We Boomers get a bad rap, though I’m barely a Boomer — I was literally born in the last week of the Baby Boom. My vibe is definitely Gen X — I have much more in common with the folks who came of age in the 80s watching "Miami Vice" and cranking the Psychedelic Furs than the peace, love, n’ flowers goobers of the 60s. To me, Bob Dylan is a muttering old weirdo, not a genius poet — and I never fell for the Jim Morrison hype either. Still, “Boomer!” is a favorite epithet among the young and the tiresome on social media for anyone born from 1946 through 1964. I will point something out based on my experience, and they get mad that I have experience, as if I should be ashamed that I’ve actually done things and know things and refuse to genuflect before their altar of inexperience.
But let’s not let Boomers off the hook. They’ve done a lot of awful things. They’ve done a lot of great things, too, but right now they’re on the way out the door — I’m two months away from becoming eligible for Social Security! — and far too many of them are grasping at power, refusing to let it go. It’s time, even if it doesn’t feel like it. When I was a kid, people my age were old — physically infirm, tired, worn-out, and they all looked like Wilford Brimley. But here’s the thing — when Wilford Brimley filmed "Cocoon," he was 49. Apparently, back then 49 was the new 79 because homeboy was crusty. I’m a dozen years older, and I’m cruising around a few miles a day, hitting the gym, and I don’t have the dia-beat-us.
Because we don’t feel old, we see no reason to move out of the way of the young folks. That’s why we’ve never had a Gen X president. That’s why we’ve never had a Millennial president. There’s some of this on the GOP side, but it’s out of control on the other side. The Democrat Party has been basically a communist/Islamist/perverted gerontocracy. It’s all these Boomers who were just now giving up power, finally letting a few young people have their turn. And I, for one, look forward to President JD Vance.
We’re the richest generation that has ever lived, partly because our frugal parents left us some of their money, but also because we earned it ourselves. I started working in 1981 mopping out toilets at the Carl’s Jr. restaurant in Foster City, California. I was an Army private, then worked my way up to colonel. I built a law firm and a writing career — by the way, you need to show some Boomer solidarity and pre-order a copy of "American Warlord," which comes out in just two weeks. The point isn’t that I am special. I’m not. The point is that most of us in our generation worked for what we have and now plan to enjoy it.
But many in the younger generation are mad about it, as if our success has somehow shafted them. They do have a point. We had some opportunities they didn’t. We weren't largely burdened with student loans. We weren’t competing against hordes of low-paid Third World foreigners willing to work for a fraction of what we would. Our jobs hadn’t yet been outsourced across the globe. But that didn’t mean we had it easy. It would’ve never occurred to me to drop five dollars a day on bespoke coffee when I was coming up.
Nor were these problems our fault — they were the fault of a uniparty political and cultural ruling class. Moreover, it was one that the older generations primarily brought Donald Trump in to disrupt. The ironic thing is the young people who are complaining about the conditions they face loudest are the ones supporting the remnants of that garbage paradigm. If you’re mad because the economy sucks, and you have no opportunity, you probably shouldn’t support Democrats who correlate with the economy sucking and you having no opportunity. They say the younger generation embraces socialism, but the problems young people face today aren't the result of Boomer capitalism; they're the result of establishment corporatism, the wink-wink, nudge-nudge collaboration between big business and establishment politicians that left young people out in the cold. You’re not getting rid of that by getting rid of the one group of people — America First — that has any chance of kicking over the status quo’s rice bowls.
It makes no sense — these faux rebels are mad at the system and yet demand we preserve it. The ultimate expression of such incoherence was the adoration of the fake nü metal radicals Rage Against the Machine, even as these gawdawful dorks who made their name pretending to fight the power loudly demanded everybody conform to the government’s decree that we need to wear ridiculous masks. There’s no conformist like somebody telling you he’s a nonconformist.
My new favorite thing is the young people mad about Social Security. No, they’re not mad about the possibility of getting Social Security — they want Social Security but don’t expect to collect it, which is why they are mad. They don’t want to do the hard things required to preserve the Social Security system. They want us to do the hard things. For instance, they point out that we Boomers often retire with some money, and yet we also expect to get our full Social Security benefits that come out of their paychecks. Well, yeah. I paid into it for 45 years. I’d be sitting on millions of dollars if I had been free to invest as I wanted. So, I earned it, I’m entitled to it, and I’m going to take it — unless I decide not to. I’m not going to decide not to because some whippersnapper is mad that he’s going to be out there toiling to pay our generation money that many of its members probably don’t even need. But we Boomers spent decades out there toiling to pay other people money that they probably didn’t need. That’s how Social Security works. We put money in, and we expect to get money out.
But I think a lot of us would be willing to reconsider what we take if, and only if, it was part of a larger compromise where everybody sacrifices to ensure the system works in the future. I could take less money if it was part of a package of reforms that raised the eligibility age, adjusted amounts, and did other things to reflect the extension of our lifespans since the 1930s when this Democrat Ponzi scheme was invented — remember that a good chunk of workers back then were expected to be dead before they could even start collecting. But a reform that consists of me not taking some or all of the money that I’m owed, and nothing else, is a non-starter. That’s one of the baffling things with young people. They don’t want to change the system; they just want to change the outcome for themselves. The sacrifice they envision to do that is all on somebody else, which happens to be us. But we’re not going to let that happen. Remember who votes — it ain’t the kids, it’s the crusties.
The fact is that to address the problems that young people face, which they blame on the Boomers, is going to require significant changes to how our society and government work. You want to fix the student loan problem? We need to stop giving out student loans. That’s going to disrupt how academia works, but they still want the four-year fun party snorting-ketamine-off-the-frat boy model that doesn’t work anymore. We’re going to have to start building more houses, because yes, Boomers are going to stay in the houses that they bought, which are therefore not going to be available. Why should they have to move out? Why don’t we just build more for the young people and thereby bring down prices? But we can’t do that! What about my environmentalism!
Everything is a choice, and choices have consequences. The problem with the critique of the Boomers is that the young critics don’t want to change the system that enslaves them. They just want to change the results, and you can’t do that by forcing people who have played by the rules to give up what they’re entitled to. Again, that is a non-starter. It’s unjust, but the young people also don’t have the power to do it. All they have is the power to complain. And that’s one power they freely exercise.
It’s less than two weeks until Kurt’s next action-packed conservative novel, “American Warlord,” is unleashed on 11/3/26, and it is out for presale now!
Also, read Kurt’s Kelly Turnbull/People’s Republic series, including the latest "Panama Red," and follow Kurt on X @KurtSchlichter!
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