Millennials

Template:Globalize/USA Generation Y, sometimes referred to as "Millennials" or "Net Generation" is the group of people born anywhere between the second half of the 1970s and anywhere from the mid 1990s to around the year 2000, depending on the source.

Generation Y is a cohort identified as born after the Generation X cohort, though the term is itself controversial and is synonymous with several alternative terms including The Net Generation, Millennials, Echo Boomers, iGeneration, and Google Generation. Generation Y is generally considered to be the last generation of Americans wholly born in the 20th century. Using the broadest definition commonly cited as of 2005, Generation Y included Americans in their mid-twenties or younger who were born before January 1, 2000.

As generations are defined not by formal process but rather by demographers, the press and media, popular culture, market researchers, and by members of the generation themselves, there is no precise consensus as to which birth years constitute any generation. Although different groups or individuals consider a different range of years to constitute Generation Y, that range of years is almost always within the outer bounds of 1976 as the earliest possible year and 2001 as the latest. The ongoing debate is in part due to the lack of a single marquee event or events, analogous to the end of World War II for the boom in births for "Baby Boomer" generation and service in the Vietnam War which had demarcated that generation. Some events have been proposed (see below). But even for the Baby Boomer birth years after 1955 would not have subjected them to the military draft and thus would not share that cultural experience sometimes deemed common to all boomers. Some believe that Douglas Coupland popularized the Generation X term, leading to the use of Generations Y and Z in the book in 1991.

If the years 1978-2000 are used - as is common in market research - then the size of Generation Y in the United States is approximately 76 million. Commonly cited theories as to the best name and year range for Generation Y are mentioned below. The discussion page for the article includes a wide range of viewpoints on this topic.

Controversy: Attempts to Name and Demarcate Generation Y

The term Generation Y first appeared in an August 1993 Ad Age editorial to describe those teenagers born between 1974-1980. The scope of the term has changed greatly since then to include in many cases anyone born as late as 2001. There is no precise definition of years.

Use of the term Generation Y (often shortened to Gen Y or Ygen) to describe any cohort of individuals is controversial for a variety of reasons. "Generation Y" alludes to a succession from "Generation X", a term which was originally coined as a pejorative label. In this sense, the use of Gen Y as a term only denotes "after Gen X" and fails to capture the cohort's unique social, political, and cultural experience.

Numerous alternative terms have arisen that are generally synonymous with Generation Y. While Generation Y alludes to that cohort's successional relationship to Generation X, the term Echo Boomers is used to allude to the generation's close tie to the primary childbearing years of Baby Boomers. The terms Millennials and Net Generation are attempts to give the Gen Y cohort more independent names that are tied with key events and cultural trends that are strongly associated with the generation. No single term is the "correct" term to describe members of this generation.

Howe and Strauss: "The Millenials"

Following the publication of their book, Generations: The History of America's Future, 1584 to 2069, much credit has been given to the names used for various American cohorts by authors William Strauss and Neil Howe. Howe and Strauss use the term "Millenials" as opposed to "Generation Y", arguing that members of Gen Y actually coined the term Millenials themselves and have statistically expressed a wish not to be associated closely with Gen X. They followed up their large study of the history of American demographics with a new book specifically on Gen Y, titled Millenials Rising.

In Generations, Howe and Strauss use the years 1982-2000 as the birth years of Generation Y, using the 18 childhood years of the high school graduating class of 2000 as their marking points. They reasoned that the high school class of 2000 received notable public attention and political initiatives during their youth that provided a contrast between Americans born before this class and those born after. This term relates to the generation's young age during the turn of the millennium.

Net Generation

In his book Growing Up Digital, business strategist and psychologist Don Tapscott coined the term "Net Generation" for the group, pointing at the significance of being the first to grow up immersed in a digital--and Internet--driven world. Accordingly, some say the final year of Gen Y is between 1993 and 2000 because they would be the youngest people to appreciate the changes of the Digital Revolution.

Generation Y

The most commonly used term, "Generation Y", alludes to a succession from Generation X, a term popularized by the Canadian fiction writer Douglas Coupland in his 1991 book Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture to describe twentysomethings at the time he was writing 1989-1991. "X" is a common term used in algebra for a variable name followed by using letters "Y" and "Z" for something that as yet has no name. As such, the first no-name variable "X" has had its cohort birth years shift. In 1989, when Coupland first wrote the magazine story which later became his book, he referred to those who were in their twenties at that time. This continued through the 1990s, when journalists finally began to use a range of birth cohort years to distinguish Gen X from the current "twentysomething" cohort.

Echo Boomers

The name "Echo Boomers" relates to the size of the generation and its relation to the Baby boomer generation.

The actual “Echo Boom” was a five year span between 1989 and 1993 when for the first time since 1964, the number of live births reached over four million. It wouldn’t be until 1985 that the live birth number would even match that of 1965 at 3.760 million. Also it should be noted that the birthrate of 1971’s 17.2% has yet to be reached according to the 2000 census.

Trophy Kids

The Generation Y are sometimes called the "Trophy Generation", or "Trophy Kids," a term that reflects the trend in competitive sports (as well as many other aspects of life) where "no one loses" and everyone gets a "Thanks for Participating" trophy. Some employers are concerned that the members of Generation Y have too great expectations from the workplace and desire to shape their jobs to fit their lives rather than adapt their lives to the workplace.

Generation Y Globally

In many rich countries, the 1980s and 1990s were a period of rapidly falling birthrates. In Southern Europe and Japan, and less markedly in Northern and Eastern Europe, Generation Y is dramatically smaller than any of its predecessors, and its childhood years tended to be marked by small families, both immediate and extended, small classes at school and school closures. In the Soviet Union during the 1980s, there was a "baby boom echo" similar to that in the United States, and Generation Y there is relatively large; however, birth rates fell through the floor in the 1990s to extremely low levels. This meant a lot of individual attention from parents in a period in which society was becoming intrinsically more risk averse.

The child poverty rate was still relatively high in many Western countries throughout the 1980s and '90s.

The increasing stratification of wealth in many societies has led to an increase in the societal differences between poor and rich members of this generation. Although many middle class and wealthier families arrange many extra-curricular activities for their children, less affluent families cannot afford such extras, increasing the pressure on their own children. Since much of the generational character is tied to the prevalence of "extracurriculars" and relatively expensive technologies such as computers, some feel that the description of the generation only applies to wealthy members or at least the broadly middle class.

In Eastern Europe, Generation Y is the first generation without mature memories of communism or dictatorial rule. In newly rich countries such as South Korea or Greece, Generation Y has known nothing but developed world standards of living, while their grandparents often grew up in developing world conditions, causing considerable social changes and inter-generational difficulties as the young reject many traditional ways of life.

Generation Y was the first generation in countries like India and China to experience modern western amenities on a wide scale due to the liberalization of their economies.

External links

• Who's filling Y's shoes - The origin of Gen Y
• Generation Next, A PBS Documentary
• USA Today
• The "Millennials" Are Coming
• Generation Y's Goal: Wealth and fame?
• [http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/05/28/100033934/ Att
• The Gen Y Perceptions Study

International

• China's Generation Y: Understanding the Future Leaders of the World's Next Superpower
• A new switched-on and cynical generation

References

5- "Drug Survey of Students Finds Picture Very Mixed" by KATE ZERNIKE, New York Times, 12/20/05}} 6- Time Magazine, August 1, 2005. 7- The Wall Street Journal, 7/28/05. 8- William Strauss and Neil Howe Generations: The History of America's Future, 1584 to 2069:Perennial; Reprint edition (September 1, 1992) 9- After X Comes Y - echo boom generation enters workforce - Brief Article HR Magazine, April, 2001 by Julie Wallace 10-Brandchannel.com: Dr. Pete Markiewicz: Who's filling Gen Y's shoe's? 11-Millennial Manifesto: Scott Beale and Abeer Aballa-InstantPublisher (November, 2003) 12-CensusScope-Dominate Generations http://www.censusscope.org/us/map_generations.html 13-CDC report- Table 1-1. Live Births, Birth Rates, and Fertility Rates, by Race: United States,1909-2000