Baby Boomers New Year's Resolution

By Kent Dagg,
CEO Shasta Builders Exchange
1/7/09

Happy New Year to all. It’s going to be a challenging one.

I am glad 2008 is over, for obvious reasons. As I try to look ahead at 2009, I sense mixed feelings. Our country, at all levels, is facing the toughest times my generation (the baby boomers) has ever seen. Our parents, the Greatest Generation, saw and dealt with much more and yet handed us a country in pretty good condition. We, in turn, are handing our kids exactly what? I’ve been wrestling with this issue for the last few weeks, as I try to get a handle on the New Year.

Sunday night, I had a great experience celebrating my stepfather’s 90th birthday. Herb is the definition of the Greatest Generation. He was born on January 6, 1919, to a poor Jewish family in New York City. His father had departed, so he labored hard to support and protect his sister and mother. While attending school, he took every job possible just to pay the rent. When the war broke out, Herb enlisted in the Army and was sent to the South Pacific. After the war, he went to college, working the entire duration, and earned a degree in Engineering and Metallurgies.

He continued working, using his strong mind as a scientist, and his strong body in his favorite past-time of sailing. His generosity to others was well known. Selflessness simply didn’t exist when it came to him.

Herb, despite the racism he’s experienced as a Jew, is more defined as an American. He loves this country and has proven it time and again. Now at 90, he still worries about our future. I look at him and worry about what we’ve let happen to his hard work.

I feel ashamed and embarrassed at how history will tell the story of the baby boomer generation. Sure, our generation master mined the technology era, and advanced medical research and inventions to new heights, we defended this country just like our fathers. Where we have failed, is on the financial mess and greed we’ve recently seen unfold. “Living within our means” is an expression we’ve thrown out, yet our parents lived by it.

As I’ve written before, I’m a Republican, President elect Obama is a Democrat, and I simply don’t care. The reality is, he won. We all need to help him succeed at, hopefully, turning this country around. The bottom line is, 2009 will be known as a defining year. I don’t think it will be a year of waiting for things to turn around but an aggressive year of change. The question will be, at what cost?

My New Year’s resolution? At 57, I was thinking that my generation has done its job, and to relax, but we haven’t done our job. For me, I want to finish what my parents started. I want to see history show that the Baby Boomers left their children an even better, financially sound Country.

Big resolution, yes, but it’s more honorable that just losing 10 pounds.