Millennials aren’t killing industries, the economy is

Millennials can’t catch a break. They’re constantly blamed for the worst of society. We all know the stereotype: lazy, socialist snowflakes living in their parents’ basement. Of course, there’s a different industry tanking every other week, and millennials are always to blame for the declining sales, layoffs, and, in some cases, bankruptcies that follow.

Just look at these headlines:

Millennials are killing chains like Buffalo Wild Wings and Applebee’s

Millennials are killing the napkin industry

Millennials aren’t eating cereal because it’s too much work

Millennials are killing a $1 billion diet staple

Millennials are killing the golf industry

Millennials could be a problem for America’s most iconic motorcycle brand

RIP: Here are 70 things millennials have killed

A new study from the Federal Reserve, however, say it’s not the millennials’ fault.

New research says millennials are worse off than their parents, due to failures of the U.S. and global economies. General advances in technology, ongoing demographic evolution, and economic cycles are to blame. The report says:

Millennials are less well off than members of earlier generations when they were young, with lower earnings, fewer assets, and less wealth. … Conditional on their age and other factors, millennials do not appear to have preferences for consumption that differ significantly from those of earlier generations.


In other words, millennials are simply living in the world their elders created for them. Most millennials were just graduating from high school or college when the financial crisis and recession hit. Job opportunities were low, stunting early financial advancements. Seeing their parents’ financial insecurities has scarred millennials, keeping them from buying property or investing in the stock market. Top this off with the average millennial graduate owing an average of more than $30,000 in student loan debt.

The study’s authors note that a similar question was posed 20 years ago “when Baby Boomer profligacy was being compared to the Silent Generation’s penchant for saving,” they wrote. “Speaking to that debate, Sabelhaus and Manchester (1995) were able to separate fact from popular myth at the time and provided evidence that consumption had not increased as much as income, and that Baby Boomer asset accumulation had in fact outpaced that of the previous generation.”

As Bloomberg’s Luke Kawa reports, “the app-loving, participation-trophy-receiving cohort, defined as those born between 1981 and 1997, aren’t really different from their parents” after all.

Alexander James is a contributor to Red Alert Politics and a freelance journalist.

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