford. Millennials, who have yet to buy their first home, have little to choose from, as older homeowners are living longer, and refusing to sell their homes and move. Meaning, fewer low-cost homes available for the younger generations to purchase. Gen Z’s, for instance, cannot accumulate the wealth necessary for purchasing a home at today’s high prices and interest rates.
Black Americans and generational differences. Is that really a thing?
Are Black Baby Boomers and the generations after them locking horns over these issues like their white counterparts? The Ark asked a group of Black Baby Boomers, representative of their generation, if they were feeling intragenerational competition and animosity.
For some, they refuse to get caught into the generational war hype. Like Dorothy Davis of Washington, D.C. emphasized that an “Us versus them generalizations are too confining. They don’t lend themselves to nuances.”
Davis, like many of the respondents, was raised by parents who experienced the 1930s economic depression, World War II, and post-war racism. A consultant on Africa issues, Davis stood firm on the notion that “ . . .the current state of the U.S. lies squarely on the shoulders of Boomers, and, to some extent, generations before us.”
What she adamantly pointed out that it looks different when you add a racial lens. “While great social programs have been put in place for all Boomers no matter the race, gender, etc., those programs are often unevenly implemented due to unconscious bias against racial, gender, and sexual orientation. Black Boomers are not any more or less accountable than [white] Boomers for what the Millennials (and other generations) will inherit.”
For José Massó, “Con Salsa!” radio program producer and host at WBUR-FM in Boston, Massachusetts, he was floored by any beef between the generations. “ I am not aware of an anti-Boomer movement against Black and Brown Baby Boomers in Boston amongst the present BlPOC (Black and People of Color) leaders and community,” said the Boriqua media personality.
If anything Massó embraces those who come after him. “[Based on my experiences] I can share … in Boston writ large, today’s generation of BlPOC leaders in the fields of activism, government, philanthropy, community building, social service, education, and academia, have an unapologetic mission in eradicating systemic and institutional racism, while embracing and honoring those who came before them to pave the way.”
According to Massó, who is ensconced in the music industry, the love flows both ways. “They celebrate us often, giving us flowers through different organizations, activities, and events. They respectfully seek us out for counsel and think of us as their mentors and champions. They are literate in history and are skilled at critical thinking and knowledgeable of critical race theory.”
Moving to the Midwest, homemaker Janice Sevayega, who lives in Warrensville Heights, Ohio gives an emphatic “No,” on if there is no intergenerational hostility between Black Baby Boomers and the younger Black generations.
Sevayega said there will be an absence of conflict, “If each generation is willing to accept and learn from the other.” Siding on the idea that there must be flexibility, while being open to growth, she explained, “There are old ways that work best for some things and innovative approaches that work better for others. If we only hold on to what used to work, we will not grow as a people.”
Going further, Sevayega added, “If Millennials are not willing to accept and understand the reasons that certain approaches were used to advance us as a people, we will not be able to make the necessary changes to make the best possible choices for ourselves. . . I believe that many (younger Black generations) are starting to wake up and understand this truth and give more credit to their parents and grandparents.”
With the current Administration, there has been a rise of old-school ideology and more folk looking back to bring forward what is needed to survive these precarious times. From gardening to giving up the bling-lifestyle that Generation Xers grew up on, there has been a return to some simpler measures. This also means squashing the idea that Black generations’ clashes are epic.
Dr. Lesley Rankin Hill, retired anthropology professor residing in St. Petersburg, Florida said, “As far as I am concerned this is a non-issue. In general, Black Baby Boomers were active, hard-working, and committed throughout their lives of taking care of their families [multi-generationally] and struggling.”
What Hill spoke on is the way that her peers endured an uphill battle unknown to their white counterparts. “[We had] to prove [our] abilities and worth daily . . . Needless to say (or should be stated vociferously), most Black Baby Boomers were constantly bombarded with racist actions, policies, innuendo and threats, on a daily basis at their jobs, lives, and streets or neighborhoods.”
Hill believes the description of Baby Boomers as selfish and self-centered does not fit Black Baby Boomers. Since the core of Civil Rights Movement activism emerged during this generation, she sees Black Boomers as those who historically contributed time and funding for justice and equality movements. They were active in their local health, community and school improvement efforts.
Moreover, Hill cautioned that the current political climate leaves no room for squabbles between Black Baby Boomers and younger Black generational cohorts. “… We are in a rising fascistic, anti-constitutional, overtly racist America,” she said.
“Which means, watch out Black people, no matter what generation, color, language, or money you are or have. Much of what you have gained in the last three-plus generations has been taken away, and they are coming for whatever else they can take away.”
Boomers are leaving the workforce and entering into the stage of life where they are largely stay-at-home citizens, it is projected that they will bequeath $84 trillion in what is called, “The Great Wealth Transfer.” According to a Federal Reserve report in 2019, the median net worth of Black Baby Boomers was around $39,000, compared to $331,000 for white Baby Boomers. With the projected rough economic and social times ahead, what Black Baby Boomers must leave behind looks to center more than money.
