Baby Boomers and the future of business

[Duckjake]

Right now most owners or senior management positions in the businesses I deal with are guys in their mid 50s to early 60s. In 10-15 years most these people are going to have to be replaced.

This is going to present a tremendous opportunity for younger people but because the younger people were blocked from advancement or even employment by these baby boomers there doesn't appear to be enough of them with the experience to move up.

How is this going to effect the future of American business?

 

[conraddobler]

Right now most owners or senior management positions in the businesses I deal with are guys in their mid 50s to early 60s. In 10-15 years most these people are going to have to be replaced.

This is going to present a tremendous opportunity for younger people but because the younger people were blocked from advancement or even employment by these baby boomers there doesn't appear to be enough of them with the experience to move up.

How is this going to effect the future of American business?

I started my own business partially because I got tired of dealing with the boomers everywhere above me.

Boomers IMO are going to cause societal wreckage when they retire, not in a mean way just in a snake ate a goat way.

Until the snake finally takes a dump it skews every kind of snake measurement.

Think about what all the boomers have to either sell or give away, houses, stocks, bonds, companies.

When they're retired and drawing down their assets I predict a world class deluge of stuff for sale.

Stocks, bonds, houses.

It's just not pretty and on the business front, I suspect a lot of 30 somethings are going to get jobs they wouldn't otherwise get and they won't have the experience to deal with it and they are going to look great for a short while then run onto the rocks a lot.

JMO.

 

[Duckjake]

I started my own business partially because I got tired of dealing with the boomers everywhere above me.

Boomers IMO are going to cause societal wreckage when they retire, not in a mean way just in a snake ate a goat way.

Until the snake finally takes a dump it skews every kind of snake measurement.

Think about what all the boomers have to either sell or give away, houses, stocks, bonds, companies.

When they're retired and drawing down their assets I predict a world class deluge of stuff for sale.

Stocks, bonds, houses.

It's just not pretty and on the business front, I suspect a lot of 30 somethings are going to get jobs they wouldn't otherwise get and they won't have the experience to deal with it and they are going to look great for a short while then run onto the rocks a lot.

JMO.

I've been wondering what is going to happen to the life insurance companies when all the boomers show up at their door asking for the cash value of their life insurance. Or start cashing out their 401k to buy an RV to drive around the country.

Won't this cause a huge capital drain?

 

[conraddobler]

I've been wondering what is going to happen to the life insurance companies when all the boomers show up at their door asking for the cash value of their life insurance. Or start cashing out their 401k to buy an RV to drive around the country.

Won't this cause a huge capital drain?

Yep.

These folks aren't good at passing time cheaply IMO, they like their entertainment and they'll IMO overspend all the way through their retirement.

Which means IMO they'll be putting incredible pressure on the system to cash in their assets into a world that is suddenly going to be unwilling or unable to afford to buy them.

Boomers go out to eat when the wind blows, they'll need to sell a lot of stuff to keep buying dinner IMO.

Since they oversaw all the outsourcing the joke on them is that there isn't going to be anyone left with any money to buy their crap from them, some small measure of justice I guess.

My generation is a bizzare one.

We were raised by parents who weren't boomers and our grandparents weren't either.

Yet we grew up with TV.

Very odd and there aren't very many of us either.

Not nearly enough to take over for the boomers which means that'll probably fall on those first raised by boomers.

Not an apealing thought IMO.

BTW, right now might be the peak of boomer retirement savings as they are just starting to retire but many are way behind the 8 ball in saving for it, if they all start saving like mad like I think they are then once that starts it's downhill run we're in for Japan part 2 on the wild ride of asset pricing pressure.

Same time that's going on our country will be printing money like mad trying to pay for all the stuff they promised the boomers but didn't really save for them.

It's basically game over, I've said this for a couple years now, it just happens in what seems like slow motion.

 

[82CardsGrad]

Right now most owners or senior management positions in the businesses I deal with are guys in their mid 50s to early 60s. In 10-15 years most these people are going to have to be replaced.

This is going to present a tremendous opportunity for younger people but because the younger people were blocked from advancement or even employment by these baby boomers there doesn't appear to be enough of them with the experience to move up.

How is this going to effect the future of American business?

My industry was essentially built and has since been led and sustained by Boomers - soley. Throughout the leadership ranks of my industry, Boomers are well represented and we often talk about what happens when they all decide to finally retire? Where does the next group of leaders come from? Who can really fill their shoes??? I'm a Boomer so I'm told, but I'm only 45 years old. For me, I see some big opportunities as the older Boomers begin to exit the industry.

It's been well documented that the Baby Boom generation is the largest in terms of population, and the wealthiest generation walking the planet. However, I think the early predictions of Boomers spending like mad upon retirement will prove to be gross overstatements... I think this Great Recession has put serious dampers on the ability and the desire of Boomers to spend as loosely as they might have 10 years ago.

 

[DWKB]

Worst. Generation. Ever

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[conraddobler]

My industry was essentially built and has since been led and sustained by Boomers - soley. Throughout the leadership ranks of my industry, Boomers are well represented and we often talk about what happens when they all decide to finally retire? Where does the next group of leaders come from? Who can really fill their shoes??? I'm a Boomer so I'm told, but I'm only 45 years old. For me, I see some big opportunities as the older Boomers begin to exit the industry.

It's been well documented that the Baby Boom generation is the largest in terms of population, and the wealthiest generation walking the planet. However, I think the early predictions of Boomers spending like mad upon retirement will prove to be gross overstatements... I think this Great Recession has put serious dampers on the ability and the desire of Boomers to spend as loosely as they might have 10 years ago.

Spoken like a boomer through and through

The answer is the next generation will take over, unless the world stops working according to plan.

Like the boomers were ready or special, they were neither just like everyone else that's ever taken over anything but amazingly, life does go on.

 

[82CardsGrad]

Should be an interesting show! A must see for you DWKB!!!

http://www.cnbc.com/id/15837856

 

[conraddobler]

http://www.profutures.com/article.php/448/

Article back in 2006, looks like the doom crowd was too optimistic.

http://www.google.com/finance?q=INDEXDJX:.DJI

BTW YOU HAVE TO CLICK MAX ON THE CHART ONCE YOU'RE IN IT, to see what I'm talking about.

That's a non distorted chart right there of the Dow, if you actually look at it a near perfect head and shoulders is forming on a massive scale, implying a low near 2000 on the DOW.

The real reason I put that link on there though is to simply look at the chart, it's so obvious looking at it that things haven't been sustainable.

Boomers are a demographic nightmare, simply because they didn't leave a baby boom echo in their wake due to free love and birth control, if they'd of had kids at the proper ratio then maybe it would of dampened down the boom and helped to smooth out the bust.

They didn't, they had less kids than ever before and so it's like a perfect demographic storm.

 

[DWKB]

http://generationzeromovie.com/

ABOUT THE FILM

The current economic crisis is not a failure of capitalism, but a failure of culture. Generation Zero explores the cultural roots of the global financial meltdown - beginning with the narcissism of the 1960's, spreading like a virus through the self-indulgent 90's, and exploding across the world in the present economic cataclysm.

Generation Zero goes beneath the shallow media headlines and talking head sound bites to get to the source of today's economic nightmare. With a cutting edge style and haunting imagery, this must see documentary will change everything you thought you knew about Wall Street and Washington.

Featuring experts, authors, and pundits from across the political spectrum, Generation Zero exposes the little told story of how the mindset of the baby boomers sowed the seeds of economic disaster that will be reaped by coming generations.