The Master Trend

Book excerpt: The Baby Boom generation is leading the nation into the future. Having elected one of its own to the White House, this generation - the largest and best educated in history - is poised to place its imprint on the 21st century. Cheryl Russell - acclaimed author of 100 Predictions for the Baby Boom and former editor-in-chief of American Demographics - meets the challenge of predicting the daunting future of this most singular of generations. Russell perceptively shows why members of the Baby Boom generation, born between 1946 and 1964, have always embraced their independence. This individualism has become the master trend of our time. But the Baby Boom generation is now finding itself in the midst of a midlife crisis as it is pulled in one direction by its sense of individualism and in another by its children. Baby Boomers, known for following the beat of their own drummer, are suddenly awakening to the urgent need to bring society together for the sake of their children's future. The Baby Boom generation prizes individualism so highly that it has become the first generation of what Cheryl Russell calls "free agents." Like Curt Flood - baseball's first free agent - the Baby Boomers play by their own rules. Free agents have become both the creators and the eager customers of a new, fast-paced, hotly competitive "personalized economy" that seizes on cutting-edge technologies to produce the innovative and custom-designed products and services the world so sorely needs. Will this personalized economy bring prosperity to Americans? Can the free agents of the Baby Boom generation make life better for all of us? Will they learn to work together for the good of society? Most important, what kind of society are the Baby Boomers leaving to their children? In a culture that values individualism above all, what will happen to the unprepared millions who are trapped in the margins of society? In a world where the disparity between rich and poor has grown dramatically what kind of tensions will arise? The Baby Boom generation is now laying the foundation for the next century. The choices it makes today will reshape America either into a society of turmoil and danger or into a brave new world of cooperation and prosperity. In this landmark work, Cheryl Russell presents the blueprint by which the Baby Boom generation will leave its legacy for the future