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Have Baby Boomers ruined America?

Which generation is responsible for ruining America?

  • The Greatest Generation

    Votes: 2 14.3%
  • The Baby Boomers

    Votes: 1 7.1%
  • Generation X

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Millennials

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • No one is ruining America - America has never been better

    Votes: 1 7.1%
  • The problem is not generational

    Votes: 7 50.0%
  • I don't know what's going on

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Other answer

    Votes: 5 35.7%

  • Total voters
    14

Stevicus

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
This is an interesting article I came across this morning: The Boomers Ruined Everything

It points to increases in land-use rules, zoning laws, requirements of licensure for employment, and incarceration rates, among other things. It partially attributes these changes to the formal ending of segregation, which led to attempts on the part of many to seek out informal ways of segregation.

There’s debate about why this is: Some researchers say the end of formal segregation may have pushed some voters to look for informal methods of enforcing segregation. Others suggest that a change in financial returns to different classes of investment caused homeowners to become more protective of their asset values.

Today, strict land-use rules—whether framed as rules about parking, green space, height limits, neighborhood aesthetics, or historic preservation—make new construction difficult. Even as the American population has doubled since the 1940s, it has gotten more and more legally challenging to build houses. The result is that younger Americans are locked out of suitable housing.

But, of course, Boomers didn’t only make rules that nudge young people out of homeownership. They also made new rules restricting young people’s employment. Laws and rules requiring workers to have special licenses, degrees, or certificates to work have proliferated over the past few decades. And while much of this rise came before Boomers were politically active, instead of reversing the trend, they extended it.

The rules of licensure for occupations are also deemed problematic.

Just as tight land-use rules make existing homeowners richer by reducing how many new houses are listed on the market, strict licensing rules make existing workers richer by reducing competition in their fields. And while some industries clearly need licensing rules for health and safety reasons, most of the growth in licensure has been in fields where health and safety justifications are less salient: Do you really need hours of course work and special exams to be a florist, an interior designer, or an auctioneer?

Again, scholars differ on explanations for why licensure has proliferated. It could be that work has simply gotten more complex. Or it could be that the decline of unions led to a search for new ways to maintain occupational closure. Increased gender and racial integration in workplaces may also have led to a search for new forms of hierarchy.

But even for workers who don’t need a formal license, barriers to work have grown over time. Jobs that once required a high-school degree now require a college degree. This escalation of credential requirements has created a kind of educational arms race.

The article also mentions that, even as educational costs are skyrocketing, the actual return on a college education has fallen flat.

Another major issue which is pinned on the Boomers is the incarceration rate:

The most glaring example of this growth in regulation and control is also the easiest one to pin on Baby Boomers: the incredible rise in incarceration rates. Even though murder rates are today at the same levels they were in the 1950s, the imprisoned share of the population is higher in America than in any country other than North Korea. We imprison a larger share of the population than authoritarian countries such as Turkmenistan and China.

And then, of course, there's the issue of debt. Over the course of their lifetimes, Boomers have incurred massive debts to fund their lavish lifestyle, while leaving it all to be paid for by future generations.

Making these payments will require fiscal austerity, through either higher taxes or lower alternative spending. Younger Americans will bear the burdens of the Baby Boomer generation, whether in smaller take-home pay or more potholes and worse schools.

So, what do you think? Are Baby Boomers to blame for this mess? Was it their parents' fault, the Greatest Generation?
 

Estro Felino

Believer in free will
Premium Member
As Thomas Jefferson prophetically said in the 18th century, the Bankers will be responsible for the destruction of America.
And this is valid also for Europe.
So please...let's not blame one generation or the other.

As for Italy, the baby boomers turned a poor agrarian country into the 5th world power.
 

Estro Felino

Believer in free will
Premium Member
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Brickjectivity

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
I think ruined is too strong a word. Here in America we are all doing Ok, but the problems mentioned in the article are real. Its a complicated question. All the wars have something to do with it. The constant rain of end times prophecy books haven't helped and have distracted the boomers. Segregation is one of the most toxic past influences in the country, and that goes back much further than the boomers. Constant technological revolution has made everything very turbulent, too.
 

bobhikes

Nondetermined
Premium Member
So, what do you think? Are Baby Boomers to blame for this mess? Was it their parents' fault, the Greatest Generation?

Being that this is a Democracy and each generation has the right to vote and most do not, it is the fault of every generation for the problems with United States. The complaints are not different they just keep getting progressively worse due to lack of interest by the general public. It seems each generation likes to sit back and complain but when it comes to working towards a solution they let others take care of it.
 

Enoch07

It's all a sick freaking joke.
Premium Member
All the troubles in the world are caused by the same thing they always have been.

Greed, power, and control of land/resources.

And this will continue for as long as humans are alive.
 

Stevicus

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
I think ruined is too strong a word. Here in America we are all doing Ok, but the problems mentioned in the article are real. Its a complicated question. All the wars have something to do with it. The constant rain of end times prophecy books haven't helped and have distracted the boomers. Segregation is one of the most toxic past influences in the country, and that goes back much further than the boomers. Constant technological revolution has made everything very turbulent, too.

I remember George Carlin had some harsh words for the Boomers. Unlike previous generations, the Boomers were born into a booming economy, with a level of opulence and comfort never seen before. The same generation as the hippies, who considered themselves more enlightened and progressive, but they somehow compromised those high-minded beliefs they once held.

I don't think it's really their fault, at least not as a generation.
 

usfan

Well-Known Member
My one word answer:
Yes

But a qualifier: that the roots of progressive ideology were in place, paused during WW2, and resumed with zeal afterwards. They were the first indoctrinated generation, with increasingly exclusive progressive beliefs. Many boomers have the conflict of the old still percolating in their minds.

And as a disclaimer, I'm a boomer.
 

susanblange

Active Member
The greatest generation are the baby boomers. They are the Messiah's generation. Psalm 14:5. "There were they in great fear: for God is in the generation of the righteous". His parents generation are lost and tenaciously joined to idols. Psalm 49:19. :He shall go to the generation of his fathers: they shall never see light".
 

Estro Felino

Believer in free will
Premium Member
Every generation ruins things somehow.
Some things improve.
Others worsen.
But we survive.
I think what is intolerable is that social inequalities are the result of a vicious circle of debt and debt comes from usury.
And banking institutions are legalized usurers.
 

Revoltingest

Pragmatic Libertarian
Premium Member
I think what is intolerable is that social inequalities are the result of a vicious circle of debt and debt comes from usury.
And banking institutions are legalized usurers.
Usury....
In Ameristan, it's a term used by people who borrow recklessly.
Interest rates are at historic lows.
But some discover that borrowing $150K to get a degree in medieval
feminist French paintings will only get them a job supersizing fries for
plumbers & carpenters....people who do something useful for a living.

A rule to live by....
Don't borrow money which you cannot use well enuf to pay back.
 

Brickjectivity

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
I remember George Carlin had some harsh words for the Boomers. Unlike previous generations, the Boomers were born into a booming economy, with a level of opulence and comfort never seen before. The same generation as the hippies, who considered themselves more enlightened and progressive, but they somehow compromised those high-minded beliefs they once held.

I don't think it's really their fault, at least not as a generation.
Georgie is funny and makes interesting observations. He's a little bit sloppy sometimes with his information and I don't vouch for everything he says. He's an excellent critic. He's inspired a lot of talent with his shows. He doesn't pretend to be Mr. Clean and is a great critic of hypocrisy.

I have a terrible, terrible time trying to remember how to spell hypocrisy. Its the 'I'.
 

Estro Felino

Believer in free will
Premium Member
Usury....
In Ameristan, it's a term used by people who borrow recklessly.
Interest rates are at historic lows.
But some discover that borrowing $150K to get a degree in medieval
feminist French paintings will only get them a job supersizing fries for
plumbers & carpenters....people who do something useful for a living.

A rule to live by....
Don't borrow money which you cannot use well enuf to pay back.
What I meant us that the US owes a debt to someone. And that someone is bankers.
 

Estro Felino

Believer in free will
Premium Member
I don't begrudge them for owing them the money I borrowed, used, & profited from.
You know...the FED doesn't give the US government dollars for free, but in exchange for treasury bonds (with interests).
If this passage was skipped, the US government would have the money for healthcare, university, etc
 

Revoltingest

Pragmatic Libertarian
Premium Member
You know...the FED doesn't give the US government dollars for free, but in exchange for treasury bonds (with interests).
If this passage was skipped, the US government would have the money for healthcare, university, etc
Free money, eh?
I suspect that fiat currency wouldn't work out so well.
 
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