The Boomer Factor: What Canada’s most famous generation is leaving behind
Author: Reginald W. Bibby
Published by: Bastian Books ($19.95)
Author Reg Bibby knows us very well. He knows how stressed we are, how many hours we sleep; he can write with some assurance about whether we’re feeling more or less fulfilled and, yes, how happy we are with our sex lives.
Canadians have been discussing their thoughts and lives with Bibby since 1975, when the University of Lethbridge professor began his Project Canada Survey series. He conducted his first national survey of adults and teenagers in 1975, just as the oldest Boomers were turning 30, and has continued his survey monitoring social trends every five years since. In his latest book, he examines the legacy of the large Boomer group among his survey respondents as they begin to move off the main national stage.
For the retirement community industry, this book is not so much a look back, but a peek into thefuture; just as the Boomers changed Canadian social trends, they will surely reshape retirement living. So Bibby brings us surveillance from the front, presented in a popular journalistic style, with lots of easy-to-understand graphs.
Society has changed in significant ways during the last 30 years, at least partly due to Boomers. Personal freedom is highly valued so organizations have had to learn to be happy with occasional participation. At the same time, decision-making has moved from obligation to gratification as “we practise highly selective consumption.” We do all this with more information and less time to sift through it. As Bibby puts it: “We think we know more than ever before about just about everything.” So the word of an expert “is increasingly not taken as definitive.”
If Boomers stay on course, continuing to put “me” before “we,” community activity in residential communities may become harder to promote. There will be more advice from people with a low-patience threshold.
The Boomer Factor is a valuable book and it brings a bonus. Bibby includes profiles of Post-Boomers, describing the people we’ll be hiring as staff to meet the needs of the Boomers
About Muriel Duncan
