NEWSWIRE: 1/8/18

  • New analysis shows that perfectionism among U.S., U.K., and Canadian college students has risen since 1989. This trait has hit its zenith among Millennials, who since birth have been taught to set the bar high and to expect great things of themselves. (Psychological Bulletin)
    • NH: Perfectionism may sound like a good thing (wouldn't you like employees who do everything perfectly?), but this study points out the association between excessive perfectionism and emotional depression, "dysphoria," and lack of resilience. (See our discussion of the "teacup generation" here: "The Young and the Anxious.") The authors examine three types of perfectionism: being too harsh with yourself; being too harsh with others; and being too harsh with yourself in the eyes of others. While all have increased, the authors show that this third type of perfectionism has risen most steeply over the last generation--a finding which conforms pretty well with this generation's strong other-direction and community orientation.
  • After decreasing in 2015, U.S. life expectancy at birth fell to 78.6 years in 2016—marking the first two-year decline in half a century. A major contributor is the ongoing opioid epidemic: The total number of opioid deaths soared 28% YOY in 2016. (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)
    • NH: This is old news to readers of our reports! The final number of drug overdose fatalities in 2016 came in at 63,300--and just the share of this total due to opioids (thanks to the recent and meteoric rise of fentanyl deaths) is now larger than traffic fatalities. All age groups are taking part in the epidemic, with the partial exception of early-wave Boomers and Silent (age 70+) and youth (under age 25). Back in 2000, the overdose mortality rate at age 55-64 was about equal to the death rate for youth age 18-25; today it is twice as high. Better news is that the Q2 2017 NCHS data show overall mortality declining again YOY, due to continued improvement in cardiovascular and cancer morbidity among older age groups.
  • Contributor Suzanne Woodley urges Boomers to make “spending money” their New Year’s resolution. While retirees often have a hard time parting with their hard-earned cash, Boomer spendthrifts will likely have no trouble splurging on luxury cars and spoiling their grandchildren. (Los Angeles Times)
    • NH: This is just what we need near the end of a long business cycle with the personal savings rate hitting post-recession lows and a widening fiscal deficit chasm opening in front of us: financial advisors telling Boomers spend more of their assets! Is she prepping us for the next recession, or what? RIAs are calling this "decumulation strategy." Memo to the quoted advisers at BlackRock: Wholesale "decumulation" by today's seniors would turn America into a current-account black hole.
  • Author Paul Gorman argues in his new book that U.K. magazine The Face captured the heart and soul of Generation X. Between its oppositional content and focus on subcultures, this publication just “got” the teens and 20-somethings who identified as misfit loners in the ‘80s and ‘90s. (BBC)
    • NH: Wonderful piece for anyone into the cultural history of Gen X. Want to know how we moved from the post-punk London scene of the late '70s to the new wave, glam rock, thrash metal, multicultural scene of the 1980s--and then further into the harrowing grunge and digital era of the 1990s, full of broken fonts and neo-contructivist page designs? Want to know who made heroin chic (Kate Moss) famous? This magazine. Created by Boomer Nick Logan (born 1947), The Face arose in 1980 and disintegrated in 2000, years that almost perfectly coincide with the coming of age of X.
  • Californians ages 10 to 17 were arrested at a lower rate YoY in 2016 for the ninth year in a row. As is the case throughout the rest of the country, Millennials’ risk-averse, rule-abiding behavior has brought down youth crime rates in California. (California Department of Justice)
    • NH: This is not just a California thing. It's a nationwide generational trend. Here are three age-arrest curves for the United States (taken from the Bureau of Justice Statistics) that pretty much tell the story:

The Millennial Race to Perfection. NewsWire - 1 8 2018 12 08 23 PM

  • Aging Boomers are starting to see the appeal of age-restricted communities. While retirement communities have a bad reputation among this forever-young generation, many Boomers who decided to age in place are not accepting the title of “old people next door” very well. (The New York Times)
    • NH: With Boomers aging in place, working more, and wanting to be closer to their children, age-restricted (or "active adult") communities are declining in popularity. To attract many Boomers at all, developers can't build huge tracts out in the middle of the desert anymore (like the Sun Cities and Leisure Worlds in which their parents once congregated). Increasingly, they are building smaller communities close in to major urban centers--as in the Long Island example featured in this story. (The trick is to live close to your kids, but so close that you have to pay the real-estate taxes that fund their schools!) Still, keep the numbers in perspective: 4,000 age-restricted units account for less than one in a hundred of every Long Island resident over age 65.
  • WeWork has acquired Meetup, a social network designed to help people organize in-person gatherings. The deal has synergy for both sides: WeWork expands its possible user base, while Meetup harnesses WeWork’s physical footprint to offer Millennials a cool place to convene. (The New York Times)
  • The Pantera Bitcoin Fund, a hedge fund launched in 2013, has returned a mind-boggling 25,000% over the life of the fund. Success stories like these are inspiring unbridled bullishness among investors—who will be sorry once this Bitcoin bubble eventually bursts. (The New York Times)
  • More employers are allowing pets in the office, with some even offering “pawternity leave” to workers who need time off to care for their furry friends. These pro-pet policies have become particularly popular in urban centers like New York City, where dog leashes are more common than baby carriages among Millennial urbanites. (The Wall Street Journal)
    • NH: We have written often on our hugely bullish outlook for the pet care industry. (See: "Pet Care: The Four-Legged Bull Market.") Scolds may say there is something decadent about Millennials raising pets rather than kids (less commitment required from them, yet also less return to society). Yet perhaps this preference may change along with the economic and political outlook. For now, it's a phenomenon noticeable throughout the lower-fertility end of the high-income world--from Spain and Italy to Japan and South Korea. Back in the post-World War II American High, policymakers put in place huge pro-family tax and benefit incentives to favor larger families. Today, there is little such interest (though note the last-minute furor before Christmas ignited by Senators Marco Rubio and Mike Lee over the child tax credit). As this story's author notes, employers of high-end Millennial professionals often offer better benefits for their employees' pets than most employers offer for their employees' real children.
  • Contributor Barry Ritholtz argues that retailers haven’t yet realized that Millennials don’t seek fulfillment through shopping like their Boomer parents. Today’s young consumers have traded materialism for experiences—and retailers that can’t figure out how to take advantage of this shift are falling by the wayside. (Bloomberg Business)

      DID YOU KNOW?

      Dreaming of a White Christmas Tree. Faux Christmas trees have long been a faux pas, relegated to the storage closet in favor of the real thing. But now, as The Wall Street Journal reports, fake is in style—and the faker, the better. Carrie Chen, brand manager for online Christmas tree vendor Treetopia, says that her store’s sales of white trees rose 44.5 percent in 2017. Online retailer Wayfair, meanwhile, reports that sales of white trees from October to December 10 quadrupled YOY, with the most popular models selling out altogether. What’s going on? Perhaps America’s yearlong obsession with going all-natural is all but spent by December: Sally Swift, who swapped her usual real Christmas tree for a fake white one this year, says that, “There is so much freedom for me in this.” The rise of social media is another driver: When adorned with ornaments, white trees provide a vibrant color contrast that’s practically tailor-made for Instagram.