Baby Boomers

St. James Encyclopedia of Pop Culture, Jan 29, 2002 by Tina Gianoulis

"For many a family, now that prosperity seems to be here, there's a baby just around the corner." This is how the April 2, 1941 issue of Business Week described the upcoming demographic phenomenon that would come to be known as the "baby boom." Between the years of 1946 and 1964, 78 million babies were born in the United States alone, and other countries also experienced their own baby booms following World War II. The baby-boom generation was the largest generation yet born on the planet. Other generations had received nicknames, such as the "lost generation" of the 1920s, but it took the label-obsessed media of the late twentieth century combined with the sheer size of the post-World War II generation to give the name "baby boomers" its impact.

Since those born at the end of the baby boom (1964) could, in fact, be the children of those born at the beginning (1946), many consider the younger baby boomers part of a different generation. Some of those born after 1960 call themselves "thirteeners" instead, referring to the thirteenth generation since the founding of the United States.

Variously called the "now generation," the "love generation," and the "me generation" among other names, the baby boomers have molded and shaped society at every phase, simply by moving through it en masse. Demographers frequently describe the baby boomers' effect on society by comparing it to a python swallowing a pig. In the same way that peristalsis causes the huge lump to move down the body of the snake, the huge demographic lump of baby boomers has been squeezed through its societal phases. First it was the maternity wards in hospitals that were overcrowded, as mothers came in unprecedented numbers to give birth the "scientific" way. Then, in the 1950s, swollen school enrollment caused overcrowding, resulting in the construction of new schools. The 1950s and 1960s also saw the institutions of juvenile justice filled to capacity, as the term "juvenile delinquent" was coined for those who had a hard time fitting into the social mold. By the 1960s and 1970s, it was the colleges that were overfilled, with twice the number of students entering higher education as the previous generation. In the 1970s and 1980s, the job markets began to be glutted, as the young work force flooded out of colleges, and by the 1990s housing prices were pushed up as millions of baby boomers approaching middle age began to think of settling down and purchasing a house.

Giving a unified identity to any generational group is largely an over-simplified media construct, and, as with most American media constructs, the baby boomer stereotype refers almost exclusively to white middle-class members of the generation. Poor baby boomers and baby boomers of color will, in all likelihood, not recognize themselves in the media picture of the indulged suburban kid-turned college radical-turned spendthrift yuppie, but it is not only the white and the affluent who have shaped their generation. The revolutionary vision and radical politics that are most closely associated with young baby boomers have their roots in the civil rights movement and even in the street gangs of poor urban youth of the 1950s. In addition, the African American and Latino music that emerged during the boomer's formative years continued to influence pop music at the end of the century. Even though their lives may be vastly different, it cannot be denied that members of a generation share certain formative experiences. The baby boomers' shared experiences began with its parental generation.

Raised during the privation of the Great Depression of the 1930s, the parents of the baby boomers learned to be conservative and thrifty and to value security. Because parents were unwilling or unable to bring children into such economic uncertainty, U.S. birth rates had dropped during the depression from 22.4 births per thousand in 1924 to just 16.7 by 1936. Experts and media of the time, fearful of the consequences of an ever-decreasing birth rate, encouraged procreation by pointing out the evils of a child-poor society, some even blaming the rise of Hitler on the declining birth rate.

Beginning as early as 1941, with war on the horizon, the birth rates began to rise. The first four months of 1941 boasted 20,000 more births than the same four months of the previous year. The uncertainties of war prompted many young couples to seize the moment and attempt to create a future by marrying and having children quickly. Those who postponed children because of the war were quick to start families once the war was over. In 1942, 2,700,000 babies had been born, more than any year since 1921. By 1947 the number had leaped to 3, 600,000 and it stayed high until 1965, when birth rates finally began to slow. The arrival of "the Pill," a reliable oral contraceptive, plus changing attitudes about family size and population control combined to cause the mid-1960s decline in birth rates.

Following the enormous disruptions caused by World War II, the forces of government and business were anxious to get society back to "normal." A campaign to remove women from the work force and send them back to the home was an integral part of this normalization. Women without husbands and poor women continued to work, but working women were widely stigmatized. During the war, working mothers received support, such as on-site daycare, but by the 1950s the idea of a working mother was unconventional to say the least. Sparked by the postwar prosperity, a building boom was underway. Acres of housing developments outside the cities went perfectly with the new American image of the family--Mom, Dad, and the kids, happily ensconced in their new house in the suburbs. Many white middle-class baby boomers grew up in the suburbs, leaving the inner cities to the poor and people of color.