Michael's Corner

And then God said, “Let there be Baby Boomers.” Apparently, God thought the world lacked grievances. Naturally, I’m being ironical. I’m also referring to the second wave of Boomers, the ones born after 1955, the sect I belong to; I was born in 1962 – the “Boomer” generation officially extends to 1964.

Recently, when in the company of my fellow peers and forced to endure another “sky is falling” grievance session that included them droning on about the dings their 401ks and various other investments suffered, I couldn’t keep quiet and thus categorically reminded them of a few facts:

If there ever lived a generation that, had its cake and ate it too, it was Baby Boomers (the second wave). “We” were the last generation to come of age in an America that still had a labor party. A viable labor party wasn’t there for our entire careers but enough so that we could simultaneously build wealth and live. Our polity, as per its chief entitlement, works by transferring wealth from the young to the old. When executed within the parameters of a measured and balanced economy, those doing the paying could lead lives marginally more successful than their predecessors. Then a funny thing happened on the way to the forum (the 21st century): the Clinton administration cut labor loose and pivoted toward corporate elitism. Since, we’ve had two management parties fighting for universal supremacy and no labor party. For decades, the Democrats championed labor; the Republicans championed management. Once upon a time the yin and yang between labor and management worked cohesively.

So, let’s feed the data America has had no labor party for the past 28 years into the equation. Let’s also add to the equation a real estate market that has outperformed all other sectors of the market. Lastly, let’s add college tuition rising more sharply than real estate. I don’t have to spell out what that meant for Millennials under the age of thirty-five and continues to mean for Zoomers. Unfortunately, I had to spell it out to my fellow Boomers the consequences of their successors not having access to the same America they did.

There’s another leg to the stool: America’s debt is currently equal to its own, China’s, Japan’s, and Germany’s GDP. It’s going to require novel ideas to right a ship that has blown far off course. We can begin by once again becoming a nation that does what it takes to save its children, instead of one that tosses its kids overboard to save itself. Imposing anti-bullying policies and putting stop signs on buses was “lovely.” Printing money to fight foreign wars and bailing out “too big to fail” entities, thus bankrupting the futures of Zoomers and young Millennials was not. So, if us boomers have to work an extra year or two to right the ship, my message is this: Buck up, buttercup!

Okay, that was my Mondy morning rant. For a more enriching experience, tap on the link The Universe in Keys 04/01/2025 and watch some of the world’s elite virtuosos at work.