This opinion piece was written by Pacey Qi, an outspoken member of Generation Z.
For years, America’s boomer leaders have blindly ignored future generations, and they will throw Gen Z into poverty because of it. As the first generation to earn less than our parents, we must try to survive our difficult predicaments after struggling through the economic hardships of Covid-19.
The marginalization of Gen Z did not start this year. Politicians have ignored climate change since the 1980s, choosing instead to protect the profits of oil companies. Gen Z will be running from the ocean as it rises and consumes our cities and homes. American debt has been soaring for years; Gen Z will have to pay it back. While American oligarchs like Donald Trump can swim in their pool of wealth, Gen Z scour for scraps of money to survive. As politicians whine and cry about how much they want to play with guns, school kids are brutally murdered for grabbing onto an opportunity to escape their already difficult predicaments. Blood is on the politicians’ hands.
Current politicians have no reason to care. This is because of two reasons. The first is because of their old age. The average age for an American senator is 64. These senators will not live to see the effects of climate change, which will engulf our cities and our futures. They will not be stricken with the burden of paying back 33 trillion dollars of debt. Their policies may have provided politicians eager support from oligarchs who dump money on their foreheads as a result, but have also created a future generation impoverished by their decisions.
The second reason is their refusal to do anything that interferes with their precious, lucrative shares in mega corporations which pay them millions to advocate for them – the companies that seemingly are more valuable to them than the people in their country. Gerontocrats, such as Mitt Romney, Richard Burr, and Roy Blunt, actively advocate for loosened gun control, because gun companies pay them millions of dollars.
Armed with the knowledge of their indifference, Gen Z must choose a government which can represent them. Social stigmas of younger politicians being naïve cause many of them to lose votes, and therefore lose elections. We, the young people, must stand up to the boomers in Congress whose policies have stolen our futures and our livelihoods and tell them that they must step down. If we wish for a government that is willing to give the future of society opportunities that are like those of the current Gerontocrats, we must start by voting against them.
Written by Pacey Qi
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