Good one John - I don't agree with some of the stuff you are involved in, but totally agree with you on this article.

I think some folks forget that Boomers were also Tax Payers for a long time, and the fact we were healthy and long lived means we paid a lot of tax.

So I don't feel so bad when Boomers comment on the following generation - we paid for it, so why not.

So you're getting old and rolling around in the money you made by living long enough to see your real estate grow in value and trying to claim some reflected respect for achievements made not by you but by better members of your generation.

Just think on this, GenX and Y are only treating you with the respect that you showed your parents. Generationally speaking of course.

Dear John (or should I call you Johnny?), I suspect the so-called Boomers get under everyone else's skin partially because of their tiresome capacity to bang on about how special their generation was/is.

I see the Boomers as a statistical glitch, a wave of often flatulent, under-qualified, over-confident wind bags, thankfully now cresting and on their way to the same place we are all bound - the scrap heap of history.

John, Boomers DO get in the way, I've seen it countless times. They are also - in my experience of several large and small workplaces over the past 20+ years - suspicious of better qualified (usually younger) folks and inclined to create barriers to frustrate their careers if they are perceived as a threat.

Now, having reached a new milestone where their past lifestyle decisions are bound to catch up with many of them and create significant budgetary pressures (pensions, health etc.) on a shrinking tax base we hear them bleat about all the tax they paid over the years, as if those taxes were never applied along the way to sustaining their unsustainable lifestyles.

One thing I admire about the generations before them who lived through truly testing times (war, depression, Menzies) is their stoicism, their self-reliance.

Perhaps the Boomers could learn from this, if they'd just shut up for 5 minutes and listen.

Tebbutt, I belong to the previous generation and I would take issue as to whether generation X and Y are better qualified. Qualified for what?
The main thing they seem to be qualified for is instant gratification as they get further into debt out of which they are finding increasing difficulty to climb.

"Take therefore no thought for the morrow; for the morrow will take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." seems to be their motto, even though they have no idea from whence the quote comes.

On the other hand, older generations are a bit more circumspect when they get into debt and if they are spending their children's inheritance, then so be it.

A couple of posters, so far, have gone straight to a major factor in generational confrontation.
Age.....and that means experience!
Forget all that rubbish about not teaching an old dog new tricks.
What some puppies perceive as new tricks, are the results of years of chasing cars, digging holes and retrieving balls.
At 70, I have balls enough, now, to know what to do, and importantly, what not to do.
Puppies, don't whimper. Sit! Wait!
O.K?
Now fetch!

tebbutt
I'll make this simple for you.Given you failed Hisory, sociology etc.
1. The baby boomers were those born after 1945.
2. The War finisead in 1945
3. The Depression was from 1929-1939.
4. Post 1950 was boom years Unemployment was down to about 2%.so where you got the stoicism from beats the hell out of me.
Might I suggest you have the wrong generation.
By definition most Snr surgeons, Scientists etc are baby boomers.
The generation you are refering to would be their parents who would be 70+ mostly retired. I might point out that that generation now are in reflective mode and like all people we remember our past as the 'good times' as you WILL do in time so don't be so judgemental.