Baby boomer is an American-English term to describe a person born between 1946 and 1964. Following World War II, these countries experienced an unusual spike in birth rates, a phenomenon commonly known as the baby boom. The term is iconic and more properly capitalized as Baby Boomers. The terms `baby boomer` and `baby boom` along with others (e.g., `boomies` or `boomers`) are also used in countries with demographics that did not mirror the sustained growth in American families over the same interval.
At some point, Baby Boomers will have a large impact on the health care industry (Funerals/Hospice/Cemeteries), but as a generation, they have tended to avoid discussions and planning for their demise and avoided much long term planning.
Baby Boomers often experience high anxiety about aging and death, and live in denial of these realities of life. Many do not believe these events have to be a reality of life.
Journalist Jeff Chang wrote in his book
Can`t Stop Won`t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation, `Boomers seem to have had great difficulty imagining what could come after themselves.`
One book, written by Colorado doctor Terry Grossman, titled `The Baby Boomers` Guide to Living Forever,` proposes how Baby Boomers might avoid death. On page 3 of the book, Grossman writes, unironically, `As an official member of the Baby Boomer Generation, I really and truly do not believe that it was intended for us to die. Death, if and when it occurs, clearly will represent a mistake of some kind.`
The humor publication
The Onion published a satirical article celebrating the anticipated large-scale deaths of Baby Boomers in the upcoming years, quoting one fictional expert as saying the Boomers are `the most odious generation America has ever produced.`
One of the contributions made by the Boomer generation appears to be the expansion of individual freedom. Boomers often are associated with the civil rights movement, the feminist cause in the 1970s, gay rights, handicapped rights, and the right to privacy.
Baby boomers presently make up the lion`s share of the political, cultural, industrial, and academic leadership class in the United States. Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, born within sixty days of each other in mid-1946, are the first and second Baby Boomer U.S. presidents, and their careers in office illustrate the wide, often diverging, spectrum of values and attitudes espoused by this largest American generational group to date. To date, baby boomers also have the highest median household incomes in the United States.
