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The Forum > Article Comments > Boomers - your time is up ... > Comments

Boomers - your time is up ... : Comments

By Trish Bolton, published 21/6/2006

Move over Baby Boomers, it’s time to let someone else drive the car.

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Steve,

"Baby Boomers is a term commonly applied to people with birth years from the span 1945 to 1964."

It is interestin the overtime the population covered by the term "Baby Boomer" has now come to encompass more than a decade. Originally, the term referred to the pre-1950s baby boom occurring, when the soldiers came home from WWII. (There is also spike in the 1970s, when BB's children started families.)

The born in 1950s generation has had to deal with wake of the "real" BBs: e.g., inflation pushing up prices.

The 1950s born generation were young in the 1960s, and, that has left an influence of this progressive group, wherein, the World of Winston Churchill and the Cooee March were pushed aside. Technology and social reform were high their agenda. Progress in both areas has been astonishing over the past 30 years.

In the 1960/70s, it was much, much harder to gain access to university. First, there fewer places. Second, one couldn't study part-time at university, because the classes were held almost exclusively in the daytime. TAFE was the only option.

Back then (late 60s) juniors' wages a proportion of adult wages was very low. A suburban Bank Manger would earn ten times the salary of a dishonours clerk. It was very hard to save a deposit for a home, because a 25% deposit was needed before a Bank would even consider an application. In the 60s and 70s, very few twenty-somethings could afford to go on holiday trips together, as today. No money. (Maybe, a few days at Gold Coast)

Perhaps, today parents might subsidise an oveseas trip. Back then a struggling 19 year old might have needed to borrow money from Mum or Dad to buy a weekly train ticket to go to work. A teenager with a car? You must be joking!
Posted by Oliver, Monday, 26 June 2006 11:32:19 AM
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LOL I love reading forum posts like these. Knock the baby boomers and they all fly into a self-indignant rage.

Frankly, the only baby boomers I have an ounce of time for are the Vietnam Veterans, who missed out on all the fun because they were sent (they didn't *go*, they were *sent*) to a pointless war then treated like s**t on their return.

The rest of the generation are over-spoiled prats who had privileged childhoods thanks to the efforts of the Greatest Generation, and who now want a privileged retirement at the cost of Gen X. We keep hearing about the "costs of an Ageing Australia" because Boomers are getting older, and apparently will be "demanding" higher standards of living in retirement. Not on my dollar. I'm too busy working my butt off trying my guts out to get a third of the living standard you bastards had at my age.

Integenerational conflict? It's a reality. It's here now. And sooner or later, the Baby Boomer generation of economic, environmental and social vandals are going to have to face up to the fact that, as even Howard has admitted, you are the only generation since the fall of the bloody Roman Empire to leave your children with a poorer standard of living than you yourself inherited.

Vietnam Veterans, thank you for your sacrifice. Other baby boomers, get well and truly stuffed.
Posted by Anth, Tuesday, 27 June 2006 8:27:14 AM
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Anth,

If a person was born after 1954 they were too young for vietnam, so many boomers fall into this category.

In fact the whole baby boomer aguement is not relevant to Australia, it relates to the economic boom generated in America after WWII.

At least my education in basic arithmetic was far superior to yours.
Posted by Steve Madden, Tuesday, 27 June 2006 10:24:55 AM
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Anth,
As a Baby Boomer I have always lived by the four golden rules taught to me by my parents, as follows:

1. 'No-one owes you a living'
2. 'Always pay your own way, never ask for or expect handouts'
3. 'You make your own bed, you lie in it'
4. 'The only things you borrow money for is a house or car - do not
live off credit - live wihtin your means.

Simple enough to understand one would imagine but it seems some of the X & Y generation have not heard about them.

My retirement in hopefully 5 years time will be fully funded by myself and my husband after years of hard work, saving, discipline and living within our means whilst providing a catholic education for our son, also giving him an apprenticeship and employment for the past 5 years in a business we started back in 1973.

Unfortunately some of todays X & Y generation on beer wages feel it is their right to spend beyond their means and want it all now if not sooner.

Our son will be very well provided for upon our death, but in the mean time we expect him to learn the basics of financial restraint and planning himself and provide for his own financial future.

Your comment is both offensive and unwarranted and suggests a person who is finding it all too hard. Perhaps following the above 4 rules as we and other Baby Boomers have will set you up for the future and elimate your negative attitude.
Posted by Babyboomer52, Tuesday, 27 June 2006 11:39:20 AM
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Anth, “The rest of the generation are over-spoiled prats who had privileged childhoods.”

I am trying to understand where, by building a business and contributing to the tax coffers which were squandered in pretending to give the likes of you an “education”, I was “spoiled”?

I suggest you consider, one day in the future, you might feel lucky to manage to survive to be the same age as present baby boomers.

On the other hand, every one else might feel lucky if you don’t.

Babyboomer52 – four great rules for responsible living (although I would not necessarily include the car loan).

Similarly my daughters will benefit to a far greater extent than either myself or their mother when we shuffle off this mortal coil but they are not waiting on me, they are busy applying those rules for themselves (as they were taught).

It is a shame Anth’s upbringing has not included similar discipline.
Posted by Col Rouge, Tuesday, 27 June 2006 2:17:36 PM
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I find the whole "generation" argument ridiculous, as it assumes that power is held by all the members of a single age group.

There are some individuals amongst the Silent Gen, WW2 Gen, Boomer Gen, X Gen and even Y Gen who have indeed contributed to a lesser world than they inherited; through environmental degradation, astronomical house prices, decreased educational oppurtunities - and all the other ills that Boomers are being blamed for. The rest of the individuals in these groups had no real power or influence to cause this harm - they just worked hard and did what they could for themselves and their families.

Shouldn't we be looking to find solutions to these problems, rather than throwing blame around crazily?
Posted by nowvoyager, Tuesday, 27 June 2006 3:38:18 PM
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