Boomers get blame for busy modern lives

people bump into each other in the shop or street and ask how the other is going, “busy” is often the reply these days.

Likewise can be the retort. The age of those in the conversation can be irrelevant. Whether it’s Generation X, Generation Y or retired Baby Boomers, “busy” can be a standard reply.

What’s going on? We were being told back in the 1970s that leisure time was going to increase, retirement ages would fall, working hours would shorten, labour-saving devices would increase. Yet these days people appear to be “time poor”. What’s happened?

Let’s blame my generation — the Baby Boomers! The argument that goes because there are so many of us Baby Boomers, younger generations may feel they have to work longer and harder to pay the taxes required to allow us to retire early and get our pensions and superannuation.

On top of this, we seem to be the ones buying investment properties, causing house prices to go up. With house prices soaring, younger generations may need two incomes to service mortgage repayments and even some in the household holding down two jobs. Leisure time can soon disappear by making ends meet. And so on these two counts, younger ones being busy might be blamed on Boomers.

Let me duck and weave at some of the punches thrown at the Baby Boomers for a few moments. A number of Gen X, Gen Y and even Millennials may well have been brought up in a pleasant home that their Baby Boomer parents took time to achieve. It wasn’t always like that for the Boomers. In their early days, many rented in none too salubrious surroundings, bought old houses in need of repair, sat on bean bags, had second or third-hand chairs and tables, maybe had a record player and an old black and white TV with a dodgy antenna. Later generations may well attempt to emulate

Ian Cole

the later life of the Baby Boomers at the start of their home-buying experience with modern furniture, kitchen mod-cons and huge televisions. Baby Boomers took time to achieve that.

So for some later generations, it can all come down to their priorities and aspirations. The mod-cons may be available for some early in life if leisure time is replaced by work — being busy. Therefore, for some it is a choice as being busy may lead to “having it all and having it all now”.

But let me be fair. For a significant proportion of later generations, being busy is a necessity, not a luxury.

Where the income is low, kids are on the scene and especially for one-parent families, not being busy is an aspiration often out of reach.

And of course, not forgetting there are the unemployed who would like to be busier and those with illhealth who can’t be busier.

So, if a number of the later generations are busy because of us, why are Baby Boomers busy? Maybe it’s in our DNA. Despite many Boomers being retired or about to retire, those of us who are blessed with reasonable health can’t seem to keep still. There is still work for some plus U3A classes, art classes, gym classes, masters swimming and athletics competitions, grandchildren duties, bowls, golf, travel, renovations, gardening and so it goes on. In most cases it’s a choice thing. Maybe it’s a badge of honour for a Baby Boomer, when asked how they are going, to reply “busy”.

But I’ll leave the last word to some graffiti I saw recently. It read: “Jesus might come tomorrow. Look busy!” Ian Cole is a former teacher who lives in Hobart. He was a state Labor MP in the 1970s.