The Rich Are Still Getting Richer

[Amskeptic]

Of course good Ol' Bush, Baby Boomer president extraordinare drove it back down to 35%.

Ronald Reagan and his cohort dropped the top tax rate down to 28% in 1988
The whole attitude against government and participating in the social contract via paying your damn taxes was most absolutely started in earnest with good ol' Reagan.
I love you like a brother, regardless.
Colin

No, the tax rate didn't go down to 28 until Reagan was done in 88.
Yeah, Reagan was a Republican, so sure, he cut taxes.

Notice how you steam-roller my response to your thesis (that Bush "drove it back down" to 35)?

If you had been paying attention to what I've argued, you notice that over and over again, I've suggested that much of what the BB's have done is part of a larger movement that transcends generations.

Oh, was that you?? Was that you, cough cough.?

What really makes the BBs a problem is fairly simple: They were unbelievably arrogant, selfish and self-righteous;
"“Baby boomers have changed norms and started movements at every stage of our lives,” asserted Laurel Gaumer, 57, a trim and lively entrepreneur from Los Angeles. “Here we are facing 65 and we all want to keep going, to keep contributing. We want to know -- how do we do this?”

“As a generation we’ve learned from experience that we can change the world if it’s not one that we want to live in,” said Roy Earnest, 57, a gerontological social worker for the Corporation for National and Community Service, a federal agency. “Most people have a good 20 or 30 years post 50, where people can live an intensely involved life that has meaning for them. “"

Holy CRAP, the above quotes are your argument? Shall I find the quotes galore that came from people one generation before?
"It's them damn nigras keeping the white people down."
"I say blow them gooks away."
"If we didn't set up our plantations down there, they would still be living like savages."
"We're the greatest civilized people in the world, we shoulda a-bombed Tokyo too."
"Put those indians on a reservation and shoot 'em."
"We at GE do not feel that we have any responsibility to dredge the Hudson River of PCBs."
Meanwhile our government was infecting African American citizens with siphilis."

Let's go into the home one generation before the BabyBoomers. Incest, physical abuse, all kinds of emotional abuse, spousal abuse, all hidden from the Roy Rodgers sunny skies.

You have, in my opinion, missed a serious serious thread throughout modern history that actually pulls us all together in a shared responsibility and a shared project.

Yeah, Colin, there's no such thing as a group of people who share a set of ideologies... except that the BBs claim JUST that fact. Over, and over, and over again.

Again, who ARE the "BBs" but some random quotes pulled up by people who are free to identify themselves as they wish?

As I said, you're welcome to your opinion, the facts are what they are.

You bet the facts are what they are.

Since I have to live with this legacy, I have to understand it so I can explain to my son why so much of his money goes into SS to fund a generation that:
1. Has more money than any generation before, and;
2. Has no interest in using it on anyone but themselves.

You have also have to live with yourself. You also have to choose to interpret what you share with your son. A big load of shoulder chips is not only not helpful, but alienating to a child's natural sense of can-do, of fairness, of hope. Your sense of history is terribly warped by a too-specific rage . . . in my opinion.
I at least rail against the rich since biblical times up through yesterday.

Please understand that while you bitch and moan about who has the money, the Baby Boomers include a great number of individuals who are not hoarding money, the statistics may skew averages, but there are plenty of real live human being people who have worked hard and watched their assets and savings get raided from the days of Silverado Savings and Loan.

Generalizing these huge sweeping statements about how we baby boomers are unbelievably arrogant, selfish and self-righteous, furthers no solutions, adds no insight, and breaks down the communication we actually need to have between generations to help find the answers we need.

Broaden up.
Colin

[ruckman101]

Flock of Seagulls? Not even with guilty pleasure. Maybe Devo.


neal

[Lanval]

Flock of Seagulls? Not even with guilty pleasure. Maybe Devo.


neal

Devo was great too; FofS were of the time; don't forget The Buggles and The Waitresses though. A good one-hit-wonder deserves to be remembered.

By the way, Baby Boomers are still paying on student loans. Bet a lot of 'em have the money, just don't want to pay.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/201 ... t=1&f=1001

Colin, if you can't accept that a large group of people who self-identify with a broad set of ideas can have an effect that is measurable then we've nothing more to talk about it. I have deliberately avoided saying "you" to anyone here, because there are plenty of Baby-Boomers who self-identify, but don't necessarily fit the mold perfectly. But those exceptions give all the more strength to the overall assessment; many, many Baby-Boomers do live according to ethics/values that are measurable for their impact on society; only a fool would argue otherwise.

Michael L

[ruckman101]

I don't consider myself a boomer. I consider myself the forgotten generation. Too young to be a true boomer, yippie, or hippie, and too old to be gen-X.


neal

[Amskeptic]

all the more strength to the overall assessment; many, many Baby-Boomers do live according to ethics/values that are measurable for their impact on society; only a fool would argue otherwise.

Michael L

You are not conversing with a fool, and I am arguing otherwise.

We all are born into our cohort. We all are trapped in our place in history.

There WERE wonderful decent slave owners, I reckon, who did not want to be in a rigid social heirarchy, and who attempted to petition change against headwinds, but there they were, sons of landowners who had rigidly prescribed Reality Itself to their offspring. We all are trapped by our norms some more than others. The Boomers were the first generation, let's say, who had to come up short that the American Dream never had a second act, we as a country arrived at Exceptional Goal #1 and fell apart like so many individuals do, and some of us collapsed into selfishness like the 2nd generation of new wealth so often does. I know some rich people, we have talked about, I know some wealthy people up close who I would like to read the riot act to, I know some wealthy people who I actually love, and their self-involved self-righteousness causes me all kinds of baffled fury, we talked about it, and I still refuse to generalize as sloppily and stupidly as to tar an entire generation. The people I know are trapped in their own fucking unbelievable smug world view, am I stuck on it??? No, I have friends elsewhere who I admire for their conscience and decency and generosity.

Snap out of it. Look around. See the long view. We ARE ontogeny mirroring phylogeny, the preceding generation to the Baby Boom doesn't win any prizes either, and neither does Mark Zuckerburg.

As Mark Twain observed, “It is not worthwhile to try to keep history from repeating itself, for man’s character will always make the preventing of the repetitions impossible.”
. . . including the impotent blame games against prior generations. Make sure you help your kid see what needs to be DONE NOW to save the Republic. As a matter of fact, enlightened childrearing may be just the ticket to grow past the accumulation-of-stuff-American-Dream.
Colin

[HiRoller]

Historically the late 60's to early 70's is and will continue to be recorded as an era of 'enlightenment' regardless of how individuals frame it, which has happened hundreds of times throughout human history. I can personally attest to knowing what it was like prior to that era.

In the 1800's the descrepancy between have and have nots in the US far exceeded todays situation, especially overseas where monarchies and dictatorships ruled. It happened again during the Great Depression.

Nomenclature like Beat Generation, Hippies, Me Generation, Gen X, Boomers and etc. are media created and driven .... have no credibility amongst real historians in terms of accuracy. It's all a continuum.

Amongst the so-called boomers, only a very small percentage are rich. The rest worked their tails off like in all other age groups in the past to have whatever they have.

The enlightenment period of the late 60's+ was largely driven by those born prior to the so-called boomers, the oldest of the latter only reaching age 21 by 1967.

Everyone, generally speaking, since the industrial revolution in the US has progressively had more options and benefits and that includes today's youngsters.

Hypothetically speaking, if the the so-called boomers were really the 'me generation', surely by comparison those who came after could fairly be tagged as the 'where's my free stuff' generation.

While almost everyone wishes to improve their circumstances and those of their children, very few actually focus on wealth. If everyone did that, even a slight majority, it would be a bloodbath. If one is disturbed by not having enough money, perhaps one should change their current life strategy and trajectory.

The only thing that's distrubing in this thread is when someone gleefully announces they are preparing their child for the FFA (Future Facists of America). The last thing this country and world needs are future dogmatic meglomaniacs running around like bigots, tidily & conveniently classifying, marginalizing, pointing fingers and harming people and the environment.

Future people will need to be progressive, compassionate, creative & enterprising, and not pointing fingers toward the past to validate their circumstance and fear.

[Lanval]

Historically the late 60's to early 70's is and will continue to be recorded as an era of 'enlightenment' regardless of how individuals frame it, which has happened hundreds of times throughout human history. I can personally attest to knowing what it was like prior to that era.

In the 1800's the descrepancy between have and have nots in the US far exceeded todays situation, especially overseas where monarchies and dictatorships ruled. It happened again during the Great Depression.

Nomenclature like Beat Generation, Hippies, Me Generation, Gen X, Boomers and etc. are media created and driven .... have no credibility amongst real historians in terms of accuracy. It's all a continuum.

Amongst the so-called boomers, only a very small percentage are rich. The rest worked their tails off like in all other age groups in the past to have whatever they have.

The enlightenment period of the late 60's+ was largely driven by those born prior to the so-called boomers, the oldest of the latter only reaching age 21 by 1966.

Everyone, generally speaking, since the industrial revolution in the US has progressively had more options and benefits and that includes today's youngsters.

Hypothetically speaking, if the the so-called boomers were really the 'me generation', surely by comparison those who came after could fairly be tagged as the 'where's my free stuff' generation.

While almost everyone wishes to improve their circumstances and those of their children, very few actually focus on wealth. If everyone did that, even a slight majority, it would be a bloodbath. If one is disturbed by not having enough money, perhaps one should change their current life strategy and trajectory.

The only thing that's distrubing in this thread is when someone gleefully announces they are preparing their child for the FFA (Future Facists of America). The last thing this country and world needs are future dogmatic meglomaniacs running around like bigots, tidily & conveniently classifying, marginalizing, pointing fingers and harming people and the environment.

Future people will need to be progressive, compassionate, creative & enterprising, and not pointing fingers toward the past to validate their circumstance and fear.

I don't have time (or at this point the interest) to knock them down one-by-one, but there is currently no one I know of in economics or any other field arguing that today's youth are better off than the Baby Boomer generation, as far as I know; the Baby Boomers have spent and grabbed their way through their lives, leaving remaining generations with the bill ~ economically, medically, politically, etc. Briefly, some links:

Is the Pew Research Center a "media" entity?:

http://pewresearch.org/databank/dailynu ... berID=1150

or how about the academic journal Population Council?

http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/2 ... 5993182503

or any of a wide of other serious, academic sources that talk about both this generation, and those that preceded it, as well as those that followed it?

Baby Boomers disproportionately inherit money:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/baby-boo ... 3xkhfCCmVM

But have no intention of passing it on:

http://articles.latimes.com/2011/sep/05 ... e-20110906

There's a lot to be said about this issue, but to suggest that the 60's were an Enlightenment doesn't stand up well to scrutiny. Many good things happened, but the Baby Boomers didn't die in 1972; just their sense of ethics and personal responsibility (which were already minimalist to begin with).

Michael L

[glasseye]

Lanval's new avatar confirms my suspicions. He's a troll.

[BellePlaine]

Lanval's new avatar confirms my suspicions. He's a troll.

Is that necessary?

[RussellK]

war between generations is only slightly more strange than between genders.

[glasseye]

Is that necessary?

Nope, it's not. But apparently the new avatar is.
Perhaps a more polite response would have been: "Hey, Lanval! What's with the new avatar?"
Let's go with that.

[Amskeptic]

Is that necessary?

Nope, it's not. But apparently the new avatar is.

"Troll" should be saved for our esteemed representative from Michigan. Lanval is a passionate committed defender of his world-view, and therefore must be treated with the dignity we accord to those who stick their neck out and state their opinions from a thought-out and maybe even learned perspective. Yaah?
A portrait of Dick Cheney only makes me grateful that I am not Dick Cheney.
Colin

[glasseye]

dignity we accord to those who stick their neck out and state their opinions from a thought-out and maybe even learned perspective.

Maybe. But I'm still smarting from:

"Go read up on it first. ... Nothing about the internet comes from the Baby Boomers"

And the lack of response to my, you know, "adequate" rebuttal therof.

[Lanval]

Historically the late 60's to early 70's is and will continue to be recorded as an era of 'enlightenment' regardless of how individuals frame it, which has happened hundreds of times throughout human history. I can personally attest to knowing what it was like prior to that era.

In the 1800's the descrepancy between have and have nots in the US far exceeded todays situation, especially overseas where monarchies and dictatorships ruled. It happened again during the Great Depression.

Nomenclature like Beat Generation, Hippies, Me Generation, Gen X, Boomers and etc. are media created and driven .... have no credibility amongst real historians in terms of accuracy. It's all a continuum.

Amongst the so-called boomers, only a very small percentage are rich. The rest worked their tails off like in all other age groups in the past to have whatever they have.

The enlightenment period of the late 60's+ was largely driven by those born prior to the so-called boomers, the oldest of the latter only reaching age 21 by 1967.

Everyone, generally speaking, since the industrial revolution in the US has progressively had more options and benefits and that includes today's youngsters.

Hypothetically speaking, if the the so-called boomers were really the 'me generation', surely by comparison those who came after could fairly be tagged as the 'where's my free stuff' generation.

While almost everyone wishes to improve their circumstances and those of their children, very few actually focus on wealth. If everyone did that, even a slight majority, it would be a bloodbath. If one is disturbed by not having enough money, perhaps one should change their current life strategy and trajectory.

The only thing that's distrubing in this thread is when someone gleefully announces they are preparing their child for the FFA (Future Facists of America). The last thing this country and world needs are future dogmatic meglomaniacs running around like bigots, tidily & conveniently classifying, marginalizing, pointing fingers and harming people and the environment.

Future people will need to be progressive, compassionate, creative & enterprising, and not pointing fingers toward the past to validate their circumstance and fear.

To me, this post lists a series of pronouncements which are to be taken on face value, without any proof or reference to statistics, or some other source that might reasonably be seen to support the claims, as a response to a detailed explanation that I've given, with additional links to support my argument. Then I'm called the "troll"?!

The rest of the posts are much the same; this is in fact my problem with Colin's response ~ rather than show me contradictory readings, people, experts or otherwise who resist the interpretation that I offer here (and that is supported by many, many others in popular AND academic realms), he argues that my conceptualization of the Baby Boomers as a collective identity is false. Fine; show me otherwise; link to something, somewhere that undermines this argument, and we'll talk like adults. But don't throw out cheap insults like "troll" ~ I've deliberately avoided using rhetoric designed to inflame, being careful to not draw connections between what I see as an effect of a very large group, and individuals who may be part of that group, but are only indirectly, if at all, involved in the kinds of thinking/acting that the group as a whole represents.

***********************************

The DC avatar was just for fun; I figured that's how you guys were perceiving me, so I thought, "let the image match the imagined." Since it displeases your imperial majesties, I've substituted the only known picture of my 73 transporter, long-lost brother to the Road Warrior, and also my first car (though not the first car I ever drove in; that was my parent's brand new 67 Westfalia, complete with green plaid interior and super-cool pump sink) and beloved friend who carried me all over Oregon, Washington and beyond.


Michael L

[ruckman101]

I wonder if Dick has a pulse now?


neal