Former Louisiana State University alumni, Sean Illing graduated with a major in Political Science and Philosophy and a doctorate in Philosophy. He started teaching as an adjunct professor for universities in 2013 and is currently the Interviews Writer for Vox. Illing alongside Bruce Gibney, former Stanford University alumni and American writer, discuss the reasons why baby boomers are blamable for the state in which the United States is today. Both, Sean Illing and Bruce Gibney, begin with a brief explanation on who the baby boomers are, their characteristics and their actions, which fundamentally contribute to a better understanding of the authors’ biased reasoning and argumentation. Gibney presents the boomers as a generation that “grew up in a time of uninterrupted prosperity”, which can be observe as fairly true. Apart from the Cold War, the Laotian Civil War, and the Lebanon Crisis, which none affected the United States on a large-scale, American baby boomers lived in a peaceful country that during that time was considered to be wealthy. Gibney argues that boomers have “gradually bankrupted” America, and partly, we can observe that his argument is relatively accurate based on President Ronald Reagan’s effort to enhance the economy with deregulation and the cut of taxes, on 1981. At first, it did show a positive effect on economy since it started growing and improving. According to Nicole Lewis’s article "Did Ronald Reagan’s 1981 tax cut supercharge the economy?” it is expressed that “According to BLS, in January 1982, the first year the tax cuts were in effect, there were roughly 90.5 million jobs, and by the same time five years later in 1987, that number had grown to 101 million”. But this “improvement” only lasted a few years, because during 1990, under baby boomer Bill Clinton’s presidency, a recession occurred, which left thousands of Americans jobless once again. Also, after Reagan’s tax cut, the gross debt-to-GDP ratio kept increasing vastly and it still is. Bruce Gibney also anticipates that a few years from now, generation Y, also known as the millennial generation, will have to face severe conditions and make complex choices to change America into the country that it used to be before the baby boomers ruined it. Regarding the how millennials are going to achieve this, he argues that for any change to happen in the country, boomers should be overthrown from all the decision-making positions existing at the moment. Sean Illing states that he sees the baby boomers as a “generational trust-fund baby”, in which Gibney responds that yes, “they were born into great fortune”, which adds up to the facts.
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After the Cold War, America’s economy experienced an incredible upgrade, which brought back wealth into the country, positioning it as the richest country in the world. According to Gibney, baby boomers have completely wrecked the United States, and why is that? For starters, the millennial generation, for the past decades, has been struggling with the consequences of the baby boomer’s acts, starting with economy. Growing up as a baby boomer was much easier than growing up as a millennial; the cost of living has been rising up onto a point where not only people finish college with a student loan so big they cannot afford to pay (if they even attend college), but they don’t even get paid enough in their workplace to maintain an active life. Grant Sabatier, founder of the website Millennial Money, stated in his article “Are Millennials F*cked?” that “[millennial’s] average wages are 20% lower and [they] earn $10,000 less per year less than [their] parents”. Also, in Michael Hobbes’s article "Why millennials are facing the scariest financial future of any generation since the Great Depression”, it is expressed that “[millennials have] taken at least 300% more student debt than [their] parents”, data which was taken by The College Board, Trends in Student Aid 2013. This facts help add up to the authors’ conclusion. In this article, Illing and Gibney offer a subjective and hypercritical analysis on the “damaged” country that is America today. They strongly defend the millennial generation and it’s difficult to disagree with them when most of the facts that they state are certainly true. But where do the authors go wrong? For
After the Cold War, America’s economy experienced an incredible upgrade, which brought back wealth into the country, positioning it as the richest country in the world. According to Gibney, baby boomers have completely wrecked the United States, and why is that? For starters, the millennial generation, for the past decades, has been struggling with the consequences of the baby boomer’s acts, starting with economy. Growing up as a baby boomer was much easier than growing up as a millennial; the cost of living has been rising up onto a point where not only people finish college with a student loan so big they cannot afford to pay (if they even attend college), but they don’t even get paid enough in their workplace to maintain an active life. Grant Sabatier, founder of the website Millennial Money, stated in his article “Are Millennials F*cked?” that “[millennial’s] average wages are 20% lower and [they] earn $10,000 less per year less than [their] parents”. Also, in Michael Hobbes’s article "Why millennials are facing the scariest financial future of any generation since the Great Depression”, it is expressed that “[millennials have] taken at least 300% more student debt than [their] parents”, data which was taken by The College Board, Trends in Student Aid 2013. This facts help add up to the authors’ conclusion. In this article, Illing and Gibney offer a subjective and hypercritical analysis on the “damaged” country that is America today. They strongly defend the millennial generation and it’s difficult to disagree with them when most of the facts that they state are certainly true. But where do the authors go wrong? For