It’s enough to give a Boomer whiplash, trying to follow the research into what’s good for us. Our morning coffee has positive effects, concludes one study; other studies suggest a sip of java is the kiss of death. The same for red wine, protein, or our favorite form of exercise. When it comes to our health, we’re always doing it wrong. The same goes for our financial health.
We’ve all been suffering lately from the “K-shaped economy,” an acknowledgment, at least, that neither financial hardships nor benefits are in any way spread equally across our society. But I’ve been reading that our economy is also “G-shaped,” that there’s a Generational framework at work here, Baby Boomers propping up the economy not only by outspending other age groups, but also by specifically assisting younger people (i.e., their kids and grandkids). And the tone of some commentators is not approving.
The discovery of this “G-shaped” economy has me shaking my head, as if it were somehow new—and inappropriate—for Grandma and/or Grandpa to pick up the tab at an upscale restaurant, foot the bill for a family vacation, or help with a down payment on a house or a car. The horror! The horror!
As with coffee or exercise, the critics are all over the place. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, the financial columns discuss the “Great Wealth Transfer” soon to come as Boomers like me bequeath their savings, stock portfolios, and paid-off homes to their kids and grandkids. Yet on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays I read dire accounts, in those same columns, of my generation’s dangerously forking over too much before the end. On Sundays the columnists carp that retirees control an unfair portion of the nation’s wealth. Forget having it both ways; some economic gurus want their arguments every which way, all at once.
Then there’s the pundit who brings the good news (We’re living years longer: Yay!) only to deliver the bad (Our nest eggs won’t last out those years: Yikes!). But hold the (rotary) phone, stop the (inky) presses—now experts declare that spending the nest egg earlier is wiser than waiting to spend it later.
Whatever the economic forecast, let’s just admit the future has a shape of its own. And it’s not a letter. It’s a question mark.
Poet and essayist James Scruton lives economically in Brookville, Ohio.
