This week, leaders in the House and Senate are debating whether to extend the payroll tax cut for workers in 2012. If Congress doesn’t vote in favor of extending the tax cut, employees will begin paying a 6.2 percent tax on their wages in January, up from 4.2 percent this year.
So, what does that mean for young Americans? A lot. 45 million young workers pay payroll taxes, and could get significantly less earnings in their paycheck if the tax break is not extended.
In 2011, Congress temporarily reduced the Social Security payroll tax from 6.2% to 4.2%, to get the economy growing again by putting more money in Americans’ pockets. So, if someone made $30,000 in 2010, she paid $1,860 in payroll taxes. But in 2011, with the 2% tax cut, she paid $1,260 in payroll taxes and had an extra $600 to put in the local economy.
Leaders from both parties have said they agree the tax cut should be extended, but remain divided over how to pay for it, and whether to include other policy provisions in a legislative package. To offset the payroll tax cut and not add to the deficit, Senate Democrats are proposing a 3.25% tax on people who earn over $1 million. On the other hand, Congressional Republicans want to offset the tax cut with reduced spending elsewhere, and have included controversial provisions like requiring the President to move forward with an oil pipeline.
Votes are expected this week as Congress negotiates the 2012 budget, and much is at stake for young workers. If the extension doesn’t pass, 45 million working Americans under 30 would see their payroll taxes go up in 2012.
To find out more on the payroll tax cut, click here.
With President Obama’s speech in Osawatomie, Kansas decrying the growing economic inequality and lack of upward mobility in America, the issue has finally arrived at the center of this year’s campaign debates. While most discussions of this growing inequality focus on the gap between America’s poorest and richest citizens, a recent report by the Pew Foundation highlights how the same economic trends over the last two and a half decades have also widened the wealth gap between the oldest and youngest Americans to the highest levels in history.
In a time of great political unrest and economic anxiety, this inter-generational wealth gap has the potential to throw gasoline on an already white hot fire. Only by understanding the sources of this increasing disparity can the country develop policies that will help to close the gap and create a fairer, less economically stratified society.
Drawing on data provided by the U.S. Census Bureau’s Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), Pew documents the tectonic shifts that have occurred in households’ net worth based upon age between 1985 and 2009. During this time, the average net worth of households headed by those under 35 fell from $11,521 to just $3,662, a drop of 68%. During the same period, the net wealth of households, as measured by adding up the value of all assets owned minus liabilities such as mortgages or credit card debt associated with those assets, headed by those over 65 increased by 42%, from $120,457 to $170,494 (all figures are expressed in 2010 dollars).
Of course younger households have always been less wealthy than older ones, since the heads of those households haven’t had a lifetime to acquire wealth. In 1984, this effect of age on household wealth meant that senior citizen households had, on average, ten times the wealth of those headed by people younger than 35. However, the enormous generational shift in household wealth that occurred in the intervening twenty-five years meant that, by 2009, the net worth of senior citizen households was 47 times greater than younger households. The resulting disparities in economic well-being are reflected in each generation’s perception of its own economic situation.
Those Americans over 65 in 2009 are members of what generational historians call the Silent Generation. Only 25% of Silents expressed any dissatisfaction with their personal financial situation that year, a percentage that did not increase in the next two years of the Great Recession.
By contrast, 36% of people under 35 in 2009 – mostly members of the Millennial Generation – expressed dissatisfaction with their individual finances in 2009, a number that rose to 39% in 2011. But the biggest jump in dissatisfaction with personal finances between 2009 and 2011 occurred among the next older cohort, who are considered to be members of Generation X. In 2009, only 30% of Xers felt dissatisfied, a number that shot up to 42% in 2011. Finally, 32% of the Baby Boom generation, born from 1946 to 1964 and approaching their retirement years in 2009, were dissatisfied with their personal financial situation, a number that rose only to 39% by 2011.
One of the reasons behind this disparity of financial and economic concern among generations lies with the different impact the nation’s housing market has had on each generation between 1985 and 2009. The great housing price collapse that began in 2008 had little impact on Millennials, only 18% of whom currently own their own home. By comparison, 57% of Gen Xers own their own home. Three-fourths of them bought after 2000 when housing prices began to soar. As a result, about one in five members of Gen X now say their home mortgage is under water, with the balance owed greater than the value of the house. By comparison, only 13% of Boomers and a miniscule 4% of Silents, most of whom bought homes well before the crash, report having under water mortgages. In fact, if it weren’t for the overall rise in housing prices since 1984 that Silents were able to take advantage of, that generation’s net worth would have fallen by a third in the twenty-five years since, instead of rising by 42%. Clearly, to improve Gen X’s attitudes toward the economy and reduce the inter-generational wealth gap, something must be done to fix the nation’s housing market.
For older generations – Boomers facing retirement and Silents already enjoying their new life – housing is not an especially large concern. Retirement savings based on stock market valuations and/or interest rates and the certainty of pension payments are clearly a much bigger issue with these generations. Almost two-thirds of Boomers believe they may have to defer their retirement beyond 65 because of the decline in their savings and net worth, with about one in four now expecting to work until at least 70. While the stock market has almost fully recovered from the 2008 crash, for those counting on a more interest-oriented set of retirement payouts from bonds or CDs, years of rock bottom interest rates, designed by the Federal Reserve to stimulate the housing market and help the economy recover, have made these investments problematic at best. In some ways, economic policies that are designed to help Gen X with their housing challenges offer older generations scant comfort, and in certain instances actually exacerbate their concerns over their personal finances.
Millennials diminished sense of economic opportunity remains focused almost entirely on the job market. About two-thirds of Millennials are employed but only slightly half of those are working full-time. Almost two-thirds of Millennials without a job are looking for work. Unemployment among 16-24 year olds rose to 19.1% by the fourth quarter of 2009, a full eight points higher than in 2007 before the crash. For all other generations, unemployment has gone up on average by only 5 points during the same time period. It seems too obvious to be worth stating, but the best way to increase Millennials’ wealth is to create an economy where they can all find jobs.
Anxiety that the nation’s economy is only working for the wealthiest drives much of the overall feeling of fear, uncertainty and doubt that pervades the nation’s political debate. But an examination of household wealth suggests the remedy to this disease varies by generation.
Senior citizens turned out in record numbers in the 2010 election to decry the policies of the Obama administration, but it would appear from both the economic and attitudinal data that most of them are more interested in fighting to hang on to what they have or in resisting other societal changes than in expressing any dissatisfaction with their own personal financial situation. Boomers complain about what has happened to their plans for retirement, but it is hard to see how fixing entitlements by raising the retirement age, or cutting the overly generous pensions of public employees will do anything to impact their own retirement prospects directly. To really close the generational wealth gap, policies should be adopted which raise the economic well being of America’s two youngest generations, rather than focusing on those who are already relatively better off.
To bring up the least wealthy of the nation’s households to levels closer to those more fortunate would require taking much more aggressive steps than Washington has so far been willing to consider. This might require expanding the scope and size of government, something older generations especially are steadfastly resisting. This inter-generational debate over the nation’s “civic ethos,” driven by the differing economic circumstances of each generation, will be and ought to be the fundamental issue of the campaign – precisely where President Obama’s speech in Osawatomie, Kansas placed it.
Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais are co-authors of the newly published Millennial Momentum: How a New Generation is Remaking America and Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics and fellows of NDN and the New Policy Institute. Blog crossposted with permission from NewGeography
"But despite all these gifts--an ease with technology, excellent educations, a surprisingly durable optimism--millennials are at the same time cursed. Simply put, they were born at the worst time in 50 years as far as careers go, having entered a horrid job market:"
Kids these days... with the Occupy protests ... and the technology and what's with the hair and music?? Is anyone else sick of hearing all of the negative commentary about what our generation does wrong as perceived by older generations?
Yeesh. Rough stuff. Without question, Millennial power and influence grows every day in the professional sphere. But if we view the Workplace Options survey as a progress report on our generation, we still have plenty to learn about life in an office.
It should come as no surprise that we rub our superiors the wrong way. We were raised to chase our dreams, eschew the age-old climb up the corporate ladder, live with an independent streak and rely on finely-tuned tech skills to fix problems 100 times faster than our parents.
*Sigh. So, here's the thing about the survey (yes I'm about to pick it apart). Only 41% of respondents work regularly with Millennials. So less than half actually have experience working with people in our generation to begin with. Of that 41% - 68% believe Millennials are "less motivated."
So, realistically what's happening here is less than half of the people who already have a negative attitude carry on with that negative attitude toward Millennials by saying they're not motivated to take on responsibility and produce quality work. But then when asked if they felt like managers needed to interact more frequently with Millennials to increase engagement, only 36% said yes. So, they think we're not motivated, but they themselves aren't interested enough to fix it. THAT doesn't bode well for your own motivation, now, does it? Hello pot... this is kettle.
A little less than half believe Millennials are loyal to their workplace. But, I wonder how many people in America feel like their workplaces are loyal to them... particularly on say... Wall Street or at a multinational corporation. The survey goes on to say that a majority believe that aggressive atmospheres and aggressive approaches aren't successful and more passive approaches are better as are more "agreeable" workers. Is it possible then, that the negative attitudes from this audience might come from more aggressive approaches from Millennial workers? Or maybe even the resistance of Millennials to be a "yes man." We don't know... because the survey doesn't ask.
Also I discovered this survey was a phone survey where you "press one for yes" etc. And chances are that comes from land line calls. So already you're targeting a very specific audience. And of those surveyed - only 7% were 18-29 year olds. So when you talk about 55% of Millennials that agree that we're "lazy and uninterested" you're only talking about half of the 7% of survey respondents who are Millennials.
The Epic Fail is more about the survey itself. It could have been done better, and there should have been deeper questions that get to the root of these attitudes.
Happy things:
78% believe Millennials are more tech savvy
of those 78% it turns out 70% of people think that's an advantage in the work place.
The New York Times reports that many in the vanguard of the MyBarackObama.com phenomenon of the 2008 election are too worried about their economic prospects to expend the same energy on behalf of President Obama's 2012 election campaign. Although the article also points out that there is an enormous outpouring of fresh blood now working on the Obama campaign from Millennials too young to have been eligible to vote in 2008, the report nevertheless highlights a critical issue for the Obama campaign's plan to win re-election.
While it is true that economic concerns are weighing down the president’s chances, despite his personal popularity, the likelihood that the economic circumstances in 2012 will be dramatically different than they are now is not great. So the economy, stupid, is not going to determine the outcome of the campaign. Its effect is already built into the poll’s numbers, which show Obama beating his most likely opponent, Mitt Romney, by six percentage points in the most recent Battleground survey.
Nor are the often cited independents likely to be the group of voters whose opinion ultimately decides the election. Surveys show that true independents, those who do not lean to either party in their partisan identification, make up less than 10% of all eligible voters. And this group tends to be the least informed portion of the electorate and therefore the least likely to vote.
Instead, the candidate that does the best job of turning out its base vote will be victorious a year from now. Right now, “the GOP benefits from a continuing intensity gap, with 79 percent of Republicans saying they are extremely likely to vote next November, compared with 65 percent of Democrats,” as the Politico poll indicates. And much of that gap comes from the current lack of attention and enthusiasm among Millennials as the recent Pew research documents.
In 2008, young Millennials provided more than 80% of Obama’s winning margin. In 2012 there will be 16 million more of them eligible to vote, making them almost one-quarter of the eligible electorate. With all polls showing Millennials prefer Obama over any of his potential rivals by the same 2:1 margin that they voted for him in 2008, there is only one clear, winning strategy for the President’s re-elect campaign to pursue.
Just as they have been doing with their recent focus on jobs and student loan burdens, the Obama campaign will need to engage Millennials with the same focus and superior outreach that they did in 2008. If they are successful in getting America’s newest generation to the polls in November, 2012 they will win re-election and usher in a new, Millennial era, in American politics.
In his usual ill-timed way, as “Occupy” protests started to spread across the country, columnist and author Tom Friedman used his appearance on MTV to tell ”young people [that they] need to be paying attention right now because we’re messing with your future.”
This was only the most recent occasion when Friedman suggested that today’s young people—the Millennial Generation (born 1982-2003)—are somehow too quiet, inattentive, or apathetic about the weighty issues that confront their generation and the nation. At least as far back as 2007, when the issue was the Iraq war, Friedman argued that Millennials should follow the example of his generation—Baby Boomers—and take to the streets to directly protest the war and confront the government that was waging it, even as Millennials were organizing to elect a presidential candidate who kept his promise to phase out America’s involvement in that conflict.
Millennials are not apathetic or inattentive. Given their relatively limited employment prospects, high student loan debts and the fact that it is their generation that makes up most of America’s fighting force in Iraq and Afghanistan, it defies logic to suggest that Millennials are unaware of and do not care about what is going on around them.
In 2008, Millennials, for all practical purposes, elected President Obama. Turning out in larger numbers than young people had for decades and voting for Barack Obama over John McCain by a greater than 2:1 margin (66% to 32%), their generation contributed about 80 percent of the president’s popular vote margin of victory. A recent CNN survey indicates that Obama maintains this same 2:1 lead among Millennials against all of his likely 2012 GOP opponents. (PDF) And, Millennials hold positions that are in almost total contrast to those of older generations on the range of issues that are currently the focus of debate in American politics. According to Pew Survey Research Center data, by a 54% to 39% margin Millennials favor a larger activist government that “provides more services” to a “smaller government that provides fewer services.” By 64% to 31% Millennials endorse gay marriage and by 69% to 26% they believe that immigrants strengthen rather than threaten American society and values.
Of course, Friedman might argue that just because Millennials have distinctive beliefs, they don’t seem to be very busy acting on those beliefs. Actually, however, Millennials are plenty busy. Perhaps if Friedman were to meet and talk with Millennials such as Hilary Doe, who heads the Roosevelt Institute’s Campus Network efforts to develop and implement a comprehensive program to reshape all aspects of American life by 2040 detailed in their Blueprint for a Millennial America, he might think differently about the level of public advocacy among Millennials. Or maybe he should observe the Millennial Leadership Summit in November in New York City where, Mobilize.org, the organization Maya Enista leads, will provide leadership development opportunities for already successful Millennial social entrepreneurs and encourage other members of the network to further develop their leadership skills..
Maybe Friedman is missing all of this involvement and hard work because what Millennials are doing and how they go about doing it doesn’t make for “good TV” like the “in your face” protest tactics that Friedman’s Boomer Generation used almost half a century ago. But despite Boomer fixation with the technology of their youth, just because it’s not on TV, doesn’t mean it isn’t happening. Millennials are neither inactive nor docile, but are working hard to fix the unresponsive institutions and inequitable systems they have inherited from earlier generations. If Boomers would take the time to look in the right places they would see—and maybe even feel good about—what Millennials are doing to clean up the mess that Friedman acknowledges his generation created for its kids and grandkids.
Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais are fellows of NDN and the New Policy Institute and co-authors of the newly published Millennial Momentum: How a New Generation is Remaking America and Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics.
Since its public announcement on June 1, 2011, Generation Opportunity has become one of the largest and fastest growing organizations targeting young Americans through social media, issue education, and grassroots mobilization. Generation Opportunity’ s facebook page – Being American – has rapidly grown to over 650,000 fans.
Most of us who are actually in the youth movement had never heard anything about this "largest and fastest growing" youth organization until their press release blitz, and many of us were puzzled by how different their "research" results were from existing research. Out of curiosity, I decided to dig deeper into this organization.
Here is how Generation Opportunity describes itself:
Generation Opportunity is a non-profit, non-partisan 501 c4 organization that seeks to engage everyone from young adults, early career professionals, college students, young mothers and fathers, construction workers, current service men and women, veterans, entrepreneurs and all Americans who find themselves dissatisfied with the status quo and willing to create a better tomorrow.
Generation Opportunity operates on a strategy that combines advanced social media tactics with proven field tactics to reach Americans 18-29. The organization announced its first communications platform – “Being American,” a Facebook page that has already amassed a fan base of more than 650,000.
Generation Opportunity currently has a website (just an email sign-up landing page), a Facebook group (for "Being American," not Generation Opportunity), and a series of press releases.
These releases fit suspiciously well within the conservative narrative. Millennials are apparently big on tax cuts, hate government spending, are American exceptionalists, believe the national debt is the most severe national security concern, and support expanding domestic coal and oil.
Millennials, also to a greater degree than members of older generations, have confidence in the federal government and are more likely to favor a clear, rather than ancillary role for it in American life. A decisive majority (64%) of Millennials disagrees with the statement, 'When the federal government runs something it is usually inefficient and wasteful,' while 58 percent of older generations agree with that harsh appraisal. Millennials are also substantially less likely to believe that the federal government should run only those things that can't be run at the local level (63% vs. 71%).
These more favorable Millennial Generation attitudes toward the federal government are not simply a matter of 'normal' youthful liberalism. Millennials today are far less likely than Gen-Xers were in the late 1980s to believe that the federal government is usually wasteful and inefficient (32% for Millennials, 47% for young Gen-Xers) and that it should do only what can't be done at the local level (63% vs. 76%) (Pew Research Center 2007a).
73% of Millennials believe the government should take care of people who can't take care of themselves.
59% of Millennials believe the government should help more needy people even if it involves debt increases.
73% of Millennials support federally guaranteed health insurance for all Americans even if it requires tax increases.
69% of Millennials favor a bigger government that provides more services.
While the GOP has made gains with young white males (though just how much is in question do to an oversampling of the south in the cited report) since the period those surveys were done, overall the ethnically diverse Millennials have not drastically changed, with the majority of disappointment in Washington coming from the left:
But the political enthusiasms of Millennials have since cooled -for Obama and his message of change, for the Democratic Party and, quite possibly, for politics itself. About half of Millennials say the president has failed to change the way Washington works, which had been the central promise of his candidacy. Of those who say this, three-in-ten blame Obama himself, while more than half blame his political opponents and special interests.
To be sure, Millennials remain the most likely of any generation to self-identify as liberals; they are less supportive than their elders of an assertive national security policy and more supportive of a progressive domestic social agenda. They are still more likely than any other age group to identify as Democrats.
THE FACEBOOK PAGE
Generation Opportunity bases their legitimacy on the number of followers on their Facebook page, "Being American." At the time of writing, the page has just under 940,000 fans, which would be very impressive for an organization that was publicly announced less than 3 months ago. According to their announcement press release, their fan page already had over 600,000 fans before they even publicly announced their existence. That is a little bit too impressive. Rock the Vote has been around for 20 years and only has 68,000 fans. The RNC only has 236,000 and the DNC 266,000. They even have more fans than John McCain. Then again, Generation Opportunity doesn't have any fans, "Being American" does. Apparently, "Being American" is a Generation Opportunity project. Here is the timeline:
In November of 2010, someone associated with what is now Generation Opportunity created a non-profit page called "Being American" in order to mislead people into becoming fans.
On May 28, 2011, the page publishes a post about a new organization called Generation Opportunity asking people to sign up for the email list on the website. The profile picture is changed to add the Generation Opportunity logo at the bottom, though the thumbnail remained unchanged.
On May 31, 2011, the page again solicits list sign-ups for a new organization, not mentioning to their fans that they themselves are the new organization.
Anyone who has liked "Being American" on Facebook because they like being American is unwillingly being counted as a supporter of this organization, and Generation Opportunity is using these people as 'evidence' that they are legitimate and "one of the largest and fastest growing organizations targeting young Americans." This is astroturfing 2.0.
Their Facebook photos consist of a couple of stock images, including the original page's initial profile picture of a soldier hugging a little girl uploaded on November 15, 2010. It was not until someone added the Generation Opportunity logo to the previous profile picture of a stylized eagle and a flag on May 28, 2011 that there was any indication that people were now fans of Generation Opportunity. One person commented on said photo saying "I didn't know being American was a project." In fact, the page's thumbnail looks exactly the same as it did before the Generation Opportunity branding was added, so people who do not click through the page still think it is for being American:
Instead of asking open-ended questions for feedback from the community, the majority of posts ask fans to like a conservative position or a loaded question. Here are some examples:
This article argues that raising taxes in order to reduce the federal deficit will especially affect areas where unemployment is already above average and growth is sluggish, ultimately raising unemployment even higher. LIKE this post if you think that reducing taxes and cutting federal spending is ultimately the best way to get more Americans working again!
Warren Buffet said that the rich need to bear a higher burden for the taxation of America. However, according to actual IRS data, the richest 1% of Americans already pay more than 95% of all the rest of America. The top 3% already pay more than the bottom 97% of Americans. LIKE this if you think that raising taxes on the wealthy is not the primary solution to fixing America’s debt problem.
Thousands of Atlanta residents showed up for a job fair and waited in line for hours in the heat to get inside. Some camped out overnight desperate to find a job. LIKE this to show your support for your fellow Americans who are struggling to make ends meet and think the government needs get out of the way to let American businesses create opportunities for American citizens looking for work.
According to the Dep't of Agriculture's Secretary Vilsack, food stamps are the "most direct stimulus you can get" because buying food at grocery stores means people are stocking, processing, and shipping food items. LIKE this post if you think real stimulus comes from the American people and the feds need to roll back regulations and government spending so we can create jobs and lessen dependence on federal programs!
Reading through the posts and comments since the page was created in November 2010, you can see evidence of people who began to realize they were misled. Here are some fan comments:
"I don't think this site is about being American. It's more about being Republican."
"Can you change the name of this group to "Being Republican"? We don't even celebrate America in the posts, we celebrate how much we love Republican talking points."
"To whoever controls this page: You need to use more politically neutral language."
"Since when did this become a bashing page on Obama???"
"i liked this group because i thought "being american" was something we could all agree regardless of political beliefs. this is a place for shared patriotism not empty political rhetoric"
"As a general rule, let's not put something from the Heritage Foundation on what is supposed to be a non-partisan page."
"Hating "ObamaCare" AKA the "law of the land" is not what "Being American" is about. This page is partisan, and this page blows."
"If I wanted to here sob stories from the rich i'd watch fox. Thought this group was gonna be fun, not tea party political."
"One more thing, I don't know who runs this joint. But please try posting topics from a neutral standpoint and let it be fleshed out amongst your viewers. Asking biased questions is no way to run a page. I agree with this particular post; but you're asking people to hate you. Then again, what do I know..."
"Who in the hell writes these Being American status updates..the Koch brothers?!"
"Wow I didnt realize being American was so hatefull and angry. This page is not what I thought it was so I will be disliking it."
"Didn't realize that "being American" would have so much political bias."
"Yea, Im officially unliking this page and spreading the word, I thought it was about being American and the UNBIASED views of our nation. You cant fool this U.S. Soldier. Goodbye and Hooah!"
"Is Being American just another site that says liberals are unpatriotic?"
"A page called "Being American" should be about all Americans and about the greatness of our country as a whole and not simply a mouthpiece for right-wing ideologues. If this page isn`t going to honor the experience and wisdom of all types of Americans, then the name should be changed to "Being Conservative" or Being Republican."
"So what's the point of this post? I love being American, but this page is nothing but political bashing."
"For real though, since when does "Being American" mean Obama-bashing? Asshole Facebook page, dislike"
"The moderators are once again showng their true colors as partisan hacks, I see...LIKE this post if you think the moderators need to quit carrying water for one political party and ideology and live up to the billing of this group."
"Wow, I'm leaving this page. It has nothing to do with being an American any more. It is clearly slanted in one direction."
"Wait, so for me to like being american, i have to be conservative and not completely check facts?"
"Like this post, and all others from this group, if you think Bias and push polls rule!"
"This page should be renamed, "Being Conservative," Because almost half of Americans' views are ignored completely."
And there are a lot more where that came from.
In other news, I would like to announce "Pizza: A Future Majority project."
SECRECY IS SUSPICIOUS
In a Daily Caller profile about Generation Opportunity entitled Rock the Right: Free-market activists eye youth vote, which inadvertently outs the organization, Generation Opportunity president Paul T. Conway refused to disclose who is financially backing the 501(c)(4).
Generation Opportunity's Terms of Use and Privacy Policy make up 99% of their website's content, with no list of who is involved in the organization or how to contact them with the exception of a generic mailto email link when you click "Contact Us," an Arlington, VA P.O. box c/o Generation Opportunity spokesman Matthew Faraci listed in the privacy policy, and an office suite also in Arlington, VA c/o Faraci in the DMCA Takedown section of the terms of use. In addition, the generationopportunity.org domain name was privately registered via proxy to prevent people from seeing who paid for the URL.
Neither Generation Opportunity nor The Polling Company/WomenTrend has released crosstabs or demographic data for any of the polling cited in their press releases.
GENERATION OPPORTUNITY: THE PLAYERS
There are only three people publicly associated with Generation Opportunity: Paul T. Conway, the organization's president, Kellyanne Conway, the organization's pollster, and Matthew Faraci, Senior Vice-President for Communications.
Paul T. Conway most recently served as Deputy Director of the Citizen Project at the Heritage Foundation. During his tenure with the Heritage Foundation, Conway coordinated a series of national public policy dialogues for faith and community leaders on a variety of issues, including education and health care reform and faith-based initiatives.
The Leadership Institute’s mission is to increase the number and effectiveness of conservative activists and leaders in the public policy process. To accomplish this mission, the Institute identifies, recruits, trains, and places conservatives in government, politics, and the media.
Founded in 1979 by its president, Morton C. Blackwell, the Leadership Institute (LI) teaches conservatives the nuts and bolts of how to succeed in the public policy process.
The Institute strives to produce a new generation of public policy leaders unwavering in their commitment to free enterprise, limited government, strong national defense, and traditional values. Institute graduates are equipped with practical skills and professional training to implement sound principles through effective public policy.
Kellyanne Conway is the owner and principal of The Polling Company/WomenTrend, the firm responsible for the polls cited in Generation Opportunity releases. Her current/previous clients include The Heritage Foundation, Massachusetts Republican Party, Mercer County Republican Committee (NJ), National Republican Congressional Committee, National Republican Senatorial Committee, Republican National Committee, Republicans for Environmental Protection, American Life League, Americans for Tax Reform, Americans United for Life, Family Research Council, Family Security Matters, The Federalist Society, National Right to Life Committee, The Susan B. Anthony List, the U.S. Department of Labor, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, as well as a number of other corporate, government, and non-profit clients. According to her bio:
Kellyanne has worked for leaders such as the late Congressman Jack Kemp; former Vice President Dan Quayle; Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich; Senator Fred Thompson and Congressman Mike Pence, the Chairman of the House Republican Conference and the third-highest ranking Republican in the House.
She was a speaker for the aforementioned Leadership Institute in September of 2001 (video here). Her bio on the Leadership Institute page lists her as a board member of the Young Republican National Federation and the Young Elephants PAC. At one time she was listed as one of the "30 Most Powerful People in Generation X in America."
Matthew Faraci, who uses the title Senior Vice-President for Communications, is Generation Opportunity's spokesman and press release contact.
Faraci was previously Vice-President of Communications and Marketing for Americans United for Life, spokesman for the U.S. Council on Competitiveness, and "spokesman for former Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao and also handled press operations for the Labor Department's Employment and Training Administration and Mine Safety and Health Administration." He was press secretary for former Indiana Congressman John N. Hostettler and a producer on PBS's The McLaughlin Group and Think Tank with Ben Wattenberg.
Here is a video of Faraci at the 2008 Republican National Convention on why he supports John McCain (hint: it involves cutting government spending):
For an organization that claims to be large and encompassing, it certainly seems to be composed of a small, tight-knit heterogeneous group of people.
All of them are heavily involved in conservative organizations and causes.
All of them worked in or for Elaine Chao's Labor Department.
None of them are Millennials
Paul T. Conway's employers, the U.S. Department of Labor, U.S. Office of Personnel Management, and the Heritage Foundation, were clients of Kellyanne Conway's The Polling Company/WomenTrend.
The most interesting thing is that all of them are on a crusade against government spending despite the fact that they spent a large portion of their careers as federal employees/contractors. I mean, Faraci even worked for PBS!
CONCLUSION
Generation Opportunity is a conservative astroturf front group being used to push a pro-conservative youth narrative using the false legitimacy of their misleading Facebook page. There are no Millennials involved. There is nobody involved in the organization that is not a conservative activist. None of their polling data has included crosstabs or demographics.
Paul T. Conway, Kellyanne Conway, and Matthew Faraci are not bad people. Kellyanne Conway in particular has been a long-time advocate of youth outreach on the right and has spoken openly about improving voter access. If conservatives want to start another youth outreach or advocacy group, more power to them. I welcome the addition of organizations that seek to engage young voters regardless of their place on the political spectrum. However, I do not support the idea of a falsely non-partisan organization disingenuously using a misleading Facebook page as legitimacy to push a conservative narrative to appear unbiased.
Written By Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais (posted with permission)
During his Twitter-fed Town Hall, President Obama admitted that the housing market has proven one of the “most stubborn” pieces of the economic recovery puzzle to try and fix. The President --- as well the Congress and the building industry --- should consider a new path to a solution for housing by tapping the potential of the very generation whose votes brought Barack Obama into the White House in the first place.
The Millennial Generation (born 1982-2003) represents not just the largest generation in American history but the largest potential market for both existing and new housing in the United States. There are over 95 million Millennials and over the next five years the first quarter of this cohort will enter their thirties, an age when people are most likely to buy their first home.
Despite what is often written about this generation, it is very much interested in owning a home. Sixty-four percent of Millennials say it is very important for them to have an opportunity to own their own home; twenty percent named it as one of their most important priorities in life, right behind being a good parent and having a successful marriage.
And, contrary to the usual claims of “new urbanists” (themselves largely members of the older X and Boomer Generations) most Millennials want to live in the suburbs where the current housing crisis is most acute. (PDF) According to a study by Frank N. Magid Associates, 43 percent of Millennials describe suburbs as their “ideal place to live,” compared to just 31 percent of older generations, most of whom still yearn for the smaller towns and rural settings of an earlier America. (PDF)
Most Millennials already live in suburbs and enjoyed growing up in suburban settings surrounded by family and friends that supported them. A certain portion, of course, enjoy living an urban life while young, but most tell researchers that they want to raise the families many are about to start in the same suburban settings they grew up in.
Furthermore, Americans between the ages of 25 and 34, both Millennials and those on the “cusp” of the generational change from X to Millennial, represent a greater proportion of the overall population in the South and West than elsewhere. These are the very regions that suffered the most from the collapse of housing prices that stemmed from the mortgage financing scandals of the last few years. Unleashing this potential demand for suburban housing in these hard-hit areas would bring two huge benefits. It would stabilize prices for existing homes while at the same time boosting the prospects for new housing construction.
The challenge is how to enable the Millennial Generation to achieve its desire to own homes without reigniting the speculation and unsustainable financial leverage that triggered the Great Recession. Clearly, in the immediate future at least, the current excess of supply in the housing market should mitigate the risk of too much demand chasing too few houses. As much as they are criticized by the financial industry and its Republican allies, the recently enacted financial regulatory reforms, might also provide an additional bulwark against allowing the market to misbehave a second time.
But the biggest factor may be the lessons learned from experience. Millennials have borne much of the brunt of the Great Recession and tend to be keenly aware about the importance of living within your means Wanting a suburban home does not mean, that Millennials want McMansions; like earlier generations, especially their GI Generation great grandparents, they are likely to be cautious and frugal home-buyers. However, this frugality and caution does not translate into a meek acceptance or desire for a future as apartment renters, as some suggest will be the case.
In the short run, Millennials will not be able to engineer a turnaround all by themselves; most Millennials can’t afford much beyond the next month’s rent, let alone the down payment on a mortgage. Many are still living with their parents to avoid having to pay rent and the cost of a college education at the same time.
To address this part of the challenge, the federal government needs to do what it did to revive the moribund housing market in the 1930’s. The New Deal created today’s commonly accepted 30 year mortgages with a 20 percent down payment by making them a financial instrument that the newly formed Federal Housing Administration would insure. Before that landmark legislation, home mortgages were rarely offered for more than half of the home’s value and normally had to be repaid in no more than five years.
As a result that era’s civic generation (the GI or Greatest Generation) was able to afford single family homes with a surrounding tract of land ; an offer returning World War II veterans seized with alacrity. These houses now make up much of the country’s inner suburb housing stock. Today’s housing crisis requires a similarly radical reinvention of the basic home mortgage to be offered to those buying their first home. Under this proposal the length of the mortgage could be extended up to as many as 50 years, reflecting the increased life expectancies --- and longer working careers --- that most Millennials can expect to enjoy. Since no market for such debt instruments currently exists, it would be up to the federal government to create one through the process of reinsurance, just as it did in 1934.
To further encourage home buying by Millennials, the federal government should also provide incentives to financial institutions to swap out the principle of the Millennials’ student loan in exchange for a new loan, whose principle would be collateralized by the value of the real estate the former student would be acquiring. The student loan would be paid off as part of the mortgage, making Millennials better able to afford a home and freeing up additional discretionary spending that current worries over student debt curtail. Today’s lower housing prices today might make this package both attractive to investors and financially viable.
Many economists today argue against the whole notion of encouraging home ownership by anyone, let alone young Millennials. Some point out that when looked upon strictly as an investment choice, the value of a home rarely appreciates faster than the overall stock market. This type of analysis, which forms the basis for arguing against any federal policy that would further encourage home ownership, ignores the proven benefits to the nation that derive from home owners committed to the success of their local community. Voting participation rates among home owners, for instance, traditionally run higher than rates among renters, and neighborhoods of owners tend to be more stable places to raise children.
More important still is what homeownership means to the nature of a property-owning Republic. Survey after survey shows that home ownership remains a central part of the American Dream and a central aspiration, particularly for immigrants and young people. A policy that works against this ideal presents a political risk that any politician should be wary of taking.
To restore this part of the American Dream, and to lift the worry of millions of Americans whose house is worth less than what they owe on their mortgage, the Obama administration must take bold steps to restore a vibrant residential housing market. President Obama, who built his winning margin in 2008 through an unprecedented mobilization of Millennial voters, is the ideal person to combine a plan for economic recovery efforts with meeting the aspirational goals of most Millennials to own their own home.
To save the housing market, and extend the recovery beyond the financial elites, America will need a new wave of home buyers. If the President works to tap this resource, he can begin to turn around the “stubborn problem” of the housing market and restore the middle class economy. If he does so, the whole country will soon be tweeting his success.
Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais are fellows of NDN and the New Policy Institute and co-authors of Millennial Momentum: How a New Generation is Remaking America to be published in September and Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics.
As I mentioned yesterday, what makes this survey unique is that most of the research done on Millennials whether its about the generation as a whole or young voters etc... it tends to contain merely about 1000 surveyed young people - most are more around 500. This research has 4,000 millennials being surveyed and has a control group of 1,400 Boomer respondents to compare which is a great sample size.
The toplines of the survey are in and internally Barkley is presenting it to their office this week, but the end all be all research will appear at their conference in San Francisco in September "American Millennials: Deciphering the Enigma Generation." (I think someone should pay for me to attend....) The conference is titled Share, Like, Buy and features speakers from many of the folks FM readers will know well like the CEO of DoSomething.org and Millennial Marketing expert and blogger Carol Phillips.
I talked yesterday about shopping habits and restaurant tendencies of Millennials but three other categories that you'll find interesting are travel and tourism, causes, and social media.
When Millennials think about traveling they rely very strongly on social media for planning purposes. This goes beyond online information, reports, ratings, and extends to photos and videos on Facebook which the research shows are "key sources of information to guide decisions on where to go." Mobile phones are also big tools for young people who use them to book or research travel contrasting with 7 in 10 Boomers who won't use mobile phones for this purpose. Online travel sites are frequent uses of over half of Millennials when it comes to booking more affordable hotels, air, or car rental where its more like a third among Boomers.
Travel in general, however, is seen as a luxury among Millennials who tend
"to think more frequently about about saving money for specific investments such as additional education, housing, and cars, older generations often think more broadly about wealth preservation and what the state of the economy may mean to them."
This last one doesn't surprise me. When you think about the affect of the economy on young people, the high cost of education, low wages, cuts in benefits, predatory lending, and the litany of economic issues facing our generation now and in the future I can understand why young people tend to trend more toward cheaper more immediate gratification purchase such as shopping and dining out rather than large purchases like vacations. Younger people are probably more into large purchases that help them with their future because their future is much more vast (no offense) where Boomers are closer to retirement so "wealth preservation" is more on their mind for the long term because they're closer to retirement. This might give a nod to travel and tourism agencies to market affordable trips and affordable family fun to young people and young families to show them that travel and recreation doesn't have to break the bank. It's probably for this reason that Millennials are "significantly more likely (nearly 30% of respondents)" than Boomers (13%) to "travel ONLY out of necessity." It's about the cost I'm sure.
When it comes to non-profits and causes we know that young people are extraordinarily caring and more likely to be involved through volunteering and community service. The research shows that young people are less likely to give money and more likely to give help. This is consistent with again the economic climate for young people and embraces the "volunteerism" trend we've seen before. Boomers write a check and young people can't afford to do that, but they can contribute to causes via word of mouth when older generations are less likely to do that. When giving is done 1/3 of youth do it via texting vs. one in ten among older people. I bet this number goes up as it becomes more accessible and acceptable and as Millennials begin to make more money in their jobs.
What is striking about purchases as it pertains to causes is that Milleninals are more likely to purchase something that supports a cause they believe in. So last week when Our Time launched their Buy Young campaign and focused on youth run businesses that have a sustainability focus they were tapping into a world that allows young people to better maximize on helping out a fellow young person while also supporting an issue with your purchase. This is going to become bigger and bigger as we move forward. We've seen it with The Gap's Red campaign and even American Eagle had Declare Yourself VOTE t-shirts during the 2008 election. Then there's TOM's shoes that give a pair when you buy a pair. I expect we'll see lingerie stores like Victoria's Secret and Fredricks offering products that contribute to breast cancer research and this will explode even more in the future. Products manufactures should think about ways they can be more honest and help more people with their products in general, but Millennials are proving and will continue to prove that being good and doing good will end well for a business, but BS attempts at a marketing ploy will backfire.
"Millennials are significantly less likely to place trust in corporations to adequately address social problems and issues. In fact, when it comes to corporations raising money for causes, Millennials agree—significantly more than older generations—these efforts are mere ploys to stimulate sales."
One of my favorites - and perhaps one of the biggest oppositions to that one guy... who is he? Ted Nugent something... who said Millennials should join the Tea Party... yeah - NEVER Going to happen. Research shows that
When it comes to big government, Millennials are true believers. Millennials are significantly more likely to favor larger government in comparison to their older counterparts who find larger government to be a hindrance.
So when progressives think about how conservative and awful things are some times. That gay rights aren't happening fast enough, that legalization of pot isn't ever going to be a thing, and the litany of other things that Millennials support... don't worry. We'll be in power soon and it will be Republicans that have to become more moderate.
If you're a thrill seeker or marketing products that can be branded through excitment and danger you'll get a response from Millennials. The research shows that if something is dangers, exciting, "and maybe even a little dangerous, it’s a good bet that a Millennial will be attracted to it." Half of young people are into it vs. 1/3 of Boomers are into danger.
When looking at technology and online media the evidence is what you think it is. Millennials are quick to adopt new tech, they have laptops not desk tops, not to mention online media tools. In fact young people are twice as likely believe that they'd be missing something if they weren't on Facebook. Which is probably why my Boomer mother constantly wants to know why people are on there all the time. Millennials also view the web as a means to connect with cultural and social activities. And while both generations have Facebook accounts Millennials are more likely to spend higher amounts of time on Facebook than older generations. In fact, millennials are more likely to trust a brand when they can connect with that brand on social networking and social media sites. So if you're company isn't active online and never gets active online - your user base is going to die off and your company will suffer.
When it comes to television usage the research suggests that young people are less likely than older generations to watch television. As a result
Millennials are much more impacted by brands and their advertising through social media sites. In fact, Millennials are significantly more likely than non-Millennials to regularly and frequently visit, follow, check-in, and interact with brands through Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, and Gowalla.
Take-Aways:
When I meet with businesses or with non-profits that either don't do online outreach or allocate online media to a communications director instead of a professional online media person I shake my head because I think, and this evidence shows, you don't have much longer before that's going to change or it'll begin to affect your bottom line.
For businesses you're looking at building a long-term relationship with a purchaser. You don't just want to have a young person who sees a facebook ad and and says - ok... I'll buy that t-shirt its pretty cool. You want to be a business that an entire generation thinks of when it thinks of toothpaste, a good hamburger, the place they turn to for a new laptop, where they get their news, do their banking, and more.
If you're a non-profit viewing social networking as a communications tool is ill-informed and reckless for your organization. The top three things a non-profit organization does are 1. Communicate, 2. Mobilize, and 3. Fundraise. If you're using online media for communication only and talking AT people then you're missing the boat entirely. Like the boat's nose is sticking out of the water and that's all you've got. Your non-profit should be about building a brand loyalty and that doesn't happen over night with a thousand dollar Facebook ad buy every day. It's a long-term investment with constant engagement and adjustments based on analytics - because no one's membership is the same.
Regardless of whether you're doing it wrong or you're a believer, you're talking about an entire generation that is the largest in history and they have a long future ahead of them. The next largest generation - Boomers - is on the way out and marketing to older people is going to die out with them leaving your business with its impact in 10 years or less that will be difficult to make up if you've not diversified your advertising and outreach. Those who preemptively use new and innovative tools in their outreach - for now it will pay for itself if not turn a profit, but it will be a long-term investment in building your brand with a generation that considers brand loyalty to be critical in their purchase habits.
A few weeks ago I spotted a piece in the Kansas City Star about Barkley - a KC Marketing firm that had partnered with the Boston Consulting Group and Service Management Group to do an extensive study on attitudes of the purchase habits of the Millennial Generation.
You expect this kind of research from coastal groups who see the importance and impact but I was excited to see central state marketing firms beginning to dive into this - so I sent them an email and scheduled a meeting while I was in KC.
I've been fascinated and following Millennial Marketing since the early days of my writing at Future Majority always wondering how such a large generation could be so consistently capitalized on by the private sector but so considerably ignored by the public sector.
What is unique about the research being done by Barkley et al is the massive sample size. Most times when I look at research involving young voters or the millennial generation at most it contains about 1000 surveyed young people - most are more around 500. This has 4,000 millennials being surveyed and has a control group of 1,400 Boomer respondents to compare. I mean... holy cow!
The toplines of the survey are in and internally Barkley is presenting it to their office this week, but the end all be all research will appear at their conference in San Francisco in September "American Millennials: Deciphering the Enigma Generation." (I think someone should pay for me to attend....) The conference is titled Share, Like, Buy and features speakers from many of the folks FM readers will know well like the CEO of DoSomething.org and Millennial Marketing expert and blogger Carol Phillips.
Some of the released toplines aren't surprising to followers of Millennial politics such as: the need "to have things at their fingertips," the openness to "exotic products" and things that are different and more "experimental," the need to have technology to help in accomplish simple every day tasks, and more likely to eat healthy organic products.... except on the weekends when they indulge.
Young people are more likely to dine out than Boomers, being some place to hang out with friends and family is critical and they see restaurants as paces to do that. My favorite and seemingly stereotypical:
"Millennials demand variety—exotic, interesting, and healthy food offerings served in a fun environment. Older generations are less about uniqueness and more about the basics—correct food temperatures, getting orders right, and being tidy."
Interestingly in shopping habits the right background music in retail stores is one of the most important things while older generations prefer a store's layout or the merchandise selection. Millennials like to be trend setters and look for truly unique products that captivate and capture them. They're also more likely to see the act of "shopping" as a way to relax and men in general go shopping two to three times per month.
The following charts and graphs are meant to contextualize the unique role that young voters played in the 2008 election, and their increasingly important role in a winning electoral coalition:
* Is a path to a brokered convention beginning to emerge? Sean Trende charts it right through the emerging demographic and geographic divides in the GOP, and concludes it’s a real possibility.
* ...
According to findings published in health policy journal Health Affairs, few small businesses are likely to take advantage of two options allowing them to avoid new regulations under President ...
The Cornwall Alliance calls environmentalism "one of the greatest threats to society."
A conservative religious organization with ties to the oil industry is lashing out at health-conscious ...
The U.S. State Department has reiterated its opposition to St. Petersburg, Russia’s “anti-gay” propaganda bill, which would fine groups or individuals who “promot”e ...
Rick Santorum has been outspoken about his Catholic faith on the campaign trail, explaining how his faith and personal values have influenced his political positions. But at a campaign event at Oral ...
Herman Cain gave his own response to the State of the Union at the National Press Club where he talked about how grateful he is with the endorsement from Stephen Colbert because he wants to keep the ...
Just a few highlights of things that reference the Millennial Generation. Read the whole thing here
"most daunting challenge can be the cost of college. At a time when Americans owe more in tuition ...
A great new video that the Illinois Caucus on Adolescent Health youth activists created about how young people need accurate access to information about sex and health to protect ...
On last night's Colbert Report columnist David Frum called for an economically inclusive, environmentally responsible and socially modern Republican party. He called out Tea Party activists saying ...
If I knew how to navigate pulling FM for the day in solidarity I would... but instead all I can do is post a blog.
SOPA's Scary Facts
Stand up to support the internet, pledge your support, contact ...
With President Obama’s speech in Osawatomie, Kansas decrying the growing economic inequality and lack of upward mobility in America, the issue has finally arrived at the center of this year’s campaign debates. While most discussions of this growing inequality focus on the gap between America’s poorest and richest citizens, 
Kids these days... with the Occupy protests ... and the technology and what's with the hair and music?? Is anyone else sick of hearing all of the negative commentary about what our generation does wrong as perceived by older generations?
When Millennials think about traveling they rely very strongly on social media for planning purposes. This goes beyond online information, reports, ratings, and extends to photos and videos on Facebook which the research shows are "key sources of information to guide decisions on where to go." Mobile phones are also big tools for young people who use them to book or research travel contrasting with 7 in 10 Boomers who won't use mobile phones for this purpose. Online travel sites are frequent uses of over half of Millennials when it comes to booking more affordable hotels, air, or car rental where its more like a third among Boomers.
When it comes to non-profits and causes we know that young people are extraordinarily caring and 
When looking at technology and online media the evidence is what you think it is. Millennials are quick to adopt new tech, they have laptops not desk tops, not to mention online media tools. In fact young people are twice as likely believe that they'd be missing something if they weren't on Facebook. Which is probably why my Boomer mother constantly wants to know why people are on there all the time. Millennials also view the web as a means to connect with cultural and social activities. And while both generations have Facebook accounts Millennials are more likely to spend higher amounts of time on Facebook than older generations. In fact, millennials are more likely to trust a brand when they can connect with that brand on social networking and social media sites. So if you're company isn't active online and never gets active online - your user base is going to die off and your company will suffer.
A few weeks ago I spotted a piece in the 
