Millennials are Ready to Talk: A Look at OK Boomer, Let’s Talk: How My Generation Got Left Behind

Journalist and author Jill Filipovic is making waves with her new book OK Boomer, Let's Talk: How My Generation Got Left Behind. Filipovic also happens to be a Millennial, and she has some things she wants to say.

Rather than being a whiny, self-pitying diatribe on a Millennial generation that is already often viewed as entitled and self-indulgent, in OK Boomer, Let’s Talk Filipovic lays out in clear language the predicament that many Millennials have found themselves in as they near age 40. With statistics, data, and well-backed research, she shows that Millennials’ massive student loan debt, lack of financial security, and underrepresentation in politics and corporate America is primarily due to a series of systems that was stacked against them from the beginning.

Take the Great Recession of 2008-2010: Millennials were just entering the workforce as companies were making massive job cuts and layoffs. Filipovic writes for CNN, “As young adults just starting our working years, we were first on the chopping block when companies had to downsize; many of us spent months or years without jobs at all. That created an earnings penalty from which we still have not recovered—and likely never will.”

Politics is another example where Millennials are fighting against unfair odds. While Millennials represent 22% of the American population, they only comprise 6% of House members. Prior to the 2020 elections, there are no Millennial members of the Senate. In contrast, many current long-standing Baby Boomer Senators were elected to their positions in their 30’s. Presidential Candidate Joe Biden (a member of the Silent Generation) won his first Senate seat at the age of 30.

Filipovic also points to the rising costs of higher education, rent and housing, medical care, health insurance, and childcare as other reasons why Millennials have had a harder time getting ahead professionally and personally than their Boomer parents.

But ultimately, her book’s invitation for conversation among Millennials and Boomers is a genuine one. She acknowledges that Boomers have paved much groundwork for the success of MIllennials—until Generation Z came along, Millennials were the most well-educated generation, having higher graduation rates from high school and college than any other previous generation. Millennials—who can be somewhat naive and idealistic—can learn much from Boomer wisdom, experience, and practicality.

She hopes her book will be viewed as peace offering between these two generations that are often in conflict. In an interview with Forbes, she states, “Okay, let’s get past some of the silly generational warfare—the ‘OK Boomer’/‘Millennial Snowflake’ business—and get to work on repairing some of the damage that has been done.”

Filipovic and many other Millennials are ready to talk. Church leader, are you ready to listen?