Generation Jones

Thank you Society Watcher for commenting on my last post. It turns out I am not the only one who wants to distinguish between the older and younger baby boomers. Unfortunately, since my retirement, I no longer get to see one of my favorite magazines, American Demographics, or else I might have been aware that a sociologist has created a new group: Generation Jones.

This new demographic group consists of those born between 1954 and 1965, bridging the Baby Boomers and GenX groups. Jonathan Pontell, who defined this new group in a book a few years ago, called them Generation Jones because of their desire to keep up with the Jones’s.

Basically Jonathon Pontell and I arrived at similar conclusions – there are a lot of younger Baby Boomers and they have had very different life experiences than the older boomers. But we differ on how to treat this difference. He wants to rewrite the long-time definition of Baby Boomers by carving out this new group – Generation Jones, whereas I feel that although they need greater recognition, this group is still a part of the Baby Boomers. (Of course I could also question why the group with the most people doesn’t retain the name of Baby Boomers and the smaller group given a different name!)

Instead of rewriting the Baby Boom definition I want to work within the group. I look at the difference between the first and last Baby Boomers as being similar to Seniors and Freshmen in high school. Seniors in high school have a very different outlook, temperament, goals and maturity level than Freshmen yet both are in the same high school and call themselves high schoolers. Therefore, I don’t see a problem of having subsets within the Baby Boomer category. As I mentioned in the last post, this topic has greatly interested me and in fact I have been fiddling around with the idea of identifying three Baby Boomer subsets: True Boomers, Wanna Be’s and Tag Alongs.

My three subsets of Boomers were based on their age during a few key dates in our country’s history. I defined True Boomers as those born between 1951 and 1946. This group was the most impacted by all the events in the 1960s and has been the group the media focuses on. True Boomers were 12 to 17 years old when Kennedy was assassinated and five years later during the assassinations in 1968 they were 17 to 22 years old. Wanna Be’s were born between 1952 and 1957. As the name implies they want to be like the older group but they were too young to be in the forefront of the 60’s revolution. They may say they remember where they were when Kennedy was assassinated but they were only 6 to 11 years old, and while some might have been impacted by the events that happened in 1968 when they were 11 to 16 years old, this group was definitely affected by Watergate and Nixon’s resignation in 1974, as they were 17 to 22 at the time. The last group, Tag Alongs, were the youngest boomers born between 1958 and 1964. This group was not impacted by any of the events in the 1960’s and instead came of age during the 1970’s.

I feel that using these subsets within the Baby Boomers group is a better solution than completely changing the definition of Baby Boomers and adding a new group. This new group, Generation Jones, includes people born between 1954 and 1964 and I am sure that those born in the mid 1950’s would strongly balk if told they were no longer considered as Baby Boomers. Perhaps those born in the early 1960’s wouldn’t mind being classified as Gen Jones instead of Baby Boomers but I still think this is the wrong approach. But no matter what you call them, this large group has become an important and finally recognized part of our society.