A GenZified America

If you haven’t read The Fourth Turning and The Upswing, you really should. Both books show how history is instructively cyclical. Gaze upon the mosaic of repeating patterns long enough and it acts as a crystal ball, bringing what lies ahead for our country into focus.

With history as our guide, predictions can be made. When enough Baby Boomers die off, it won’t be Generation X or the Millennials who remake America in their image. It’ll be Gen Z, today’s teens and twenty-somethings. Once Gen Z matures to full force, its influence will be as transformative as the Greatest Generation that lived through the Great Depression, went off to fight World War II and returned to fuel prolonged prosperity.

With Gen Z in the driver’s seat, passive climate concern will turn into desperate and determined climate action, in spite of widespread fear that the reparations come too late. Dissenters will be few and won’t be treated charitably. Corporate power will be increasingly challenged. Excesses of capi…