All my generation has known is war and economic collapse. We deserve stability.
On behalf of my generation, I have a request: Can we move past "crisis" and into "stability?" Please.
As we witnessed the markets become so volatile that a single false tweet moved $4 trillion in the stock market Monday morning, I was reminded of the 1997 book, "The Fourth Turning: an American Prophecy' where the authors trace historical cycles spanning the past 500 years. Each cycle is roughly 80-100 years and consists of four distinct eras.
The cycle begins with a period of confidence, growth, and stability — called a "High" — followed by an era of spiritual exploration and cultural rebellion, the "Awakening." This transitions into an "Unraveling," when individualism surges and faith in institutions collapses.
Finally, society enters an upheaval, what the authors William Strauss and Neil Howe label 'Crisis' or 'the Fourth Turning,' and emerges on the other side fundamentally transformed. Think about the social and economic transformations that followed the end of WWII (1945), the Civil War (1865) and the American Revolution (1783 ) — each roughly 80 years apart.
Howe published a follow-up in 2023 titled "The Fourth Turning is Here." As a millennial, both books are compelling reads to understand what American life was like before the current 'Fourth Turning." Because, for my generation, 'crisis' is practically all we have ever known.
Millennials witnessed the deadliest attack on American soil live on television as teenagers, saw friends enlist in needless foreign wars, endured economic collapse right as we entered adulthood, rebuilt careers amidst a global pandemic and now are confronting yet another assault on our financial futures. And the eldest among our generation is only 44.
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I was 15 when the World Trade Center fell on 9/11. For many millennials, the images playing across our screens in real time, along with older generations' reactions, introduced the beginning stages of a world order that was far more uncertain and fragile than the 1990s would have had us believe.
I was 22 when the 2008 recession obliterated our prospects for the kinds of careers we'd been promised. We entered a historically terrible job market after taking out astronomical student loans to pay for the higher education we had been convinced was absolutely essential.
I was 33 when COVID-19 hit. The second major recession of my lifetime. For a little more than a decade, we did have a solid run building our careers and saving for homes, only for economic stability to get pulled out from under us once again.
I'm about to turn 39 and we're here: the beginning of the Trump Tariffs Timeline. One week in, it feels like it could be the beginning of another crisis. But maybe, hopefully, the beginning of the last one of this crisis era.
If you subscribe to Strauss and Howe's generational theory, this climax is right on schedule. Their original prediction was that an economic restructuring would happen around 2026. Howe's updated version pushed that timeline out to the early 2030s.
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Some have dismissed this theory as 'astrology for intellectuals,' but as a millennial, I'm really emotionally banking on these gentlemen being right in so far as their prediction that we are close to the end of this 'Crisis' phase and turning into a 'High' point.
Millennials have earned our shot at a 'confident growth and stability' economy because, despite our many obstacles, we have kept on keeping on since 2001. We're resilient because crisis has become our routine. Here's hoping we can turn the page … soon.
Kristin Brey is the "My Take" columnist for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Trump tariffs are hopefully the last of my economic woes | Opinion
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