The Boomer Time Bomb Arrives

They were a time bomb ticking away as soon as they were born in the post-WWII period, and now that the early Boomers are approaching 70, like Angelica, it’s shameful that planners did not make provision for the social crisis in health and housing that they are now spearheading.

“We early Boomers spearheaded the social revolution of the 1960s and 70s,” says Angelica, “and because we promoted drugs, divorce and zero population growth we, as a group, have a higher rate of people who are childless, single and suffering drug related health problems than any other age group.”

“Despite the social revolution that started in the 1960s, society still operates as if it’s a coupled world and families are there to take care of you,” explains Angelica. “Very little sympathy is extended to a single person who becomes vulnerable through illness or accident. It’s assumed that someone exists somewhere to take care of you, but that’s not always the case.”

“Married seniors, even if they’re not happily married, do provide protection, advocacy and company for each other,” says Angelica. “It’s single seniors, like myself, who are found dead in apartments weeks after they’ve fallen ill or had an accident; and that’s why we need access to appropriate accommodation and care, just like the previous generation had.”

“All it takes is an unexpected incident to render you vulnerable,” says Angelica. “Whether you're a single senior by choice or circumstances, with or without adult children, an illness or accident can render you virtually helpless overnight. Suddenly, you no longer feel confident or happy about living independently; you can't afford to pay for the extra services you now need; and when you check out senior accommodation options you can’t believe that nothing suitable exists for you.”

“Unlike married seniors whose aged care needs are largely met by each other and who can opt for retirement villages where they can retain independence while enjoying the company of other aged couples,” explains Angelica, “single seniors in a vulnerable situation need a family-type environment, ideally provided by assisted living facilities, where company, safety, security and services such as meals, cleaning and heavy laundry are provided.”

“Unfortunately, assisted living facilities are now geared for the generation before ours (80+ seniors), not our age group,” explains Angelica, “and because of this you feel pushed prematurely into the arms of the Grim Reaper.”

“It is very likely that 80+ seniors will outlive their Boomer children,” says Angelica. “This is simply because they received the best possible care and accommodation at the appropriate age (the age that their children are now entering).”

“Lobbying governments and private enterprises to address our needs takes time and perseverance, which we don't always have,” says Angelica. “So before the Grim Reaper claims us we need to help ourselves but unfortunately the ‘cons’ of our alternative options (shared accommodation, serviced rooms/apartments, group living, finding a mate, home-care, living with family, etc) far outweigh the ‘pros’.”

“To put it bluntly, our alternative options suck.”

“After an illness or accident, independence becomes a liability for a 60+ single senior for the first time in their life,” says Angelica. “Death becomes your stalker. You're terrified at the prospect of dying alone in isolation before you qualify for the companionship and care that assisted living facilities provide; or, worse still, bypassing assisted living facilities altogether and going straight into a nursing home or hospice.”

“The assisted living facilities our parents entered at our age are now, in effect, de facto nursing homes,” says Angelica. “It's obvious to anyone who has visited these places that more than half of their residents should not be there. This may be because there is a lack of dementia specific facilities and nursing home beds, but the most salient factors are reluctance of the 80+ residents to admit they’re on their last legs as well as reluctance of families to pay the extra cost involved in caring for their loved ones in a more appropriate nursing home.”

“In effect, the 80+ population – practically nonexistent 20 years ago as a significant population group – has redefined not only the aged care industry but also the whole concept of ‘old age’,” says Angelica. “This is great for them, but awful for us Boomers (especially vulnerable singles) because we are not only being denied the services that they enjoyed at our age but we are also being denied the dignity that being old warrants.”

“Us early Boomers feel severely disadvantaged by the age care crisis caused by lack of planning,” says Angelica. “With the incredible medical advances that have led to more and more seniors 80+ living longer and staying far longer in assisted living facilities than their frail condition warrants, planners had a double-duty to plan ahead for the care and accommodation of the massive Boomer generation and they’ve failed us miserably.”

“At 60+ you're not considered old enough to need any sort of aged care, even if you’re on your last legs,” explains Angelica, “but this is only because the whole industry is geared towards supporting the fastest growing age cohort in society – the 80+ population.”

“Nothing exists in-between retirement villages (which cater for independent seniors, mainly married couples, and offer little more than what we want to move away from) and assisted living facilities which cater mainly for ex-retirement villagers 80+ who can no longer take care of themselves and, as such, are essentially de facto nursing homes.”

“If more facilities suitable for younger seniors are not built soon,” says Angelica, “we’ll not only have an aged care crisis but a generation war too.”

Read more of Angelica's story:

Three Score Years and Ten

did the boomers have it all good?

Daisy, 65, had an interesting discussion with a young man aged about 20 working at a convenience store who moaned about his prospects and when she told him how harsh early life was for her generation, too, he agreed that growing up in post-war Britain must have been awful but maintained that at least we had progress to look forward to – his generation doesn't.

"I tried to explain to him that we had no idea, at the time, that the good times were coming – and that's why so many of us turned to nihilism, drugs, sex and rock n'roll to ease our pain," says Daisy, "but he wouldn't budge from his belief that we 'had it good' and that somehow it was our fault that his generation is suffering."

"Our personal circumstances differed, but my generation, the post-war boomers, were all programmed to live in fear of an atomic holocaust; reds were crawling under our beds; and those of us who could afford a TV were bombarded with daily horrors up until the Vietnam War ended in the 70s," says Daisy. "Still, like zombies, we started families, trudged to dreary jobs, listened to the Stones and never thought about tomorrow."

"As far as we were concerned, the world was stuffed," says Daisy. "Today was all that mattered, and when the good times did come, we were middle aged."

"We had no idea that Margaret Thatcher was coming and that council houses would be flogged off for a song, giving us a chance to get on the property ladder," says Daisy. "By then, our kids were grown up, our parents were retiring, marriages were breaking up left right and centre and there was lots of unemployment and social unrest going on; but I still remember the 80s as the best decade ever because I actually felt hopeful and prosperous for the first time in my life."

"I may be wrong, but I don't think that this young man is going to have to wait until he is in his forties, like most of my generation, to experience the good times," says Daisy. "In fact, when you think about it, he has already had the good times – being fortunate enough to have been growing up in the fantastic 90s with the tech revolution, all of the information we took a lifetime to find through old books available to him at the click of a mouse – and although he works at a convenience store, he owns a car. We were lucky if we could afford a scooter at his age.”

"Under the capitalist system, we really don't know what cyclical horror is going to hit us next - and maybe things are due to get worse this time around, just like they did for our parents," says Daisy. "But let's hope not, because I feel very sorry for the hell my parents went through – a great depression, a major war and everything we experienced as kids in the post-war period – and by the 80s, when the 'good times' came, they were too old to benefit, but at least they were cared for very well by the welfare state before it broke down."

cohorts and generations

Daisy, 65, has always found it easier to accept being a Baby Boomer rather than a War Baby – which she strictly is – but recent aggression against the 'big generation' has caused her to re-think what being a Baby Boomer means.

"Baby boomer is a term describing a massive COHORT of children born in the immediate post-war period to parents whose family aspirations were delayed by WWII," explains Daisy. "It's a term similar to War Babies, describing a cohort of babies born between 1939-45 (so strictly speaking, anyone born in 1945, like I am, is a War Baby not a Baby Boomer, but being on the cusp of any cohort – age, weight, height, IQ or postcode – is always going to be troublesome)."

"To use cohort terminology to describe a generation is misleading because Baby Boomer men could still be fathering children in old age," laughs Daisy. "I know a man, born 1949, who married and became a dad for the first time at 56 in 2005. His wife is 24."

"So, children of Baby Boomers are still being born, forty-five years after the first lot were born in 1960 (to young mothers of 16 born 1946)," explains Daisy. "In generational terms, then, the children of the Baby Boomers – the next generation – range in age from 5 to 50. How silly is this?"

"If people use the term Baby Boomer to describe a generation, then their children would be the next generation on a family tree chart wouldn't they?" asks Daisy. "And generations are supposed to have something in common, aren't they?"

"I have trouble enough finding anything in common with my own cohort, the war babies, without trying to find something in common with children of my parent's age cohort – my generational ‘equals’ – who, when you think of Rupert Murdoch, may be the same age as my grandchildren."

"Perhaps 30 was a reasonable time span for a generation when women, without birth control, continued to produce babies up until 50," says Daisy, "and once upon a time it was probably a useful yardstick for governments to use to determine infrastructure, but when the term 'generation' is used colloquially to describe shared values it is meaningless and annoying."

"From now on, I am going to call myself a War Baby," laughs Daisy. "It is a clearly defined cohort, even if I have less in common with someone born in 1939, six years older, than I do with someone born in 1951 in the next cohort, six years younger."

"With the current perception of the Baby Boomers as a 'generation' spanning thirty years from 1946," says Daisy, "my children, born in the 1960s, are in the same 'generation' as the one I've always considered myself to belong to – and that’s ridiculous.”

"It was easier to call myself a Baby Boomer," explains Daisy, "because my parents started off with me a bit early in 1945, and 3 children later finished their family in 1949."

"I think most parents who started off families after the war, stopped having children well before 1955," says Daisy. "Most babies born from 1950 onwards came from a new cohort of parents – the Depression Babies of 1929-35."

"So, can everyone please start talking cohorts rather than generations?" pleads Daisy. “My cohort was lucky if they could afford a scooter to get them from A to B in the 60s, very different from the later Boomers who aspired to having a car in the 70s, and tail-end Boomers who were getting from A to B by flying and had forgotten what legs are for!”

Is the dice loaded against the young?

As the world's economy teeters in the wake of the global financial crisis, and unemployment rises, many young people are rightfully angry, feeling that the dice is loaded against them, and they're starting to lash out, very unfairly, at the generation they feel is responsible for it all – the poor old baby boomers – and Daisy, 65, is hopping mad because she made huge sacrifices to give her two children (now aged 45 and 40) a good start in life, she is now making huge sacrifices to look after her mother, 82, and she wishes younger generations would stop and think before they lash out.

"I didn't have any help when I started out in life," says Daisy. "My parents had nothing, I left school at 15 to start work and it's been ‘slog, sacrifice and save’ for 50 years, and I cannot understand why the young people these days think that we gained what we have at their expense."

"Yes, it’s true that it was very easy to get a job back in the 60s,” admits Daisy, “and in that sense the dice is loaded against today’s young who are competing with machines and a highly educated globalized workforce for jobs – but our ‘good fortune’ came on the back of so many millions of previous generations having been slaughtered or disabled in the war.”

“After the war, there was such a huge labor shortage that the whole population of Jamaica, I think, was shipped in to help Britain rebuild," says Daisy. "So, to blame the current economic situation on the baby boomers is as ridiculous as blaming us for the great depression of the 30s, WWII and multi-racial Britain."

“Some of the same movers and shakers who caused these calamities are still around today, lurking in the shadows, pulling the strings.”

"We're as easy target to blame, I guess, because our ‘generation’ goes on and on getting bigger and bigger, and the first wave of us is now retiring to take life easy," sighs Daisy. "I don't think the young people starting out in the 30s blamed the retiring generation for their woes – they were smart enough to know that a stock market crash caused the great depression – so why do the young people of today ignore the string of events leading up to the current crisis and blame us?"

"Could it be that there was no retiring generation back in the 30s, or that the retiring generation was no better off than anyone else?" asks Daisy. "I really cannot understand why old people of my generation are resented so much – would they be happier if we had nothing?”

"I started my family in the 60s and, having made huge sacrifices to give my kids a better start in life than I had, I deserve to retire easily, or as easily as I can with a mother to look after," says Daisy. "I've done my duty to my kids, I'm continuing to do my duty to my mom, and apart from paying my tax there's absolutely nothing I can do, or should do, on a personal level to help the new generation starting out in life."

"I am not going to apologize for having the good fortune to be starting out in life at a time when jobs were plentiful and life was relatively peaceful – discounting the Korean War, the Vietnam War and all the other stupid wars that we've been involved in since I was born in 1945," says Daisy. "My generation fought in those wars, we didn't cause them; and my generation lost big time in the global financial crisis (in pension funds), and we didn’t cause that either.”

"And, my children are not going to apologize for having the good fortune to be starting out in life in the 80s when life was even better than it was for us when we were starting out in the 60s," says Daisy. "Individually, or as a generation - Boomer or Gen X - we are not responsible for the world's current problems."

"Baby boomers produced the luckiest and most successful generation ever - Gen X," says Daisy, "and we all thought the good times would last forever, but all that unregulated lending to all those no-hopers in the 90s was the downfall of us all – not just the current generation starting out in life."

"The government was asleep at the wheel - it didn't do the job we pay it to do - and it let the sharks loose on all the poor fools out there," sighs Daisy. "And then it bailed out the banks and the masters of the universe with our tax money!"

"If the dice now seem loaded against the young, then perhaps it's worse than it seems because they've been fed a pack of materialistic lies about all the 'trappings' they need in order to start out in life," says Daisy. "If earlier generations held such beliefs, none of us would be here today!"

"Get real kids, and if you must get angry direct it at the government and the masters of the universe and leave us alone."

Read more of Daisy’s stories about this issue:

did the boomers have it all good?

cohorts and generations

growing up in smoggy post-war Britain

vulture circling young estate agents

materialism vs motherhood

snakes and ladders at work

the ponzi welfare system

redefining the boomers

Isobel is a retired early Boomer, born 1946, and she loathes being lumped in with mid and late Boomers believing that the difference between 1940s Boomers, 1950s Boomers and 1960s Boomers is so distinct that they should be given special categories over and above their demographic hump.

"We're more than a demographic hump," laughs Isobel. "I realize that the traditional notion of a generation covers 30 years, but now that Gen X (1965+) and Gen Y (1980+) are so much in the news, and in our faces, and have forced a fifteen year generation between themselves, it's ridiculous to call everyone born from 1946 to 1964 a Boomer."

"If we are to accept a fifteen year generation, then the generation before Gen X should start at 1950."

"At 62 I have absolutely nothing in common with a late Boomer of 44 -- and vice versa," says Isobel. "I believe that the Boomers, en masse, are so different -- for reasons I'll explain later -- that they should be split into three distinct waves."

"How about: Early Boomers for those born in the 1940s, Mid Boomers or Boom-Boomers for those born in the 1950s, and Late Boomers or Boom-Boom Boomers for those born in the 1960s?"

"Growing up in the 1950s the idea of distinct generations was alien to me -- and everyone else -- because back then families were huge (it was common to have as much as twenty years separating first and last children) and the age range of parents was massive."

"WW2 disrupted everybody's lives," explains Isobel. "After the war you not only had young parents starting a family but also older couples resuming their families as well as older couples marrying for the first time after their plans were disrupted by the war."

"At school, my friends had mothers born from 1900 to 1930 and fathers born much earlier," says Isobel. "That's a thirty year age range for parents -- you don't see that these days -- and everything in the early 1950s was still overshadowed by the previous war years."

"The early Boomers cannot be lumped into an homogenous blob with mid and late Boomers because those of us born in the 1940s were strongly influenced by the particularly diverse ages of our parents; the war years that preceded our birth; the miserable post-war period; and the music and culture that went with it."

"If the first seven years of our life determine our values for the rest of our lives, then by 1953 -- when I was seven -- I had a very different experience of life to that of a Boom-Boomer born in 1953 who turned seven in 1960, and a Boom-Boom-Boomer born in 1960 who turned seven in 1967."

"In terms of musical influence, that's Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley and the Beatles respectively dominating the first seven years of our lives."

"Had it not been for the pill, introduced in the 1960s, the Baby Boom would have continued for decades," laughs Isobel. "And had it not been for the women's lib movement that went with it, women would still be second class citizens -- and we have the pre-Boomer generation, our courageous mothers, to thank for our freedoms."

"Yes, definitely, something did happen to define the post-ww2 generations," says Isobel. "It wasn't just the pill and women's lib -- it was also television."

"My generation, the early boomers, weren't parked in front of a television in childhood -- we read books, played board games and ran wild on the streets -- and I believe we are mentally richer and far more independent minded than mid and late Boomers because of this experience."

"In this respect, the early boomers are more like earlier generations," explains Isobel. “We weren't raised as infants to accept without question what a man in a box tells us."

"By the 1960s, with the pill, the large families and the huge age ranges of parents died out – and with this came affluence and the generational wars."

"If Gen X are the Pill babies and Gen Y are the Internet babies, then the mid and late Boomers are the TV babies."

"My generation, those born immediately after WWII, are postwar pre-TV babies and defy description really," sighs Isobel. "All I know is that we are nothing like mid and late Boomers and I resent the Boomer term being used to define us."

the gods of war

We see them in old movies when they were young and fighting for freedom, now we see them in veterans’ marches, adorned with medals. At cenotaphs around the world we worship at their altars. Marina’s gods of war are not mythical gods but real life men now well into their 80s and older who fought in WWII - and like to be compared with Olympian gods - and the war they fought in has achieved a reverence similar to that of a religion that previous and later wars never achieved.

“I attribute this religiosity surrounding WWII to the artful manipulation of those who fought in that war, in combat or behind a desk, whose coincidence of birth at a critical time in our history endowed them with spectacular opportunities after the war that they have milked non-stop ever since at our expense,” says Marina. “And, just like the early Christians used Jesus’ death to inspire guilt and line their pockets – he died for us, you see – the gods of war used the death of their fallen mates to do likewise.”

“The gods of war enjoyed unprecedented hero status and respect after WWII,” says Marina. “Their war films, veterans’ marches, war medals and endless stories about the war assured them respect and reverence that it is totally out of proportion to the achievements of earlier and later generations, as if WWII were the only war ever fought or the only war worth remembering.”

“My generation, the Boomers, held the WWII vets in awe, opened doors for them, offered seats for them, called them sir and m’am, never spoke out of turn to them and never questioned their right to the best of everything from our taxpayer dollars,” says Marina. “They deserved it – they fought for our freedoms – or so we were forever told!”

“Compared to the freedoms the gods of war had after the war – no censure on drugs or family size, no politically correct speaking or environmental restrictions – our lives are so circumscribed by their rules and regulations, far more than the simple Ten Commandments they grew up with, that I don’t feel very free at all.”

“WWII was an abomination caused by greedy old men and should not be revered,” says Marina, “and those who fought in it were pawns not gods and should be exposed as such before they wreak even more damage upon us.”

golden generation vs. boomers

The Golden Generation appear to be outliving their Boomer children and now that she is 60, retired and has time to think, Marina has come to the conclusion that her parents’ generation used WWII as emotional blackmail to justify massive exploitation and used her generation as the scapegoats for all of the world’s ills that they, not the Boomers, caused.

“With apologies to the few real war heroes, who truly deserve our respect – like my dad, who returned injured and died before his time -- I want to expose the rest of this generation as undeserving frauds, peddling endless war films and veterans’ marches to glorify themselves at our expense.”

“The Golden Generation never suffered unemployment throughout their lives as we and our children have – there was no globalization, their jobs were protected by tariffs and the union movement – and most important of all, they had very little competition because the world was a smaller place back then and millions of talented people had been wiped out by the war.”

“The Golden Generation never suffered housing or land shortages when they were starting a family. Many were given land grants for free! They built ranches; they had holiday homes, and double garages. They paid off their mortgages early and easily. They had drive-in movies, supermarkets a block long; vast tracks of wilderness to escape to and more recreational facilities per person than we can dream of. They deserved it – they fought for freedom!”

“The Golden Generation never suffered prohibition in their working years – they drank, smoked and did drugs with impunity, on and off the job. They deserved it – they fought for freedom!”

“The Golden Generation never suffered population control or family size worries in their fertile years – they procreated freely and easily, producing the unlucky Baby Boomers, a generation the size of which has never been seen before or since. They deserved it – they fought for freedom!”

“The Golden Generation never suffered racial or religious or other PC prohibitions in their working years – they called a spade a spade, so to speak, and protected their suburbs and borders from outsiders. They deserved it – they fought for freedom!”

“The Golden Generation never suffered environmental prohibitions in their working years – they slashed, mined and burned merrily, destroyed forests, polluted the land, air and waterways, hunted other species to extinction and littered the world with discarded motor vehicles which they still insist on their right to own and drive into dotage. They deserve it – they fought for freedom!”

“In fighting for freedom, are they proud of the overpopulated, under-serviced and horribly polluted world they left us necessitating loss of OUR freedoms?”