80
New office crisis: Boomers won't leave!
Dan Drezner
To view this content, Javascript must be enabled and Adobe Flash Player must be installed.
TEXT OF STORY
Kai Ryssdal: How you feel about the economy right now might well depend on where you are in the pecking order, generationally speaking. To use a personal finance term here for a second, financial horizons -- that is, the time any given person has left to work and save -- can vary widely. And in light of the great stock market crash of 2008, everybody's reassessing their economic future, including commentator Dan Drezner.
DAN DREZNER: The financial downturn has left all sorts of casualties in its wake: more unemployment, depressed wages, and greater economic uncertainty. But I'd like to direct my angst at a different target -- the baby boomers.
A hidden effect of this crisis is that, in the workplace, as in popular discourse, they simply refuse to get out of the way.
To understand my lament, you have to realize that the oldest of the baby boomers are on the cusp of retirement. For younger generations, this should be a cause for relief. For decades, Gen X-ers like myself have had to hear the standard declarations about the uniqueness of the baby boomers. Maybe they were not the Greatest Generation, but they were the ones who glorified the whole idea of generational identity. For decades, Gen X-ers have had to hear complaints about our political apathy, our popular culture, and our musical tastes.
We have suffered many of these critiques without complaint. Why? Because so many of us worked for so many of them. They were the bosses of the business world. And they were supposed to be retiring very soon, but the recession has changed all that.
In 2008, U.S. workers aged 55 to 64 who had 401(k)'s for at least 20 years saw their retirement balances drop an average of 20 percent. A recent YouGov poll showed two-thirds of this generation have not made the necessary adjustments in their financial planning. This is not a recipe for leaving the workforce anytime soon.
What does this mean for the rest of us? Younger workers who expected promotions when the boomers cleared out are going to have to stew in their own juices. With this job market, looking for a better opportunity elsewhere is not in the cards. Which means that Gen X-ers are going to have to listen to baby boomers doing what they do best -- talk about themselves.
Office politics across the country are going to get a lot nastier. Of course, it could be worse. Generation Y not only has to deal with the boomers, they have to cope with people like me complaining about them.
Ryssdal: Dan Drezner is a professor of international politics at Tufts University.
Pages
This story is best summed up in the words of Albert Einstein when he said the thinking that got us here, will not get us out of the current situation.
Millenials and X'ers have a right to want their voices heard regarding their future especially on issues such as the environment and economy, and to infuse their vision into the future of this country. (Especially since they too pay taxes that will support Bailouts for companies run by "Boomer strategists" and Medicare for "Boomers" as they age.
Boomers should be careful not to bite the hand that will eventually have to wipe their . . . . .
Don't take their criticisms too harshly, Mr. Drezner. One thing Boomers can't stand is that anyone else other than them has the audacity to consider themselves an actual generation, equal to their generation in its right to have a life path, values and needs.
Mercy. Those Boomers. When they were young. How quickly they forget! How easy they are to be hypocritical. Ah, such is their way. And we allow them that because, well, because that's just the way they are. Weren't they the gen that cried out for the destruction of the older establishment when they were in their rising young adult years? Weren't they the gen that called wrong, outdated, and, even, soulless, their elder generations. Weren't they the ones who said, "Never trust anyone over 30?"
Funny, isn't it, Mr. Drezner? We can still love them for who they are. Equally, we can stand in our own right, at this moment in time and say, calmly (at least for now), clearly and with equanimity, "MOVE OUT OF OUR WAY." See, dear Boomers, your style of problem-solving is becoming/has become part of the problem. A huge part. It's time for the values of a younger generation (yes, the GenXers, not the Millennials) to have full court.
You can either calmly move to the side (not leave ... just stop being in our way by your stubborn belief system that you are entitled to all the turf upon which you can squat). Cuz, see, if you don't move out of the way, you will be marginalized and then we won't have the benefit of your perspective. We want it. We just want you behind us, as elders, not at the helm anymore, acting as though you know best what to do in These Times.
Please, calmly, move to the side. You're welcome to stay around and be part of what's going on. Just move out of the way. I know you can't see it. But your generation's narcissistic attitude that you know best -- always -- is really in the way of a new era of leadership.
Choose while you can. If you don't, it may be too late for your generation to leave the legacy you so want to leave.
PS -- History shows your gen archetype shines as wise elders in crisis times, not as Can-Do Generals. That's our job.
Mr. Drezner has publicly humiliated himself. He's showcased to the world his moronic sense of entitlement, his prejudice against older workers, as well as his inability to move ahead in his chosen profession. Drezner also did a fine job, too, of displaying the talent too often seen in Gen-Xers---an Olympic-class ability to whine about what isn't being handed to them on a silver platter. Did the Tufts U. system produce this sad excuse for an educational leader, or did Tufts merely make the collosal error of hiring him?
There are genuine crises in the world and you seem to find humor in stepping like a stray dog into the middle of other people's mud. Mindless pap clogging the...oh, right. It was 'public radio'...explains the shallow thought process. 'Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach.' You look of what you speak. Suck air, putz.
Actually, Matt, there are two sides to that proposition. In addition to the strength of the jerk doing the pushing, there is a person that doesn't want--nor deserve--to be pushed into starvation.
That is, if you're strong enough to push someone out of the way, then shut up and do it. If not, then maybe you you should think about--I don't know--negotiating like an adult with people? And, here's an idea: with logic?
We've heard the people here saying "why don't you go away and die." We've said "no." Are you people hard of hearing or something?
This argument was ridiculous to begin with. Now that it's been pretty soundly refuted by about a dozen of the arguments below, people are just showing their poor reading skills. I see how it is: all it took were some desperate economic times; mix in someone yelling "it's all (name of group)'s fault!" And bingo: a bunch of people not in that group will follow like lemmings. Here it's age. Elsewhere it'll be race. Somewhere else again it'll be undocumented immigrants.
Don't be Sheep. And yet again: blaming one age group for this makes about as much sense as blaming Americans who have never touched drugs for the fact that "American demand supports Mexican drug cartels." Use some logic, for crying out loud.
I have to agree with Bill Gaits comment above, namely:
"Most of you never worked a job that required you to do physical things, like clean the scum from a carwash, or build a stone wall, etc..you want to start at the top, when we are at the top."
I started working for a living in the 70's washing dishes, working on fishing boats, carpentry, etc. I worked through a series of labor type jobs until computers were widespread and moved into that field in my 30's. I have EARNED my way to my present position of intellectual skill and financial comfort. I don't plan on moving out simply because you are younger than me. If you take it outright because of your talents so be it. But don't think I have spent decades getting to this point to simply move aside. I would however like to stick around long enough to see the Gen X'ers go through the same thing we are. Ooops sorry, I just has a "I told ya so" fantasy for a second there.
I am a boomer, and you are quite right we should all be signing up for euthanasia. The correct term is voluntary transitioning. It will solve the social security crisis and all sorts of other ills. I think it was Marketplace that had Christopher Buckley on talking about his book Boomsday. It's all in there. Go read it.
I retired just last July 1 and thought I would have a lot of fun times. However, with the tanking of the stock market and my 401(k), I went back to work after only 6 months off. I am working only part time. I have been bridging the knowledge gap between what I know from a 36 year career and what the people behind me know. Half of what I do is to fill in for vacancies caused by the younger generatino moving on all too often and trying to train those that want to stick with it. My status is day-to-day, so I try to make sure I contribute more than enough to keep working. I have a lot of ground to make up financially due to the recession.
He is obviously not a math major.
His best hope economically is for us to keep working for as long as possible. My generation contributed nowhere near enough babies to provide the workers needed to pay our Social Security and Medicare costs. Where there were three boomers supporting every one WW II retiree, there will come a point where there will be one gen-Xer supporting three boomers.
How do you like me retiring early now?
Pages
