Getty Images; Alyssa Powell/BI
You know “main character syndrome?” The phenomenon/meme that posits that certain people go about life like they’re the stars of their own private TV show? Gen X, broadly speaking, is suffering from a perpetual case of whatever the opposite of that is. They’re the cool kids in the back of the classroom who act so chill that the teacher, the principal, the lunch lady, and all the other kids barely notice they’re there.
Gen Xers — people born from 1965 to 1980 — have a reputation for being the “forgotten generation.” When the discussion of generations comes up in popular culture, work, or the media, it tends to be framed as baby boomers vs. millennials or millennials vs. Gen Z. Gen Xers are sort of just squashed in there, if they come up at all. To be totally transparent, we here at Business Insider play into this, too: We’ve published 166 stories about Gen Z, 123 stories about millennials, and 97 stories about boomers this year, while we’ve touched on Gen X only 34 times. And in many cases, Gen X has been a footnote in the story.
It’s complicated to unpack why Gen X is so overlooked and what it all means. Some of it’s a question of numbers. Gen Xers are sandwiched between two giant, transformational generations. In some ways, they’re a transitional bridge between them.
“It’s almost like Gen X was a journey from boomer to millennial, and it wasn’t a destination at any point,” says Jason Salmon, a standup comic whose comedy often focuses on the plight of Gen X. Online, he jokes, younger generations identify themselves with pronouns, and older generations do flags, but “we’re in this middle ground, where there’s no emoji for concert T-shirts.”
Some of Gen X’s discourse disappearing act is contextual. Many Gen Xers, famously, were latchkey kids, often left to their own devices after school while their parents were at work. They grew up in the 1990s, a solid time for the US economically, but also an era of transition in technology, politics, and culture. They idolized Luke Skywalker as kids and then came of age with Kurt Cobain, a shift from romantic heroism to grunge cynicism. Whereas boomers were the “me generation” and millennials were the “me me me generation,” Gen X has become the “meh” generation.
“We historically have wanted to kind of fly under the radar,” says Erin Mantz, the founder of Gen X Girls Grow Up, a blog and Facebook group for Gen X women. “We kind of were like, ‘Whatever.'”
Gen X’s “whatever” attitude has translated to a society that’s perpetually a little “whatever” about them.
When I called up Megan Gerhardt, a professor of leadership and management at Miami University who’s a Gen Xer herself, to ask for her take on the whole forgotten generation thing, I floated the idea that maybe a lot of it was about middle age. Gen X right now is 44 to 60, in the throes of what’s supposed to be the most miserable era of life. Is the problem that talking about it too much would just be depressing? Gerhardt shoots down my thesis immediately.
“It’s kind of on brand that Gen X is overlooked,” says Gerhardt, who is also the author of the book “Gentelligence: The Revolutionary Approach to Leading an Intergenerational Workforce.”
A big part of the issue is that the generation never became the most dominant force, population-wise. Millennials surpassed boomers as the US’s largest generation years ago — Gen X never got there. “I don’t think Gen X had as significant of a ripple because of the statistical side,” she says. Another statistical issue: Gen X was the “least supervised” generation, she says. In many households, they were the first cohort of kids to have both parents working outside the home, and it happened at a time before they’d figured out day care entirely or helicopter parenting was in vogue. This meant many Gen Xers had to be more independent and autonomous. There was no tech for their parents to track them or cellphones to even reach them. Gen X kids were expected to watch TV after school and put dinner in the oven before Mom and Dad got home. They were the “supporting actors” in the family, Gerhardt says, not the focal point.
It’s kind of on brand that Gen X is overlooked.
Jean Twenge, the Gen X author of “Generations: The Real Differences Between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents — and What They Mean for America’s Future,” tells me many people of her generation say they don’t feel as distinctive as the groups above or below them. Gen X’s psychological profile tracks a shift across generations, she says, “when you look at, say, increases in positive self-views and individualism that grew steadily from boomers to Gen Xers to millennials.” Citing the American Freshman Survey, which tracks the attitudes of incoming college freshmen in the US, Twenge notes that from boomers to Gen X to millennials, young people have become more focused on their financial well-being than developing a meaningful philosophy of life and have become likelier to think they’re above average. Gen X was the transitional phase from one mindset to the other.
This dynamic has left Gen X with a sort of generational middle-child syndrome. They feel overlooked and stuck between self-centered boomer parents above them and perhaps even more self-centered up-and-comer millennials behind them. But they’re also good at figuring stuff out on their own, and a lot of them say they’d really rather be left alone.
“We’re super proud of how independent and resourceful we are,” Mantz says.
The ambivalent attitude Gen X embodies is appealing. Part of Salmon’s Gen X routine is that the generation’s slogan is, “I don’t care,” which can be empowering but also presents problems at work and for people just trying to muddle through life.
Gen Xers were the first generation to reject the baby boomer work ethic and rat race. There’s a reason movies such as “The Breakfast Club,” “Slackers,” “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” “Reality Bites,” and “Office Space” have come to epitomize them. That’s good in that there’s more to life than work, but it’s also difficult when there’s a super-hungry generation coming up right behind you. As much as millennials prioritize work-life balance, they also want to get ahead, and their employers have been happy to help them get there.
“When millennials came to the workplace, they brought that hustle culture of you work hard and you go for it, anything’s possible for you,” Gerhardt says.
Many businesses created fast-track programs to get millennials into leadership, which often leapfrogged the Gen Xers in the room for some positions. It’s left Gen X in a mediator role within the hierarchy and in a weird limbo. Given their age, Gen Xers do occupy the C-suite — about half of Fortune 500 CEOs are Gen Xers — but millennials now make up the largest share of managers in the workforce overall. As the Wall Street Journal notes, people in their 50s are losing share of CEO spots in the Russell 3000. Many Gen Xers feel like they’re stuck with a boomer executive who won’t retire or a millennial young gun who shot to the front of the line. They’re the translators between the old and the young, trying to find common ground. It’s worth pointing out that we haven’t had a Gen X president yet, either — the cohort is more of a victim of America’s political gerontocracy problem than anyone.
Mantz says part of the reason she started her community for Gen X women was to try to get them to make a little more noise and get themselves into positions of power, despite their low-key inclinations.
One part of the Gen X wealth story is they really took a hit from the financial crisis in 2007, 2008, at a time when they were just starting to build wealth.
“We’re having to shift gears. We are being forgotten. We’re being taken for granted,” she says. “We are such a strong and steady force at work, and if we don’t start changing the way we amplify our generation, we will continue to be overlooked.”
Gen Xers also aren’t particularly happy, and again, not just because they’re middle-aged. Frank Infurna, a psychology professor at Arizona State University, tells me that Gen Xers in the US are reporting higher levels of loneliness, more depressive symptoms, and poorer physical health than other generations. He says their cognition is worse, too. He chalks it up to a variety of factors. Gen X started working during the transition from pensions to 401(k)s, when the onus for retirement savings switched from employers to employees, and many workers were still figuring the system out. They’re the first generation raising kids in today’s hypercompetitive educational environment, with all the pressures to make sure your children succeed. They’ve also lived through a lot of economic upheaval, even if we don’t always talk about it.
“They’ve dealt with the dot-com bubble burst, the Great Recession, and it’s like, can you just have some stability when it comes to these big economic events?” Infurna says.
Jeremy Horpedahl, an economist at the University of Central Arkansas who studies wealth across generations, echoes the point. “One part of the Gen X wealth story is they really took a hit from the financial crisis in 2007, 2008, at a time when they were just starting to build wealth,” he says. “They have recovered since then, but it took a long time for them to catch back up to where baby boomers were at the same point in their life.”
The vibe from Gen Xers on their neglected status is mixed. On the one hand, a lot of them are fine doing their own thing. On the other hand, it’s not particularly fun to have your experiences constantly erased from the narrative.
It’s not the case that Gen X hasn’t left its mark on American culture. I think there’s an argument to be made that in many ways it’s more significant than boomers and millennials, but much of what Gen Xers have contributed doesn’t get pinned to their age as much as other generations. “Friends” is Gen X, but nowadays doesn’t really code as such. The same goes for “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “The X-Files” and “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.” They don’t feel as generationally specific as, say, “Girls” or “M*A*S*H.” Angelina Jolie is Gen X, as are Jennifer Aniston, Ethan Hawke, Will Smith, and we’ll count Brad Pitt, too. We see them as the big movie stars, not the big movie stars of a certain era or age. Facebook’s cofounder Mark Zuckerberg: solidly millennial. Apple’s Steve Jobs: boomer. Google’s founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin: Gen X, which I bet you never even thought about.
To be sure, this isn’t true in every arena. Beck, Nirvana, and Pearl Jam epitomize Gen X music culture, like Taylor Swift and Beyoncé do millennials these days. Gen X also got a bit of a nostalgia hit over the past few years, which millennials are only getting a taste of now and Gen Z is about 10 years away from.
This may be the millennial in me talking — after all, Gen X teens were my “cool kids” growing up — but Gen Xers getting to fly under the radar does seem like a solid deal. Maybe they’re not managers at work, but middle managers are getting phased out anyway, and besides the pay, being in charge of everything doesn’t seem that awesome in terms of actually enjoying life. They don’t get blamed for ruining everything like millennials do because they eat avocado toast, or Gen Zers because they stare weirdly. Gen X has a sort of soft power that comes with people not paying attention to you all the time. And they got to experience life before the internet, which, what a joy! They know how to adapt to technology, but they’re also aware it can be tricky.
“Before we got the internet, we got Terminator,” Salmon says.
Perhaps Gen X is finally about to have its moment in the sun, politically, culturally, etc. The ’90s are making a comeback, after all. If not, whatever.
Emily Stewart is a senior correspondent at Business Insider, writing about business and the economy.