William Strauss and Niel Howe wrote a 1997 book, The Fourth Turning, about the generational flow of events in societies. The authors were historians who wrote about the evidence of generational patterns, and how societies, including American society go through 80 year cycles. The fourth portion of each cycle is usually cataclysmic, as it has been for us. Each of those cycles in our society brought us the Revolutionary war, the Civil War, the Great Depression and WWII, and a decade or so after they wrote their book, the Great Recession and a major war that is yet to come.
Strauss and Howe had interesting things to say about Boomers and Social Security.
“…Not far into the Fourth Turning, today's long-term projections for Social Security, Medicare, and other elder benefits programs will lie in history's dust bin. The economy will not keep growing as smoothly as the actuaries now assume—and critical events will force the government to reshuffle all its spending priorities. At that point, no one will be entitled to anything; those in need will merely be authorized something. Public figures should alert today's working Americans to their vulnerability…”
“…For Boomers, Social Security will be the object of fatalism and sarcasm. Some will get it, and some won't. The typical Boomer will live on bits and pieces of SEP-IRAs, Keoghs, 401Ks, federal benefits, and assorted corporate pension scraps that will vary enormously from person to person. For many, this will add up to a lot; for many others, nearly nothing. When the market hits bottom, millions of Boomers will find themselves at the brink of old age with far smaller nest eggs than they ever expected. They will immediately have to make do with steeply diminished material consumption…”
Howe, Neil; Strauss, William (2009-01-16). The Fourth Turning (Kindle Locations 6082-6086). Random House, Inc.
The authors very pointedly say that the Silent Generation, those born from 1924-1942 is the last generation to receive full Social Security.
We Boomers should be under no illusions about any of this. The Social Security Trust Fund is made up of worthless treasury bonds that must be funded by future borrowing. There seems to be no political will to try and address fixes to the system. It is ripe for collapse. The Millennial Generation is not going to shoulder the burden of the current system voluntarily, knowing they are not going to get the same benefits as their parents. They are going to be voting against their parents' interests enmass.
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