Millennials are Not Children

The problem with infantilizing a whole generation

If I had a nickel for every time I heard that dumb millennials are kids who don’t know anything, proud gulpers of Tide Pods with suspiciously leftist leanings and paper-thin skin, I wouldn’t be as broke as a — well, millennial.

Doncha know, “millennial” is code for “someone too young to take seriously.”

Millennials have observed that many people over the age of 50 seem to think that “millennial” means anyone under 40. Some people think it’s an age group rather than a generation. Others know it’s a generation and insist that it’s the laziest, most entitled and coddled generation that can’t take a joke.

It’s not that we can’t take a joke. It’s just that jokes about millennials are punching down.

Millennials are a particularly downtrodden generation of people who entered the workforce during the worst possible time and had their American Dreams dashed. They started out their careers earning less, which made it harder for them to move up the financial ladder. (When you establish a baseline salary or are forced to accept a lower-paying job or a job outside your field, you hurt your marketability for better-paying jobs.) The cost of tuition spiked…