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February 1998, Vol. 121,
No. 2
Making it on their own: the baby-boom meets generation X
Geoffrey Paulin and Brian Riordan
- In a popular 1970s television series,
Mary Tyler Moore portrayed Mary Richards, a young woman
living alone in Minneapolis and working as an associate
producer at a televison news program. In some ways, the
Richards character typified the successful young singles
of the baby-boom generation. To illustrate, the opening
theme song asked, "How will you make it on your
own?" Richards would toss her hat into the air in a
gesture indicating that she would indeed succeed.
However, the theme songs question might get a very
different answer from todays young singles.
Structural changes in the economy may have altered the
outlook for young single women and men, making the theme
songs concluding lyric, "Youre gonna
make it after all," a less-likely outcome for
contemporary young singles.
-
- How do todays
young singlesoften called "Generation
Xers"compare to their baby-boom
counterparts who entered the labor market 10 or even 20
years ago? And do the figures look the way they do
because of real, structural changes in the economy, or
could it be that despite gains in employment, differences
in wages or other economic measures persist among men and
women, or whites and minorities? As labor force
participation has increased among these groups, per
capita income has declined, in real terms, even though
some segments of the population currently earn more than
did their counterparts in earlier years. Despite these
other changes, relative to everyone else in the economy,
are young singles today doing worse, holding their own,
or perhaps even doing better than their counterparts from
the previous generation?
-
- To answer these
questions, this article examines various measures of
economic well-being for 18- to 29-year-old single persons
in three periods: 197273 (Boomers I), 198485
(Boomers II), and 199495 (Generation X). Using data
from the Consumer Expenditure Survey, it analyzes
differences in incomes and spending patterns to see how,
if at all, these measures have changed, and how
todays young singles are indeed "making it on
their own."
This excerpt is from an article published in
the February 1998 issue of the Monthly Labor Review. The
full text of the article is available in Adobe Acrobat's Portable
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Related BLS programs
Consumer Expenditure
Survey
- Related Monthly
Labor Review articles
- Labor market success
of young adults from two generations. February
1998.
-
- Young men and the transition to stable
employment. August 1994.
-
- Education and the work histories of young
adults. April 1993.
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