The Selfish Generation

When the Greatest Generation built, the Boomers bought. They inherited the wealth of a booming postwar economy—union jobs, cheap homes, affordable college, and rising wages—and then quietly rewrote the rules to keep it. Over the past half-century, Baby Boomers have amassed more than half of the nation’s wealth while younger generations, despite being more educated and productive than ever, struggle to afford rent, healthcare, or a home. What began as the promise of prosperity for all has turned into a generational pyramid scheme—where the future was sold off to fund the comfort of the present.

After World War II, the U.S. government invested heavily in people. The GI Bill paid for college and home loans, unions ensured fair wages, and a single income could buy a house and raise a family. In 1989, Boomers owned about 21 percent of national wealth. By 2024, they controlled over 50 percent—roughly $78 trillion—while Millennials, the largest working generation in American history, own less than 10 percent. It isn’t because younger generations are lazy or irresponsible; it’s because the economic rungs were sawed off one by one.

Between 1979 and 2013, wages for the bottom 90 percent of American workers grew just 15 percent, while the top 1 percent saw gains of 138 percent. The Pew Research Center put it bluntly: “For most U.S. workers, real wages have barely budged for decades.” Productivity soared, corporate profits hit record highs, but paychecks stayed frozen in time. Adjusted for inflation, a worker in their 30s today earns roughly what their parents did in the 1980s—yet faces costs that have exploded in every direction.

Nowhere is this clearer than in housing. In 1970, the median home cost about two and a half times the average annual income. Today, it’s seven to ten times higher in many areas. The National Association of Realtors reports that millennials’ homeownership rates have never reached the level Boomers and Gen X achieved at the same age. While older Boomers made up 22 percent of all homebuyers in 2024, younger Millennials accounted for just 14 percent. Many have given up entirely—52 percent of non-homeowning Millennials aren’t even saving for a down payment, citing stagnant wages and skyrocketing prices.

Those same Boomers who bought homes for $60,000 with 6 percent interest rates now fight new construction to “preserve neighborhood character.” They defend property tax caps, oppose multi-unit zoning, and vote down affordable housing—all while lecturing younger Americans about personal responsibility. They turned the American Dream into a gated community.

At the same time, the nation’s debt has ballooned beyond imagination. In 1981, the national debt was under $1 trillion. By 2025, it has surpassed $37 trillion, larger than the entire U.S. economy. Interest payments alone now exceed $1 trillion a year, outpacing defense spending. This is not some accident of nature—it’s the accumulated result of tax cuts without offsets, unfunded wars, and a refusal to pay the bills. The Baby Boom generation slashed the taxes that built their world, then borrowed against their children’s future to maintain it.

The political revolution of the 1980s—deregulation, trickle-down economics, and the cult of the free market—was sold as liberation. In reality, it was a transfer of obligation. They privatized gains and socialized losses, hollowing out the middle class while shifting costs onto those too young to vote. They defunded education and infrastructure, gutted labor protections, and turned healthcare into a corporate racket. Then, as the planet began to burn, they blocked climate action and called it “fiscal responsibility.”

Boomers will tell you they “earned what they have.” And many worked hard—but so did everyone else. The difference is timing. They came of age when housing, education, and energy were cheap, when public investment was high, and when the economy still rewarded ordinary people for showing up. Millennials and Gen Z entered adulthood in an era of wage stagnation, student debt, and global instability—problems built by the same generation that refuses to relinquish power even as the system buckles.

This isn’t about blame—it’s about truth. America’s wealth didn’t vanish; it was concentrated. The future wasn’t lost; it was pawned off to buy one more tax cut, one more stock buyback, one more decade of denial. The boomers inherited the richest country in history and are leaving behind the most unequal.

History will remember them not as the “Me Generation,” but as the one that mortgaged its children’s future and called it freedom.

Every empire falls when it eats its young. America is no exception.