The Real Generation Gap
Presidential birth years since Nixon, and why we will never have a Gen X President
The Baby Boomers (b. 1946 - 1964) are an ageist generation; I say this from a lifetime of experience.
When the world is literally built around you (public infrastructure was needed, and built, as was suburbia), and then deconstructed to suit (Supply-side economics, privatization) there will be an inclination to focus on oneself and those most like oneself. Birth cohort density in ways became destiny, and by virtue of being the largest (at the time) in American history they would be making an outsized impact in markets and upon elections.
More workers equals more labor. Labor is the source of value. More voters equals more votes. Votes are the motor of electoral politics.
First, “Don’t trust anyone over 30” may have been adopted as a slogan by Boomers, but it was coined by a pre-Boomer, Jack Weinberg (b. 1940), in the middle of the UC Berkeley Free Speech movement (1964-1965).
Was this the marker of the so-called “generation gap” Boomers claimed, seemingly occurring by virtue of their birth? Denoting particular years as demarking a “generation” is a tenuous proposition, however by focusing on cohort density as a phenomenon, we can see the peaks and valleys marked by higher and lower fertility rates. After WWII these followed a pattern, with alternating high- and low-density birth cohorts until the most recent one. The younger Millennials (b. 1985 - 2002) (high-density) and the eldest Gen Z (b. 2003 - ????) (low-density) have a crashing fertility rate, where under past patterns we would have expected a new, high-density birth cohort being born for the past handful of years. We should be birthing the new largest birth cohort in American history, but it is not happening.
While larger, denser birth cohorts exert the greatest influence upon markets and elections, it seems that smaller ones exert a greater amount of cultural influence and innovation. The original Yippies were not Baby Boomers; they, and the authors and entertainers that influenced them: The Beats, the musicians who created rock and roll (incl. the Beatles), comedians/social critics like Lenny Bruce and Dick Gregory, second wave feminists like Gloria Steinem—these people were born before the second World War was completed.
Other “Practicing Sociology Without a License” pieces on Birth Cohorts:
Happy Birthday, Sweet Sixty
On January 1, 2025, the eldest members of Generation X turned 60 years old. Unless one was paying attention to the math, it would never be a concern. Go ahead and search “Generation X turns 60” you will find this blog post—hegemonic bullshit about how Gen X “refuses” to retire.
Current American Birth Cohorts
My research on popular marijuana culture called my attention to birth cohort density in America. Examining marijuana use rates over time, from 1964 onward, I could see that first-time marijuana use rose at a near-exponential rate, from the mid-1960’s through the early 1970’s, plateauing at around 2.5 million annual initiates through the 70’s. Numerical …
Happy Birthday, Tommy Chong
Tommy Chong's 87th birthday today is a reminder to appreciate those still among us from the pre-Boomer generation. I have written a bit on generational cohorts and their significance in how we come to understand culture and history. Cohorts with greater density will have stronger collective imprints upon society than those with les…
Boomer sentiments shifted as they aged. We spent the early 1980’s hearing that “30 is the new 20” (You can trust them!) and the later 1980’s hearing “40 is the new 30” (for the older Boomers’ sake). Then in the 1990’s, “50 is the new 30,” and by the 2010’s, “60 is the new 40.” Whose 40? Why, the generation that preceded the Boomers, who had aged into their 40’s in the 1960’s and 1970’s. This occurred forty years *after* their parents had aged into their 40’s.
They refuse to accept that they are becoming elderly, and insist on voting for their peers because they don’t trust *anyone*, which is why we have had *7* consecutive Boomer presidencies (already the longest stretch held by any generation, and soon to become eight [n.b. this piece is from 2019]. Gen X will get 1, maybe 2 terms of the Presidency.
They are going to go out, kicking and screaming.
From 2024:
Presidential Birth Years Since Nixon
(the first president those born in 1946 could vote for):
1913 Nixon (2 terms)
1913 Ford*—unelected
1924 Carter (new, “young,” change — 1 term)
1911 Reagan (2 terms)
1924 H.W. Bush (1 term)
-Boomers start voting for their own, never for a younger candidate-
1946 Clinton (2 terms)
1946 W. Bush (2 terms)
1961 Obama (2 terms)
1946 Trump
1942 Biden (established, “old,” “return to normal” — 1 term)
1946 Trump
See a pattern here? Carter (1924) and Obama (1961)? I do.
The pre-WWI domestic population growth (There was a dense birth cohort from the 1900’s into the 1910’s) produced two Presidents (4 terms—Ford folded into Nixon’s) born in 1911 and 1913, with the years between 1914 and 1945 (36 years, inclusive) producing two more (both 1-term, both born in 1924).
The post-WWII Baby Boom produced four consecutive presidents, then a 1-term step into the elder generation (1942), and the back to the Boomers. We never saw a president born in the 1930s, and it looks like we will never see a president born between 1965 - 1980.
Those generations just preceding and just following the Boomers have been discounted by that birth cohort.