12/17/2023 0 Comments The silent age playtimeBut a poor showing for his coalition could be a thorn in his side for the rest of his second five-year term. Macron will have substantial powers over foreign policy whatever the outcome of this poll. Macron and his allies are expected to win between 260 and 320 seats, according to latest polls. Though Mélenchon's coalition could win more than 200 seats, current projections give the left little chance of winning a majority. But observers think Macron's party and allies could have trouble getting an absolute majority - the magic number of 289 seats - this time around.Ī government with a large, but not absolute, majority will still be able to rule, but only by bargaining with MPs. If Macron’s coalition, Ensemble!, keeps control, the president will be able to carry out his agenda as before. Most are worried about the economic challenges facing their families-and wonder why success has become so much harder for them.A lot. Many have set up college trust funds for their grandkids-and indeed, a record share have assumed formal custody of them. Many routinely pay for extended-family vacations or subsidize their grown Boomer or Xer kids. Given their material good fortune, along with their instinct to help others in need, the Silent as elders have become economic anchors for America’s new renaissance in multigenerational family living. ![]() ( See part one.) Astoundingly, it’s over five times higher than the median net worth of households age 35 to 44 ($44,600). (Back in the early 1960s, the elderly were poorer than young adults by most measures.) In 2010, for the first time, the median net worth of households age 75+ ($228,400) is higher than that of any younger age bracket. Coming of age fifty years ago, they quickly amassed more wealth than the seniors of that era. Yet they are without doubt the healthiest and most educated generation of elders that ever lived-and, of course, the wealthiest. In Presidents, we jumped from George Bush Sr., the World War II veteran, to Baby Boomer Bill Clinton. According to the late management guru Warren Bennis, they redefined leadership as more “maestro” than “macho.” They are the only generation in American history never to occupy the White House. In terms of national leadership, the Silent-unlike the G.I.s-are not a powerful generation. This is the only living generation that could half-believe, along with Woody Allen, that “80 percent of life is just showing up,” a joke that makes most Xers simply shake their heads. The last Silent cohort reached age 65 in 2007. And after riding this bull, the Silent retired and sold out just before the crash hit. Their midlife high-savings decades roughly coincided, in 1980s and ‘90s, with perhaps the greatest bull market ever in both stocks and bonds. managers started-the same plans that are now unraveling for Boomers. In the large corporations where so many of them worked, they signed up young for the defined-benefit pension plans their G.I. Many of them locked in fixed 3% mortgages on their first homes in the 1960s just before inflation hit-giving them decades of negative real interest rates. ![]() Sociologist Elwood Carlson echoes Easterlin’s thesis in his recent book, The Lucky Few: Between the Greatest Generation and the Baby Boom.Īs the Silent have aged, their perfect timing has not let them down. Later, as they retired, their small size (next to the large FICA-paying generation following them) has certainly helped make their pay-as-you-go Social Security and Medicare benefits seem more affordable. ![]() Easterlin noted that a remarkable feature of the Sputnik era was how the typical young man could earn more by age 30 than the average wage for men of all ages in his profession-and could certainly live better than most “retired” elders. He also noted that since the mid-1970s, the economic conditions facing young late-wave Boomers were becoming much tougher.Īt the time, Easterlin hypothesized that the Silent-being small in number due to low birthrates during the 1930s and early ‘40s-benefited from labor markets that bid up their wages in an era when young adults were relatively scarce. ![]() Demographer Richard Easterlin, in his 1980 book Birth and Fortune, called them the “Lucky” or “Fortunate” generation for their great timing. A new “booming” economy was ready to join right out of school. Unlike the G.I.s, the Silent didn’t have to wait for a depression or war to end. elders by marrying and having babies incredibly young-in fact, younger on average than any other generation in American history. Fortune’s story on the “College Class of ‘49” was subtitled “Taking No Chances.” When they went to job interviews, their first questions were about pension plans. They were also careful in the labor market.
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