The generation gap

In the eyes of their elders, young people have always been strange. And to the young, there’s nothing so weird and embarrassing as their parents. So we shouldn’t be too surprised by a poll out this week that found 51 per cent of Millennials (that’s the generation born between the mid-1970s and mid-90s) think Baby Boomers (1946-1964) have ruined the world for them. Apparently, it’s all the Boomers’ fault that the climate is warming, Donald Trump’s in the White House, Britain’s leaving the EU, and nobody under 30 will ever be able to buy a house.

It all sounds horribly familiar. Remember how the Boomers, with their fashion-crime flares, flowers in their hair and their Ban the Bomb banners, thought the reason their world was in such a mess was that the ‘‘Squares’’ had spoiled everything? Well, the Boomers got their chance and, for all that they rode a wave of rising wages, better healthcare and soaring house prices, they didn’t do such a great job with their stewardship of the planet. Who’s looking square now?

Before we dismiss the latest poll as yet more entitled whining from the younger generations, we might do well to recognise that actually they have a point or two. Yes, they’re better fed, better housed, better travelled, and educated to a higher level, than Boomers were at their ages, but they’re also saddled with debt, and might possibly be the first generation for some time to be financially worse off than their parents.

So bleat on, Millennials. You’re part of a timehonoured tradition – and it would pay to remember that when your kids start complaining about how you messed up the world for them.