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Sad but true. As someone who spent junior high through college in that decade, I remember the "Whip Inflation Now" buttons of the mid-'70s, the energy crisis, the general societal disillusionment.
The year I was born, 1957, was the peak birth year, I believe. Overcrowding in schools--and in the church pews, even--was a way of life then. Even getting a job at McDonald's in high school was somewhat competitive because there were so many of us. It felt like we were just a number--certainly not anything special.
The cynicism and ennui were strong in college. Unlike earlier college graduates, those of us not in STEM or business fields struggled to find jobs because there were so many of us being spit out into the job market during that time. I had been an excellent student and worked various jobs throughout college, so should have been employable, but was underemployed for years due to the lack of opportunities.
I know what you mean. The early boomers took a booming economy for granted, and the later boomers had a much darker economic picture to deal with. Many of the policies adopted in the 1960s simply didn't work out well, and led to the stagflation of the last half of the 1970s.
Like me, you came of age after Vietnam, so I would classify you as a later boomer like myself.
Yeah, those early boomers got things like 12 - 14% mortgage rates (booming economy indeed!) when they were ready to buy houses in the late seventies, early eighties. They may have been a little late getting started in home ownership due to being sidetracked by Vietnam in their early earning years. It might be interesting to learn how that booming economy was taken for granted by your predecessors; I thought they were forced to compete for limited seats in college classrooms after being crammed into undersized schools before then and had to compete for limited early jobs. None of them ever told me how easy life was for them.
I went to Jr. High (7th and 8th) on split session. School started at 12:20 and got out at 4:50. I walked home in the dark in winter. One day I had to leave early and the friend I walked home with didn't get the message and waited a while for me, then left. She got hit by a car because the driver didn't see her. Minor injuries, but she was in the hospital for a few days.
It was a Jr-Sr high school but it was too crowded, so the high schoolers grades 9 - 12 went from 7 a.m. to noon and then we came in afterward. This was in 1970 through '72, so it was a Boomer issue. After that they put an addition on the school, and so for ninth grade I was back to normal school hours.
And hey--most kids I knew in high school smoked pot or at least tried it.
Sad but true. As someone who spent junior high through college in that decade, I remember the "Whip Inflation Now" buttons of the mid-'70s, the energy crisis, the general societal disillusionment.
The year I was born, 1957, was the peak birth year, I believe. Overcrowding in schools--and in the church pews, even--was a way of life then. Even getting a job at McDonald's in high school was somewhat competitive because there were so many of us. It felt like we were just a number--certainly not anything special.
The cynicism and ennui were strong in college. Unlike earlier college graduates, those of us not in STEM or business fields struggled to find jobs because there were so many of us being spit out into the job market during that time. I had been an excellent student and worked various jobs throughout college, so should have been employable, but was underemployed for years due to the lack of opportunities.
Born in 1956. Your experiences match mine. The salient feature of the baby boomers is that there are too many of us: too many in school, too many in college, too many in the job market, and now too many of us retiring. At least my draft status was H-1, plus I had a high draft lottery number, so I did not have to worry about being sent to Vietnam.
Yeah, those early boomers got things like 12 - 14% mortgage rates (booming economy indeed!) when they were ready to buy houses in the late seventies, early eighties. They may have been a little late getting started in home ownership due to being sidetracked by Vietnam in their early earning years. It might be interesting to learn how that booming economy was taken for granted by your predecessors; I thought they were forced to compete for limited seats in college classrooms after being crammed into undersized schools before then and had to compete for limited early jobs. None of them ever told me how easy life was for them.
Yup, we early birds got stuck with an adjustable rate mortgage of 13% by the time we could buy a house. We had already gone through the 1970s oil crisis when you couldn't fill up with gas except on certain days. At least View Nam was over but I remember thinking how I wouldn't want to bring a child into this world, the way it was.
There were no jobs where I lived but in some places it was booming with jobs and some people made a lot of money. I chose to live in a pretty suburbia that some might have even called rural rather then a city. But the city people made the money.
I remember 15 to 17% mortgages and almost as bad for car loans. My first car loan, 1985, was at 13.85% interest. I paid it off early to save some money, which I did again on two other vehicles. Those high rates persisted all through the 80s and, actually, even into the early ‘90s.
Early boomers had a 10-year advantage over late boomers when in came to mortgages and housing. The 1970s saw rates of from 7 to 10 percent, but the 80s peaked at 17.6% in 1982, and stayed in double digits the entire decade. Add to that the cost of housing more than doubled due to inflation by the end of the 70s, so for a couple of decades we late boomers felt as if we "missed out" on affordable home ownership compared to earlier boomers.
Not only costs, but even though I graduated college with an engineering degree in 1982, 70% of my classmates couldn't find a job right away. Those of us in Rust Belt cities had it the worst, as deindustrialization caused many of us to leave home and head to places like Texas, and even then we were met by the oil bust just a few months later. After losing a couple of jobs there, I did find steady work (at lower pay) and was "lucky" to get a 12% mortgage by 1985 on an older home as there was a housing bust going on there at the time that increased availability. Even places like Houston were crumbling in the 1980s, with high crime, uncompleted buildings, and vacant subdivisions throughout the city. I missed all of the boom years.
Early boomers had a 10-year advantage over late boomers when in came to mortgages and housing. The 1970s saw rates of from 7 to 10 percent, but the 80s peaked at 17.6% in 1982, and stayed in double digits the entire decade. Add to that the cost of housing more than doubled due to inflation by the end of the 70s, so for a couple of decades we late boomers felt as if we "missed out" on affordable home ownership compared to earlier boomers.
Not only costs, but even though I graduated college with an engineering degree in 1982, 70% of my classmates couldn't find a job right away. Those of us in Rust Belt cities had it the worst, as deindustrialization caused many of us to leave home and head to places like Texas, and even then we were met by the oil bust just a few months later. After losing a couple of jobs there, I did find steady work (at lower pay) and was "lucky" to get a 12% mortgage by 1985 on an older home as there was a housing bust going on there at the time that increased availability. Even places like Houston were crumbling in the 1980s, with high crime, uncompleted buildings, and vacant subdivisions throughout the city. I missed all of the boom years.
Wow...I'd almost forgotten that when I graduated from college I was wanting to take a year or two before grad school. So the main reason I got my first job in 1983 was because of some government program where the company got money for hiring recent college graduates. I don't even know the details but, yeah, jobs were really hard to come by.
I am sure that you didn't! I am older than you, and I was only labeled a boomer sometime in the 1970s or 1980s.
This is NOT a matter of "age vanity". "Labeling" is a sociological concept that helps us to understand commonalities among cohort groups, and thus, explain their opinions, attitudes and experiences. It is not being judgmental. It is not name calling.
There are many differences between the original "Baby Boomers" and the later group, who was originally called "generation X".
1. Like Coney, I believe that the break up of The Beatles was a dividing line between Boomers and Generation Jones - or Gen X. The Beatles were the soundtrack to my childhood, not my teen or college years. Interestingly, MY MOTHER - (a "silent generation" person) bought the Beatles first album. I did not. (I was the eldest in my family). She also bought The White Album". My cousins, born in 49, and 51, saw the Beatles at Shea Stadium. I was too young to go to concerts with friends and honestly, my desire was not huge. I watched the Beatles on Ed Sullivan but screaming at them seemed crazy to my younger sisters and me.
The first beatles album I bought myself was "Abby Road". Interestingly, that was their last.
2. Woodstock - I never heard of "Woodstock" until the movie came out. I knew that the older brother of a neighbor was going to "some big concert" upstate NY. Honestly, I don't even remember it being covered on TV news.
3. Vietnam - either serving in Vietnam or protesting against Vietnam. Boys my age still had to register for the draft, but then so did my son, born in 1994. Vietnam was fought by Baby Boomers. The original ones.
The war was over before I graduated from HS.
4. Activity in the Civil Rights Movement - The Freedom Riders were Baby Boomers. Protesting political issues in college. That was gone once I went away to school.
5. Remnants of the 1960s in HS culture - I would say that these persisted through 1965 - although some social observers cite the assignation of JFK in 1963 as the cultural end of the 1950s, I think it persisted somewhat longer. Since I attended a Jr. Sr. High School, I closely watched the activities of the older students. As a tween, I though my teenage years would be like that. They were very different.
6. Older Boomers - 1. Had "sock hops" in the gym. 2. Went "steady", exchanging a school ring, ID bracelet, or another token of exclusive dating. 3. Listening to AM radio. By the time I was a teenager, most of the "cooler kids" had switched to FM and album oriented rock. 4. 45 records bought as a teen. We bought albums, 8 tracks or tapes of the whole album. 5. Rock n Roll records that had a particular dance associated with them - The Twist, the Mashed Potato, the Pony, the Swim, the boogaloo, the Jerk etc.
Dances with names and exact steps were not in style when I was a teen.
7. Prom and Homecoming - this may vary as to geography, but by the time I went to my first Prom, it wasn't a huge deal. We didn't wear long gloves, lots of eye makeup, or overly formal gowns. Both of my prom dresses were bought quickly and they were long halter dresses. We wore very little make up. I don't know anyone who had their hair or nails done, wore a contrived hairstyle like an upswept beehive, a flip or any formal style. I knew girls with curly hair who ironed their hair. Girls wore their hair long and loose. No Aqua Net.
These rights of passage were less important to us. We did them, but finding the perfect prom dress and makeup on girls was much less prevalent.
8. Distinct social categories of people in High School. - the names for these social groups and cliques are different depending upon where one lived.
In my area of the North East older boomers were divided by social class and clothes.
"Collegiate" people, as the name implies, were usually from solidly middle or upper middle class backgrounds. The girls dressed more demurely, and favored Villager and Lady Bug skirts, crew neck sweaters, peter pan collars, liberty print floral dresses and circle pins. The boys wore button down collar shirts, Lacoste polo shirts, and crew necks. Kachiks and madras shirts. Both boys and girls favored loafers - particularly Bass Weeguns (sp) The less wealthy wore knock offs from Sears or JC Penny. Boys aspired to be lawyers, doctors, or studied business administration. The girls favored teaching, registered nursing, English, social work or Art.
The second category were called "Continentals" or more disparagingly, "greasers" or "hitters:. Boys wore fitted shirts, shark skin tight slacks, black and slightly pointed boots or shores. Girls wore teased hair, short and styled, eyeliner with tails, and generally heavy makeup. They wore tight sweaters, wiggle skirts, Capri pants and pointed flats. They frequently attended Vocational school during High School, where half of the day was spent at high school, and half at Vo-tech. The boys favored automotive careers, construction, or welding, The girls favored cosmetology, dental assisting, medical assisting, or secretarial training. They shopped at Lerners, and other mall shops.
9. Many towns had soda shops, candy stores or others places where there was a jukebox and a soda fountain. Sometimes there was dancing. These soda fountains were no longer popular by the end of the 1960s.
10. Male hair length - most boys wore their hair short in HS. Despite the fact that the 60s were associated with long hair, this was rare in high school. Look at a 1968 year book. and you will be hard pressed to find boys with long hair. Now check out a 1975 year book. Most guys had longer hair.
11. Pot smoking. Rare in HS among Boomers, endemic in HS in generation X or gen jones.
Generation Jones was less cohesive as a generation and more apathetic. I don't think any song defines that "micro generation" more than Mott the Hoople's "All the Young Dudes"
These lyrics say it all - "My brother's in his room with his Beatles and his stones.
I never got it off on that revolutionary stuff
What a drag. Too many snags".
Perhaps no performer divides early boomers from late boomers than David Bowie. More conventional than Bowie, were Steely Dan, Fleetwood Mac, Bruce Springsteen, and Pink Floyd. The Sones were popular through out the 70s and 80s.
These are just my observations, but I think they are fairly accurate.
Don't forget your beloved Ramones
Do you remember the sitcom Family Ties? The parents were supposed to have been hippies from the 60s and Alex Keaton (Michael J. Fox) was their son. Alex Keaton was the ultimate member of Generation Jones.
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