读不懂美国。最近几件事，更是让自己觉得越读越糊涂： 

·         老布什去世，这位“难得”的只做过一任总统就被拉下马的人，就守卫总统宝座而言，应该说是做的很不怎么地，因为几乎每位总统都能做两届，他却没做到。可就是他，今天成为全国人民想念的好总统，至少媒体给的印象是这样，为什么？

·         美国历史上活得最久，对中国最了解的总统，上任不久中国政治开始走向最低谷（1990年），一辈子守着一个自己十七岁时遇到的十六岁女神，对独裁政权敢打敢拼，让苏联解体，让政治低估之中的中国再次回到世界大家庭，觉得孤立中国并不是最好的选择。

·         现任总统川普，几乎在样样指标上都和老布什对着干：老婆一节节的更换上瘾，在历届总统中最不被人待见，几乎和过往总统都有过节，不受人喜欢；连麦凯恩去世，末了死了都想着法子羞辱总统一番，连去参加自己葬礼这样的“荣誉”都不给，虽然对方贵为世界领袖，最厉害国家的总统，天下第一权力拥有者。川普有苦说不出，也拿麦凯恩没有办法，只能自己暗中叹息。即使如此，川普似乎也不怎么在乎，继续我行我素，不觉得自己做错什么，也不觉得和昔日的总统们搞好关系有什么意义。

·         被老人们不待见的川普总统，居然在普通民众中拥有历史上最高的支持率。这些支持川普喜欢他做法的民众，似乎多数也喜爱麦凯恩，这位美国历史上不多见的好政治家，还有奥巴马、克林顿、小布什，这些选民昔日自己选出的总统们。这是因为选民的兴趣发生变化，还是选民们此刻的心情自己也搞不明白，到底是什么样子的。

·         川普现在的处境几乎是四面楚歌，国内被司法系统的刺头们紧紧的盯着、咬着，国外四面树敌，想制服所有人，包括自己昔日的盟友，却没几人屈服，现在只好拿中国这个最大的潜在对手开刀，看看能不能在历来软弱的中国人那捞点便宜，获得围魏救赵的效果。

·         川普发力，对中国四面围堵，如果成功了，他会成为改变世界格局的大英雄：老布什制服了苏联，自己制服了中国！就此，他可能看不到，自己留给世界的将是暂时镇痛的中国政府和大众，百年后很可能就是个更强大的中国。对于长远的效果，他自然没有兴趣去想，就像美国现在不得不面对的越来越巨大的国债：爆发危机是后来者的事情，那时自己已经不是总统，这样的境界，估计也只有川普这样的政客才能做到，才敢说。即使中国帮助美国降低了贸易逆差，那么，下一步是不是也得逼着中国帮美国降低政府赤字？

·         最近三十年，中国发生巨变，美国也一样，只是表现的形式不同。最近三十年通过改革开放获得巨大社会变革和经济发展。美国也有一代人对应中国的这个时代，被称作“千禧代”或叫Y代，婴儿潮X代后的一代人。在中国，八零后觉得自己的日子没六零、七零后过的好，也就是说，在中国“千禧代”过的不如“婴儿潮”那代人，觉得是没赶上时代。美国的情况似乎也类似。后面的文章给出了详细的，基于统计数字的分析。

·         目前主导美国政治的主要还是婴儿潮一代，千禧代在发力。在科技领域，千禧代则已经占住重要阵地，网路时代，本来就是他们的地盘。那么，未来几十年，美国的走向会因为这些人生活习性的变化带来什么样的变化？川普使出的从政手段的“与往不同”和无底线的“发横”，会不会刚好做了两代人之间“无缝对接”的工作？

·         无论如何，理解美国的未来，先得好好的理解千禧一代人！他们的处境，他们的喜好，他们的选择。

婴儿潮，是二战之后出生的那一代人，主要是五零后和六零后。跟随其后的就是“千禧”一代。下面的介绍内容来自《维基百科》：

从威廉·斯特劳斯与尼尔·郝伊的书《世代：1584年到2069年的美国未来历史》（Generations: The History of America's Future, 1584 to 2069）、使用了不同名词（Y世代与千禧世代）来描述这个特定的美国世代，因此两方引起了相当大的争辩。Y世代在名称上具有紧密从X世代接续的意涵；而千禧世代则明确的给出了特色和结束点。于是两位作者引用美国人口统计学的历史与大量研究，又推出了《千禧风云（意为千禧世代的堀起）》（Millennials Rising）这本新书。

在《世代》这本书中，郝伊和斯特劳斯将Y世代的诞生时期定义为1982年到2000年，并以2000年时毕业的18岁高中生为主角。原因是这一届毕业的高中生，在成长时期，受到许多媒体关注他们的就业、生活、消费、政治与社会观点等。这一点提供了他们之前与之后出生族群对比对早期的Y世代来说，他们正好处于一个科技“起飞”的年头，因此对他们来说，新科技总是在“那边”等待着他们，许多早期的Y世代都是技术或专业领域的佼佼者。尽管学者对他们所擅长的领域究竟是专一的还是混合的，时有争论，但早期的Y世代和X世代有所明显区别的，往往在于面对新科技的态度，相较之下，X世代是较为保守、悲观的。早期的Y世代则是易于接受的。

Y世代爱旅游、爱转工、爱虚拟、爱手机...对工作的态度大多是自我、讲求灵活、不计回报(部分人)只问快乐。简言之，他们不像X世代般“为工作而活”，而是“为生活才工作”。

根据以往研究，购房需求受诸多因素驱动，例如：利率，移民，房屋市场之投资价值。Y世代认为负担能力为最重要因素，X世代则认为价格才是首要因素。Y世代较着重政府相关政策帮助，X世代更着重生活质素。

下列几个历史事件是学者经常拿来定义Y世代的关键：

·         挑战者号航天飞机爆炸事件，1986年1月28日，这个事件是分离X世代与Y世代的主要事件，多数Y世代的成员太小，记不得这个全球性的历史事件，或是他们根本就还没有出生。

·         苏联解体、第一次波斯湾战争。这是属于Y世代中期的重要全国性事件。多数Y世代都记得住这个事件。

·         在1996年到2001年间，个人电脑和互联网迅速的普及，这也是少部分家庭能负担得起电脑和网络费的Y世代记忆之一。这部分的Y世代多有在网络事业与电脑科技界成功的案例。

·         911事件也是Y世代的关键事件。不少学者认为911事件之后出生的世代，就不能算是Y世代的范围。而1997年之后出生的孩子，由于在2001年911事件发生时，他们才4岁不到，对此事件印象不深，也不能算做Y世代。也就是说，1997年之后，可算是Y世代的尾声，Z世代的开始。但这一论点目前还在持续的争执当中。

·         阿富汗与伊拉克战争，还有美国的反恐战争，是Y世代记忆中的战争事件关键。此事件可等同于GI世代中的第二次世界大战，或是婴儿潮世代中的越战。

延伸阅读：Millennials Didn’t Kill the Economy. The Economy Killed Millennials.

Derek Thompson

When a staid American institution is declared dead, the news media like to haul the same usual suspect before the court of public opinion: the Millennial generation.

The 80 million–plus people born in the United States between the early 1980s and the late 1990s stand accused of assassinating various hallmarks of modern life. The list of the deceased includes golf, department stores, the McDonalds McWrap, and canned tuna. Millennials tore up napkins, threw out mayonnaise, and mercifully disposed of divorce and Applebee’s before graduating to somewhat postmodern crimes: “Have Millennials Killed Serendipity?” With the national murder rate in long-term decline, it may even be said that Millennials are killing killing.

But according to a new report by economists at the Federal Reserve, this genre of news analysis is pure fiction.

When researchers compared the spending habits of Millennials with those of young people from past years, such as the Baby Boomers and Gen Xers, they concluded that “Millennials do not appear to have preferences for consumption that differ significantly from those of earlier generations.” They also found that “Millennials are less well off than members of earlier generations when they were young, with lower earnings, fewer assets, and less wealth.”

Millennials aren’t doing in the economy. It’s the economy that’s doing in Millennials.

My history with the accused goes back several years.

In 2012, I published a column in The Atlantic with Jordan Weissmann, now a writer at Slate, called “The Cheapest Generation.” That headline—which got us in trouble because it was the only thing most people read—was a bit of a misdirection. The deeper question of the piece was whether the Great Recession might permanently reduce young people’s taste for houses and cars—two of the most vital engines of the economy.

For years, various outlets, including The Washington Post and the Pew Research Center, continued reporting that young people were buying fewer cars and houses than those in previous generations at a similar point in their life. In 2016, about 34 percent of Americans under 35 owned a house; when Boomers and Gen Xers were under 35, about half of them did.

But the fact that young people are buying fewer houses and cars doesn’t prove that they want fewer houses and cars. It might mean they simply can’t afford them. That latter conclusion is now supported by research from the Federal Reserve.

Fed economists found that the depressed rate of homeownership among Millennials was entirely about income and affordability. Young Boomers and young Gen Xers made significantly more money at a similar point in their life cycle, they said, and controlling for income and employment wiped out all generational differences.

Just as important, homes in the United States are less affordable than they used to be. According to the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University, the typical sale price of an existing single-family home in 2017 was 4.2 times greater than the median household income; that’s 30 percent higher than in 1988. It’s even worse in some cities. Since the late 1980s, price-to-income ratios have more than doubled in metro areas such as Miami, Denver, and Seattle. In San Francisco, the median house price doubled in just five years to more than $1.6 million. That’s a lot of foregone avocado toast.

On the car front: News reports sometimes find that the average age of new-car buyers is quickly rising, which makes it sound like young people are ditching their ride. But as the Fed economist Christopher Kurz has shown in several studies, that factoid is somewhat misleading. Young people actually buy the same number of cars per capita today that they did in 2005, at the height of the housing bubble. The average age of car buying is going up almost entirely because Americans older than 55 are buying more new vehicles than they were 20 years ago. In 1995, Americans over 55 bought about one-third of all new cars. Today they’re buying almost two-thirds.

It’s also true that Millennials spend less than previous generations on transportation. But everybody is spending less; total transportation spending has declined as a share of the typical household’s budget by almost 5 percent in the past 30 years, according to the Fed. Perhaps that’s because people hold on to their car for longer, or own a more efficient car that requires fewer tune-ups. Or maybe that’s a result of the declining cost of new vehicles under the North American Free Trade Agreement, which shifted some auto-manufacturing work to Mexico.

The economists ultimately found “no evidence that Millennials have preferences for vehicle purchases that are lower than those of earlier generations.” Case closed.

It’s typical for Millennials to bear blame for dramatic cultural and economic changes when their only crime is behaving like everybody else. For example, last year The Wall Street Journalpublished a report that cited young people for killing grocery stores. The proof? Consumers ages 25 to 34 are spending less at traditional grocers than their parents’ generation did in 1990. Seems pretty damning. But upon closer examination, the stagnation of grocery stores is a complex story that implicates just about everybody. Americans of all ages are relying more on convenience stores, such as CVS, and superstores, such as Walmart, for food to eat at home, and those institutions aren’t typically counted as grocers in government data. Also, Americans of all ages are eating out at restaurants more. The group shifting its spending toward restaurants the fastest? It’s not 20-somethings. It’s people over 65.

In the biggest picture—from cars and houses to restaurants and grocers—Millennials aren’t serial killers. They’re serial scapegoats.

If there is one category in which the generation born between the early 1980s and the late 1990s really is different, it’s politics.

Young people are not only to the left of the country, but also to the left of previous generations of young people. In national elections, Millennials have voted for Democrats over Republicans by unprecedented margins. They are far more open to various strands of socialism—including social democracy and democratic socialism. As I wrote in summarizing their political views in 2016, Millennials “sense that they are both America’s impoverished generation and its moral guardians—absent on the payroll, but present at the revolution.”

Why would young people feel such revolutionary fervor? Maybe it’s not because Millennials have rejected the American dream, but rather because the economy has not only blocked their path to attaining it but punished them for trying to.

Millennials are the most educated generation in U.S. history to date. They bought into a social contract that said: Everything will work out, if first you go to college. But as the cost of college increased, millions of young people took on student loans to complete their degree. Graduates under 35 are almost 50 percent more likely than members of Gen X to have student loans, and their median balance is about 40 percent higher than that of the previous generation.

And what has all that debt gotten them? “Lower earnings, fewer assets, and less wealth,” according to the Federal Reserve paper’s conclusion. Student debt has made it harderfor millions of young people to buy a home, since “holding debt is associated with a lower rate of homeownership, irrespective of degree type,” as Fed economists wrote in a previous study. In other words, young people took on debt to pursue a college degree, only to discover that the cost of college would push the American dream further from their grasp.

Is it any wonder that Millennials are eager to overthrow a system that has duped them into a story of permanent progress, thrown them into debt, depressed their wages, separated them from the trappings of adulthood, and then, for good measure, blamed them for ruining canned tuna?

When the 20th-century sociologist James Chowning Davies studied the political convulsions of France and 20th-century Russia, he observed that the conditions for revolution are ripest “when a prolonged period of economic and social development is followed by a short period of sharp reversal.” These revolutions occurred, he said, when a large group of people felt that reality had suddenly fallen short of their expectations for social or economic development.

Millennials were promised rising wages, homes, and cars; they got 140 characters. Okay, fine, 280 characters. That’s nothing to live on. But it’s just enough to efficiently articulate one’s despondency alongside 80 million frustrated peers, all of whom are exasperated with a system that keeps finding new ways to brand its young economic victims as cultural criminals.