The Old Can Share the Wealth, or the Young Will Take It From Them

The next great political civil wars won’t be over race, the nation-state, religion or even class. They will be generational, pitching the Boomers, who still dominate the global economy, against their offspring, the Millennials, who assuredly do not.

Of course, generational conflict has been a feature of politics for, well, generations, but in the past older folks had at least bequeathed their offspring the prospect of a better future. Now, according to Pew, three in four American adults think their children will not grow up to be better-off than they are. Views about the future are, if anything, more pessimistic in France, Britain, Spain, Italy, and Germany. 

This intergenerational pessimism is particularly acute in  Japan, where a remarkable three-quarters of those polled believed things will be outright worse for the next generation; similar sentiments also predominate in Taiwan, Singapore and South Korea, and in developing countries including India, South Africa and Nigeria. Even in China, many young people face a troubling economic future; in 2017, eight million graduates entered the job market, but most ended up in with salaries that could have been attained by going to work in a factory straight out of high school. 

Read more at The Daily Beast.