Friday, March 1, 2024

Review

Quick Acknowledgement

A quick thank you to all the people I've spoken to over the past two decades - from the Silent Generation all the way to the AutoMons. It has been an absolute pleasure to meet everyone and hear your life story. I share more details on this thanks in the ending part of this post.

Terminology

Echo Boomer/Millennial/Generation Y 1981 - 1995. The term "echo boom" comes from the demographic observation that Echo Boomers are a massive generation in size, while Generation Y is the title because Echo Boomers follow Generation X. I generally tend to use Echo Boomer as the noun, Millennial as the adjective, and Generation Y as the title when talking about Echo Boomers - these individuals are all the same in terms of people born between 1981 and 1995 (you will see that I sometimes include 1980 in my posts). Unfortunately, I do not always do this consistently, so you will sometimes see Millennials as a noun. However, they are all the same.

iGenZ/Generation Z 1996 - 2010. This is the internet generation that follows Echo Boomers. As a generation they only know of a world with the internet. I call this generation iGenZ for this reason (shortened version of Internet Generation Z). I generally tend to use iGenZ as the noun and Generation Z as the title for this generation - these individuals are all the same in terms of people being born between 1996 and 2010. I do not share most of my research publicly on this generation as my predictions with Echo Boomers were extremely successful and I am replicating that success with iGenZ privately. Unlike Echo Boomers, my research with iGenZ has been global, mostly with Asian iGenZ.

AutoMons/Generation Alpha/Generation A 2011 - 2025. I refer to this generation as AutoMons (The Automation Monoculture Generation), as they were born in a world where significant automation will be the norm - 3d printing, artificial intelligence, etc. They also show early signs of shifting toward social monoculture, which is where I get the Mons in AutoMons.

Prediction: Education Bubble and Regret

I predicted that at least 25% of Echo Boomers would regret attending college and cautioned that Echo Boomers' stories about attending college might someday mirror what we heard during the housing bubble. At the time of this prediction, former Generations such as the Silent Generation, Baby Boomers and Generation X had less than 5% of their generational members regret attending college, so I had a lot of people argue that I was predicting a big shift. However, as of my research over the years of 2021 and 2022, 37% of Echo Boomers have told me that they regretted attending college. Let me repeat a point I made which we are now seeing:

The perception of education changes. Echo Boomers were inculcated with "get a degree" messages from everywhere. As Echo Boomers mature and make less money than they expected, they will communicate their disappointment with education to the next generation. Unless Echo Boomers look back on education with rose color glasses, the next generation will hold a different outlook on education than their parents.

In addition to the 37% of Echo Boomers who regret attending college, I found that almost one-third (33%) of Echo Boomers report being underemployed with a degree. Undermployment in this context either means they have a degree and no job or they have a degree but are only finding part time or internship work. On a related point here, the only educational path that is not in an education bubble (still!) is medicine.

Humorous Prediction: The Education Bubble Popped First

I write this tongue-and-cheek: my humorous prediction about the education bubble popping first is true. In addition to a decline in college enrollments, universities are closing in the United States at a pace of one a week. Tattoos are still popular, though one of the fastest growing industries by percent is tattoo removals. The tattoo bubble hasn't popped yet, but it's coming.

Prediction: Healthcare

In the post Med School Blows Past the Education Bubble I remarked that medical school would blow past most college degrees since medical school was in a shortage and other degrees were not. This has held correct and in fact, medical wages have significantly outpaced other industries. Some doctors are now making more money than CEOs of medium to large sized companies - it's almost insane to see these wages until you realize the shortage in medicine. I also noted in the past that the USA graduates almost as many lawyers as doctors and lawyers keep trying to add complexity to the system, which has only increased costs. Finally, the anti-male sentiment in the USA has caught up with the country. Hard working young men do not enter medical school, nor want to. College is as anti-male as it comes and young men are wise to avoid American colleges (Chinese, Japanese, Russian, Indian and other colleges in Asia make much better places for young men to attend college).

Not only did my post age well in terms of how much money doctors make, it aged extremely well when you look at life expectancies of Americans: it's plummeting. Americans are dying faster and their healthcare costs are skyrocketing. I did warn you it was coming! Even the American Medical Association is forced to agree with what I cautioned (and note too that they're even talking about the extreme bureaucracy with examples such as "Physicians today, on average, spend about two hours on paperwork for every one hour we spend with patients").

Compared to Generation X, the Millennial generation has a higher suicide rate for both men and women when evaluating age-by-age comparisons of previous generations. As a generation, the data show that US born Echo Boomers will not outlive their parents.

Prediction: Millennial Women Will Make More Money

I predicted that Millennial women would make more money than Millennial men and this has held true as of my recent analysis in 2021. Some quick points on how I compared these differences: identical data points were compared (ie: comparing a female sales manager with 10 years of experience, a bachelor's degree and working in the same area as a male sales manager with 10 years of experience and a bachelor's degree), married Echo Boomers were deducted (see below point), and only data points that exist within a single context - for instance, if a Millennial male worked 3 jobs versus a Millennial female who worked 1, that's not the same context.

Summary of 2021 findings:

  • When comparing non-Married Millennial males and females using ceteris paribus factors, Millennial females make approximately 8% more than Millennial males.
  • Millennial males are more likely to work multiple jobs, but also more likely to not work at all - the bell curve is very broad when looking at work for Millennial men compared with Millennial females.
  • Over 32% of Echo Boomers own a home, most of this group is married/coupled Echo Boomers. In 2011, only 11% of Echo Boomers owned a home.
  • The 15% subset of Millennial males have done what I predicted in private discussions with financial executives. Those of you who attended those presentations should continue the suggestions. I do not and will not share pubicly these predictions, as I am continuing to invest in this area.

As a general point on why married Echo Boomers were excluded (and should be): in many married couples, one person will work more while the other may work either less or not at all "officially" - this latter point being important. Consider that a married partner who does not work still can add significant value by extending the value of the income of their partner. For an example, a stay-at-home wife may be able to leverage her husband's income by taking advantage of opportunities and sales that people who work regularly cannot take advantage of, such as buying toilet paper cheaply before the shortage in 2020. It is actually very common for single income households to have a partner who leverages their partner's income; this matters in situations where there is an income tax, as tax authorities cannot take advantage of someone who extends an income by purchasing more value than standard. For this reason, comparing income of married people is unreasonable because we'd also have to evaluate how the other partner is possibly extending that income. That's more difficult to do in research and it outside the scope of my prediction that Millennial women would make more than Millennial men (which they did) when we consider a ceteris paribus context.

Prediction: Millennial Marriage Rate

I predicted that 33-40% of Echo Boomers would never marry. In 2011, only 22% of Echo Boomers had married. As of 2021, only 48% of Echo Boomers were married. Based on 2021's data, I expect that 67-70% of Echo Boomers will marry (higher than initially expected). A big part of this slight upshift is that more Echo Boomers have committed suicide than I expected (and at earlier ages) and their life expectancies are dropping faster than their parents, which will lower the never married population, as never marrieds tend to belong to both of these groups.

As I noted when speaking at events, a low marriage rate would mean the following:

  • A shortage of housing, as more single Echo Boomers means there's an increased need for housing, apartments, townhomes, etc.
  • Declining individual productivity. An old idiom goes that society is built on the back of married men. This is true, as married men produce significantly more economic output than every other demographic group. A decline in married men means a decline in productive output. Healthcare is a big industry that's seen an absolute collapse in male labor, especially male labor working extra hours (men are much more likely to work more hours).
  • Increased and rising crime. Married people commit fewer crimes and are more likely to vote on policies that keep their family safe (anti-criminal policies). In addition, children raised without two parents are statistically more likely to be criminals.

Prediction: The United States Becomes Socialist

While easy to overlook at the time, my prediction that Generation Y's lack of respect for privacy would push them into socialism has aged well. In fact, my exact words were:

As to how this all plays out in the long run, see the Eastern Bloc and Soviet Union from history.

In general, socialist societies are built upon the framework mentioned in the post - "value is perceived as a concept determined solely by others." Socialism like it's result (communism) relies on centralization through controlling concepts of value toward the community. Value is determined by the community (others), not the individual. What people consistently miss about capitalism is that both the producer and consumer in a capitalist society determine value as individuals. People often mis-assume that it's only the consumer who does this; they forget that a producers also choose what products they want to create.

People are slowly seeing this now. I find it peculiar (and funny) that these leaders didn't see this developing a decade ago with this generation. This was always inevitable.

Prediction: Products

Electric cars. As I predicted with Tesla, electric cars have been extremely popular with Echo Boomers, especially since Millennial attitudes toward environmentally friendly companies is positive. I expect that this trend will continue and as electric cars become even more affordable, for their use to spread. Echo Boomers have never forgotten the pain they felt at $4 a gallon gas back in 2008 when oil was over $150 West Texas Intermediate. To this day, oil prices have never risen that high even though actual oil resources are declining. The only surprise here is that some of the competitors to Tesla have done poor in their electric car production.

Energy drinks. As I predicted, supplements did well with single male Echo Boomers, especially the more active Echo Boomers. One suggestion I made early given the success with Red Bull was that energy drinks should broaden their appeal to single male Echo Boomers and this has paid off for the ones who followed this. Energy drinks have become a huge market and they've been able to attract many male consumers outside of the fitness industry (Monster Beverage being a great example of one that does this with blue collar male Echo Boomers and Celsius Holdings being a great example of one that does this with white collar male Echo Boomers).

Survivalism takes off in 2024. The survivalist industry has done well since I published that post, though it was very niche. This year, the interest in the industry has absolutely exploded - some of the private startups in the industry are making $1+ million a weekend teaching survivalist skills to the exceptionally wealthy. This isn't only the skills either; the industry has seen an explosion in interest in the actual goods that makeup the industry. This is one of the hottest industries in 2024 that still is flying below the radar.

App Dating. As I've long advised with companies, when appealing to Millennial females, details and the shopping experience matter. The popular dating apps that exploded in popularity followed this advice. The experience felt like shopping for dates and the apps encouraged that users would add key details that single female Echo Boomers wanted to know. Also, I advised some of the companies to track how Millennial females used the apps, such as where they would look and how much time they would spend on certain areas of the app because these are key to improving the shopping experience. While the female Echo Boomers didn't pay as much as the male Echo Boomers, female Echo Boomers were key for dating apps as the male Echo Boomers wouldn't pay for the app if there were no females (gay dating apps being exceptions to this point). Another related appeal to dating apps and why they've been so popular with Echo Boomers is that Echo Boomers prefer self-esteem boosts over money and sex and dating apps provide Echo Boomers with a self-esteem boost, even if they don't act on it.

Acknowledgement

Some specific appreciate to all the people I've interviewed over the years when doing research along with links to the interviews:

Also, thank you to those who I interviewed outside the topic of demographics - Dr. Dan Eisenberg, Dr. Catherine Shanahan, Tom Naughton, Dr. Layne Norton, Christine Cronau, and Dr. Lindsey Mathews.

Thank you to all the people I've met over the years, as I've done research. The people I've met and interviewed, the people I've worked with on various studies, even the people in the studies themselves. To me there is nothing more exciting than hearing a person's story - it's more of an adventure than traveling to the coolest places. Thank you for sharing your life with me. I have been extremely careful to avoid ever storing identifiable information and looking only at patterns in a big picture sense because fundamentally I respect what you as an individual are willing to share publicly under your name. The biggest takeaway to any research is how people are the greatest work of art.

Posted by Echo Boomer at 8:00 AM